According to Ted Klug, vice president for enrollment management at Martin Luther College, New Ulm, Minn., students who graduate from the synod’s ministerial education schools—our future pastors, teachers, and staff ministers—oftentimes have something in common.

Someone encouraged them.

“The influencer could be their home pastor or a teacher, but a lot of times it ends up being their parents or just your everyday 82-year-old grandma sitting in the front pew in the same spot throughout her life,” he says. “She was the factor.”

With a continued high vacancy rate and need for called workers to serve in WELS congregations and schools, those congregational encouragers or influencers are an important part of the synod’s efforts to recruit future ministers of the gospel.

But, Klug emphasizes, that means everyone needs to get involved. “The church is not one person. It’s not your called worker. The church is everyone. It’s you. It’s me,” he says. “When we crack the surface of this idea of influencers—that people in each and every congregation and school are influencing kids—that’s when things began to change.”

But how will pastors and teachers know the best way to encourage future students both young and old?

How can laypeople be knowledgeable about what the synod’s ministerial education schools have to offer?

These are the questions multiple task forces that have been discussing ministry recruitment have been wrestling with. “How can we equip every person in the congregation with what they need to be good influencers for the next generation?” asks Klug.

One answer? Ministry recruitment counselors.

Due to donors who wanted to make an impact on the synod’s called worker shortage, the Board for Ministerial Education is able to call up to five people outside of its budget to serve as a team of counselors across the United States in this four-year pilot program. Three calls have been issued so far (at the time of this writing).

“The people who need to do the recruiting are the people who have regular interaction with young people who have the gifts for this,” says Earle Treptow, president of Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary, Mequon, Wis., and member of the Ministry Recruitment Task Force (see sidebar “Studying ministry recruitment”). “The counselors’ main task is to work with these frontline influencers to help them identify candidates, encourage them, and expose them to opportunities.”

The idea is to have these counselors—a mix of men and women—discover and share ideas and best practices for ministry recruitment. They also will serve as resources, providing information about the ministerial education system and the various options for training. They will be encouragers, reminding pastors and teachers and other frontline influencers about the importance of continued and consistent encouragement. Finally, they will bring awareness of the need for more full-time ministers of the gospel.

“They’re getting people excited and owning the challenge we are facing, which is we need more people to preach the gospel,” says Klug.

While the program is in its beginning stages, Treptow is excited about the possibilities. “I think God will bless this with awareness and more people thinking about and praying about the ministry of the gospel and more gospel servants. How can that not be a blessing for us?”

Studying ministry recruitment

The 2023 synod convention adopted a resolution encouraging the formation of a Ministry Recruitment Task Force. This task force studied the synod’s current ministerial education system and the called worker shortage, offering 20 recommendations that are listed in the 2025 Book of Reports and Memorials (pages 138,139).

These recommendations cover topics such as student financial assistance, compensation, a shared philosophy of ministry, called worker retention, new programming, congregational recruitment, and improved promotion.

See more in the 2025 Book of Reports and Memorials, welsconvention.net/boram. At that site, you will also find the entire report from this task force under “2025 BORAM extras.”

A continual process

Encouraging a future called worker isn’t really a “one-and- done” proposition. It can take continual effort and repeated messages.

WELS area Lutheran high schools are one place where that continual encouragement can take place. Don Schultz, principal at Lakeside Lutheran High School, Lake Mills, Wis., says that Lakeside works closely with Martin Luther College in this process, which includes reminders to the faculty about the importance of ministry recruitment.

“Sometimes you need people to push you to think about [ministry recruitment] consciously,” says Schultz. “We all assume that someone else will do it. But if you have someone standing in front of you telling you that you have to be the one to do it, that puts to sleep that natural lazy person inside of us and wakes up the ‘I will do it’ person.”

Besides faculty members encouraging students to consider the gospel ministry, Lakeside also has events to highlight gospel ministry. Visits from MLC counselors and a trip to visit the campus target those expressing an interest in becoming full-time called workers. Yearly ministry mission trips provide practical experience and a taste of ministry.

Schultz says another key is setting a positive example. “One of the things we talk about in our faculty meetings is the importance of modeling positive ministry experiences. We are trying to set an example for our students that to serve God full time is a joyful thing to carry out in our lives. It’s a blessing, not an unpleasant burden.”

Historically, 8 to 10 percent of students from Lakeside attend Martin Luther College after graduation.

A future pastor

Luke Rogotzke, a 2025 Martin Luther College graduate who is heading to Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary in the fall, shares his story of the person who encouraged him: 

Mr. Dave Gartner was my grade school principal in Redwood Falls, Minn., and he often encouraged me to consider becoming a pastor. I’d just be passing him in the halls, and he’d say, “There could be a future pastor!”

– From MLC InFocus Fall 2024

Author: FIC
Volume 112, Number 07
Issue: July 2025