Gerald B. Kieschnick

Gerald Bryan Kieschnick (born January 29, 1943, in Houston, Texas) is the Chief Executive Officer of Legacy Deo (formerly known as the Lutheran Foundation of Texas).

Kieschnick attended Texas A&M University, graduating with a bachelor of science in 1964.

He is a 1970 graduate of Concordia Theological Seminary in Springfield, Illinois (now located in Fort Wayne, Indiana), obtained his Master of Divinity in 1977 from Concordia in Fort Wayne, and received an honorary doctor of laws degree in 1996 from Concordia University in Austin, Texas.

After his ordination in 1970, Kieschnick served as pastor at Good Shepherd Lutheran Church in Biloxi, Mississippi, until 1973; at Redeemer Lutheran Church in Beaumont, Texas, from 1973 to 1981; and at Faith Lutheran Church in Georgetown, Texas, from 1981 to 1986.

Polarization in the LCMS dated back at least to the Seminex controversy in the early 1970s that centered on the faculty of Concordia Seminary, St. Louis.

He served the Texas District of the LCMS as a circuit counselor from 1978 to1981 and as director of public relations from 1977 to 1986.

Kieschnick was director of development at Lutheran Foundation of Texas from 1986 to 1988 and then served as its executive director from 1988 to 1991.

But by the 1990s, members of the LCMS' more conservative wing (who often dub themselves "confessional Lutherans") and its more mission-oriented wing had both established internal caucuses, organizations, and news services to promote their viewpoints and to campaign for Synod leadership candidates.

Kieschnick spent much of his first term under fire for his support of Atlantic District president David Benke.

In 1991, Kieschnick was elected president of the LCMS's Texas District and served in that position until 2001.

In addition, from 1998 until his election as LCMS president, Kieschnick chaired the LCMS Commission on Theology and Church Relations and served on the program committee of the LCMS Council of Presidents.

Kieschnick served as the 12th president of The Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod (LCMS), being elected to three terms in 2001, 2004, and 2007.

At the LCMS' 2001 convention in St. Louis, Kieschnick was elected to his first three-year term as president of the 2.6-million-member church.

He won by 18 votes out of 1,182 total votes cast in the fourth round of balloting over Dean O. Wenthe, then president of Concordia Theological Seminary, Fort Wayne, Indiana.

Three other candidates had dropped off in the first three ballots.

One of those candidates, Daniel Preus, subsequently was elected to be the church body's first vice president.

Kieschnick's first presidential term was almost immediately beset by controversy (see "Interfaith issues," below).

He faced opposition within the church hierarchy, including from four of the Synod's five vice-presidents and a majority of the board of directors.

On September 23, 2001, Benke took part in an interfaith prayer event at Yankee Stadium sponsored by the City of New York to commemorate the victims of the September 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center.

Daniel Preus and others argued that Benke, by participating alongside non-Lutheran clergy and leaders of non-Christian faiths, had engaged in practices that the Synod condemns as "unionism" and "syncretism", respectively.

Kieschnick and his supporters replied that the event was not a worship service, as Preus maintained, but a civic event, and that Benke had given Christian witness in a permissible manner.

In the Synod's official newspaper, Reporter, which reported on the controversy, Kieschnick said that his support for Benke's participation was based on a document titled "The Lutheran Understanding of Church Fellowship".

That document had been prepared by a predecessor LCMS president (Alvin L. Barry) and the Synod's Commission on Theology and Church Relations, chaired by Kieschnick, and then commended for use and guidance by the Synod's 2001 convention.

In a section under "civic events", the document states that "offering prayers, speaking, and reading Scripture at events sponsored by governments, schools and volunteer organizations would be a problem if the organization in charge restricted a Christian witness.... Without such a restriction, a Lutheran pastor may for valid and good reason participate in civic affairs such as an inauguration, a graduation, or a right-to-life activity. These occasions may provide opportunity to witness to the Gospel. Pastors may have honest differences of opinion about whether or to what extent it is appropriate or helpful to participate in these or similar civic events. In these cases, charity must prevail."

The document continues, “There are also ‘once in a lifetime’ situations.

It is virtually impossible to anticipate all such situations or to establish rules in advance.

Specific answers cannot be given to cover every type of situation pastors and congregations face.

These situations can be evaluated only on a case-by-case basis and may evoke different responses from different pastors who may be equally committed to LCMS fellowship principles.

The LCMS has always recognized this.”

Two LCMS ministers sought to bring charges against Kieschnick that, if upheld, would have led to his removal from the clergy roster of the Synod.

The matter ended with the charges against Kieschnick being voided by a ruling of the synod's Commission on Constitutional Matters and Benke being cleared of charges that also had been brought against him.

For several years, the Benke controversy left some LCMS members speaking of a "crisis in the Synod" and warning openly of the possibilities for a schism.

During Kieschnick's first term in office, the Synod's board of directors approved a proposal from the Board for Mission Services for a 15-year initiative to reach 100 million non-Christians worldwide with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Mark Weinrich, senior director for LCMS World Mission Support, said that the plan, subsequently titled "Ablaze!", was consistent with a mission emphasis for the Synod that Kieschnick had promoted.

"President Kieschnick set the vision in his acceptance speech because he talked about shaking the earth with the Gospel," Weinrich said.

The 2004 Synod convention took note of the Ablaze! initiative by adopting a number of mission-oriented resolutions.

He was defeated in his bid for a fourth term by the Rev. Matthew C. Harrison on July 13, 2010, at the 64th Regular Convention of the LCMS, and his presidency ended on August 31, 2010.

Kieschnick and his wife, Terry, have two grown children and two grandchildren, all of whom live in Texas.

The fund-raising effort, subsequently titled "Fan Into Flame," had raised $58,900,172 as of July 1, 2010.

Among those was Res. 1-04 to accept the challenge to reach 100 million people with the Gospel by 2017 (the 500th anniversary of the Reformation) and to seek to raise $100 million over and above the current mission budget for additional mission support by 2010.