"I want to apply the truths to my people, to God's people in my congregation, and to preach the good news to all the surrounding villages in our area.”

This statement from Prasad Babu, one of 11 seminary graduates from WELS' sister church in India this summer, demonstrates why WELS places such a high priority on theological training of members of WELS missions and sister churches—to reach even more people with the true gospel message.

Currently 27 missionaries and 28 nationals are training 235 people at Bible institutes and seminaries around the world. Visiting professors from the United States also teach short term in many world mission fields.

The language, curriculum, and set-up of these systems vary dramatically, but the focus is the same—to equip nationals to share the good news of Jesus. Not only does this training increase the number of workers in a given mission field, but national pastors better understand the local culture and can serve people in their native language. Having its own pastors also brings a national church body closer to its ultimate goal—self-dependence.

"There is no shortcut to a thorough training when entrusting God's truth to 'reliable men who will also be qualified to teach others' (2 Timothy 2:2)," says Dan Koelpin, Board for World Missions administrator. "National pastors will carry on the work of shepherding the Christian congregations in their nation after the missionaries leave, and we want to prepare them to be faithful shepherds who speak God's truth."

As world mission seminary professors work to provide a thorough theological education, they are dealing with two competing trends, according to Ken Cherney, world mission professor at Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary—the value of greater cooperation in worker training and the understanding of the uniqueness of each mission field.

Developing curricula for these seminaries demonstrates these trends. Cherney says that although there is not one standard curriculum, many WELS world mission seminaries follow a similar program, often using Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary as a model. But, he says, because each mission field is unique, each curriculum must include applications pertinent to the local setting. "My hope is that over time the curricula on world fields reflect much more the situation and the realities of the national church," he says. This approach not only prepares the national pastors to deal with situations unique to each mission but also allows the national church to have input on how its pastors are trained.