-
-
The Season of Creation, an annual ecumenical initiative, concludes with the feast of Saint Francis of Assisi on 4 October. Inspired by his Canticle of Creatures and Romans 8:19-25, this prayer invites us to praise, repent and lament, and then “to hope and act with Creation”.
God, Creator of heaven and earth,
We praise you for the gift of life,
For the complexity, beauty and generosity of this world,
That sustains our existence and that of all your creatures.At the same time, we recognize the magnitude of what we have done:
Climate change, the collapse of biodiversity, pollution –
All consequences visited upon every one of your creatures.
We repent of injustice, oppression, destruction.We praise you for the sun, which warms every living thing,
And we lament the droughts that endure and worsen.
We praise you for the moon, which helps balance the earth’s systems,
And we lament the rising sea levels that threaten many populations.
We praise you for the wind, which maintains the water cycle vital to your creatures,
And we lament the increasingly devastating storms.
We praise you for water, without which there would be no life on earth,
And we lament the terrible floods that kill and destroy.
We praise you for fire, a purifying force and symbol of your presence for your people,
And we lament the ever-increasing fires that devour and suffocate.
We praise you for the earth, whose extravagant diversity of fruits nourishes us,
And we lament the impoverishment and pollution of the soil.God of oppressed peoples, God of endangered species,
You see that we are often both victims and perpetrators.
Thank you for your grace that forgives us again and again,
Thank you for your promise that evil will not triumph on earth or in our lives.Holy Spirit, you intercede for creation as it groans in the pains of childbirth,
You hear our sighs and our suffering with and for all your creatures.
Fill us with hope for the glorious day when all your children will be revealed,
And everything on earth and in heaven will be set free.Jesus Christ, you give us the ministry of reconciliation.
You show us the way to humility, peace and self-sacrifice.
Teach us to act out of love for our brothers and sisters, for all your creatures.
Set us in motion to proclaim your reign of justice, love and joy.Amen
—contributed by David Nussbaumer, European representative on the Creation Care Task Force
-
Africa
One of the events that bring people together among our people are funeral wakes and funerals.
Sometime last year, we had one of our church leaders have his wife taken to be with the Lord. It was a challenging time not only to the man, his family and the church, but the community as well. The community gathered every evening for four days before the actual funeral.
The man who lost his wife was a pastor and a respected leader. The death of this dear woman brought together church leaders and people who would otherwise not ordinarily meet and worship together!
The speakers and preachers on each of the days came from different churches and denominations. The unity of the body of Christ became a reality to many. Christ was lifted high, and the funeral wake literally became a revival of some kind. The presence of Christ was felt as the Spirit of God touched many who participated in these services.
Funerals are generally accompanied by mourning and grieving. In this instance there were signs of loss, but for the greater part it was indeed celebrating the life of one who had exemplarily walked with Jesus.
An exemplary walk
Testimony after testimony came from people who were not part of the church expressing how this departed sister and brother (the husband) had significantly touched their lives.
At the funeral service, one of her workmates (the deceased was a teacher) gave a touching testimony. When other teachers went on strike demanding what they believed to be their rights, the deceased never participated, believing that for her teaching was a calling. The welfare of children was her priority.
Parents’ representatives also testified of the same and that over the years the children she taught almost always produced the best results.
At her funeral, many people who had absolutely nothing to do with the church attended her funeral and testified of God’s love and goodness and the worth of following Jesus.
Let me point out that funeral wake gatherings are more or less cultural and expected. However, it is the Spirit’s demonstration of unity of the church and the reality of the transformative power of Jesus that was experienced during that time.
People still testify about that funeral wake to this day. The transformative power of Jesus made this funeral different from among many.
For us Christians and indeed many others, the funeral wake, and the funeral itself made the words Paul in Romans 14:7-9 come alive. These words continue to encourage us:
“For we do not live to ourselves, and we do not die to ourselves. If we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord; so then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s. For to this end Christ died and lived again, so that he might be Lord of both the dead and the living.”
Amen.
—Danisa Ndlovu is the MWC regional representative for Southern Africa. He is [role] in the Brethren in Christ Church in Zimbabwe.
This article is adapted from the speech he presented at Renewal 2024, “Transformed, together we live Jesus” 6 April 2024 in Brazil.
-
Indonesia
My wife and I have pastored together for 25 years at a church in downtown Jakarta with a congregation of around 250 people. We really enjoy our ministry’s call to grow together with the congregation we pastor.
We have one daughter who is now in her sixth semester of medical school preparing to become a doctor.
Since our time in the seminary, my wife and I have been mentors to more than 120 teenagers. We discipled them so that many of the active members in the church today are the teenagers we mentored.
If I were asked what position or role is the most meaningful, it would be being a father to the many foster children we have brought into our home as part of our family. I treasure this more than all the other roles I have held in our synod or national church or even globally.
A home with open doors
This story began when my wife and I were still dating at a seminary in Salatiga.
We had the same passion for loving children and young people, guiding them to know the Lord Jesus and to grow in all aspects of their lives. We both realized that our existence is only due to God’s grace; and we wanted other people to also experience God’s grace.
After we got married and our daughter was 10 months old, God sent a young man to us. He had no parents and was rejected by his family. His body was emaciated and he had a burst eardrum due to violence from his uncle.
A member of the congregation took him to our place and that night we agreed to take care of him. He stayed with us for many years. We were able to guide him to meet the Lord Jesus.
That young person went on to complete theology and mission studies and has been serving for 10 years as a missionary in the interior.
Since then, God has sent many children from various regions and ethnic backgrounds to our home.
Some 43 children have become part of our family. Generally, they are from poor families in villages and remote areas who don’t have a father or mother. Several of them have special needs or have conditions like epilepsy that need to be controlled by a doctor.
Bringing so many children into our home is not an easy thing. From the beginning we were committed to using our own money, which was very limited at first, even for daily meals. As pastors our income is not large. It became difficult when our foster children increased from 4 to 10 then 13 and then 17. Yet we see it as our calling to bear all their living expenses: food, clothing, school fees.
For two years we ate salted fish almost every day (which made my wife suffer from high blood pressure). But we never regret doing it because God gives us joy.
In the way of God
The hardest thing is not how to provide food, but how to educate our children in the way of God in light of their different family and cultural backgrounds.
We are not creating an orphanage, or even a dormitory for children. Instead, we are making them part of our family. We often tell our children that this is their home and this is a family, so that they rediscover the warmth and security of a family they never had.
Our goal is not only to allow them to pursue their dreams, but to educate them to become transformed by Christ and find their callings as his disciples.
When our daughter was in elementary school, she once asked: “Mom and Dad, why do you bring so many children into our house? Our house is so full. It would be nice if it was just the three of us living alone, and everything was mine.”
However, when she was a senior in high school, she wrote an essay for a writing competition hosted by the biggest newspaper in our country.
“I was born as an only child who should be able to enjoy that blessing without needing to share with others. But my father and mother brought many children to be raised in our house, which meant that I had to share everything, including my father and my mother. At first, I was sad and found it difficult to accept. But my parents were very loving people who longed for other children to feel God’s love and have a future. They allowed their lives to be disrupted so that they could become trees that sheltered many vulnerable people. Today, my house is filled relatives from all across Indonesia. I now understand that life must be shared. Where is the beauty of life if it is only lived for yourself?”
We shed tears as we read her reflection, grateful that she has also discovered that the true meaning of life is found only when we share.
As it turned out, she won the contest.
Currently, many of our children have graduated and are pursuing their vocations as pastors, missionaries, teachers, nurses and working in the marketplaces. If they ask, “How can we repay you for all the kindness you have shown as our father, mother and sister?” we always answer, “Repay it by sharing God’s love with others so that doesn’t just stop with you. We look forward to visiting you seeing many children in your families.”
Of course, there are many dynamics in this whole process – many joys and sorrows. But God has allowed our dream to be fulfilled.
Pray that our children will continue to become believers and faithful disciples, serving God according to their gifts and callings.
Blessed be the name of the Lord!
—Agus W. Mayanto is the Mennonite World Conference Regional Representative for Southeast Asia. He and his wife Rosmaida are co-pastors of GKMI Cempaka Putih Jakarta in Indonesia since 1999.
This article is adapted from the speech he presented at Renewal 2024, “Transformed, together we live Jesus” 6 April 2024 in Brazil.
-
Colombia
Called and chosen for God’s purpose on earth.
Where there is vision there is provision.
When the intention is to bring heaven to earth, it has God’s full support.
Thirty-three years ago, we heard a call for evangelism and church growth.
We began to participate in the Mennonite congregation in our home town Anolaima. At that time the pastor Peter Stucky gave us the endorsement to participate in the leadership and direction of this community. In those days there was a decline in membership to the point of wanting to close.
In the municipality of Anolaima it was never easy to evangelize because of its cultural background. We began the tasks of evangelizing in places outside the temple (church building). We wanted to preach the gospel where the lost were.
So we decided to go to the schools to preach to the children and to the young people, providing them with biblical principles and values as tools.
We also organized family conferences with the sole purpose that they would know us as an open broad-minded alternative, developing a culture of the kingdom of God.
We created a school for businesspeople as a model of self-sustainability.
We worked in the parks recovering spaces as an example of service and living better.
In those days, we received a vision from God to create a park to evangelize from nature – where the heavens tell the glory of God and the firmament announces the work of his hands (Psalm 19).
So we dreamed of a park in the midst of nature recreating the Word to help in the meeting of needs and delivery of the good news of salvation.
Why a park?
We couldn’t understand it but we began to dream without knowing, without money, but intent on it being God’s dream. In a meeting of fifty people from the church and using a clay vase as a symbol of our intention, we sowed a sunflower seed and gave birth to God’s dream of building a park so as to create a kind of tourism involving conversion and transformation.
It took some time before we were able to invest in a property. We saved US$ 30 000, bought and sold a 6 000 m2 property for US$ 45 000, and then acquired a 51 000 m2 plot of land for that amount.
When the vision is from God, faith becomes the currency that buys without money, since the seller charged US$ 75 000 and honoured us by sowing the remaining amount.
God is always faithful to provide for his own dreams when we make them our own.
We have had to learn to trust God: the work is God’s; we only accompany him.
An encounter with God
“IgleParque” (church park) presents moments from the biblical narrative in a natural setting. We respect nature, making the most of its majestic colours, diversity of birds and animals to enrich the biblical panorama.
Over the year, we attend to some 2 000 to 3 000 visitors including young children, families and congregations who spread the news by word of mouth.
Our purpose is to encourage visitors in their faith and in each of their felt needs, whether emotional or physical; to bring direction, light to their paths, through the knowledge of Jesus Christ.
We transmit a message of peace, since this is our mission as Mennonites.
IgleParque is an open space in a natural environment where visitors take with them an “unlimited” experience with God, since this project´s skies break the barrier that hinder their encounter with their Creator. Creativity is the primary instrument for a different evangelization, contemporary but with biblical elements.
For those who visit it, the park is a voice of hope because for any need there is a solution. There are 17 spaces to share biblical advice and interact with the good news of salvation.
IgleParque is a blessing not only for the visitors but for the city itself, since through it there has been blessing to hotels, restaurants and transportation. Due to its proximity to the capital city Bogotá (we are only 70 km away), it has been a meeting point for international visits. IgleParque has become a place to visit that opens a door for evangelism.
God has given us the strategy for an evangelization without limits. It is a two-hour tour that recreates faith, history and conviction for those of us who need God.
The park is at 60% of its construction, according to the vision, but the community is committed to finish what God faithfully began with us.
Passion drives the work
For more than 10 years, we have developed the IgleParque project step by step. It is a process with ups and downs, but we do not lose heart because God has given us his strength. We are learning to build by the power of the Word, faith and perseverance, making the impossible possible and the invisible visible.
In the process God has added people, one after another until we became a team and a family with the passion to turn a dream into a reality.
We have learned to build on the model of Jesus serving and managing divine, human and physical resources and transforming them with the creativity and blessing that God places in our hands.
We hope to be inspiration, motivation and testimony for the fulfillment of the Great Commission to go and make disciples of the nations from the perspective of a peacebuilding gospel (Matthew 28:19) but above all of faith in God and his Word.
—Eduardo and Lucy Bautista are pastors in the community of leaders at Iglesia Menonita Anolaima, Colombia.
-
Uruguay
In these last few years that I’ve been involved with Mennonite World Conference and particularly the Young AnaBaptists (or YABs) it has been awesome to connect with people from around the world and be enriched by their perspectives and ways of living their faith. This has opened my eyes and shown me Jesus in a way I hadn’t seen him before.
Today I want to share with you a testimony of how I’ve seen God move in a special way.
In Uruguay, we have beautiful beaches, and most Uruguayans love to take time off during the summer to go to the beach.
This is a time to unplug and rest, but also a time to party for most of the young people. And in church it is also a great time to do something cool with our youth because the pressure to go partying is huge.
So, we organize summer camps – one for the teenagers and one for the young adults of our Mennonite conference. Every year, around 40 teens and almost 100 young adults attend our camps which happen at a campsite right next to the beach! (This is awesome, as we can go to the beach at least twice a day.)
This is now the second year that I’ve led these camps with a friend, and it’s been a huge blessing.
Deep and nourishing chats
During the camp, I had several very deep and nourishing chats with some of the participants, which were often a great blessing to both of us.
One conversation in particular stood out for me. A girl came up to me one afternoon and asked if she could speak with me. I agreed and we sat in the grass in the shadow of one of the trees. She shared with me part of the story of her life and how she’d lately been very hesitant to accept Jesus as her Saviour because she didn’t feel ready. After hearing the messages at the camp, talking to our guest speaker and some others she had concluded that the gospel is much simpler than she thought, and she wanted to make the step to accept Jesus into her life.
I had the huge privilege of helping her make that prayer! And around a month later I received an invitation to attend her baptism. It was such an honour to be a part of it.
Another amazing experience was in our youth camp. On the first day the guest speaker conveyed the importance of sharing what we’re going through with others. Through an interactive activity he showed that everyone is being challenged, that it’s ok not to be ok, and to share this with others for support. This was super nourishing for everyone.
Sharing with others for support
In particular, I was amazed by how a small group of boys of around 13-14 years old immediately took action. All participants had to get up at 7:15 in the morning for morning sport. But from that day on till the end of camp, they got up at 6:00 a.m. They prepared their maté, talked about their challenges, and then discussed ways to build each other up and achieve their goals.
Seeing the fruits of all the previous work is amazing because before the camps, the entire team felt opposition. I faced a lot of challenges, struggling again with things I thought I had already won. But thanks to Jesus who kept inviting us to see all that he was about to do!
I think a verse that reflects pretty well what we experienced during this time is John 10:10: “The thief’s purpose is to steal and kill and destroy. My purpose is to give them a rich and satisfying life” (NLT).
Through this challenging time, I was able to see a glimpse of the rich and satisfying life that God has prepared for our youth and young adults and also even for myself.
—Valentina Kunze is the Young AnaBaptists (YABs) representative for Latin America. She is a member of Konferenz der Mennonitengemeinden in Uruguay.
This article is adapted from the speech she presented at Renewal 2024, “Transformed, together we live Jesus” 6 April 2024 in Brazil.
-
ELKHART, Indiana (Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary) — A collaboration formalized in 2020 between Mennonite World Conference (MWC) and Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary (AMBS) in Elkhart, Indiana, USA, is opening doors for people across the world to gain Anabaptist pastoral and leadership education.
Through existing programs and new initiatives, pastors and church leaders are taking both for-credit and noncredit AMBS courses in biblical and theological studies, ministry and church history in their home countries.
MWC General Secretary César García, PhD, described the collaboration as a response to a 2003 call for “sharing of gifts” among MWC member churches. AMBS is owned by Mennonite Church Canada and Mennonite Church USA — two of MWC’s 108 member churches.
Through AMBS’s connection with MWC, the seminary has been receiving a growing number of invitations from national church leaders to support the formation of Anabaptist leaders in their contexts. This has led to increased sharing of gifts as MWC member churches and other Anabaptist organizations have joined with AMBS in response. The seminary’s Forming Leaders Together campaign has been helping fund these collaborative efforts as well.
For example, in October 2023, Andi Santoso (MA 2022), Regional Director for Asia and the Middle East for Mennonite Mission Network (MMN); Joe Sawatzky, PhD (MDiv 2005), AMBS Global Leadership Collaborative Project Specialist, also of MMN; and David Boshart, PhD, AMBS President, were invited to teach a three-day course on leadership for about 30 students from five Anabaptist conferences in India. Each conference sent two women, two men and at least one youth to be trained to teach the material in their area going forward.
“We tested the materials with the leaders in advance and then revised them for contextual relevance, providing spaces in the curriculum for trainers to include case material from their local context,” Boshart said. “This material now belongs to these churches to use and adapt in ways that are most helpful in their settings.”
A partnership formalized in 2019 between AMBS and Meserete Kristos Seminary (MKS: Ethiopian Mennonite Seminary) in Bishoftu/Debre Zeit, Ethiopia, also has been strengthened through AMBS’s relationship with MWC. Together, MKS and AMBS leaders created a customized version of AMBS’s Master of Arts: Theology and Global Anabaptism to educate leaders for the Meserete Kristos Church. The students take a combination of semester-long online courses and short-term intensive courses adapted for the Ethiopian context and taught in person at MKS by AMBS professors. The program has 29 students; the first seven students graduated in 2023.
“Engaging with churches and emerging leaders in context strengthens our Teaching Faculty members because they are gaining broader exposure and appreciation for the global Anabaptist community, especially in the Global South,” Boshart noted.
—Annette Brill Bergstresser is Communications manager at Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary (AMBS), a learning community located in Elkhart, Indiana, USA, on ancestral land of the Potawatomi and Miami peoples. AMBS offers theological education for learners both on campus and at a distance and a wide array of lifelong learning programs — all with the goal of educating followers of Jesus Christ to be leaders for God’s reconciling mission in the world. ambs.edu
-
About the Faith & Life Commission
Anabaptist churches around the world live their faith diversely, addressing local challenges and opportunities while adhering to Shared Convictions.
The Faith & Life Commission enables MWC member churches to receive and provide counsel on Christian faith and practice, as well as on Anabaptist witness in the world today. This Commission encourages MWC member churches to develop relationships of mutual accountability regarding the convictions they hold and in the lives they live – locally, internationally and cross-culturally.
“The Faith & Life Commission is one nerve centre among many by which we do not ‘build the koinonia’ but tend, nurture and maintain the unity the Spirit creates. We thus hope in our small way not to impede, but to speed the signals the life-giving Spirit is sending along to the various parts of the body, or mosaic, to mix metaphors,” says Thomas R Yoder Neufeld, Faith and Life Commission chair.
What does the Faith & Life Commission do?
Members of Faith & Life and some other MWC representatives have engaged in dialogue with World Communion of Reformed Churches (WCRC). After years of planning, this process got underway in March 2023 in Canada.
Dialogue members have collaborated on a statement for the Zurich 2025 ecumenical worship service in Zurich, Switzerland. It will include remembering the past, lament for division and persecution, gratitude for steps toward reconciliation, desire to live in unity and commitment to common witness and engagement in justice and peace.
“In 2023 we launched the dialogue report on Baptism and Incorporation into the Body of Christ, the Church (2020) and a study guide to the report by Tom Yoder Neufeld. We continue to invite churches to engage with this report and send their response to it by November 2024,” says Anicka Fast, Faith and Life Commission secretary.
In the past year, Faith & Life has been sharing stories about entry into the global Anabaptist tradition and what the challenges are to unity in our various regions. These stories nurture initiatives to support member churches in living out unity in an increasingly polarized world.
In 2023, the Global Anabaptist Education Networks (GAEN) entered a relationship with the Faith & Life Commission, with two of its members becoming part of the Commission, pending General Council approval in 2025.
“Education networks are key to transmitting Faith & Life Commission resources to GAEN member schools, and supporting its goal of strengthening the church through Christ-centred faith formation,” says Anicka Fast.
Plans for the next year
Leading up to the commemoration of 500 years of Anabaptism in 2025, Faith & Life is envisioning some workshops for the General Council meetings in Germany in May 2025. The workshop materials will be made available to all churches after the meetings.
A major focus of the workshops will be on baptism, both because it’s the 500th anniversary of the first “believers baptism” in Zurich, and because Faith & Life has been centrally involved in helping MWC member churches engage the materials coming out of the Trilateral Dialogue on baptism.
“Most importantly, we want to encourage our churches to take this as an opportunity to strengthen and deepen our understanding and practice of baptism, especially its relationship to grounding our discipleship,” says Thomas R. Yoder Neufeld.
Other than baptism, two increasingly urgent topics will be on the Commission’s scope:
- Unity in diversity – continuing to work at helping our communion of churches deal with the real challenges of being one in the face of great diversity.
- Creation care – in the urgent pressure that the climate crisis brings, Faith & Life sees an urgency to extend beyond human relationships. Sustainable ways of living are an issue of faith and life.
“We are seeking ways to help our church family to engage with creation, as per God’s mandate for people to work it and take care of it in Genesis 2:15. We will be publishing a brief document on this topic this year,” says Anicka Fast.
“We have also been listening to Commission members emphasizing the importance of producing theological resources for the global church that respond to felt needs especially in the Global South. Within this are some passionate discussions about how to connect these theological resources with today’s youth and young adults. We hope to work at this in collaboration with GAEN and the Creation Care Task Force,” says Anicka Fast.
“In essence, we are helping churches to be faithful in discipleship and to learn to live with diversity. Since the church is God’s peacebuilding project, everything we do to assist the church to be more faithful is peacebuilding. In this way, Faith & Life lives the MWC tagline Following Jesus, Living Out Unity, and Building Peace,” says Thomas R. Yoder Neufeld.
-
“Do not be conformed to this age, but be transformed by the renewing of the mind so that you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.” Romans 12:2 (NRSVUE).
Renewal is the name that Mennonite World Conference has given to a decade of regional events around the memory of the five centuries of our existence as a community of faith.
We are approaching these 10 years of commemorations by focusing on our history from a global, ecumenical and transcultural perspective.
These words from the apostle Paul help us to remember the past and look toward the future.
We express gratitude to God for inheritance of the faith we have received.
But we also come before the Lord in a spirit of repentance and renewal, committed to learning from the past to grow in our relationship with God both here and now and in the years to come.
Transformation
We explore how our Anabaptist tradition has understood discipleship as an ongoing process of transformation.
First: transformation is a journey where we leave things behind and take other new things along the way.
It implies continuous movement. We constantly abandon a place and move forward. We move against the religious spirit that affirms absolute certainty of doctrines, dogmas and ethics, we affirm the need to renew our minds, therefore being open to challenging beliefs and ethics as our spiritual ancestors did in the 16th century.
Second: transformation in the Bible is never an individualistic experience.
It is always communal. We do it together because it requires dialogue and interdependency.
Our community’s diversity of positions allows us to correct the direction we are taking in the transformation process.
Focussed on Jesus
Our brothers and sisters help us discover those things we need to change, leave or incorporate to become like Jesus.
And that takes us to the third biblical comment or component of transformation: the person of Jesus.
Not all change is valid.
As followers of Jesus, we cannot support transformation in any direction. To be faithful disciples, changes in our beliefs and ethics must be made to make us similar to the character and person of Jesus.
As Paul says, “until all of us come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to maturity, to the measure of the full stature of Christ” (Ephesians 4:13).
Transformation in unity is a challenge historically faced in the Anabaptist world. Too often renewal movements have faced rejection which has produced divisions. Transformation has not always been toward Jesus’ character.
So today we need to recover the vision of Mennonite World Conference:
We want to be a global church where we follow Jesus, live out unity and build peace.
We are a body of more than 10,000 local congregations in distributed in 110* national churches distributed around the world, with more than 1.5 million baptized believers. We need each other to be transformed to the image of Jesus.
As we thank God for opportunities to be transformed, let us also maintain an attitude of repentance for our divisions.
Let us ask for forgiveness for our hesitance to change.
Let us repent from our pride and the attitude of judging the transformation process of others instead of participating in it with love and patience.
Let’s seek the renewal from a contrite heart that recognizes its need for continuous transformation.
May we be transformed together into Jesus’ image.
—César García is general secretary of Mennonite World Conference. Originally from Colombia, he lives in Kitchener, Ontario, Canada.
*Number of MWC member churches after Executive Committee meetings in Brazil, April 2024.