Who Am I? Anabaptist

This is the third installment of streams of theological thought that have influenced my current theological state. I am evangelical, Wesleyan, and Anabaptist.

Few people have connection to the anabaptist movement in our culture, so I will spend a little time explaining the movement. The anabaptist movement arose during the reformation period and was quickly dubbed the "radical reformation". They were persecuted both by Luther's reformtation churches and the Roman Catholic Church. They protested the connection between state politics and the church. They also believed that people should make a conscious decision to join Christ's church and not be "forced" to be a part by the state church which expected infants to be baptized as a sign of the Christian nation.

The anabaptist movement today is known best through the denominations known as Mennonites, or Brethren churches. I came in contact with anabaptist thought through the writing of John Howard Yoder, J Denny Weaver, Alan Kreider, and secondarily through Stanley Hauerwas, who is a Methodist theologian that has been influenced by Anabaptist thought.

Here are the points of Anabaptist thought that I find particularly helpful:

1. Anabaptists have always had a strong view of the church and community. Because they were so persecuted during the reformation and afterwards, they have a deep sense of community. And since they believed theologically that the church is made up of people that profess Christ and meet to be discipled in His ways (not just infant baptized at some point in the past) - they see church as the locus of God's activity in the world. The church's gathering becomes an outpost of God's reign in the midst of a world that is yet to be redeemed. For anabaptists, the church is not a building that individual Christians meet together in order to sing and hear a sermon. No, the church is the gathering of the spirit-filled community coming together to worship and disciple one another in how to live faithfully as Christ-followers.

2. Anabaptists have always led the way in caring for the poor, looking out for the outcast, etc. Possibly as a effect of their own persecution, Mennonite churches have always had a stong sense of connection with the poor and disenfrachised. For such a small denomination, the Mennonites have an incredible amount of influence in prison work, poverty issues, peace issues, and justice issues.

3. Anabaptists have a strong sense of discipleship in the way of Christ. The early anabaptist objected that discipleship is not a function of becoming a good state citizen, but is about following Jesus in his manner of life and his way of death. Therefore, they have an incredible way of reading the Gospels and accepting Christ's life as normative for Christian discipleship. Hence, they have a wonderful correction to many evangelicals that effectively believe that what is important about Christ is that he died to save us from sins. Anabaptists believe that Christ lived in order to show us how to live. Very inspiring...

4. Anabaptists have also led the way in peace witness. This peace witness comes from their reading of Christ's life and death. Christ lived as a servant and when he could have called ten thousand angels to defend himself, He chose to suffer as a servant to the world, and let God the Father vindicate him. Anabaptists believe that Jesus, in the way he lived and died, teaches us that suffering servanthood is a way of witness to our world. Trying to take control of the world through violence is contrary to Christ's life and to Christian discipleship. I must admit I have been profoundly enriched by this reading of Christ's life and death.

5. Finally, Anabaptists have been critical of the relationship between church and state. They are aware how discipleship in the way of Christ can be challenged by state citizenship - where the most important role of the individual is to be a good American and support the country's policies and war-making. Anabaptist believe that our primary allegience is to Christ and His church, and sometimes this demands a prophetic challenge to the culture.

Well enough for now. But hopefully, you can see how enriching Anabaptist thought can be, especially in conversation with evangelical and Wesleyan thought. I would love to hear comments about evangelicalism, Wesleyan, and anabaptist streams of thought. What streams are enriching you?