Interested in learning about Holdemans

[JohnH]

And I have avoided specifically relying on the testimony of people that leave. Uniformly. I have heard it said that what is preached from the pulp it is that the Church of God in Christ, Mennonite is the only way to salvation, and its baptism is the only true baptism. You just can't escape that.

This is simply not what I’ve ever heard. We learn that salvation comes from faith in and following Jesus.

[JohnH]

JohnH, I don't often converse with you on MN but I think you should reconsider putting your thoughts about this on a public forum. I don't want to be a part of a conversation that you might regret at a future date.

Can you be more specific?

[ken_sylvania]

Overall, the story of trying to have relationships with other conservative Mennonite groups is pretty much the same old story for Holdemans: if we try to do something together, like have young people go to a CAM type of service-oriented mission, the other people express shock that "your church doesn't let you do X thing", and then say if you joined our church, you'd be allowed to do X and Y thing. Then the other people express more shock that "your church doesn't let you leave".

This is a general mindset that does not lead to spiritual fruit and one that, as a whole, we have decided we don't want to participate in. If other plain people decide that's how they want to do things, they may do so. I would note that the most thriving Anabaptist groups at this point in time are the ones who are erecting fairly high walls around such things. The future of Anabaptism is not figuring out how to get on a slow-moving escalator that still ultimately leads to the world.

I have no objection to working together with Holdemans on various projects, and I don't think proselytes who are coming for greater freedoms make good church members.

I think your claim that the Holdemans have a history of trying to have relationships with other conservative Mennonite groups lacks a historical basis.

[JohnH]

I think your claim that the Holdemans have a history of trying to have relationships with other conservative Mennonite groups lacks a historical basis.

When I lived in Kidron we did stuff like conduct "pizza drives" to raise funds for someone in the community with medical bills. Mostly done with Amish folks.

In the past young people have done service projects with CAM.

People used to interact with AF, too.

Generally speaking, the two mindsets are just too different. Holdemans are not familiar nor comfortable with a setting where people come together with a variety of practices, enter close fellowship, yet somehow still evaluate each other as faithfully living for God. I am not convinced conservative Anabaptists are actually good at doing this, but they do try to do it. But Holdemans simply can't handle it at all.

(I personally can and will go to something like AIC and enjoy it. The only other Holdemans you'll run into is either an occasional person there because they have a relative to visit there, or else another person from a seeker background.)

Overall, I've learned to respect this and it does actually lead to a more wholesome spiritual life since you aren't always busy trying to figure out how to mix different practices. I think the wide variety of Anabaptist practices is a relatively recent thing, too. There were far fewer groups even as recently as the 1950s.

[Anthony]

Instead of everyone overreacting, it should be obvious on some level the Holdemans have drifted from a hardcore OTC policy into a “we know where the true church is, we dont know where it isnt” policy. JohnH talked about “i hope everyone finds ‘A’ true church that is visible” earlier in the thread, and says that holdemans view the panels with a level of trauma.

[Ernie]

JohnH talked about “i hope everyone finds ‘A’ true church that is visible” earlier in the thread,

And then JohnH goes on to say that he doesn't really know of any other Anabaptist groups in America that fit that criteria. If this represents the viewpoint of the rank-and-file Holdeman, then we know what Holdeman's functionally believe, regardless of what nuanced verbiage they use to soften their stated views.

[Anthony]

JohnH talked about “i hope everyone finds ‘A’ true church that is visible” earlier in the thread,

And then JohnH goes on to say that he doesn't really know of any other Anabaptist groups in America that fit that criteria. If this represents the viewpoint of the rank-and-file Holdeman, then we know what Holdeman's functionally believe, regardless of what nuanced verbiage they use to soften their stated views.

Im not gonna comb through the entire thread cause im lazy, and John will probably respond in 15 minutes, but even words like “other groups that fit the criteria” implies there hypotheically could be a true church outside of the holdemans, even if none exist.

I view this as soft a OTC stance you can get without fully dropping it.

[JohnH]

JohnH talked about “i hope everyone finds ‘A’ true church that is visible” earlier in the thread,

And then JohnH goes on to say that he doesn't really know of any other Anabaptist groups in America that fit that criteria. If this represents the viewpoint of the rank-and-file Holdeman, then we know what Holdeman's functionally believe, regardless of what nuanced verbiage they use to soften their stated views.

Of the ones I am familiar with, there is something that I don’t agree with in terms of doctrine or practice. That is just my own opinion though. I am not in charge of deciding what is a true church and not.

I have endeavoured to explain what Holdemans actually believe and practice. Many myths seem to abound. I would like to correct those myths. Ultimately, they do believe in a true church doctrine, but that is a trait of much of Dutch Anabaptism and some of Swiss Anabaptism, so they are not unique in that regard.

The level of vitriol between non-Holdemans and Holdemans is saddening. I appreciate a few in this thread who were willing to lay that aside. I sometimes feel frustrated with this. The Holdeman church was a very big blessing to me at a point in time when I was so frustrated with Swiss Anabaptism that I was ready to leave it and never look back and simply accept a church I didn’t share much doctrine or practice with.

[Ernie]

Of the ones I am familiar with, there is something that I don’t agree with in terms of doctrine or practice. That is just my own opinion though. I am not in charge of deciding what is a true church and not.

We are trying to learn the functional beliefs of Holdeman's. You are the only representative here on MN that I am aware of. While we are glad to hear your own opinions, we are also trying to learn what the majority of Holdeman's believe. I'm not confident that we are really getting an accurate picture in this thread.

Most of us Plain Anabaptists on MN believe that most other Plain Anabaptist churches are part of the one true church. You've made it clear that you are not of this persuasion. You are welcome to that belief but I for one am trying to learn whether this is indeed the view of most Holdeman's.

[JohnH]

Of the ones I am familiar with, there is something that I don’t agree with in terms of doctrine or practice. That is just my own opinion though. I am not in charge of deciding what is a true church and not.

We are trying to learn the functional beliefs of Holdeman's. You are the only representative here on MN that I am aware of. While we are glad to hear your own opinions, we are also trying to learn what the majority of Holdeman's believe. I'm not confident that we are really getting an accurate picture in this thread.

Most of us Plain Anabaptists on MN believe that most other Plain Anabaptist churches are part of the one true church. You've made it clear that you are not of this persuasion. You are welcome to that belief but I for one am trying to learn whether this is indeed the view of most Holdeman's.

I can say with confidence other Holdemans don’t believe other plain churches are part of the “one true church” (with a possible exception of a congregation we don’t know about that shares enough doctrine and practice we would easily be united with them).

However, they would say many believers in other churches are sincere and are “brothers in Christ”, but not a “brother in the faith”. I have only heard older (60+) people use those phrases with that distinction.

I have run all these questions by other Holdemans to find out what they believe as opposed to just my own opinions.

You can occasionally find a Holdeman that doesn’t believe in an otc doctrine at all. This is tolerated provided they don’t spread it to others, promote it, and don’t have other spiritual problems. If they do lack of otc belief is often considered the root problem.

My understanding is that the national churches in Haiti and Nigeria take a much more hardline view and would consider far fewer other Christians in their national area to be “saved”. For example in Haiti they consider basically all the Catholics there not saved.