Lay Schools for Ministry

The Lay Schools for Ministry program creates a communal and virtual meeting place where life-long learning intentionally happens. Our task is to promote and nourish this meeting place where all can share our stories – stories of multigenerational Christian and Lutheran families dining together and sharing their long-day experiences at the fireplace and stories of recent immigrant families rebuilding their lives in a new place. In this communal and virtual place, we will also share the many talents and gifts that the Spirit has given the church for the sake of the world. Our goals are to develop and maintain avenues for life-long learning, to create and share resources, and to sustain accountable processes that help our denomination be a good and efficacious steward of its mission and vocation. Our partners in Select Learning provide an avenue to access and share current and future resources.

In Called Forward together in Christ, our church affirms that “we are a church grounded in the Lutheran confessions inspiring biblical and theological literacy, gospel fluency and daily vocation and ministry through shared experience and life-long learning.” Our gospel fluency, the affirmation of our daily vocations and ministry and our experience as life-long learners lead us to equip “people for their baptismal vocations in the world and this church.” Our stories, history and lives are affirmed in their dignity and equipped to serve as the gospel called us and Jesus Christ sends us into the world. This is what the Lay Schools for Ministry program of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America is about: confessing, worshiping, learning, witnessing and serving the neighbor in need. Let’s be bold and adventurous in our life-long learning!