June 2017
LCMS Northern Illinois District President Rev. Dan P. Gilbert was in Norway the end of May to participate in a service consecrating the first bishop of The Lutheran Church of Norway. Rev. Torkild Masvie was consecrated on May 25 by Latvian Archbishop Janis Vanags, assisted by Bishop Arri Kugappi of the Ingrian Russian Lutheran Church, Northern Illinois District President Dan Gilbert, and Bishop Hanss Jensons of Latvia. Deputy Bishop Rev. Alf Danbolt led the Norwegian part of the consecration.
The relationship of The Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (LCMS) with The Lutheran Church of Norway (LCN) was finalized by delegates at the summer 2016 LCMS Convention in Milwaukee. Approval of the fellowship relationship was first announced during the Northern Illinois District Convention in 2015. Pastor Masvie was living in this district when he felt called to go back to his home country to plant a new confessional church body in a country that had increasingly become secularized. U.S. congregations were instrumental in supporting the fledgling confessional mission work in Norway, and President Gilbert was an active champion of the work and became a good friend. Rev. Gilbert served as acting bishop during those first years when new pastors were being raised up to plant new congregations.
Two weeks after Bishop Masvie was consecrated, the LCN ordained the first pastor raised up solely out of the new mission work. (Masvie and other pastors in the church body had been ordained previously by other church bodies.) The fledgling church body is preparing its new workers through a combination of basic courses at a State Church theological school, instruction in Confessional Lutheran doctrine and practice from experienced pastors serving in the LCN, and required studies for two quarters through one of the LCMS seminaries in the U.S.
The church body currently has seven pastors and five congregations. All, including Bishop Masvie, are bi-vocational and the plan is to continue in that model.