The Nelson Family Indonesia

With a baptism in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and a visit to the LCMS international school in Hanoi already planned, I was a bit surprised when the week before departing I was contacted by our Regional Business Manager, Sam Borgwardt. He asked if I could come to Taiwan the following week – in between my two trips. 

At first I was worried. Last minute requests to come to headquarters tend to make me a little nervous. But then he explained that our Taiwanese church partners, the Chinese Evangelical Lutheran Church (CELC) were looking for someone to lead some teaching time as they gathered for their annual conference. While we have highly skilled team members in Taiwan who are fluent in Mandarin, the CELC specifically asked for someone different to lead the teaching for a change. They intended no disrespect to Rev. Drs. Michael Paul and Steven Oliver, but they had been working with these men for years and heard them teach many times. They were looking for an outside voice.

I managed to rearrange my schedule slightly to depart Kuala Lumpur a day earlier than planned and fly to Taiwan. Of course that meant I also needed to prepare material to present! The requested topic was The Lutheran Mind. I completed my Powerpoint and sent it off to Rev. Paul for him to try and get translated before the event. 

What do pastoral and church leadership gatherings look like in Taiwan? Actually, a lot like they probably look in, say, Tacoma. We began with worship Monday morning. The CELC recently moved to a new location and had a chapel and conference area on the 12th floor of the building. 

The altar area of the CELC headquarters is beautiful and familiar despite being on the other side of the world!

While it might be a misnomer to call the conference area beautiful, it was definitely functional and allowed for 20-some men and women to gather to listen to my teaching in English with Rev. Paul translating into Mandarin.

My presentation discussed the distinctiveness of Lutheran theological thinking – thinking that isn’t limited to Sunday morning sermons but in fact must necessarily be the lens through which we live our lives. Our insistence on trying to adhere to the Word of God even when it seems to be saying things that are mutually exclusive is part of our Lutheran mind. Allowing God to be God is part as well. All of which leads to certain distinctive features of Lutheran theology in contrast to our brothers and sisters in Christ in other Christian traditions.

The teaching was well received, and generated a fair amount of discussion. How do we watch out for the infiltration of cultural assumptions that are contrary to God’s Word? How do we hold together in tension the entirety of God’s Word, rather than erring in one direction or the other? How do we help our people with these things when the vast majority of their life and time is formed beyond the sanctuary by philosophies and assumptions diametrically opposed oftentimes to God’s Word? Good questions indeed.

Aftewards there was, of course, lunch. 

The bowl contains a corn soup that is very popular in Taiwan. Slightly savory and very, well, corny! There was a baked pie that was similar to a quiche with vegetables and meat in a flaky crust. And the pastry in the forefront had a savory curried meat filling. There was a glutenous rice dessert. So maybe the food options are slightly different from gatherings in the US, but the same basic idea.

I was pleasantly surprised that it was very, very chilly in Taiwan. The conference was held in the northern city of Hsinchu City rather than the southern city of Chiayi where our regional headquarters is located. The weather was windy, rainy, and cold! I only had a thin windbreaker with me but it was a joy to shiver in the cold for the first time in two years! 

We give thanks for our faithful partners at the CELC and pray the Holy Spirit blessed their conference not just through my teaching but through their deliberations and decisions!