May is a month of celebrating the resurrection of our Lord and the giving of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. It is a month in which our youth are confirmed in their Lutheran faith and made members of the Lord’s Table. It is also a month in which we in the Lutheran church commemorate one of the most significant American theologians of our church body, C.F.W. Walther.
Carl Ferdinand Wilhelm Walther (1811-1887) was the first president of the Missouri Synod, a president of the St. Louis seminary, and began what came to be the Lutheran Witness. His journey to leader and theologian began when he was eighteen and studying theology with his brother at the University of Leipzig. His older brother Otto influenced Walther to join a group of Christians who were fighting against the rationalism that was overrunning the school at the time. While in this small group, Walther began to study the Bible, the Lutheran Confessions and Luther’s works which strengthened his resolve against the academic rationalists. After finishing at Leipzig, Walther took a call into the ministry and after disagreements with the state church joined a group led by another Lutheran pastor, Martin Stephan, travelling to America. The group of 800 Saxon Lutherans arrived in 1839 to New Orleans then travelled up the Mississippi to St. Louis.
Shortly after landing in St. Louis, Walther began a congregation (Trinity) and started to gather and invite German immigrants to attend. Walther’s first congregation later produced three sister congregations in which he served as head pastor (all still operating today). He eventually took over the leadership position from Stephan and began work unifying Lutherans. His newsletter “Der Lutheraner” was a popular resource for Lutheran pastors and laymen around the country. It eventually led to the Synodical Conference, a group of Lutheran representatives from different areas that discussed doctrine, practice, and unity in America. Along with serving as pastor and leader of the Missourians, Walther was a professor and first president of the St. Louis seminary. While serving as professor many of his lectures were published along with treatises and letters that continue to shape the church today. He served as professor and president until his death in 1887.
When the Missouri synod was initially formed in 1847, Walther was the obvious choice for president. He served from 1847 to 1850 and again from 1864 to 1878. Under his leadership our congregational structures were established along with our stance on God’s Word and the Lutheran Confessions. It was his leadership that laid the foundation for the 2 million+ organization we have today. So this May we celebrate his contributions and the contributions of so many others that have led us in this broken world with God’s Word as a light to our feet and a light to our path.
Vicar Patrick Gumz