The Organization of the Congregation in the Early Lutheran Churches in America

An historical study traces how eighteenth-century Lutheran congregations in colonial America developed internal constitutions and officer structures. The author surveys parish records to argue that few congregations had formal written constitutions before the arrival of a prominent pastor who introduced a brief Philadelphia constitution; congregations commonly relied on locally elected officers—typically elders and vorsteher or deacons—to direct affairs. The essay probes likely influences on this model from neighboring Swedish and Dutch churches and from ecclesiastical patterns in London and Amsterdam, and analyzes letters, ministerial proceedings, and emigration constitutions to show how congregational organization gradually became more standardized.