A History of the Mennonite Brethren Church, Ja Toews

was destined to play a leading role in the early history of the Mennonite Brethren in America. It also became the mother church of several congregations in Reno, McPherson and Harvey counties. The man whom the Lord used as a "chosen instrument" in organizing and establishing the Ebenezer Church as well as scattered groups of believers throughout the Midwest was elder Abraham Schellenberg (1845-1920) who arrived in Kansas on July 7, 1879. At the age of thirty he had been elected elder of the Rueckenau, Molotschna, M.B. Church in Russia, and served effectively as local leader and itinerant minister until his emigration in 1879. Upon his arrival in Kansas the Ebenezer M.B. Church immediately elected him as elder and he served in this capacity for thirty years. J. H. Lohrenz gives the MENNONITE BRETHREN COME TO THE UNITED STATES 135 following summary of the many significant involvements of Schellenberg in the work of the brotherhood: He at once began to minister to other M.B. Churches and was helpful to them in organization, guidance, discipline, exhortation, and nurture in the Word. He filled a very important role in the M.B. Conference. He served as moderator eighteen times between the years 1880 and 1900. The Conference assigned to him evangelistic and itinerating work for sixteen years. He strongly urged the M.B. Conference to begin its own Foreign Mission, and when this was begun he was chosen chairman of the Committee and served for many years. He was among the first to advocate the publishing of a church paper and later continued to be a hearty supporter of the publishing efforts of the Conference. He understood the importance and need of advance in education in the M.B. Church, and the Conference began the German Department School in McPherson . . . largely because of his influence. He encouraged the founding of Tabor College and continued to be a faithful supporter of the school. ..." The Ebenezer M.B. Church prospered under Schellenberg's lead- ership. When a sanctuary was built in 1880, the mother church in the Molotschna contributed two hundred rubles. It was perhaps inevitable that Schellenberg's strong personality, which in so many ways overshadowed that of his coworkers, would create tensions in the leadership of the congregation. In 1893 the associate ministers Franz Ediger, Peter Wall and Gerhard Franz with a number of members withdrew from the congregation and formed a separate fellowship. Although the Ebenezer schism was discussed on the conference floor on several occasions, 15 the conference was reluctant to intervene in the affairs of a local congregation especially since it involved the conference chairman. Fortunately for church and conference, the schism was healed by 1899."' In 1921, a year after Elder Schellenberg's death, the entire Ebenezer congregation transferred to Buhler, greatly strengthening the ministry of the "daughter church." In 1926 the Inman M.B. Churc