A Pilgrimage Of Faith, J.B. Toews, 1993

Japan; Alfred Foth, Uruguay and Emilio Zabala, Venezuela, REFLECTIONS ON OUR PAST AND A LOOK INTO THE FUTURE The rapid changes of the past three to four decades have left Mennonite Brethren somewhat stunned. Our preoccupa- tion with the struggles at home may have blunted our sensi- tivity to the need for changed strategies and relationships abroad, We failed in many cases to follow our own rheteoric of "Partnership in Obedience," Our missionaries, though sin- cere, reflected the lifestyle and relationships of the sending church. Missions is seldom better than the church that nur- tures and develops the missionaries that it sends. Our re- sponse to our failures should not be retrenchment but rather repentance. We should seek forgiveness from our brothers and sisters who failed to see in us and our missionaries the love and grace of Jesus expressed in partnership, identifica- tion and relationship. Our Mennonite Brethren Board of Missions/Services has adopted the slogan of "Global Mission." This suggests ending the division between missions abroad and missions at home, Mission abroad and evangelism at home are one in principle and must be our first passion. Our ability to act on this pas- sion depends on the renewal of the Mennonite Brethren Church in North America. 280 CHAPTER 20 Faith in Tension The 1990 convention of the General Conference of Mennonite Brethren Churches adopted a vision state- ment for the 1990s, The central issues facing the church were articulated in a series of questions; "What does it mean to be a Mennonite Brethren people? What does it mean to be a Mennonite Brethren Church? What are the bonds that hold us together?"1 The Mennonite Brethren are not alone in asking "Who are we?" and "What does it mean to be the church?" In a time of cultural relativism and religious pluralism virtually all reli- gious communities are asking the same question. The post- Second World War era appears to have removed all absolute standards. We find ourselves in a generation spiritually adrift, Pilate's question, "What is Truth?" (John 18:38), finds no defin- itive answer. Our culture of relativity and individualism has eroded the fabric of social and spiritual interdependence. Churches in North America, be they Baptist, Presbyterian, Catholic, Methodist, Episcopalian or Pentecostal, are struggling like never before with questions of theology and ethics.2 Mennonite Brethren, heirs of the sixteenth-century An- abaptists and with a history tested in isolation and persecu- tion, now find themselves buffeted on the open sea of Ameri- can Prote