If I were to ask you what you are looking for in a church, would you know? If I were to ask you what you value, could you put words to it?
Many of us could probably come up with a few things like community, life, faithfulness to God’s Word, family, peace-making, brotherhood, and many other things. But those are all actually really vague. None of them differentiate one church from another.
If the early Anabaptists were alive today, I am quite certain the Mennonite church would run them out of their congregations.
I realize that’s a pretty strong statement, and not altogether fair. But I’m willing to stand by it, nonetheless.
You see, the early Anabaptist leaders, such as Grebel, Manz, Blaurock, Sattler, and others, began to question the status quo of the institutionalized church. Should the church really baptize infants? Should a believer take oaths or go to war? Even more, they questioned the ruling of a council as being more authoritative than the Spirit’s leading in people’s lives, as was commonly accepted in their day.
I’m speaking specifically to Anabaptist churches. Not because they are worse than others and not because they are better. I speak to Anabaptists because I am one. I understand this denomination the most. I feel the frustrations others feel as they work with their Anabaptist brothers and sisters. I value the upbringing and heritage I have been given, as many Anabaptists do.
This generation of Anabaptists wants to know we won’t be written off when we verbalize the frustrations we feel. We want people to care, to invest in us and help us chart an even better course—no matter how good or bad the current one is. But in our ambition for the change we want, I fear we may neglect what we really need.
We don’t need everyone to stay “Anabaptist,” neither do we need everyone to leave. I see at least seven things this generation of Anabaptist really needs.
There is a lot of uncertainty in Christianity today, especially among the younger generation. Church is frustrating, whether you come from a more traditional background or a progressive one. Either it’s full of ritual and stringent practice or obsessed with growth and modern advances.
People want more; but they’re scared. Unless you’re willing to come under suspicion, it’s best to keep your questions and desire for change secret.
So what do you do when things feel remarkably out of order? How are you supposed to handle it when church is not as you are studying about in the Bible? Do you sit passively by and accept the status quo? Do you campaign for reform, start a radical movement, and subject yourself to critical suspicion? Or do you simply walk away?
In the past number of years, I have noticed there are primarily three kinds of millennial Christians who discover weaknesses in their upbringing and strengths in other denominations, and struggle to know how to reconcile them.
Is it wrong? Is it right? What do we do if we see ourselves in one of these?
In this post, I introduce an eBook where I address the three kinds of millennial Christians in the church today, and give a few words for each as to what I believe we can do to grow personally, as well as corporately, in maturity in Christ.
Every generation has to find their place in history. For one, morality may be the trump struggle they face. For another, it may be poverty.
For us, there’s never been a more Christian time in history. And that’s making us ask questions. How do we know what we’ve been taught all these years is right?
With as many faults as our parents may have, we have been given a lot. We have been given faith blocks to build on—will we building on them? Do we want more of God, and are we willing to take what they gave us and add to it?
I have remarkable friends. Remarkable because they are intelligent, good-looking, serve people, love God, and seem to get a kick out of me. They also ask great questions.
One of the questions I often hear my remarkable friends ask is “Why does everything have to be about being Anabaptist?”
Much of my generation is tired of the “us” vs. “them” mentality of the Anabaptist church. In fact, I believe it’s one of the primary reasons young people choose to leave. Too often, the focus is on our differences from the rest of the evangelical world and why they are wrong and evil and how we should keep away from them. That gets exhausting for young believers who simply want to follow Christ.
What would it be like to walk into Walmart and be able to buy a music CD from a girl wearing a head-covering? Or to have an Anabaptist author publish a NY Times Bestseller?
How do we best serve people?
Think of a restaurant. How does the owner of a restaurant best serve his customers? Does he offer only water because that is healthiest and he wants his customers to be healthy? Maybe he’ll throw in Coke because he knows that if you don’t like water you probably like Coke.
Heritage is powerful. God saved Lot because of his family heritage through Abraham. If it wasn’t for Abraham’s intercession, Lot would have destroyed along with Sodom.
Everyone who knows the story of Lot remembers that his family became enemies to Israel. God pronounced judgement on them. The godly heritage of his uncle, which could have been passed on, was destroyed.
Why? Because of Lot’s choices. He chose the better fields, subsequently, “pitching his tent toward Sodom.” (Gen. 13:8-13) He later lived in the city of Sodom and would have gone up in flames with it if it wasn’t for Abraham. (Gen. 18:22-33)
Sometimes it feels like our churches are filled with older sons, as in the parable of the prodigal son (Luke 15): our obedience is for the purpose of getting things from God.
We try to be faithful because we feel that warrants more love from our Father. Like the older son who got angry when the younger son received a feast after rebelling against his Dad. The older brother saw his obedience as something his father was indebted to. He didn’t obey because he loved his father, he obeyed because he loved the blessings his father would give him.
I look around at many conservative Anabaptists and see this same pattern happening.
I took a risk in asking some questions last week about Mennonite distinctives. I framed the questions so they would be probing, yet wide-open for any and all to answer. It felt risky, and proved to be so.
There’s no doubt in my mind that this is a pressure point. Call me naïve, but I honestly didn’t realize asking these questions would produce as many fireworks as it did. My intention was not to create an argument or discredit our Anabaptist heritage. It’s just that there are a few things I wanted to share with my generation and felt I had to first ask some (risky) questions.
Author Asher Witmer knows what it’s like to want freedom from sexual sin only to continually fail. We’re often told we need more personal discipline, that we need to think godly things instead of fleshly things.
What if I told you that discipline won’t solve your problem with lust?
Our male sexuality is given by God for advancing beauty and goodness. But somewhere along the line it becomes something that causes devastation and guilt. The good news is we don’t have to live with guilt. In Live Free, Asher Witmer shows us how we can find freedom from sexual sin, live with nothing to hide, and be able to fight for others.
