Christ Through Us

I was always taught that history repeats itself. What a beautiful pattern is given through this historical account of our Synod! God moved people to new places and the message of Christ was spread—this was not new to the church! With a sense of familiarity, we see how believers grew with a desire to share God’s grace. And just like today, the church needed more pastors to nurture souls. At the same time, it shouldn’t surprise us that the church continually faced earthly struggles. There were financial set-backs, times for a new direction, and disagreements that caused division. This history gives us glimpses of severe hardships that plagued ministry work and weighed heavily on pastors who led the church. We hear of men who selflessly devoted their lives to overcome trials and guide the church with the truth of Scripture. Each of them has a rich life story made perfect by Jesus. Praise God for every believer who played a part in shaping our Synod!

I enjoyed the accounts of young women whose influential lives were captured with such appreciation. I loved Marie, the young, Catholic fiancé from Bavaria who passed by a WELS congregation on her way to Sunday Mass. She kept stopping to hear the sermon and eventually the Lord moved her heart to become Lutheran. Years later, she was instrumental in gathering families to start a congregation in Winneconne, WI so their family had a place to worship.

I was moved by the story of Rosa Young from 1890 who faithfully taught school in Alabama. God moved this ten-year-old girl from an African Methodist Church to start her own school and seek support from the Synodical Council. Her heart rejoiced when Pastor Nils preached at an opening service, “There was where I first learned to know what my Savior meant to me. There is where I became a Lutheran” (p. 117). Working together with pastors, Rosa was involved with founding “30 Lutheran schools, 35 Lutheran congregations, and helped establish what came to be Concordia College Alabama” (p.117). I can’t wait to meet her in heaven!

So much has changed and so much has stayed the same. We are a world with new struggles that threaten the church. We have opportunities the church on earth has never known. We communicate in new ways, yet we share the same message. Just like the early settlers, 21st-century Christians need a Savior from sin. And the forgiveness purchased by Christ on the cross is still moving hearts to share God’s greatest gift, Jesus.

Thus, as a church body, the example of God, Luke, Paul and others who created the original, historical inerrant Word of God, should encourage us to document our time here on earth as well, as we follow and pursue God’s great commission “go and gather disciples from all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and by teaching them to keep all the instructions I have given you. And surely I am with you always until the end of the age.” (Matt 28: 19-20).

And so, through God’s grace, like Solomon who directed his people to look back into history—this book provides us with a small piece of history. A piece that many of us witnessed and can attest to. Many of the early Christian’s names do not appear in the Bible or history books. But yet, they were there and witnessed all that God had and was doing through their lives and the lives of their fellow Christians. We can boast the same, giving all glory to God, as we explore the many pages of this beautiful keepsake.

As you pick up this book, you will notice superior quality content of this pictorial manuscript, it creates a museum-like experience. Yet unlike brick and mortar museums, you can return to it again and again for reference. Read the stories of our mothers and fathers who went through harrowing, at times, life-threatening experiences, all for the sake of spreading the Gospel. God preserved us in unity, and now we too can “imitate” and be inspired by the work they have done. As beneficiaries of this eternal inheritance, we have so much yet to do! Jesus will return one day soon. Until then, let this book inspire our journey, remembering what has come before. It is evidence of what God’s grace has done in the lives of his faithful servants.

John Muehlhaeuser was trained as a baker, not a pastor. He eagerly traveled through central Europe distributing Bibles and telling people about Jesus before he came to America. In his heart he was a sincere Lutheran, but he did not value the Lutheran Confessional statements or the harsh attitudes he believed firm confessionalism produced. It was not inevitable that the next generation of pastors from Germany or in the United States who joined Muehlhaeuser’s synod would insist on being confessionally Lutheran.

Nor was it inevitable that this immigrant church body would envision, develop, and support an extensive ministerial educational system, to enable future church workers to read Scripture in its original languages and to communicate the gospel clearly. The conviction expressed by Philipp von Rohr—“We give first thought to our institutions. They are the focus of our synodical life”—was carried on by many devoted pastors, professors, teachers, and education advocates, despite the schools’ persistent financial struggles and occasional internal conflicts.

In 1961 the Wisconsin Synod had congregations in 16 states, yet at that very time in which many feared that our break with the Missouri Synod could spell the demise of our synod, leaders like Edgar Hoenecke, Carleton Toppe, Oscar Naumann, Norman Berg, and others emboldened us that we were “large enough to do more and greater things in the kingdom of God than” than we had done in the past. Their encouragements proved prophetic. By 1978, there were WELS congregations in almost every state in the United States, and missionaries were commissioned to locations around the globe.

None of this was inevitable. All of it was due to the grace of God. We face an unsteady future, but we pray that God will continue to use these commitments to confessional Lutheran teaching, a strong ministerial education, and zeal for missionary outreach as blessings for his church and in his world.

This anniversary book explores the complex texture of Lutheranism on the American frontier in the mid-19th century and beyond. Other Lutheran synods, most in the upper Midwest, drew together under the banner of what was started in Milwaukee to form a church body that is the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod of 2025.

Scripture encourages, “Remember your leaders.” This book goes a long way in doing just that. It appropriately highlights men and women who have worked tirelessly for the cause of the gospel through the work of the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod.

While the reader will be treated to a retrospective that features a wide variety of cherished buildings – churches and schools and campuses, this book is a clear reminder that the church is truly a gathering of people. It offers a generous photographic remembrance of dedications, conventions, global mission outreach, worship services large and small – what better expression of the body of Christ at work.

Christ Through Us is an honest account. The history of church bodies will involve controversies and disputes. The authors did not shrink back from these. Instead, they emphasized the account of God’s grace that, despite our human flaws, Christ’s forgiving love has allowed a path forward.

From cover to cover Christ Through Us maintains a focus on the mission of Christ through his church. It places the history of WELS into the context of time and place to reveal – in both a narrative and visual documentary – seven generations of blessing on our little channel in the stream of the Christian church.