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	May 8, 2003
..................................................... LCMSNews -- No.
37

	Oklahoma elects president,
	first veep to fifth terms

	Delegates to the LCMS Oklahoma District convention, April 25-27
in Tulsa, re-elected to their fifth terms in office Dr. William R.
Diekelman, Owasso, president, and Rev. Paul A. Hartman, Moore, first
vice president. Both were returned to office on the first ballot.

	Others re-elected were Rev. Velmer H. Goebel, Lahoma, second
vice president, and Rev. Carlton L. Riemer, Stillwater, third vice
president.

	A resolution that reportedly drew considerable discussion before
it passed asks the district board of directors to send an overture to
the 2004 Synod convention urging the two seminaries not to call to their
faculties any pastor with less than 10 years of parish experience. It
also asks the seminaries to offer each professor every 10 years a year
away from the campus to serve a congregation.

	Other adopted resolutions affirm the following:

	-- Ablaze, the initiative to reach 100 million people with the
Gospel by 2017;

	-- Pentecost 2000-Plus, with its goal of starting 1,000 new
ministries among non-Anglo ethnic groups; and

	-- support for the Synods colleges, universities and
seminaries, while encouraging them to work to bring tuition costs in
line with tuition costs at state universities, and to continue providing
tuition-free education to all their students who are preparing for
professional church work.

	Another resolution asks the Synod to start a separate Board for
School Ministry Services that would provide services and curricula for
preschools through Grade 12.

	Other adopted resolutions encourage or urge congregations to:

	-- take active interest in members who are moving to other areas
and to use proper transfer procedures;

	-- utilize the Lutheran Church Extension Funds demographic
studies to recognize changes and opportunities in their communities;

	-- invite an LCMS Foundation representative to educate members
on methods of giving, while encouraging members to prepare wills; and

	-- support members attending district youth-leadership-training
events and sending a minimum of two members from each Oklahoma District
congregation to the 2004 LCMS National Youth Gathering.

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