Journal of European Baptist Studies, Volume 9, Number 2, January 2009

actice of forgiveness arises out of the central place that Jesus assigns to it in the Sermon on the Mount. Forgiveness, as well as other related practices of peacemaking, praying and loving one’s enemies, are part of the kingdom vision around which they all cohere. These practices of discipleship, moreover, are to some extent interrelated. For example, a former leader of the Bruderhof community, 59 J. H. Arnold, demonstrated how the practice of forgiveness and reconciliation is related to Jesus’ teachings on marriage and divorce. In one of his letters, Arnold gives the following wise counsel: ‘we should not come to prayer or partake of the Lord’s Supper unless there is complete peace among us. Too often it happens that things are left unresolved when people pray together. 52 Ibid., p. 8. 53 In his essay, ‘The Practice of Community Formation’, McClendon provides a more developed argument for the importance of the Lord’s Supper as a community practice. See, Virtues and Practices, edited by Murphy et al, pp. 91-93. 54 See, McClendon, Ethics, pp. 178-182, for an account of how practices can become sinful, thereby distorting the kingdom vision. Stassen, too, is aware of the potential danger of practices becoming destructive. In Living the Sermon (p. 155), for instance, Stassen refers to those sinful activities which Christians must ‘repent from practising’. 53 Stassen, Living the Sermon, p. 155. 56 Ibid., p. 154. 57 Ibid., pp. 155-165. 58 McClendon, in Virtues and Practices, edited by Murphy et al, p. 102. 59 For a candid historical account of the way of life of the Bruderhof, see, M. Mow, Torches Rekindled: the Bruderhof’s Struggle for Renewal (Rifton: Plough Publishing, 1989). 49 Is the Sermon on the Mount too unrealistic to serve as a resource for Christian Discipleship and Spiritual Formation? But communal life will not endure like that, and neither will marriage .’ 60 Since Arnold was part of the Bruderhof community, which quite deliberately and self-consciously based its life on Jesus’ teachings in the Sermon, his writings are particularly instructive. He maintained that his community sought ‘to take Christ’s words on the Sermon on the Mount literally and be measured and judged by them’. 61 For Arnold and the Bruderhof, therefore, the Sermon provided the framework for the moral vision of the community which ‘found vivid expression in every area of life’. “ The normative value of their community practices came by assuming that the Sermon was accepted as a standard and realistic guide for every sphere of their moral life. It may be shown, therefore, that spirituality can be expressed in a kingdom vision which becomes embodied in practices. If these practices are modelled on Jesus’ teaching in the Sermon they thereby acquire normative value because they embody precisely that vision of moral life that Jesus set forth. 4. Conclusion From both Stassen and McClendon, therefore, we gain val