Understanding the divine call

The Bible teaches that every Christian is a member of the priesthood of all believers. That means that every believer has direct access to God in prayer through faith, can assure repentant sinners of God’s free forgiveness in Christ, and has the responsibility to share the gospel with others. The priesthood of all believers is sometimes described as the personal, private ministry that every believer carries out in whatever vocation God has placed him or her.

Photo Mark Schroeder wearing green vest with cross — WELS President Mark Schroeder

The Bible also teaches about the public ministry of the gospel. This is when individual Christians are called by God through the church to preach the Word of God and to administer the sacraments publicly in the name of and on behalf of other believers.

This public ministry of the gospel, which includes such ministerial offices as pastors, teachers, missionaries, professors, staff ministers, or any office deemed needed by the church, is not something that someone simply decides to do on his or her own. The Augsburg Confession states the biblical truth that “no one should publicly teach in the Church or administer the Sacraments unless he be rightly called” (Article XIV). God extends the call into the public ministry.

Because God is the one who calls a person to serve, it is a divine call, in other words, a call from God himself. God does that calling through the church. When a church issues the call from God, in Christian freedom it determines the scope or responsibilities of the call.

God has not given specific instructions to the church on how to go about issuing the divine call. So, while the call is divine, the system for administering it is not. God gives his church the freedom to carry out this calling in keeping with sanctified human judgment and good Christian order. For that reason, our Wisconsin Synod, along with other confessional Lutheran churches, has put procedures and processes in place that guide us in how the divine call is carried out in the life and work of the church. Because it is a system designed by sinful human beings, the system will never be perfect, but that does not take away the divinity of a call.

When there is a pastoral vacancy in a congregation (and this is true for any other office), it is the responsibility of the district president to examine the needs of the congregation. He then develops a list of candidates, all of whom he judges to have the skills and abilities to meet those needs. Candidates are not interviewed. The congregation does not review their sermons. The district president simply provides biographical information and perhaps describes what qualifications led him to include these names on the list of candidates. He provides that list to the congregation, which trusts his judgment, prayerfully considers those names, and then votes to determine who will receive the call. Once a majority selects the man, the congregation unanimously extends a call to that person, who then deliberates where he can best serve God in the future.

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