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The Story of the Norwegian Lutheran Church
  The first Norwegian Lutheran Church in America was built at Muskego, Wisconsin in 1844.  Many Concordia families lived in Houston County before coming to the Buffalo River, and belonged to the Stone Church, one of the oldest Norwegian Lutheran Congregations in Minnesota. | Martin Luther touched off the Reformation in 1517 when he nailed his 95 Theses to the door of the church in Wartenburg, Germany. For the kings of Northern Europe, the appeal of Luther's new ideas wasn't just about religion. The Pope had great power over how the kings in Catholic countries did almost everything and he often had the last word on important political issues. They didn't like the pope's interference in their affairs, so by embracing the Lutheran faith they were also able to become independent of the Pope. After the death of most of the Norwegian royal family during the Black Plague about 1350, Norway fell under the control of Denmark. In 1536-37, Christian III, the Danish king, removed and arrested Catholic bishops and declared Lutheranism to be the state religion in all his realm, including Norway. Because the Lutheran church was the only approved religion in Norway, almost all of the people there were brought up following Martin Luther. When Norwegians started their great immigration to America, they brought their religion with them. The first Norwegian immigrants didn't include any pastors, though, and they learned to worship among themselves with someone taking the role of leader. Elling Eielson was a lay minister (that means he didn't have formal training in a seminary) in Norway who wanted to minister to immigrants in their new home. The first settlement in the Midwest was in Fox River, Illinois, and he arrived there in 1839, and built a meeting house in 1841. The first floor provided a place to live, and the upstairs was left wide open and that was where services were held. The first Norwegian Lutheran Church in America was built in the Muskego Settlement (near Milwaukee) in Wisconsin in 1844. Claus Clausen was Danish, but he had been living and working in Drammen, Norway before coming to America. He helped to organize the Muskego Congregation and was its first pastor. The first Norwegian Lutheran confirmation class was confirmed at Muskego on April 14, 1844. A new church was built in Muskego after the Civil War. In order to preserve this important landmark, the original church was moved all the way across Wisconsin to the Luther Seminary in St. Paul, Minnesota in 1904 where you can visit it today. It is listed in the National Register of Historic Places. The church in Norway sent missionaries to America to help, but there was a real need for a seminary in America. In 1855 a committee visited Lutheran seminaries around the country and agreed that the Missouri Synod's seminary in St. Louis, Missouri were "brothers in belief." The first Norwegian ministers graduated from Concordia Seminary in St. Louis in 1863. In 1876, the Norwegian Synod founded its own seminary in Madison, Wisconsin. Many of Concordia's families have ties to one of the oldest Lutheran church in Minnesota, the Stone Church in Houston County. Its history begins in 1853 when Rev. Koren of Iowa made a missionary trip to the area. In 1854 both the Stone Church and Norwegian Ridge Church in Spring Grove were formally admitted to the Norwegian Synod. Tarje Grover had been the clerk of the Stone Church, and when he moved to the Buffalo River in 1874 he used his connections there to help establish Our Savior's Church in November of that same year. Our Savior's joined with the Moland missionary congregation in 1891 to form Concordia. You can find out more about the history of Concordia in the history section of this website. |
| October 2013 | ||||
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