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PERSONAL OPINION
The Mennonite Brethren Church in two millennia

John H. Redekop

Although the second millennium A.D. does not actually end until December 31, 2000 – the first decade ended at the close of year 10, not 9; the first century at the close of year 100, not 99; and the first millennium at the close of year 1000, not 999 – most of humanity is celebrating the close of the year 1999. This means that some of us will be celebrating God’s grace and goodness twice. Since a thousand years is like a day to God (II Peter 3:8), a difference of a year is not particularly critical to God’s people. End of millennium reflections are equally timely now or a year from now.

Looking back.

For Mennonite Brethren in North America, the 20th century, the first full century of our denominational existence, has been extremely important. Founded in the Ukraine on January 6, 1860 as a tiny offshoot of the larger Mennonite Church, the Mennonite Brethren movement until 1900 was preoccupied with strengthening itself first as a renewal venture and then, after 1874, as an immigrant community in the United States. However, major transitions occurred among Mennonite Brethren in North America in the 20th century.

Missions. Following some early missionary initiatives at the close of the 19th century, MBs’ North American-based missionary movement reached its peak between 1940 and 1960, when a denomination-wide burden for the lost, expanding material resources and missionary training opportunities converged.

Bible schools. Not surprisingly, the decades 1940-1960 were also the golden age of the MB Bible school movement, with more than 30 in existence (although some for only a decade or two) in the United States and Canada. We are still benefiting greatly from that educational initiative. It is doubtless one of the reasons why our seniors today are the major financial supporters and prayer warriors for the cause of missions.

Language transition. Because major MB migration to the US began in the 1870s but major MB migration to Canada did not occur until the early 1900s, the transition to English occurred in the US sooner than in Canada. In the US, it was almost complete when World War II broke out in 1939. In Canada, it began seriously only during that war, and English did not become the dominant language until the late 1950s or early 1960s.

Home missions. With the transition to English, a whole new emphasis on local outreach and “home” missions was launched. An ethno-religious immigrant people had come to realize that the Great Commission referred not only to “regions beyond” but also to “Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria”. It was difficult for some people to accept the social, marital and other consequences, but the commandment could not be denied.

Polity issues. MB congregations also had to process another fundamental shift in the late 1950s and the 1960s: the sometimes painful transition to a paid pastorate. In the last decades of the 20th century, two other matters had to be processed: first, the place of women in ministry, and, second, the relationship of the missionary-sending conferences (Canada and the US) to the rapidly expanding sister conferences which had developed around the world as a result of our mission efforts.

Socio-economic transitions. Socio-economic change has been rapid, especially in Canada. The major MB migrations to the US took people to farms. In Canada, while earlier and smaller migration waves took MBs mostly to farms, the major migrations after World War II, from Europe and Latin America, took people mainly to professions in the cities. Together with the rapidly increasing prosperity in farm areas in the 1940s, this transformed MBs in Canada, and to a lesser extent in the US, from a rural immigrant people to an urban people, and from relative poverty to middle-class or upper middle-class prosperity. By the end of the 20th century, Mennonite Brethren in both the US and Canada were found in disproportionately high numbers among the affluent. Especially in Canada, Mennonite Brethren are heavily represented in all of the major professions, in culture and even in politics at all levels.

Looking ahead.

As Canadian and American Mennonite Brethren enter the 21st century, we face at least six crucial questions.

Will we be able to retain a distinctive evangelical-Anabaptist understanding of the church, of Christian discipleship and of the Great Commission, or will we be submerged in the mainstream of North American evangelicalism? With increasing numbers of our pastors seeming to neglect those particular emphases which justify the existence of a separate denomination, one wonders how long our denominational existence is warranted and how long it will survive. Will we be able to accommodate the still-increasing emphasis on congregational autonomy, an emphasis which in several respects runs counter to our understanding of brotherhood? As we become socially and economically integrated into Canadian and American society, will we be able to retain an understanding of what it means to be a people separated unto God? Will we function as such a people? Having decided to dismantle our North American General MB Conference structures, will Canadian and American MBs find new ways to cooperate with one another and also with the 15 MB sister conferences around the world, or will we content ourselves with localism? Will the initial preoccupation with “the regions beyond” be replaced by a preoccupation with “Jerusalem”? While we have to some extent discussed the questions, we still have not successfully processed the social and theological consequences of calling ourselves both “Mennonite” (with its dual ethnic and religious connotations) and “Brethren” (a significant problem for some). Most new MB churches no longer call themselves Mennonite Brethren, and these issues will not simply go away. Perhaps the biggest question facing a growing segment of our increasingly prosperous congregations is simply this: Will spirituality survive affluence?

John H. Redekop is on the faculty of Trinity Western University and is a member of Bakerview MB Church in Abbotsford, B.C.

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Last modified January 12, 2000.

© 2000 Mennonite Brethren Herald.
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