A History of the Mennonite Brethren Church, Ja Toews

1 A HISTORY OF THE MENNONITE BRETHREN CHURCH For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ 1 Cor. 3:11 A HISTORY OF THE MENNONITE BRETHREN CHURCH PILGRIMS AND PIONEERS BY JOHN A. TOEWS Edited by A. J. Klassen Board of Christian Literature General Conference of Mennonite Brethren Churches Fresno, California A HISTORY OF THE MENNONITE BRETHREN CHURCH Copyright © 1975 Board of Christian Literature Library of Congress Card Number: 74-33718 Second printing 1982 Printed in the United States of America by the Mennonite Brethren Publishing House Hillsboro, Kansas 67063 To the "Company of the Committed" in our brother- hood, who with faith and courage under the guidance of the Holy Spirit endeavor to translate the Anabaptist Vision of Christian discipleship and community into the work, witness, and life-style of the church in the contemporary world. Introduction The Mennonite Brethren Church had its origin in the great awakening that came to the Russian Mennonite community in the middle of the nineteenth century. Some twenty years later, the early brethren assigned to P. M. Friesen, the leading Russian Mennonite historian, the task of researching and recording that beginning as a twenty-fifth anniversary tribute. However, it was not until 1910 that he finally completed his monumental account of the background and development of that movement in Die Alt-Evangelische Mennonitische Bruederschaft in Russland (The Old Evangelical Mennonite Brother- hood in Russia). In many ways, J. A. Toews' A History of the Mennonite Brethren Church: Pilgrims and Pioneers, is a fitting sequel to P. M. Friesen's work. The intervening years have witnessed many changes in the life of the church that he described. It is the purpose of this book to complete the story of the Mennonite Brethren to the present day. The need for an up-to-date history was born in the crisis of the search for identity that has become so apparent in the life of the church during the last decade or two. When the Board of Christian Literature received the mandate of the conference for the realization of this project in 1969, J. A. Toews was the unanimous choice for the difficult task. His training in the historical disciplines have led him to understand that the roots of the present are deep in the past. His many years of teaching and conference-wide ministry have involved him in the three main theaters of the Mennonite Brethren Church life which he describes: Russia, U.S.A. and Canada. We are greatly indebted to the author for the careful work he has done in recounting the Mennonite Brethren story with sensitivity and courage. His conclusions are based on a lifetime of careful research in Anabaptist-Mennonite history and theology as well as personal involvement in the life and ministry of the people he describes. The book is suffused with a love that is as warm as it is deep. E