An Australian Invasion!

by David Haberstock

Thanks be to God, Lutheran Church of the Redeemer in Winnipeg finally has a pastor! Her last pastor accepted and moved to a new call in 2020, in the midst of the pandemic that shut the world down. Finally, after four long years, at the end of August 2024, their new pastor, Rev. Shaun Manning, has arrived, and was installed September 8. 

You can imagine the struggles and trials of the call process during those years of lockdowns and restrictions. Life was challenging for all of us, but to weather those days without a pastor! What a burden! 

Thankfully, due to travel restrictions curtailing their travels, Lutheran Church–Canada (LCC) President Timothy Teuscher and International Missions Director Mark Smith, were able to serve Redeemer with Divine Service and Bible Study throughout most of those first two years of vacancy. Due to the increasing pastoral shortage (and God’s own purposes), Redeemer was not provided with her own called pastor for two more years after the pandemic. Then, about a year ago, the Lord dropped into my lap a pastor from an unlikely source: Australia! 

LCC has for some decades had a confessional relationship with Lutheran Church of Australia (LCA) and as a result there have been many short-term exchanges of pastors and seminary professors between our two church bodies. However, I’m not aware that we had ever had an Australian-trained pastor called indefinitely to an LCC parish until Rev. Adrian Kramer—who had vicared in LCC and met his wife, Rebecca Klages, at the end of vicarage—accepted a call to Canada and was installed in 2021 in St. Peter, Oxbow, and St. John, Frobisher, Saskatchewan.

Just when we are experiencing a pastoral shortage, we are excited to welcome a faithful, confessional, young pastor into our midst.

As you well know, our Lord chooses to work through the people of His Church. And thus, out of the blue, Rev. Kramer contacted me to let me know of a young pastor in Australia who might be interested in serving in Canada. This young man and his wife had recently been blessed with a child, and he was pondering the future of Lutheranism in Australia. LCA has been wrestling with the topic of women’s ordination—and the undergirding doctrine of the authority and inspiration of Holy Scripture—for some time. As of this writing, they were scheduled to vote on the issue again in early October. Please pray for our brothers and sisters in Australia, that they stand steadfastly on the Word of God and not lose hope.

Closer to home, Redeemer Winnipeg is blessed to have Rev. Manning, his wife Jacqui, and their darling 16-month-old daughter join us here in LCC. Just when we are experiencing a pastoral shortage, we are excited to welcome a faithful, confessional, young pastor into our midst. It took them months of preparations, dozens of hours of flights, courage, and faith to accept a call to a totally different country, continent, and culture some 14.5 hours of time zones away! 

Rev. Manning brings not only the fresh eyes of a different viewpoint from a sister Synod—not about doctrine but about church culture—and also the zeal and experience of someone who did not grow up as Lutheran or even a Christian. Meanwhile, Jacqui is a third generation Pastor’s Kid (PK). So, you can imagine for them the great sadness in leaving the cradle which has nurtured and nourished their faith. Please pray for them, for their new parish of Redeemer, and for their ongoing adjustment to a new country and culture. Rejoice that LCC still seeks to be a Scripturally-faithful church body, which is recognized throughout the world, and pray that God give us the strength to confess His Word. 

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Rev. David Haberstock is Lutheran Church–Canada (LCC)’s Central Regional Pastor.

For those who are curious, on LCC’s pastoral roster (including emeritus pastors) about 64 percent were trained in Canada, 31 percent in the United States (most of whom are now retired), and five percent abroad. Of that five percent trained abroad, two were trained in Australia, 11 in Brazil, two in Ethiopia, and one each in Argentina, Haiti, India, and Korea.

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