The Lutheran Free Church (LFC) was a

Lutheran Lutheranism is one of the largest branches of Protestantism, identifying primarily with the theology of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German monk and reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practice of the Catholic Church launched th ...

denomination that existed in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

, mainly in

Minnesota Minnesota () is a state in the upper midwestern region of the United States. It is the 12th largest U.S. state in area and the 22nd most populous, with over 5.75 million residents. Minnesota is home to western prairies, now given over to ...

and

North Dakota North Dakota () is a U.S. state in the Upper Midwest, named after the Native Americans in the United States, indigenous Dakota people, Dakota Sioux. North Dakota is bordered by the Canadian provinces of Saskatchewan and Manitoba to the north a ...

, from 1897 until its merger into the

American Lutheran Church The American Lutheran Church (TALC) was a Christian Protestant denomination in the United States and Canada that existed from 1960 to 1987. Its headquarters were in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Upon its formation in 1960, The ALC designated Augsburg ...

(ALC) in 1963. The history of the church body predates its official organization, and a group of congregations that did not join the ALC formed the

Association of Free Lutheran Congregations The Association of Free Lutheran Congregations (AFLC) is the sixth largest Lutheran church body in the United States. The AFLC includes congregations from the former Lutheran Free Church in 27 different U.S. states and four Canadian provinces. The ...

Background

Georg Sverdrup Georg Sverdrup (born Jørgen Sverdrup; 25 April 1770 – 8 December 1850) was a Norwegian statesman, best known as one of the presidents of the Norwegian Constituent Assembly in Eidsvoll in 1814. He was a member of the Norwegian Parliament and ...

and

Sven Oftedal Sven Oftedal (March 22, 1844 – March 30, 1911) was a Norwegian American Lutheran minister. He served as the 3rd president of Augsburg University and helped found the Lutheran Free Church. Background Sven Svensen Oftedal was born in Stavanger, ...

were two scholars from prominent

Haugean The Haugean movement or Haugeanism ( no, haugianere) was a Pietistic state church reform movement intended to bring new life and vitality into the Church of Norway which had been often characterized by formalism and lethargy. The movement empha ...

families in Norway who came to Augsburg Seminary, now

Augsburg University Augsburg University is a private university in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It is affiliated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. It was founded in 1869 as a Norwegian-American Lutheran seminary known as Augsburg Seminarium. Today, the u ...

, in

Minneapolis Minneapolis () is the largest city in Minnesota, United States, and the county seat of Hennepin County. The city is abundant in water, with thirteen lakes, wetlands, the Mississippi River, creeks and waterfalls. Minneapolis has its origins ...

, to teach in the 1870s, bringing with them a radical view of Christian education that was centered on Scripture and the simple doctrines of Christianity. The Haugean movement took its name from Norwegian lay evangelist

Hans Nielsen Hauge Hans Nielsen Hauge (3 April 1771 – 29 March 1824) was a 19th-century Norwegian Lutheran lay minister, spiritual leader, business entrepreneur, social reformer and author. He led a noted Pietism revival known as the Haugean movement. Hauge is also ...

who spoke up against the Church establishment in Norway. Sverdrup and Oftedal had been concerned about hierarchy within the Christian church as well as the study of the

Bible The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, and many other religions. The Bible is an anthologya compilation of texts of a ...

. They believed that, according to the

New Testament The New Testament grc, Ἡ Καινὴ Διαθήκη, transl. ; la, Novum Testamentum. (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus, as well as events in first-century Christ ...

, the local congregation was the correct form of God's kingdom on earth. Their vision was for a church that promoted a “living” Christianity, emphasized an evangelism that would result in changed lives, and enabled the church member to exercise his/her spiritual gifts. Augsburg was the seminary of the

Conference of the Norwegian-Danish Evangelical Lutheran Church of America Conference of the Norwegian-Danish Evangelical Lutheran Church of America usually called the Conference was a Lutheran church body that existed in the United States from 1870 to 1890, when it merged into the United Norwegian Lutheran Church of Am ...

In 1890, the "Conference" joined with two other Lutheran church bodies to form the

United Norwegian Lutheran Church of America The United Norwegian Lutheran Church of America (UNLC) was the result of the union in 1890 of the Norwegian Augustana Synod (est. 1870), the Conference of the Norwegian-Danish Evangelical Lutheran Church of America (1870), and the Anti-Missourian ...

(UNLC). A dispute within the UNLC over which school, Augsburg or St. Olaf, should be the college of the church body led in 1893 to the creation of the Friends of Augsburg. By 1896, Sverdrup, Oftedal, and others felt their beliefs of a "free church in a free land" were being compromised and broke away from the UNLC, forming the Lutheran Free Church in 1897. The LFC's publishing house was the ''Messenger Press'' and its official

English language English is a West Germanic language of the Indo-European language family, with its earliest forms spoken by the inhabitants of early medieval England. It is named after the Angles, one of the ancient Germanic peoples that migrated to the is ...

magazine was the ''Lutheran Messenger'' started in 1918. During most of its earlier history the church also published a

Norwegian language Norwegian ( no, norsk, links=no ) is a North Germanic language spoken mainly in Norway, where it is an official language. Along with Swedish and Danish, Norwegian forms a dialect continuum of more or less mutually intelligible local and regio ...

publication named ''Folkebladet'' (the People's Paper). In harmony with its emphasis on utilizing and developing the natural spiritual gifts of all the members of the Church, the LFC gave a freer rein to women within its church body to hold non-ordained ministries, offices, and responsibilities than many of its contemporary Lutheran counterparts.A point stressed on numerous occasions by Gracia Grindal, a professor at Luther Theological Seminary. The LFC also strongly emphasized the importance of foreign missions (with missions fields in Madagascar and the Cameroons) and spent more of its financial resources on foreign missions and supported a larger number of foreign missionaries than many of its contemporary Lutheran church bodies of comparable size. By the 1950s there was a growing movement by many Lutherans throughout the

to merge smaller Lutheran bodies into larger ones. The Lutheran Free Church joined the

on February 1, 1963, after votes were held in 1955, 1957, and 1961. In 1988 the ALC itself joined with other Lutheran churches to form the

Evangelical Lutheran Church in America The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) is a mainline Protestant Lutheran church headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. The ELCA was officially formed on January 1, 1988, by the merging of three Lutheran church bodies. , it has approxim ...

(ELCA). About 40 Lutheran Free Churches however did not join the ALC, instead forming the

(AFLC) in October 1962. Today the AFLC has more than 250 congregations. In 1963, just before its merger into the ALC, the LFC had 252 pastors, 334 congregations, and 90,253 members.

Presidents of the LFC

Term of office: one year 1897-1920. Three years 1920-1963

Annual Conferences

*1897 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1898 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1899 Dalton, Minnesota *1900 Montevideo, Minnesota *1901 Willmar, Minnesota *1902 Audubon, Minnesota *1903 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1904 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1905 Willmar, Minnesota *1906 Battle Lake, Minnesota *1907 Fargo, North Dakota *1908 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1909 Montevideo, Minnesota *1910 Valley City, North Dakota *1911 Willmar, Minnesota *1912 Thief River Falls, Minnesota *1913 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1914 Brainerd, Minnesota *1915 Marinette, Wisconsin *1916 Willmar, Minnesota *1917 Fargo, North Dakota *1918 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1919 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1920 Thief River Falls, Minnesota *1921 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1922 Fargo, North Dakota *1923 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1924 Northfield, Minnesota *1925 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1926 Willmar, Minnesota *1927 Fargo, North Dakota *1928 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1929 Thief River Falls, Minnesota *1930 Fergus Falls, Minnesota *1931 Fargo, North Dakota *1932 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1933 Willmar, Minnesota *1934 Duluth, Minnesota *1935 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1936 Fargo, North Dakota *1937 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1938 Thief River Falls, Minnesota *1939 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1940 La Crosse, Wisconsin *1941 Morris, Minnesota *1942 Fargo, North Dakota *1943 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1944 Willmar, Minnesota *1945 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1946 Fargo, North Dakota *1947 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1948 Willmar, Minnesota *1949 Morris, Minnesota *1950 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1951 Seattle, Washington *1952 Fargo, North Dakota *1953 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1954 Thief River Falls, Minnesota *1955 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1956 Fargo, North Dakota *1957 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1958 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1959 Minot, North Dakota *1960 Fargo, North Dakota *1961 Minneapolis, Minnesota *1962 Minneapolis, Minnesota

References

Other sources

{{Portal, Christianity *Clarence J. Carlsen, ''The Years of Our Church'' (Minneapolis, MN: The Lutheran Free Church Publishing Company, 1942

*Eugene L. Fevold, ''The Lutheran Free Church: A Fellowship of American Lutheran Congregations 1897-1963'' (Minneapolis, MN: Augsburg Publishing House, 1969) *Aarflot, Andreas ''Hans Nielsen Hauge, his life and message'' (Augsburg Publishing House, Minneapolis, MN. 1979) *Hamre, James S. ''Georg Sverdrup: Educator, Theologian, Churchman'' (Northfield, MN: Norwegian-American Historical Association. 1986) *Loiell Dyrud, ''The Quest for Freedom: The Lutheran Free Church to The Association of Free Lutheran Congregations'' (Minneapolis, MN: Ambassador Publications, 2000)
Augsburg College- The Lutheran Free Church
CLiC Digital Collections. Lutheran denominations in North America Evangelical Lutheran Church in America predecessor churches History of Christianity in the United States Religious organizations established in 1897 Lutheranism in Minnesota Lutheranism in North Dakota