In 1839, Elling Eielsen, a lay preacher, was a leader in the Haugean pietistic state church reform movement which encouraged evangelism and vigorous lay leadership. He made it his mission to return the growing Fox River Norwegian colony to the Lutheran fold. He organized a house of assembly and was ordained a Lutheran pastor in 1843 in the German-Lutheran tradition. Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, known as the Eielsen Synod, founded in 1846 at the Jefferson Prairie Settlement, was named in his honor. Eislsen was resident pastor at Jefferson Prairie from 1846 to 1872.