Theodore Wiesehan

    Seward may soon be home to another Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (LCMS) congregation, as Christ Lutheran Church, Lincoln, has agreed to sponsor a new church plant in Seward, Nebraska District LCMS Missions and Outreach Director the Rev. Richard Boring said at a June 3 informational meeting at Lied Senior Center, Seward.
     Boring said that a group of families in Seward had been meeting in each others' homes for Bible studies and had approached Christ Lutheran about the possibility of a new church.
     "Christ Lutheran Church did not come over to Seward and say, 'We want to plant a church,'" Boring said in a June 6 telephone interview. "It was people from the local area."
     He said the plant is still in the conceptual phase, but will continue to move forward now that a church has agreed to sponsor it. The degree to which sponsor churches are involved with new churches varies from church plant to plant.
     "It can mean a lot of different things by way of sponsoring it," Boring said. "[Christ Lutheran] will walk alongside them and help them in ways that [new church organizers] need support and encouragement."
     At the June 3 meeting both Boring and LCMS Executive Director for the Center for U.S. Missions the Rev. Mike Ruhl told attendees that Seward's growth makes the community a good location for a new church plant.
     "God has given us another great opportunity to figure out, 'How do we connect,'" Boring said.
     Ruhl said that new churches grow faster than established churches and pull in people without a church home.
     "Sixty to 80 percent of new adult members in new churches were not involved in a congregation immediately before [joining the new church]," he said.
     A number of attendees raised concerns at the meeting about a new church pulling members and support from St. John Lutheran Church and School. According to the LCMS website, St. John currently has 2,691 baptized members and 2,103 confirmed members with a weekly worship attendance of 1,010 people.
     Boring said that the intent of the new plant was not to erode support for St. John Lutheran and he was hopeful the endeavor would be used to reach out to people not currently attending a church.
     "I don't care to plant churches just to recycle Lutherans," he said at the meeting.
     Boring said that to his knowledge the drive for a new church was not sparked by a dispute or dissatisfaction with St. John Lutheran but rather as a mission outreach.
     "What [the organizers] are telling me is that it's a great opportunity for people to reach out in Seward as Seward continues to grow as a community," he said in the phone interview.
     At the close of the meeting Boring said he would set up a future meeting for representatives from St. John Lutheran and Christ Lutheran churches and people involved in organizing the church plant at a future date.
     Representatives of Christ Lutheran Church could not be reached for comment.