✦ Our Story
About Calvary
Lutheran Church
Our History
Founded in 1875, Calvary Lutheran Church was established to serve the spiritual needs of the Ulen community and the surrounding farm families of northwest Minnesota. Like many Lutheran congregations in this region, Calvary was founded by Scandinavian immigrants who carried with them a deep love for the Lutheran confessions, faithful preaching of the Word, and regular celebration of the Sacraments.
Through decades of ministry, the congregation has remained committed to confessional Lutheran theology — the same faith confessed in the Augsburg Confession, Luther's Small Catechism, and the Book of Concord. We have weathered the changes of many generations, and in each era, the heart of our ministry has remained constant: proclaiming the forgiveness of sins won for us by Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior.
In 2025, the congregation celebrated its sesquicentennial — 150 years of ministry in Ulen. Across a century and a half of harvests and hardships, weddings and funerals, baptisms and confirmations, the Lord has preserved this congregation around His Word and Sacraments. We give thanks to God for the generations of faithful pastors and members who have gone before us, and we look to the future in the same confidence that has sustained Calvary since 1875.
Today, Calvary Lutheran continues as a member congregation of the Evangelical Lutheran Synod (ELS), a church body that maintains faithful adherence to the inerrancy of Holy Scripture and the historic Lutheran confessions. We invite all who seek the Word of God to join us for worship.
Quick Facts
- Founded
- 1875
- Anniversary
- 150 Years · Sesquicentennial (2025)
- Location
- Ulen, MN 56585
- County
- Clay County, Minnesota
- Synod
- Evangelical Lutheran Synod
- Worship
- Sunday, 8:00 AM
- Language
- English
- Confessional Basis
- Book of Concord (1580)
Rev. John Merseth
Pastor
Calvary Lutheran Church
Called to Serve
Calvary Lutheran is blessed to be served by Pastor John Merseth, who ministers in the tradition of confessional Lutheranism. Trained for the ministry in the Evangelical Lutheran Synod, he has been called to preach the Gospel and administer the Sacraments faithfully among us, in accordance with Holy Scripture and the Lutheran confessions. Pastor Merseth also serves our sister congregation, Immanuel Lutheran Church in Audubon, with whom Calvary forms one parish.
The pastoral office at Calvary Lutheran is held by a man ordained to the ministry of Word and Sacrament, in keeping with the teaching of Holy Scripture and the Lutheran confessional tradition.
Contact the Church Office✦ Synodical Membership ✦
Evangelical Lutheran Synod
The Evangelical Lutheran Synod traces its heritage to the Norwegian Synod of 1853. It was reorganized in 1918 by pastors and congregations who, unwilling to compromise the pure teaching of God's Word, sought to continue in the historic Lutheran confessions; the body took its present name in 1957. Today the ELS consists of congregations across the United States and supports world missions in several countries. The synod operates Bethany Lutheran College and Bethany Lutheran Theological Seminary in Mankato, Minnesota.
Membership in the ELS means our congregation stands with a synod that holds to the inerrancy of Scripture, the Lutheran confessions in the Book of Concord, and the doctrine of justification by grace alone through faith alone — the heart of the Lutheran Reformation.
Learn More at ELS.org →