The sun continues to sink lower in the West for Protestant denominations in the US. Aging demographics, internal sniping and division, and battling through the culture wars have all taken a toll. The large Lutheran denominations are led nationally from the edges of the cultural wars. The great majority of the attending members, those in worship on a Sunday morning, are by any measure huddled in the middle.

What God's people desire and deserve is clear preaching and teaching of Christ from Scripture. What they desire and deserve is daily baptismal refreshment and renewal among a communion of saints that receives the forgiveness of sins. What they desire across all boundaries of race, class and clan is a church carried by grace alone to claim a destiny that is eternal. What they desire and deserve is to be challenged by their church and their church body to engage the world with the Gospel of hope in word and deed.