Reforming Anabaptists

As our Anabaptist traditions fade and are replaced with more modern Protestant and Catholic ideas, many forms of church function are changing. We are replacing the tradition of our fore-bearers with the traditions of the fore-bearers of the Reformers. Teaching, doctrine, and style of the last five hundred years are being pulled up and quickly and quietly chucked out of the window as we scramble to replace our backward and embarrassing past with the prestigious and regal formalities of the Calvinists. All but Calvinism itself has been accepted, with patriotism being lauded as Christlike, weapons of self defense touted proudly, and Zionism becoming the norm; all the while we cover our mantles with guns, flags, and crosses.

How do Mennonites become functioning Calvinists? By turning from studying the Word to following loud, confident men. We listen hungrily to the confidence and emotion of teachers who teach the religion of Americanism. We drink up stories of the nobility of long dead men, fantasizing about becoming them, idolizing those who came before us. Instead of turning to the purity of Christ and His Word, we take in the predigested words of those who speak boldly. We idolize fallen humans of the Old Testament; sinners who are under grace, just as we are, and relish in the violence of their lives. We take the stories of Godly men and deify those men, rather than glorify the Creator of men.

Sadly very few people born as Mennonites believe or even understand anything that the Anabaptists taught. The last century of Mennonites have left a poor example of leadership and theology and instead of improving the situation, we have abandoned the focus that the original Anabaptists taught; namely, following Christ and only Christ. Instead, the majority of Mennonites have become "Reformers in Denial". That is, they adopt the teaching of Reformed personalities on tv, youtube, and the radio without understanding the theology and meaning or implications behind that teaching. We have become starved for leadership, and like starving men, we stopped checking what we are using to fill that void. In our hurry to have human leaders to look up to and admire, we have trampled the foundation that our Anabaptist forbearers insisted upon: the literal interpretation of Christ's commands and obedience to them. 

Instead of this literal interpretation, we have substituted the doctrines of the Reformed Church. Our churches may not accept TULIP theology in so many words as of yet, but that is usually out of ignorance, not disagreement. We have turned from a literal application of the Sermon on the Mount to the American Reformed teachings of justified lethal self-defense, the glory of mammon in the form of capitalism, and the inalienable rights that are promised to all men that are not found in the Bible, but instead in American Scripture, the Constitution. We reinterpret loving your enemies to somehow exclude the actual enemies of the United States or those of the new nation of Israel. The teaching of the Anabaptists is dead, so now Mennonites are now scrambling to join Calvin's followers, a mere five hundred years late to the party.

Our Anabaptist heritage doesn't make us better than other Christians, however the teaching of the original Anabaptists still is founded upon God's truth. Not because its labelled Anabaptist, but because it is founded in following Christ, literally and fully. It is not founded in adding teaching to Scripture, such as the Just War Theory or TULIP. Instead, Anabaptism is about removing these human doctrines from our faith. 

Sadly, most Mennonites don't even know the term Anabaptist, nor what it means. We have become ignorant, both of history and theology. As such we have turned to predigested theology offered in an appealing way through some easy to use media, be that tv, the radio, or youtube. As such, I very much doubt that my son's generation will have any qualms about Reformed doctrine, as the majority of them won't even bother to find out what that means. Instead, it will just permeate the church as the easiest and most available teaching to digest, with very few, if any, to care enough to find out why so many of their forefathers were martyred for disagreeing with the Reformed doctrines. While our forefathers were willing to die for rejecting man's doctrine mixed with God's command, we cannot be bothered to tell the difference.