December 12, 2007

CHICAGO – The Rev. Brian E. Konkol does not see himself as "too special or anything like that" as a young pastor in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) serving overseas. But he believes that God is capable of doing some "pretty amazing things through some pretty ordinary people."

"Don't allow the doubts of others to prevent you from following God's calling to service," said Konkol, who is serving in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Guyana as a long-term missionary of the ELCA. His advice to other young adults in the ELCA considering mission and ministry overseas is "simply ‘go for it.' Young people are capable of great things."

For the past 160 years Lutherans from the United States have been sending missionaries to serve around the world. Most of these Lutherans helped to establish and nurture new churches. Because of these efforts, Lutheran churches in many parts of the world today are independent and self-governing with their own seminaries, social programs and more. Along with that, today's ELCA mission personnel – 70 percent of whom are lay people – are now called to assist in a variety of mission and ministry roles, ranging from librarians to financial administrators.

As a teenager Konkol dreamed of becoming a courtroom lawyer. After high school he enrolled in the criminal justice program at Viterbo University, LaCrosse, Wis. During his second year of study, "my career path started to take a massive change" after listening to a speech from Sister Helen Prejean, a Roman Catholic nun opposed to the death penalty and whose character was featured in the film "Dead Man Walking."

"My home pastor always told me that I would make a good pastor. Like most children, I simply wasn't interested. I figured ordained ministry wouldn't be of any fun, and it simply wasn't ‘cool' enough for me. After hearing Sister Prejean, I realized that I could run from God but not hide. At age 21 I began seriously to consider a life of ordained ministry," said Konkol.

Konkol became a student at Luther Seminary, St. Paul, Minn., and accepted an internship with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Guyana through the ELCA's Horizon Internship Program. Luther is one of eight ELCA seminaries. Through Horizon, students enrolled at an ELCA seminary can spend their third year in rural, urban, multicultural, mission development or international ministries.

"After a variety of written applications, interviews and formal evaluations in January 2003 I had been accepted to serve overseas at Ebenezer Lutheran in Guyana," said Konkol. "My first thoughts were, Guyana? Where in the world is Guyana?" Guyana borders Venezuela and Suriname in South America.

The internship in Guyana "challenged me in ways like never before. I learned things about global ministry, the people of Guyana and, of course, a great deal about myself and how God was trying to work through my life. I thought about cultural differences between Guyana and the United States, I examined my personal beliefs as a curious young-adult Christian, and I realized that customs and practices that I had long assumed were ‘the best' were not universal in practice," he said.

While making "numerous mistakes during that year," Konkol said, "the Guyanese people were wonderful, and I knew that I had found a home among them. While just a few years before I couldn't have found Guyana on a map, I was now seeing it as place that I could spend a significant amount of my young life."

Following his internship experience in Guyana, Konkol returned to Luther Seminary and earned a master in divinity degree in 2005. That year, staff of ELCA Global Mission contacted Konkol and offered him an assignment to serve as pastor and leadership developer with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Guyana as a long-term missionary. He accepted the assignment. Konkol and his wife Kristen live and serve in Guyana.

Some of Konkol's responsibilities include serving as pastor of Emmanuel Lutheran Parish, which consists of four congregations; lecturer for the Lutheran Lay Academy of Guyana, a lay training center which empowers Lutherans there with skills in worship leadership, Bible study, church history, preaching and general theology; and one of three panelists for the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Guyana's weekly television show, "The Word for the World," which broadcasts throughout the country every Sunday evening.

"I truly love the various forms of service taking place here, and I see it as a wonderful fit," said Konkol. "As a developing country, Guyana certainly has many challenges and there are times of frustration. Some days I just yearn for ESPN or ice cream sandwiches. In the midst of the challenges and frustrations one grows, develops new perspectives and reaches new heights," he said.

Non-clergy mission personnel serve as musicians and other roles

Thirty percent of ELCA pastors overseas teach at training institutions and serve in churches. Lay mission personnel from the ELCA serve as medical workers, librarians, financial administrators, teachers and university professors.

"It is now very clear to us that God had been preparing our family for mission work for many years. We just didn't realize it," said Randy Stubbs, who heads the department of music at Makumira University College (MUCo), just outside of Arusha, Tanzania. MUCo is part of the university system operated by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Tanzania.

Randy and his wife Carol, a music instructor at MUCo, committed to serve in Tanzania from 2006 to 2007 as ELCA short- term volunteer missionaries. They have three children ages 13, 12 and 10.

"The vision of the music program is not only to train music educators" but to develop "enough qualified Tanzanians to run the music program," said Randy. "We have a small number of talented and dedicated music students and two part-time Tanzanian musicians committed to a brand new program that is exciting. My wife and I are the only two with master's degrees in music, which is required to teach full-time at the university," he said.

"Some transitions (in moving from the United States to Tanzania) were easier than expected, while others have been more challenging, such as a big lack of electricity and more than a three-month (process) to purchase a car," said Randy.

Prior to moving to Tanzania, the Stubbs worked as musicians at First Lutheran Church, DeKalb, Ill., for 19 years. A year before "stepping on a plane to Tanzania," Randy said his family had come to a turning point in its life during a family devotion and began to explore options in becoming short-term missionaries of the ELCA. They sold their house and car and gave away other family possessions.

"Our children are thriving in this very different environment," said Randy. "When people ask, ‘don't (your children) miss life in America?' (Our children) respond, ‘This is life. Life doesn't only happen in America.' They speak Swahili and barter at the market."

In 2007 the Stubbs family will complete their one-year commitment of service and has considered staying longer.

"We are staying longer because we realize just how much God had been preparing us for what we are currently doing in Tanzania. We continue to sense a strong call to stay and help complete the task that we have begun," said Randy. "Our thinking about money, security, life and blessings has changed as a result of this first year of service. Staying longer is much easier to consider."

ELCA mission personnel live and work in ‘accompaniment'

According to ELCA Global Mission, mission personnel live and work in a model called "accompaniment" – mutual relationships between churches in the United States and Lutheran companion churches.

Kate Lawler, originally from Massachusetts, was director of a program that enrolled children in state health care insurance programs. David Wunsch, originally from Indiana, directed an advocacy coalition for people with disabilities seeking affordable health insurance. Lawler and Wunsch met in 1995 as graduate students in New York City and later married.

"Ten years, two children and two mini-careers later," Lawler and Wunsch are long-term ELCA missionaries serving Lutheran churches in five countries – Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Peru and Uruguay.

"Serving as ELCA missionaries was something we hadn't ever considered seriously," said Wunsch. Their church experience was limited to an active membership in an ELCA congregation in upper Manhattan, New York. Lawler and Wunsch had lived and worked in Latin America for several years. "We knew that our hearts and minds belonged in Latin America and that we would eventually end up there in some sort of calling." They found out about mission personnel positions on the ELCA Web site.

As mission personnel "the most important aspect of our ministry is relationship. We sit with the leadership of our companions and listen to their vision, strengths, weaknesses and opportunities. We then together strategize on how the ELCA can best accompany our companion church and institutions, first through relationships and then through resources if and when possible. ELCA resources generally seek to strengthen our companions' capacities in the areas of church growth, leadership development, peace and reconciliation, and sustainable development," said Wunsch.

Lawler and Wunsch also coordinate the ELCA Young Adults in Global Mission program in Argentina and Uruguay. The program gives young adults between the ages of 19 and 30 the opportunity to serve in a global context for one year, said Wunsch. "For us the most exciting aspect of this work is the potential to transform the ELCA through the development of future leaders who are globally formed and globally informed," he said.

As of 2007 ELCA Global Mission supports about 275 mission personnel, including long-term and short-term appointments, self- supported volunteers, seminary interns and participants in the Young Adults in Global Mission program. There are 34 participants in the Young Adults program – young adults ages 19-30 placed in ministry settings that provide service in social ministry, youth work, congregational outreach, education, social justice and health care in Argentina, Germany, India, Kenya, Mexico, the Philippines, Slovakia and the United Kingdom.

"Nearly all our companion churches' ministries are focused on people living in or near poverty," said Wunsch. "In Argentina and Chile, churches are helping to rebuild day care centers, train health workers, support small agricultural producers and change the government's economic policies that keep millions of people living in poverty," he said.

The Bolivian Evangelical Lutheran Church is working with "faith communities and building churches that will house them in this country's most economically marginalized towns and cities," he said.

"We have been awed by the depth of theology, the stirring of the spirit, the solidarity among people, and the presence of the liberating Christ that we have experienced as we walk together with our companion churches as representatives of the ELCA," said Wunsch.

Information about ELCA Global Mission is available at http://www.ELCA.org/globalmission/ on the Web.

ELCA News Service