I have often understood the telling of Anabaptist history to be something that is changing; changing from a biased retelling in almost heroic imagery (seen in Dyck) to more recently a more honest “human” telling (seen in Roth). I am now seeing that even the “older” books tell a very honest story of struggle. A struggle with how to define the movement and struggle with how to move forward in terms of civil law and citizenship. I wonder how the future generations of historians will write our story. For the purpose of this reflection I will narrow the topic to a focus on service/aid to those in need and salvation concepts.
One small story in our reading this week caught my attention. In 1550s, Protestants in England fled the persecution under Queen Mary by crossing the English Chanel. Their boat somehow got caught in ice and the newly formed Mennonites near Wismar helped them. The interesting part of this to me is the how the persecuted Mennonites continued the desire to provide aid to others not in their group. It reminds me again of how important it is to see the needs of others around us even when things don’t look good inside our own group. During a time when early Mennonites were refugees themselves, they helped other refugees.
My church (Souderton Mennonite) is going through a difficult time in terms of our budget. We are limiting funding or even cutting funding to some ministries. Many of our members in the church are experiencing unemployment and/or reduced income. I cannot state that the lack of money is as great of a trial as persecution seen in the 1550s but our focus outward should be the same. My church needs to learn a quick lesson from our former Mennonite brothers and sisters near Wismar, North Germany, and also continue to provide aid to those in need even if it means our own suffering.
The final area of focus for this blog will be salvation theology. I find some similarities with other reformers in language but it seems to me that the Anabaptists had something more. A good example is the use of the word blood. Menno uses it and others also often reference blood. What seems to be unique is that blood language is not enough for the early Anabaptists. Salvation must be combined with works or acting like Christ. The blood on the cross is a part of salvation but does not stand alone as salvation. In our language today we would say that we need a non-violent atonement. Not to look past the death of Jesus on the cross but to not just hang out theology hats on this death alone. We also need to live like Jesus.
From my perspective, the early Mennonites struggled internally with theology and how to set up systems to survive as a movement. One thing that they focused on that allowed them to overcome internal disputes was the external awareness of the suffering of others and the decision to provide aid to them. This is the lesson for my church, Souderton Mennonite. Living like Jesus was a part of Mennonite history as their core salvation theology and Souderton Mennonite should also focus on this with its current struggles for unity and vision.
