Churches, Dealerships, and Franchises

[steve-in-kville]

I fundamentally think we have a major ecclesiology problem that needs to be fixed for a change that matters in 500 years. I feel we are on the cusp of something...and folks across the sector are realizing the western structures, including all aspects of CA churches, are not quite working.

This is my opinion, and perhaps part of the reason why we left the conservative circles: most groups have become all about preservation of their standards and practices and not enough about personal growth. Many have become very exclusive which is a turn off to outsiders looking in.

Just my two cents.

[Josh]

I am not convinced that the movement in Anabaptist churches is primarily driven by "what we are allowed to do." That is a factor...however their are larger sociological and ecclesiological issues at play I think that are sector wide in the western/protestant churches that have folks lacking church stability. Vanishingly few people are in the churches their grandparents or great grandparents are in. That applies to basically every plain ordnung out there including Eastern, Pilgrim, Groffdale, Weaverland, etc...none of which existed 140 or so years ago...

I fundamentally think we have a major ecclesiology problem that needs to be fixed for a change that matters in 500 years. I feel we are on the cusp of something...and folks across the sector are realizing the western structures, including all aspects of CA churches, are not quite working.

Could you express a bit of self-insight why you chose to move to a much more transitional church group that has a much larger list of things you are "allowed to do"?

I am saying this because I rarely see folks such as yourself ever choose a group that is more "strict". This shows to me that the heart of the person who leaves a church group is usually a heart that seeks to be closer to the world. We can judge it by its fruits - their children and grandchildren often end up much, much closer to the world, if not deeply embedded in it.

[Judas Maccabeus]

I am not convinced that the movement in Anabaptist churches is primarily driven by "what we are allowed to do." That is a factor...however their are larger sociological and ecclesiological issues at play I think that are sector wide in the western/protestant churches that have folks lacking church stability. Vanishingly few people are in the churches their grandparents or great grandparents are in. That applies to basically every plain ordnung out there including Eastern, Pilgrim, Groffdale, Weaverland, etc...none of which existed 140 or so years ago...

I fundamentally think we have a major ecclesiology problem that needs to be fixed for a change that matters in 500 years. I feel we are on the cusp of something...and folks across the sector are realizing the western structures, including all aspects of CA churches, are not quite working.

Could you express a bit of self-insight why you chose to move to a much more transitional church group that has a much larger list of things you are "allowed to do"?

I am saying this because I rarely see folks such as yourself ever choose a group that is more "strict". This shows to me that the heart of the person who leaves a church group is usually a heart that seeks to be closer to the world. We can judge it by its fruits - their children and grandchildren often end up much, much closer to the world, if not deeply embedded in it.

I cannot fathom why anyone would want to move toward the “evangelical “world. That is what I ran from.

[ohio jones]

2. On one side, you might have folks who live very simply, and engineer their own way of getting their van started such as a push button to run the fuel pump for 15 seconds prior to trying to start the car, and a metal rod sticking out of the dash that adjusts the vent. (I rode in such a vehicle recently.)

Okay, I have to ask about this one. Is there an actual objection to starting the vehicle normally, or did something stop working and they rigged up a cheap fix instead of repairing it?

[ken_sylvania]

2. On one side, you might have folks who live very simply, and engineer their own way of getting their van started such as a push button to run the fuel pump for 15 seconds prior to trying to start the car, and a metal rod sticking out of the dash that adjusts the vent. (I rode in such a vehicle recently.)

Okay, I have to ask about this one. Is there an actual objection to starting the vehicle normally, or did something stop working and they rigged up a cheap fix instead of repairing it?

I'm going to venture a guess that any objection to starting normally came from the vehicle rather than the owner.

[Ernie]

2. On one side, you might have folks who live very simply, and engineer their own way of getting their van started such as a push button to run the fuel pump for 15 seconds prior to trying to start the car, and a metal rod sticking out of the dash that adjusts the vent. (I rode in such a vehicle recently.)

Okay, I have to ask about this one. Is there an actual objection to starting the vehicle normally, or did something stop working and they rigged up a cheap fix instead of repairing it?

The latter. But this family would encourage everyone to do this, so as to live a more simpler life and not feel a need to keep up with the Jones's. And if I did not have the time or know how to do what he did, the husband in this family would offer to do it for me for free if I would let him.

About a year ago, this husband (a man not raised Christian or Anabaptist) was encouraged by an Old Order Mennonite, to stop charging labor for his work and simply accept donations. The idea is to trust God more and not be so capitalistic. So this brother took the OO man serious and started doing so.
I asked whether he gets as much income as he did before switching to donations and he said, "I do not. But I have enough to meet our needs. Things do get a little tight sometimes. But if I made more money, then I'd have to think about what to do with it. I don't have that worry anymore."

If I was in his shoes, I would charge labor and buy myself a van that is 10 years old, and get rid of my 28 year old van. But his values are different than mine, and I actually admire him for being radical. He is currently building himself a house out of 4 shipping containers.

[Ernie]

I'm going to venture a guess that any objection to starting normally came from the vehicle rather than the owner.

[Ernie]

If you allow such persons to join the church and demand changes.

Well, not allowing transitional persons (or specifically transitional persons who then get away with demanding changed) to join would be a good thing. But I haven't seen any transitional places that are able to actually put this in practice.

Neither have I. I don't even know that transitional churches even attempt this as this is not a concern of theirs when interview prospective church members.  (There may a be a few non-transitional folks in the church who might have this concern, but there isn't really anything they can do about it in the end, since the church as a whole is transitioning and that is where the momentum is.)

That could be true. It would be interesting to see a church body that explicitly set out to make transitional people uncomfortable.

Isn't that what Old Orders and Ultra conservatives do? Which is why people are leaving those churches to join transitional churches.
Actually, OO's and ultra CA's believe that keeping things the same is a good thing, and making transitional people uncomfortable, is simply a byproduct.

Instead, what I usually see is endeavoring to make transitional people more comfortable, as long as they are coming from a "more conservative" church.

Yep.

[Ernie]

Not really, no, because I don't think there is any value in holding up my own family as somehow being holier or more spiritual than the rest of my brethren, nor that thinking my light shines a bit brighter than theirs does. If there is a problem, I would try to address it church or school wide, and if I'm not successful, I will simply have to accept that I'm wrong (or that I didn't win).

So, for example, I have certain opinions but they aren't shared church wide, and once my kids are in school, I won't have any control over that. For example, I don't feed my kids junk food including toxic, unhealthy industrially produced processed foods like Cool-Whip. However, once they go to school and are served things like "hot lunch", they will undoubtedly be served junk food. I am not going to take a special stance that "no, you can't serve my kids the same food everyone else is eating". I accept this even though I think eating such food will have long-term negative effects on their health.

Likewise I think WhatsApp and text/chat groups are very harmful for young people. But (assuming nothing changes between now and then), I would let my kids join the youth chat when they are 15½ or 16, because I don't think isolating them from the rest of the youth group would be a good thing.

I have expressed my opposition to allowing children in school to use any Internet connected computers, and that it is not necessary for typing class, but so far I don't think I will be successful in my opposition to it between now and when my kids are in a grade to take typing class. (There are offline typing programs, but it's easier for a teacher to just get a computer and type in "typing.com" and then ignore the kids for 15 minutes. The problem with those free online ones is that it exposes kids to a lot of questionable advertising.) I don't want my kids exposed to the Internet like that, but I will not demand that they somehow get special treatment compared to the rest of the class.

I have seen what happens when parents think they are "special" and want every little accommodation for their own quirks and preferences. In fact I spend a great deal of my time trying to help rehabilitate a person who was raised such a way. It is something I want no part of the fruit of. If you see the church falling apart, you just have to accept that your family and children and grand-children will fall apart, too.

Interesting. Will your kids go to a Holdeman school?

I think you have indicated that there is a range of behavior in the Holdeman church. I assume that you are ok with parents holding to the more conservative side of the group if they wish, as long as they don't insist on something that even the conservatives aren't doing?

In most OO and ultra-CA churches, there are the conservatives, the middle of the road folks, and the fence pushers. (And some folks in between.)
There is some migration between the groups, (a conservative teen might not like always being on the conservative side and heads for the middle or the fence; or a person in a fence pushing family or middle of the road wants something more principled than what his parents gave him and ends up as a conservative). But in general, the next generation typically ends up about where their parents and grandparent's are/were.
Families in transitional churches don't have this luxury, as they often need to change churches if they want their children to end up at about the same place as themselves.

[Ernie]

Vanishingly few people are in the churches their grandparents or great grandparents are in. That applies to basically every plain ordnung out there including Eastern, Pilgrim, Groffdale, Weaverland, etc...none of which existed 140 or so years ago...

I don't know what you are seeing that I am not...
The far majority of Plain Anabaptists are in a church that is very similar to their church of 150 years ago, even if it had a different name at one point.