These Mennonfestos were inspired our dear friend Peter Guertzen. Peter was listening to the NPR programe Fresh Air with Terry Gross. She was interviewing a non-Christian Left-winger who wrote a book about the Religious Right. As Peter listened to the interview, he was repelled by the understanding of Christianity which was given to this man by the Religious Right. On the other hand Peter felt himself rising to the defense of Christianity as this man completely dismissed the idea of creation and the essentially proclaimed Christianity stupid. He felt this tension inside. On one hand there was his own disgust with the Religious Right. On the other was his deeply held sympathies for Christianity. He felt a need for an articulation of Christianity which was not like that of the Religious Right, but that could be seen as a compelling and radical interpretation of the teachings of Christ. Something that would have more integrity and be more compelling than mainstream Christianity. He wondered what would be the result of a number of Anabaptists writing their understanding of Christianity which could be compiled into a book as a statement of Anabaptist Christianity. In answer to his call, Michael Hostetler, Darrel Hershberger, and I (Jordan Ehst) have written the following papers. We each have a little bit of a different angle.
Michael’s paper focuses on his understanding of the theological and worldview foundations of Christianity and how these boil down into a compelling view of the Kingdom of God.
Paper coming soon.
Darrell’s narrative account of the history of God and the world shows in a simple way God’s good creation, the fall of man, and the redemption God is bringing to his world through Jesus.
Download Darrell’s Paper as a Word Document
Download Darrell’s Paper as a PDF file
My paper attempts to give my understanding of the answer to “What does it mean to be a disciple of Jesus Christ?”, which I see as the essence of Christianity.
3 responses so far ↓
Mike Fisher // November 2, 2006 at 10:02 pm
Jordan, a question on this quotation from your paper:
“Matthew 18 gives the way in which the local church is to settle conflicts and determine what or who is right. Christ says in Matthew 16 and 18 that the church has the power to declare what is right and wrong.”
Shouldn’t this statement be qualified in such a way as to allow for the possibility that our fallenness as human beings may cause mistakes in judgment (even corporate judgments by mature Christians)?
Great reading, Jordan.
musicoflife // November 3, 2006 at 3:51 am
Mike, what you say is right. The ability of humans and churches to determine what is right is diminished or distorted by sin, but I am still reeling from Yoder’s discussion of this after having read it about 9 months ago. “If you go about [reconciliation]in an open context, where both parties are free to speak, where additional witnesses provide objectivity and mediation, where reconciliation ist he intention and the expected outcome is a judgement that God himself can stand behind, the the rest of the practical moral reasoning process will find its way.” from The Priestly Kingdom Ch. 1 He goes on to explain the “binding and loosing” by say that God has so much “faith” in the ability of the church to use the Matt. 18 method of determining it, that the conclusions of the church are ‘as if it were bound or loosed in heaven’.
Javan // November 6, 2006 at 8:12 am
The power in Yoder’s ecclesiology (i still havent finished Priestly Kingdom, but I have read Body Politics twice or so) is his assertion that God can reveal himself through community…through a collection of his people…on a level that he doesnt always individually. As Anabaptists face postmodernity, and re-evaluate what their heritage has to teach them, they may need to reverse the trend of putting focus on “personal convictions” and taking another look at how God plans to indwell and use Christ’s Body on earth.