Spoken greetings offered to Dr. Harold Senkbeil on his forty-fifth anniversary in the ministry, from colleagues and friends gathered across his years of service, including the military chaplaincy and the church abroad. Each recalls his faithfulness and counsel, and above all his confession and preaching of Christ, commending him and his family to God’s continued blessing.
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Transcript (edited for readability).
Good evening, and congratulations to you, Hal, for 45 years in the office of the ministry. Today, the 29th, is also the 25th anniversary of my service in the office. I was ordained 25 years ago in a little parish in Iowa, and right from the beginning I was reading your books about worship and the Christian life, and they had a very profound effect on me. And you were wise beyond your years. I think you've always had gray hair, right? Since the time you were eight or ten years old. Mine's becoming gray over time, being earned by synodical service. But you were wise beyond your years then, and you continue to be wise beyond your years even now.
We traveled a lot together on the Real Life Worship Conference team. We got to know each other very well through the years. You served in various ways, and quite a while ago now, you came to me as executive director of LCMS World Relief, asking for a little startup grant and some help with a project you and Bev were thinking about called Doxology. It was a pleasure to be able to help that little thing get off the ground, and wow, how it has turned out to be such a grand blessing to so very, very many pastors, and their spouses, and congregations, and elders, and others.
And so, I don't know how to say it any better than Paul said it to the Philippians: I give thanks to my God every time I remember you, and always, in making prayer for you, I pray for you with joy. And so it is, what joy it's been to know you. God bless you, Hal, and give you another 45 years. Thanks.
Good evening to each of you. It's a delight to be with you as you celebrate the ministry of the Reverend Dr. Harold Senkbeil, even though we cannot be with you in person. We want to relay greetings. I'm Larry Myers. I am one of the pastors at Elm Grove Evangelical Lutheran Church in Elm Grove, Wisconsin, where Dr. Senkbeil served from 1986 until May of 2002. He came to Elm Grove Lutheran as the successor to the Reverend Dr. Victor Bartelt. Pastor Bartelt served at Elm Grove Lutheran for nearly 40 years. And so when Pastor Senkbeil came from Madison, Wisconsin, it was a difficult role into which he stepped. But he served well.
It was our intention that both of the current living pastors at Elm Grove Lutheran who served with Dr. Senkbeil would have a chance to address you and share some thoughts this evening, but that became impossible. The other pastor who is still living who served with Dr. Senkbeil is the Reverend Carl Eggloff. Both Pastor Eggloff and I are in agreement that our greatest joy in serving with Hal Senkbeil was the collegiality that we enjoyed with him.
In the year 2001, I was on Air Force Reserve duty in the Pentagon on 9/11. I was on duty on that fateful day in 2001 when the plane struck the Pentagon. I'd gone to DC with the intent of only staying for six days. The chief of chaplains of the Air Force chaplain service simply announced, "God provides, and God has provided, Chaplain Myers. Do you want to volunteer to stay, or do I have to mobilize you and keep you here even beyond your retirement date next year?"
I knew that impending within the next number of months, Harold Senkbeil was going to receive a call to teach at our seminary in Fort Wayne, Indiana. I also knew that if I stayed for many months in Washington, DC, that Harold Senkbeil loved this congregation so much that he would use my absence as an excuse not even to consider a call to the faculty at the Fort Wayne seminary. So I struck a deal with them, and I served for 60 days in volunteer status.
Not many months later, the call did come to the Reverend Dr. Harold L. Senkbeil, which he accepted, and he moved on then to a six-year teaching stint at Fort Wayne, Indiana. It was both my delight and that of Pastor Carl Eggloff to have the privilege of working with Dr. Senkbeil. As I indicated, it was the collegiality, his concern for us, working together as partners in ministry, that made it an absolute delight for each one of us to work with him.
And so on this evening, when you celebrate with him and celebrate his gifts to the church, and celebrate with him even his 45th wedding anniversary, which was earlier this month, we rejoice with you. We give thanks with you to Almighty God for the gifts of this man, and pray that the Lord of the church will continue to use him for many, many years in the future. You have our prayers and our blessings, Dr. Senkbeil. And we hope that you enjoy this evening. Thank you for being who you are.
Dear Professor Dr. Senkbeil, what a joy it has been to know you, and to have you come and teach our Lutheran pastors here in the South African capital at the Lutheran Theological Seminary in Tshwane, Pretoria, South Africa, with your great team of experts, Professor Beverly Yahnke and Dr. John Kleinig. Now you're celebrating your 40th anniversary of your ordination and serving in the pastoral office of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. So together with you and many others, we rejoice in remembering all the great, wonderful, lovely, and merciful things our Lord, our God, has done through you and your ministries throughout these decades. Although at some distance away, we still give thanks with you to Him, our Lord, who has blessed His holy church and most lovely, beautiful bride with such an outstanding and faithful teacher, pastor, professor, missionary, bishop, and doctor of theology, and pastoral care like you. For sure, His grace and mercy is great and most deserving of praise and worship. May the Triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, continue to bless and keep you in the true faith, as you serve His people, and especially His pastors across the globe, faithfully, with the precious treasures of the Holy Gospel. You have started the good work, and you will surely complete it, for His faithfulness and His goodness and mercy endure forever and ever. Amen.
Dear Dr. Senkbeil, beloved father in God, allow me to express my most cordial congratulations and greetings on your 45th anniversary in ministry. When I was a school student, I was not very strong in mathematics, but when I think of you, I cannot help but think of some math. Forty-five years — it's one quarter of the whole history of the existence of the Lutheran Church, Missouri Synod. So your ministry covers one quarter of the history of your church. It's, wow, just wow.
And thank you for not being an idle person. You have been pastoring congregations, and you have been teaching in the seminary, and I got to know you as one of the leaders in Doxology. Doxology is something very important for us, especially because during the Soviet period, the whole theological education and instruction of pastors was destroyed. We could renew, somehow, the theological part of it, but spiritual care, or pastoral care — what you are teaching in Doxology — has always been a big deficit that we were struggling with.
And when I come back to some mathematics, then I think: the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod and the church in Latvia have now been in partnership for 15 years. Fifteen years — it's one third of your period of ministry. So I'm glad and happy that we have been in partnership for so long, and that we have benefited in Latvia so greatly from you. May God give you health and strength and courage and strong faith, and I hope to see you often, here in the U.S. or in Latvia. God bless you, Pastor Senkbeil.
What a delight it is to be able to bring greetings to you from Concordia Theological Seminary in Fort Wayne, Indiana — from your faculty colleagues, from our staff, from our board of regents, from all of the community here who think of you so highly, and rejoice always along with you as you celebrate 45 years in the office of pastor. You've been a blessing to this seminary. You've been a blessing to our church, most of all because of your faithful confession and preaching of Christ. In 45 years you have shown yourself to be a true servant, and we count ourselves honored to have served alongside of you. May God continue to bless you in your service, as we and you together go forward with the word of Christ upon our lips, sharing it with a world in need. God bless you and your family always.