Joyful News from Siberia

This report from the Rev. Dr. Albert B. Collver, assistant to the Rev. President Matthew Harrison and director of the Synod's director of Church Relations is good news indeed!

The Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod (LCMS) and the Siberian Evangelical Lutheran Church (SELC) have formally declared that they are in doctrinal agreement.  The Rev. Bishop Vsevolod Lytkin of Siberia has declared SELC fellowship with the LCMS from Siberia's end, and the LCMS's Committee on Theology and Church Relations will hold a formal vote at its December meeting to declare full communion (altar and pulpit fellowship) with the SELC - after which, according to the recently adopted procedures, will then be sent to the next convention for ratification!

We look forward to sharing ministers and sacraments with our Russian brethren (even as we have shared education and fervent prayers for many years now) in our mutual confession of the Gospel proclaimed in Holy Scripture and articulated in the Lutheran Confessions.