November 1994

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Introducing the new Mennonite Brethren hymnal. How will it serve the church in these contentious times?

FIRST WORDS from the editor

THE RELEASE OF a new denominational hymnal is a big deal. For Mennonite Brethren, it happens about once every 20 to 25 years. So this is our moment.

Not everyone is thrilled, though. The trends of our day-toward choruses and away from denominational loyalty-have generated legitimate speculation about a new hymnal's marketability.

It's not our intent in this issue to sort that one out. Instead, we simply introduce you to the product and the context into which it comes . An interview with Clarence Hiebert and Christine Longhurst, two key players in the hymnal project, raises the curtain on our new worship resource. The interview begins on page 4.

Following that, Randy Klassen provides some historical background and analysis about our strong sacred music tradition. You'll find his perspective interesting and thOUght-provoking.

Interspersed between the two articles, we introduce you to some of the contemporary hymn writers and arrangers who have contributed to the new hymnal.

And now, let 's take our magazine and turn to page 3....

COMING

_ NOVEMBER 10-12-Pacific District Conference convention, Fresno Pacific College

- JANUARY 6, 1995-The 125th birthday of the Mennonite Brethren Church.

_ FEBRUARY 23-25, 1995-Annual joint board meetings of the u.S. Conference boards, Dinuba, Calif.

_ MARCH 25-28, 1995-Estes '95, the quadrennial national youth convention, Estes Park, Colo

_ JULY 6 -9, 1995-60th convention of the General Conference of Mennonite Brethren Churches, Fresno, Calif.

QUOTABLE

• Anxiety always poisons our discussion of an issue facing the church. Because in anxiety the focus is always on the other person, the issue no longer carries its own substance. Instead, it becomes the issue du jour, a vehicle for no-size-limit emotional freight which is unloaded onto the other side Anxiety might be said to be one of the greatest works of the tempter. With anXiety, Satan successfully turns the church s eye from the kingdom of God. We are distracted by a focus on contentious issues and bullheaded opponents. And we waste good time that we might have spent struggling toward growth and maturity in Christs kingdom - VERNo N REMPEL IN GOSPEL HERALD

VOLUME 57, NUMBER 11

4 Hymnal, harmony and hard work

The chair of the Hymnal Commission and the managing editor of the hymnal respond to questions about Worship Together and the seven-year process of pulling it together.

11 Mennonite Brethren music-making

Mennonite Brethren are known for their strong tradition in church and congregational singing. Here's how we got there and where we're going from here. BY RANDY KLASSEN

DEPARTMENTS

• Now for the good news

Minds

• Praying for those who suffer

• The final accounting Musings by Jim Holm 21

• A matter of comparisons

• Fall enrollment at our colleges 22

• Tabor College's new president 22

• General Conference board meetings 24

• Plans for Estes '95 26

• Crime will be Peace Sunday focus 27

• New pastors' orientation is postponed 28

• Three Mennonite Brethren prepare for MCC assignments 27

• Intermenno experience draws three Mennonite Brethren 28

• A resource for the future

• Attack mode?

ART CREDITS: Cover and page 4, courtesy of Christian Press; pages 5 through 70, Fred Koop; photo of 7976 Tabor College Choral Union courtesy of Center for Mennonite Brethren Studies, Tabor College, Hillsboro, Kan ; page 72, Orley Friesen; page 23, Tabor College; page 28, Leader staff photo

Don Ratzlaff

Connie Faber

BOARD OF COMMUNICATIONS: Ron Braun (chair), Noelle Dickinson, Jeanie Klaassen, Herb Schroeder, Kathy Heinrichs Wiest

MANDATE : THE CHRISTIAN LEADER (ISSN 00095149), organ of the U S Conference of Mennonite Brethren Churches, is published monthly by the U.S Conference Board of Communications, 315 S Lincoln, Hillsboro, KS 67063 The Christian Leader seeks to inform Mennonite Brethren members and churches of the events, activities, decisions, and issues of their denomination , and to instruct, inspire and initiate dialog so that they will aspire to be faithful disciples of Christ as understood in the evangelical!Anabaptist theological tradition.

EDITORIAL POLICY: The views and opinions of our writers and advertisers are their own and do not necessarily represent the position of The Christian Leader, the Board of Communications or the Mennonite Brethren Church. The editors invite free -lance article submissions, but ask that each submission be accompanied with a SASE The editors reserve the right to edit, condense or refuse all copy submitted for publication; anonymous contributions will not be published

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THE CHRISTIAN

Will we Worship Together? , •••••••••••••••••••

HE PROJECT WAS CONTROVERSIAL from the beginning-as all Mennonite Brethren hymnal projects have been. But speculation for this one was particularly intense. Why produce a new denominational hymnal when singing choruses "off the wall" was the growing trend in our churches? And what about all those congregations, several of them sizeable, that had recently purchased massmarket hymnals? Would there be a market for a new denominational resource? . In the face of doubts, the Hymnal Commission, appointed and empowered by the General Conference Board of Faith and Life, moved ahead. And now their considerable work, begun in 1987, is all but completed. Worship Together, the new 650-song Mennonite Brethren hymnal, is coming off the presses this January. • This issue of the Leader, planned in cooperation with the MB Herald, our sister publication in Canada, introduces the new songbook and explores the history and issues surrounding the state of sacred music in the Mennonite Brethren churches of Canada and the United States . • In the following article, the Herald staff interviewed Claren ce Hiebert of Hillsboro, Kan., chair of the Hymnal Commission, and Christine Longhurst of Winnipeg, Man., commission member and managing editor, about the book and their work.

Hymnal, harmony and hard work

An interview with Clarence Hiebert and Christine Longhurst about our new Mennonite Brethren worship resource

How do you feel, after seven years of work, about being this close to flnished?

HIEBERT: Excited. Also relieved It's been a long haul to go through about 4,000 songs Of course, we wonder about the final product. Is this the balance which will, in the future, nurture us in the Christian faith? We are very diverse congregations throughout North America.

LONGHURST: It's hard to believe so much time has gone by. Part of me says, Oh good, it's almost done. The other part of me says, like Clarence, Oh, I hope everything's just the way we wanted.

How would you describe the new hymnal?

LoNGHURST: We kept saying it had to be as balanced as possible, to meet the needs of a diverse constituency When I flip through it, page by page, I'm really astonished by the variety. I think the constituency will find the book extremely user-friendly, extremely worshipfriendly

What do you mean by "user-friendly"?

LoNGHURST: Almost the first half of the book has been divided into chapters which relate directly to the various aspects of worship. It begins with a "Gathering" section, with all the invocations, calls to worship, and gathering songs. There's a large "Praising" section, which is what we spend much of our time doing at the beginning of the service . We're calling them chapters and actually putting them in chapters. The various Scriptures, prayers and readings for each of those times of worship will be included there instead of hidden at the back of the book. We'd like to enable peo-

pIe to use the book easily, instead of just opening the book at the beginning and stopping when they find the song they want

Another thing is that we've had many requests for putting groups of songs into packages-two, three, four songs that move together in some way. We've made 80 medleys of songs, joined either because they're in the same key, or because there's a written-out transition for them. That's something congregations can use, no matter what their accompanist's resources are

How does the new hymnal differ most in content from our current one?

HIEBERT: There's a piece of history that evolves here. The 1971 (green) hymnal was an attempt to merge the best of the Canadian culture with the best of the American culture. When I look at the genre of songs, I find our new songbook more British/Canadian than any songbook we've ever had. It's not a fault, it's simply a statement of a reality. That's where the explosion of hymnody is at in North America.

LoNGHURST: In terms of style, we're used to differentiating between hymns and choruses. Anybody who walks through the pages of this new book will soon realize that division doesn ' t exist anymore I hate those divisions ; I think we have to stop using those words because they're not helping us at all.

Take, for example, Graham Kendrick's "Shine, Jesus, Shine ." I defy anyone to tell me whether it's a hymn or a chorus. It's got three stanzas and a refrain. You can sing it out of a book, you can sing it off an overhead. The types

of music represented in this book cannot be put in those simple categories anymore

I would like to think we've seen the worst, in tenns of musical intolerance There's a renewal of worship happening, in all sorts of different ways. We're beginning to feed off worship renewal movements around the world For example, there's the international influence-lovely, strong, singable, yet bringing us a whole differ-

PRAISE PROFILE

Margaret Clarkson

SOMEONE ONCE SAID, "Eighty percent of the world's work is done by people in pain." If this is true, poet, hymn-writer and author Margaret Clarkson has certainly done her share.

Sick with juveni le arthritis from birth, Clarkson experienced two attacks at age 3 and 12 that left her with a wrist and hand swo ll en and partly cripp led. Plagued by headaches, congenital back pain and malformation of the lower spine, she never had a day free of pain By the time she was 50, pain, spasms, difficulty with walking and surgery necessitated an early retirement from her teaching career

Coupled with the physical pain was the breakup of her parents' marriage. "A pain-filled body is a heavy burden for a young person with an active mind to bear, even without the trauma of an unhappy home God has touched my spirit and is working his miracle of healing there," writes Clarkson in her book Destined for Glory: The Meaning of Suffering.

Clarkson became a Christian after reading John Bunyan's Pilgrim Progress at age 10, studying her Bible and reading her hymnbook daily. Clarkson, a Canadian, has wr itten 14 books, hundreds of articles and many hymns Well -known composers and arrangers such as Tom Fetke, John W. Peterson and Kurt Kaiser have used her poetry

Texts by Margaret Clarkson used in Worship Together:

• "Our God Is Sovereign Still"

• "Burn in Me, Fire of God"

• "Through Faith We Understand"

• "So Send I You-By Grace Made Strong"

• "God of the Ages"

• "Let Us Build a House of Worship"

• "For Your Gift of God the Spirit"

• "Lord Jesus, We Must Know You"

• "If I Trust Him"

• "We Gather Here to Bid Farewell"

PROFILE CONTRIBUTOR: Bertha E. Klassen, Winnipeg, Man

ent flavor. There are new folk-music traditions, for example, the lona Community in Scotland. The Taize Community in France-they believe music is prayer Of course there's the traditional hymns that we always will sing, "Praise to the Lord the Almighty," "Holy, Holy, Holy"-that type of thing. They're well represented too. As far as new hymnody, in Canada there's Margaret Clark· son and Walter Farquharson. In the U.S. there is Ruth Duck.

HIEBERT: There's Brian Wren, he's British and so is Fred Kaan, and so is Christopher Idel.

LoNGHURST: And new hymns which are being set now to traditional tunes so that people have easy access to them. There's also the contemporary gospel, or chorus style.

What makes this hymnal Mennonite Brethren?

HIEBERT: That's a good question, one we wrestled with a lot. We can't say Mennonite Brethren are unique in terms of what we believe. We've always been borrowers-from the Baptists, the Pietists, the Lutherans, the German people, the Americans. We Mennonite Brethren generally feel quite comfortable being labeled evangelical. We refuse to be called fundamentalist. We also say we are pacifists. We believe in reconciliation and are concerned about justice issues. Worship Together is an evangelical hymnal with the component part that addresses the hard sayings of Jesus But as for specific songs written by Mennonite Brethren, that's virtually nil .

The book has no Mennonite Brethren authors or composers?

LoNGHURST: Not very many We've had quite a number of people helping us out on harmonization, descants and so on. Some of our graces are done by Mennonite Brethren. We're represented. But it wasn't a concern of ours to put as many of them in as we possibly could.

Did you select the new writers and hymns because they're being sung in our churches or because you think they should be sung?

LoNGHURST: We chose them on the basis of whether they are helpful to us in worship. For example, one of the areas where we really lack songs, in the current hymnal is the baptism sec· tion and parent-child dedication songs. Some of the newer writers are writing fine things for these moments of celebration and worship. Special-occasion hymns are getting familiar tunes because no one wants to learn something new for an occasion like that

'Worship Together is an evangelical hymnal that addresses the hard sayings ofJesus." -HIEBERT

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How does our chorus book, Sing Alleluia, fit into the mix?

LoNGHURST: It was designed to be an ongoing resource. We expect the new hymnal will include music that has a life of 10 to 25 years, but there'll be an ongoing need for that kind of "disposable" music . We anticipate Sing Alleluia will continue to live.

IImBERT: Some "oldies" were left out of the green book that people continued to request : "Wonderful Grace of Jesus," which got in the Sing Alleluia, "Victory in Jesus" and "Hallelujah for the Cross." They're in the new book .

You must have had some tough calls. Did it ever come to arguments?

[Laughter] IImBERT: Strong feelings.

LoNGHURST: I think we all saw quite a number of personal favorites cut.

Do you feel the commission was representative of our diverse constituency?

LoNGHURST: One of the strengths of the commission was its unique makeup. It was people in a variety of positions, in a variety of churches. They weren't all large -church music ministers, they weren't all pastors, they weren't all anything-just a range of church size, church involvement, experience, age.

Whenever we would go too far in anyone direction, one of us would say, "Just a minute, you've forgotten what my church situation is like ." That kept bringing us back to the reality of who we are in the constituency.

HIEBERT: An important difference between this committee and some others is that all seven of us were not primarily choir leaders. We were primarily interested in two things: the whole business of worship, and congregational singing-not what a choir can do.

How did you handle the question of language usage?

LoNGHURST: Almost more than mUSiC, text was our concern. We found things in the green hymnal that weren't getting sung at all, but which had a lot of life and value The problems of imagery, archaisms, and even some transla-

tions were standing in the way.

HIEBERT: We made minor text revisions related to doctrinal faithfulness, language clarity, gender sensitivity, archaisms Well-known songs which are strong in the memory bank of people or those in which change would violate poetic beauty were left untouched. Some songs have two versions, a contemporary one and a traditional one. They can be sung

PRAISE PROFILE

Taize Community C

HRISTIANS AROUND THE WORLD have been blessed by and drawn closer to God through the songs of the Taize Community. In 1940, a Prote stant Christian named Brother Roger dreamed of starting a community "on account of Christ and the gospel." It was wartime and his home in the small village of Taize, in the eastern part of France, became a place of refuge for Jews and others fleeing the Nazis. In 1942 he was joined by others and in 1948 seven men committed themselves to celibacy and li fe together

Today the community is made up of more than 80 brothers from many Christian traditions . Life in the community is marked by a strong emphasis on worship: members meet three times each day for prayer.

Taize Community music gradually evolved out of a vision for worship which centered on prayer and congregational participation Scriptural texts and traditional responses are joined with simple melodies and harmonies. Statements are repeated in a meditative fashion by the entire congregation.

Songs from the Taize Community in Worship Together:

• " Hosanna"

• "Bless the Lord"

• "Eat This Bread "

PROFILE CONTRIBUTOR: Christine Longhurst, Winnipeg , Man

simultaneously, the way we used to do with German/English.

LONGHURST: The decision the commission made, in consultation with the Board of Faith and Life, was that we not change the language we use for God. On the issue of gender language-how we refer to each other-we decided to adopt the practice of society, which has basically adopted inclusive language.

Graham Kendrick

HAILED BY THE British national press as "the new Charles Wesley," Graham Kendrick is generally regarded as the leading praise-and-worship songwriter in the United Kingdom and Europe.

Several of his songs are new favorites in churches of Great Britain, the United States and Canada. Perhaps his best-known chorus is "Shine, Jesus, Shine." He has written numerous chorus and songbooks in addition to the book Learning to Worship As a Way of Life.

Kendrick is credited for being the main visionary behind the "March for Jesus" pub li c worship rallies. He is the composer of nearly all the music for these international festivals. On "march day" every year, millions of Christ ians in more than 80 countries sing Kendrick's songs as they march down public streets to proclaim Jesus Christ.

"I believe that it is time for Christians from different backgrounds, traditions and nations to come together in a massive show of love for Jesus," Kendrick says. "The world needs to see the glory of God displayed in the lives of ordinary people. The church needs to break out of its buildings, to let the light of Chr ist shine brightly in the darkness. This is our opportunity to break the caricatures of Christianity that exist in people's minds, and to reintroduce them to the Church as a joyful company of people, full of life and color, with a message relevant to today's world."

Songs by Graham Kendrick in Worship Together:

• "From Heaven You Came"

• "Lord, Have Mercy on Us"

• "Meekness and Majesty"

• "Such Love"

• "Make Way"

• "Christ Is Risen"

• "Come, Let Us Worship Jesus"

PROFILE CONTRIBUTOR : Larry Albright, San Jose, Calif

It is often said that music shapes theology. How do you see this hymnal shaping Mennonite Brethren theology?

HIEBERT: Music shapes theology, and theology shapes music. They influence each other. One of the things that troubles me greatly is music that is not congruent with theological understandings.

H our churches don't use this hymnal, perhaps less because of content than because it's in book form, will our denomination become more diverse?

HIEBERT: That's very speculative. We may have church splits on the basis of culture. We already have existing churches divided that way.

Your 1988-89 survey indicated that 80 percent of churches sing from overhead transparencies. Are you discouraged about the limitations of the product you've spent seven years producing?

LONGHURST: Absolutely not. We do not feel the new hymnal is the be-all, end-all resource in music. This is one part of the answer, one resource alone. I feel strongly that if we take away this type of resource we're losing something historically and traditionally. We're losing connection with churches who have sung these songs for the last 2,000 years; we're losing connection with churches who are singing these songs around the world.

In the fascinating survey we did with Mennonite Brethren students in institutions in Canada and the U.S., overwhelmingly they said, "We want choruses off overheads, but do not take our hymnal away. "

HmBERT: And when we asked what kind of hymnal they preferred, the Mennonite Brethren hymnal option was highest of the four options

So you're convinced there's a market?

LoNGHURST: People who say hymnals are not selling anymore aren ' t looking around In the last 10 years alone, there have been some 15 new hymnals produced. We've also been contacted by others who say their smaller denomination isn't able to produce their own and are very interested to see what we're coming up with.

There was a period of controversy during the process. How did that time of challenge affect your work?

HIEBERT: It sparked more of a conversation in Canada than in the u.s . What the article said was we'll spend a half-million dollars buying new

"We do not feel the new hymnal is the be-all, end-all resource in music. This is one part of the answer, one resource alone.-LoNGHURST

•••••••••

hymnals. People understood this to mean that's what it would cost to produce the first songbook That was an unfortunate misunderstanding. We all agreed not to do battle, but let the Board of Faith and Life deal with the question. But it was sludge in the gears to slow up the process.

Was there a defining moment when you decided, we're doing this, no matter what?

my own answers was, how can I stand before God in judgment if I cut off the possibility of a wealth of historical, spiritually nur-

turing things because the environment in which I lived said "Stop it." For me it was a faithfulness issue. I would have had that right, to say, "Let's quit. " But I felt we needed to at least hand this resource to the next generation.

HmBERT: I faced that personally, yes. One of Faithfulness meant handing it on We offer it

PRAISE PROFILE

Where are the Mennonite Brethren writers?

CAN YOU NAME three Mennonite Brethren who are contributing songs for worship today? How about two? Can you even name one?

Actually, Mennonite Brethren do have several contributors who are doing some fine writing. Those in the United States wou ld include Clarence Hiebert and Jonah Kliewer of Tabor Co ll ege, our liberal arts college located in Hillsboro, Kan., and Larry Warkentin of Fresno Pacific College, our liberal arts college located in Fresno, Calif. Jean Janzen of Fresno, Calif., is writing excellent texts which would be fitting for new hymns.

But why don't we have more writers among the Mennonite Brethren? For one reason, some talented writers have left the denomination for more charismatic traditions or other more "seeker sensitive" churches where there is greater receptivity to their songs.

Also, composers have received little encouragement or motivation to write. Many Mennonite Brethren churches seem more anxious to adapt the new songs of other traditions rather than make the effort to write songs that might teach and encourage doctrines of the Anabaptist faith.

Add to this the fact that several Mennonite Brethren congregations in the United States- and perhaps even more in Canada-have discontinued using hymnals. This discourages

those who might write texts and songs with a more "traditional" style.

But new writers are beginning to emerge in several congregations in North America. These people write primarily for local use. Our Bible schools and colleges could take a more active role in encouraging gifted students to write new songs that we desperately need; songs that speak to urban life, to issues of evangelism and mission in texts and imagery that we understand clearly in this technological age.

God has given the talent and skill. We need to encourage and share this vision with others.

Mennonite Brethren contributions to Worship Together:

• Jean Janzen, Fresno, Calif.: "With a Thankful Heart and Mind" (text; previous ly known as "Thank the Lord with Joyful Heart"; "When I'm Lonely and Defenseless" (rewrite of "In the Rifted Rock"); "The Sun Has Now Risen" (rewrite of "The Sun Has Arisen")

• John Regehr, Winnipeg, Man. "God Is King of All the Ages" (text) "We Thank You, God of Love" (text)

• Jonah Kliewer, Hillsboro, Kan. SO LANGE JESUS hymn tune (arranger)

PROFILE CONTRIBUTOR: Larry Albright, San Jose, Calif.

"Music is a medium to put us into the presence of God, into relationship with God and with each other, and to teach us the work, will and acts of God. "

-HIEBERT

to God and the people-and then back off

You, Clarence, have been a real push behind the hymnal. Where did that calling-if I can link it up with the faithfulness idea-come from?

HIEBERT: It's a lifelong love for the music of the church and the worshiping people. Music is a medium to put us into the presence of God, into relationship with God and with each other , and to teach us the work, will and acts of God .

LoNGHURST: I would be very disappointed if people got the impression that this was a group of seven people who have an agenda. Nothing could be further from the truth I feel strongly that this book belongs to someone else. I've been hired to do the editing and am enjoying it, but it certainly is not my project. Like Clarence says,

PRAISE PROFILE ...

Brian Leech

GOD HAS CALLED ME to be faithful, not successful," says hymn writer Brian Jeffry Leech. Leech has been a dedicated writer of hymns and a leader in the field of Christian worship for years. He is best known for hymn texts such as "Spirit Now Live in Me" and most notably his setting of "We are God's People" to the tune of a Brahms' symphony.

Leech is both excited and troubled at worship trends in churches today. He is excited about the "devotion and sheer breadth" of some of the new and fresh songs emerging in the church.

He is uneasy about the trend in many churches to exclude the singing of hymns. "Sadly, today in many churches, one is often made to feel like a second-class citizen if one wants to sing hymns," Leech says.

"We may be reaching out to others at the expense of our own people," he says. "There needs to be a blending of the best of both worlds of hymns and praise choruses."

Leech's hymn-writing skills made him a natural choice as assistant editor for the popular hymnal Hymns for the Family of God published

you're called to it and you do it. You're faithful to it.

What would you say to churches who no longer use hymnals?

LONGHURST: I still recommend that a copy go into their library Wonderful things have happened with copyright licenSing We have so many new hymn writers with wonderful collections, covered by copyright licenSing. Churches should have copies on their shelves and use them as resources Congregational music is giving people words to say before God.

We've had the green hymnal. What color is this one going to be?

LoNGHURST: A royal burgundy. ef2

in 1976 This hymnal is noted for its increase in songs authored by living authors and composers, a trend that continues in new hymnals.

Leech came to the United States from Great Britain as a pastor 15 years ago and continues to write new and fresh hymns and anthems for the church. He has been involved in radio programs and ministries and is currently on the pastoral staff of First Covenant Church in Oakland, Calif

Songs by Brian Jeffry Leech in Worship Together:

• "We Are God's People"

• "Kind and Mercifu l God"

• "Let Your Heart Be Broken"

• "Come, Share the Lord"

• "Make Room Within My Heart, 0 God"

• "0 Lord, I Love This Land of Mine"

• "Spirit, Now Live in Me"

• "All Things Are Yours"

• "Happy the Home" (revised version)

PROFILE CONTRIBUTOR : Larry Albright, San Jose, Calif

BY RANDY KLASSEN

Mennonite Brethren music-making

Where we've been, where we're going

HEN I WAS IN FIRST GRADE, MY SPOT IN church on Sunday mornings was not in the front pews, or the nursery, or shuttled away to children's church. It was sitting beside my dad in the choir loft. I didn't sing, myself-that was reserved for Sunday school. But choir was where my place was. Two or three years later, I joined a children's choir. When I was 9, I

remember hearing my fIrst oratorio concert. By grade nine, I was primed to join the church choir. Since then, most of my church life has revolved around music, and particularly choral music.

For me, the close connection between church and choir is not coincidence. Since the birth of the Mennonite Brethren movement in 1860, music-making, and choirs in particular, have been central to our denomination'S spiritual life.

Choirs sprang up quickly in the new Mennonite Brethren gatherings. By 1875 they were considered common The purpose of the choir was to help the congregation learn the new "happy songs" which expressed the joy of their spiritual renewal.

In the beginning they had no instrumentslet alone recordings-to help in learning and leading The choir also functioned as the youth group. Most singers were unmarried, and marriage often meant graduation from the choir.

The choir movement was fIrst transplanted to North America by those who emigrated in the 1870s. Even though these people had the extra pressures of agricultural pioneering, choirs sprang up almost as quickly as Mennonite Brethren congregations were organized . The

1919 North American conference yearbook reports that of the 7,000 or so Mennonite Brethren church members, about 2,000 were choir members!

Meanwhile, back in Russia, the choir movement grew and matured . Given the relative prosperity of the Mennonite colonies, members had ample room for developing cultural and spiritual activities. Choral workshops and training courses for conductors were common By the 1910s, choirs in Russia were presenting major spiritual concert works, such as Mendelsohn's "St . Paul " oratorio. Such "art" was sometimes held suspect, but the fact that key music leaders were also ordained ministers helped to gain its acceptance .

The 1920s emigration brought this enriched choral life to North America, mostly to Canada. A tradition of regional songfests and itinerant choral workshops that began in 1893 continued through the 1940s. But especially with the establishment of the music department of the MB Bible College in Winnipeg, Man., in 1945, the Canadian choral tradition began to fInd a more visible center. At about the same time, the music department of Tabor College in Hillsboro, Kan ., under the leadership of Herbert C. Richert, strengthened the choral music tradition south of the 49th parallel.

Since the 1980s, the choir movement has slowly and steadily declined The choir is no longer central as a teaching tool. The youth have generally gone to a different sort of program to meet their social and spiritual needs.

Indeed, the work of the college music departments has possibly contributed, in a backhanded way, to the decline of church-choir singing. The cultural richness of a college setting is often hard to duplicate back in local congregations. Well-trained musicians can get discouraged with always working the basics ("milk music") when they know there is much "meat" out there Many such singers and conductors will rather give their time and energy to community choirs which tackle "the really good stuff," than spend time on the basics of congregational service music .

But choirs are not dead. Many Mennonite Brethren congregations have stron g and hopeful choir programs . But our present trend is toward smaller groups, "worship t e ams" or "praise bands" which combine vocals and instrumentals. These groups bring the kind of music to the congregation that reflects what most people are listening to all the time, just as choirs were at one time the normal cultural form of music-making. The North American cultural swing in the last

three decades, away from tradition and toward relevance, has had a decisive impact on the choir as a Mennonite Brethren institution

Music leadership

What has happened to music leadership over the past 130 years? We see a movement from congregationally based music-making to professionally oriented leaders-ftrst classical, now contemporary. In the Mennonite churches of the mid-1800s, the song leader, or Vorsanger , was a man of considerable pres-

had no organs or pianos. When groups got together informally in homes, guitars and other folk instruments were gladly used for singing. But in church, the simplicity of unaccompanied singing became the musical standard. Reed organs, pianos and other instruments became more common in the homes, and soon after the turn of the century, they began to be used in Mennonite Brethren churches. No doubt there was a fuss in some congregations when they were brought in.

By and large, the Mennonite tige. He acted as the worship leader for the service By and large, the Since the hymnbooks had no printed music, the Vor- Mennonite Brethren sanger was the authority

and guardian of the con - attitude has remained gregation's musical heritage. But his leadership one of slow and was limited to encouraging the church's singing; he eventual acceptance set the pitch and lined out the words, but could not Of whatever musical add anything to the singing itself.

instruments are

In the emerging Mennonite Brethren churches, popular at the time, the choir basically usurped the authority of the Vor - whether piano, sanger While at first the

Brethren attitude has remained one of slow and eventual acceptance of whatever musical instruments are popular at the time, whether piano, electric guitar or drums. The 1971 Worship Hymnal was probably the first denominational songbook which included guitar chords in its contemporary music section.

Songbooks

The ftrst Mennonite Brethren groups found the old Mennonite hymn books , published in Danzig in 1787, inadequate for their new spiritual joy. They used a number

of songbooks from diverse choir's-and director's- electric guitar or leadership was one of sources: Baptist, Methodist, Pietist, Moravian.

teaching new songs to the drums. congregation, it gradually added the element of "special music ." Choirs grew in their repertoire and musical maturity. They began to offer music that went beyond congregational service music. With the professional help that was available in the choral workshops and conducting courses, song-leading evolved into conducting; the music leader's purpose was to set the beat with hand motions so that congregation and instrumental accompaniment stayed together This has been the main kind of leadership for the last half century. In the last decade, many churches have come to a renewed focus on worship. "Song leaders" have become "worship leaders ." Worship leaders still need musical skill, and they are often part of a band But they are also working with a new emphasis on spiritual and pastoral sensitivity while leading.

Instruments

The earliest Mennonite Brethren churches

The gospel songs typical of the Moody-Sankey revivals (18701890) were popular in North America and quickly made it over

to Russia in German translation. These became the meat-and-potatoes of the Mennonite Brethren musical diet. According to a 1990 survey, these gospel songs still comprise almost 40 percent of the songs we sing.

H wasn't until the 1940s that Mennonite Brethren began working on their own hymnal. The Canadians produced a German hymnal in 1952; a year later the U.S. churches published an English hymnal. The Canadians realized, almost as soon as their book came out, that they also needed an English book They came up with a unique solution: an exact translation, hymn by hymn, of the German book. But this didn't last. Soon the U.S. and Canadian conferences began a joint work, resulting in our present Worship Hymnal (1971)

Congregations always seem to have had their own individual collections of "disposable music " as well, whether hand-copied, mimeographed ,

photocopied or, now, on overhead transparencies or slides.

Types of music

Mennonite music in the Russian colonies was strongly rooted in the German choral tradition. Some examples: "Now Thank We All Our God" and " 0 God, Thou Faithful God." But the earliest types of songs that expressed the new Mennonite Brethren spiritual life were German "spiritual folk songs," such as "For God So Loved" and "Take Thou My Hand, 0 Father." Soon the gospel songs, like "I Will Sing of My Redeemer" and "Blessed Assurance," came to dominate. For a century the latter has been the

ralism in our churches. We borrowed, adapted and shaped, but never really created a body of songs from our own spiritual identity Hymnal projects have been a part of the shaping, but they can't take as much credit as some might hope in creating denominational unity The seeds of theological diversity, planted 130 years ago, are bearing much fmit.

• Our music-making space has moved from the congregation to the front stage.

The choir may have contributed to this earlier, but the real impetus has come with contemporary Christian music since the 1980s. A church ' s architecture determines whether the congregation hears itself (live acousmainstay of our diet.

Christian contemporary

our songs serve us rather than prod mUSic-broadly defined-has been around for more than 40 years. It emerged first as "folk hymn," then "Scripture song," and now commonly as "praise chorus." This type of music US. Song has patterns makes up the second largest part of our musical diet today. become less .a Denominationally, almost one

We prefer to have tics) or hears a sound from the front (dead acoustics and a major sound system). Few sanctuaries are able to do both well Interestingly, the symbolic movement from congregation to front stage also seems to be mirrored in changing church leadership

• The role of the song has changed from a tool for Christian maturity to a tool to experienceGod. third of all the songs we sing teaching tool and are praise choruses; more and

This may be the most significant trend, and the one most debatable and difficult to assess. We have been more congregations are using more an them almost exclusively.

The most recent phase of experiential tool. contemporary Christian music affected (infected?) with a basic North American trend: declining has come together with a renewed emphasis on worship. This worship renewal music has two streams: the more evangelical and charismatic, such as the music produced by Maranatha! and Hosanna/Integrity publishers, and the more ecumenical and globally oriented, such as the music produced by GIA, Taize, Wild Goose publishers. Right now, the first group has by far the greater influence in our churches.

Trends and reflections

When we look back at the dynamics of Mennonite Brethren music -making, charting both innovation and resistance to change, we find there's very little new under the sun But at least four aspects of our story bear further reflection

• We have always been a borrowing people.

Very little of our music has been written by our own musicians Thus we have always looked to other groups for our spiritual music. As a consequence, the practical concerns of finding "a new song" sowed the seeds for theological plu-

standards in basic knowledge. We are showing a preference for the "easy" and the "accessible " We shy away from words, phrases and images that we don 't understand. We prefer to have our songs serve us rather than challenge and prod us Song has become less a teaching tool and more an experiential tool.

Many traditional hymns are good teaching tools; they express thoughtful theology. Presently we are seeing a move toward the short and simple in contemporary lyrics-songs that are easily remembered and recalled throughout the week. There's nothing wrong with this. But we should be aware that it implies a move away from literary lyrics-those crafted with disciplined skill and polish in the tradition of good writing. Such lyrics do not contain less spiritual truth, but often less discipline and depth in the way this truth is expressed

Some would like to say that contemporary songs are also more subjective, and therefore less useful. But really, the old gospel songs and pietist hymns that were sung a century ago aren't less subjective. Contemporary lyrics do work with a

narrower scope of topics than the traditional hymns and gospel songs. But the purpose of these songs is also narrower: to foster experiences of God's presence. If we rely on them as teaching tools of the church, be assured we will have a lopsided understanding of our faith. Our challenge as churches is to become creative, effective teachers in other ways.

Present trends in church life are guided by concerns for relevance and spiritual intimacy. Our music reflects this We probably lack a bit in the areas of doctrinal truth and clear-headed thinking, but I imagine we are on a pendulum swing between these two extremes We seem to be gaining in a significant area: recapturing the intensity of a personal relationship with our Redeemer. If this is authentic renewal, it will surely lead us on to deeper reflection and theological insight.

The deeper question that we face is this: Will our churches have the mental tools, the sharp minds, that we will need on this return pendulum swing? In the past, choirs and other musical activities have given a focus to much educational work in the congregations. Of course, they aren't the only way to keep minds sharp for Christ. But are we finding other ways of filling our minds and hearts with the deep thoughts of God?

• In general, we have been cultural followers rather than trendsetters.

This may seem strange for a denomination that strove to be "in the world but not of the world." But the trends which have shaped our musical history are much the same as larger cultural trends: leadership has become more specialized and professional; maturity and richness of thought have declined; the value of relationship and relevance has increased while the value of authority and tradition has decreased.

These represent significant shifts. They are bearing much worthwhile fruit for the kingdom. But we will always be better off when we, as local congregations and as a denOmination, make ourselves aware of the trends, prepare for them, and even work to influence them. e!2

Randy Klassen is associate pastor for music and adult ministries at the Coaldale (Alta.) ME Church.

Speaking of Worship Together, did you know ...

• about 200 people assisted in the selection of songs to be included in Worship Together. Twenty-five hymnals were perused and 4,000 songs considered.

• "The survey says " was the operative phrase when the initial list of songs to be included in Worship Together was compiled. In 1990, all North American Mennonite Brethren congregations were given the opportunity to complete a survey which asked for a list of all songs sung during the past year Congregations representing 65 percent of the membership responded. Songs mentioned more than 25 times were considered for inclusion in Worship Together. Songs included in the current hymnal but never mentioned on completed surveys were not included.

• the popular song, "Victory in Jesus" has never been included in a Mennonite Brethren hymnal before Worship Together.

• the often-sung "Wonderfu l Grace of Jesus" will again be in a Mennonite Brethren hymnal. It was omitted from the 1971 hymnal but is back in Worship Together.

• the most popular song not included is "I Will Enter His Gates with Thanksgiving " Committee members believe when we begin using the new book, the song will be outdated.

• the most popular traditional song among Mennonite Brethren in the United States is the German hymn "The Son Has Now Risen " Among Canadian Mennonite Brethren, the most popular traditional song is "When I'm Lonely and Defenseless" (known by the title "In the Rifted Rock").

• we've consistently underestimated the marketability of our hymnals. The Mennonite Brethren Church Hymnal, our first English hymnal, was published in 1953 with an initial run of 7,500 copies; it subsequently went through six printings with a total of 37,000 copies The Worship Hymnal was published in 1971 with an initial run of 25,000 copies; it subsequently went through six printings with a total of 61,700 copies.

• the word hymnal is to be avoided, according to the Hymnal Commission. It's an outdated word for some. So our new book is called Worship Together.

-compiled by Connie Faber

Second thoughts on seekers

I was taken back by a statement in Gary Hardaway's article about "seeking" (October issue) in which he quoted church-growth strategists as saying "we need seeker-sensitive services or our language, lifestyle, tastes and learning modes will be unpalatable to the seeker and he will stop seeking."

Are we only interested in numbers? What ever happened to the instruction "be in the world but not of the world?"

May I submit that the reason a visitor comes to church is because he is seeking a different language, lifestyle, taste and learning mode than he finds in everyday life outside the church?

Shouldn't it be our fervent prayer

We hear so much about getting the unchurched to come to church but so little about saving souls. Doesn't it follow that if we have changed our language, lifestyle, tastes and learning modes to match theirs so that they will become "churched," they won't be hearing what it takes to save their souls?

If we are only interested in getting them inside the church in numbers then we could take a lesson from the entertainment industry. Tap a keg of beer and feature a popular rock and roll band and they will come.

Jerry Ingrim Sr. Buhler, Kan.

Aword about that word that a visiting seeker would see such a different language, lifestyle, taste and learning mode in our service that the

Holy Spirit would convict his heart and con- We hear so vince that person to change? much about getting the

I regret having to raise the ugly prospect that the Christian Leader editor might by untrustworthy. I am referring to Don's claim that floccinaucinihilipilification is not in a dictionary (October

To change our services to be comfortable to the unchurched unchurched to come to church, but so little about relives the fable of the boy who had a canary which sang so beautifully that it inspired everyone who heard it sing. One day the boy saving souls. turned it outside with

and adding the suffix "-ification." Compounding Latin words was a relatively familiar device for adding emphasis. So it means something like "the estimation of something as really, really, really, really worthless_"

Perhaps, in keeping with the spirit of your editorial, we need a word that equally emphasizes the value of our relationship to God through Jesus Christ. David Faber Ass 't professor ofphilosophy Tabor College Hillsboro, Kan.

Editor's note: We've just placed our order for an OED, given our sudden floccinaucinihilipilification of our otherwise trusty Webster's Ninth Collegiate Dictionary.

Tough question, good answer

Wow! I was impressed. What an answer!

When I got my September issue of Christian Leader, I glanced through it and noted the frrst question in Inquiring Minds: "What right do we have to be happy and enjoy God's blessings when so many suffer so terribly in our world?" Good question, I thought. I wondered how Marvin Hein would respond. His answer deserves a letter of commendation.

According to the OED, "floccinaucinihilipilification" was made by compounding four Latin words meaning "at small price" or "at nothing"

editorial). It is in the dictionary; at least it is in a dictionary: the Oxford English Dictionary. By the way, it was not invented by Conrad Teltell. (It sounds to me like Teltell made up his own last name.) The OED, which classifies the word as humorous, cites a use by William Shenstone in 1741 : "I loved him for nothing so much the sparrows that they might learn to sing as beautifully. But he found that instead of the sparrows learning to sing, his little canary started chirping like the sparrows. Soon the bird totalas his floccinaucinihilipilification of money." ly lost its ability to sing.

Hein could have treated the question as simply an intellectual exercise, but he began his answer with an honest response: "I don't really know!" From there, he described the paradox that is inherent in the question. I counted six more times Hein said "I do not know," or the equivalent.

To stop there, though, would have been to do nothing more than elaborate on the question itself. He went on to tell us some things he did know:

(1) It's not because of what I have done that I am the recipient of blessings .

(2) It was this way in Bible times with Bible people.

(3) Circumstances of poverty or plenty sometimes have nothing to do with the way we live

(4) We are responsible for the use of our plenty.

c.$.... Pontius' Puddle

(5) We ought to be humble and grateful.

To stay within what is possible to know (compare Deut. 29:29), and to come up with the right response to a question that has no answer-I say, that's quite an accomplishment, espe· cially for a column titled "Inquiring Minds"!

Paul M Zoschke, pastor Faith Bible Church Lawton, Okla.

AGod who grieves

Thank you for your editorial, "Our Grieving God" (September). In his book The Suffering God, Charles Ohlrich expresses similar views to yours.

From the book's title I gained no security or comfort, but literally entertained futility. Is even God crushed with grief and lacking ability to show me strength? Using a distinct literary style, Ohlrich offered examples of God entering into our very suffering. What revolution in our thinking and focus when we view God no longer as cold, aloof or indifferent, but as intimately and poignantly involved with us

My family endured indescribable pain when my husband and precious 2-year-old grandson were killed in a five-vehicle accident in 1987. I contemplated the reality, availability, and presence of a comforting and powerful God. I somehow hoped that for the sake of my sanity God would intervene or do something spectacular.

After reading Ohlrich's book and others, I understand that because we exist in an interrelated world suffering is simply part of life.

When undeserved suffering overcame Job, he honestly voiced his doubt. We can determine that God respects honesty above mindless submission. But through weeks and months of physical, emotional and spiritual turmoil, I never needed to ask the question "Why?" Instead when painfully hard things came my way, I learned to say, "How, God, will you use this for your glory?"

Ultimately, I will never underestimate the significant and encouraging results of caring concern, love and prayers of countless friends and family And though I have always thOUght I trusted my Lord, what a loss for me

if I had never gained that clearer focus on God!

Barbara Wohlgemuth Wichita, Kan.

{6 I will cling to Don Ratzlaff's words and ideas from "Our grieving God" if I have to go through the loss of another family member or friend . Very few words offered genuine comfort when I was going through the loss of my dear father as a teenager . Nothing made sense when my young cousin with a 2-year -old and a 7month-old died a few years after that.

This summer we very nearly went through another tragic loss. But God intervened and we were spared. Instead, we witnessed a miracle.

If I were to live through these events again, I am certain Don's words would help me sense the tears and sobs of another-God.

Mukthajost Ames, Iowa

{6 Thank your for the editorial "Our grieving God " I was very sorry to hear of your sister's death. I appreciated your reminder of God's goodness and grace and His caring when we hurt so much.

About a year earlier, on July 22, 1993, our youngest daughter Sylvia was killed instantly in a collision with a semi-truck in Palmdale, Fla. She was a volunteer under Eastern Mennonite Missions teaching at a preschool in Immokalee, Fla. She was on her way to meet her brother in the Orlando area so they could spend a few days vacationing together.

Where was God when we hurt? I found him on the cross, suffering and dying to bring healing and life for us. His "sorrow and love flowed mingled down" and washed over me. I found the Father watching his only son die because he loved us so much. Then he turned his back as our iniquity was laid on Christ.

Maybe the question should be: "Where are we when God hurts?" I found the Comforter bringing the peace of his presence, the hope of his glory and even the joy of his salvation. I found him in the body of Christ as our brothers and sisters wept, mourned and hurt with us

Don Sager Englewood, Colo.

BY JIM HOLM

A matter of comparisons

EVERYBODY KNOWS Jesus's story about the Pharisee and the tax collector. At Thanksgiving, we could profitably consider it again. The text is Luke 18:9-14.

Jesus told this story to people who "were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everybody also" (v. 9) . As you might guess, their attitude affected the way they gave thanks.

Look at these two men . Being sincere and devout, both had a desire to pray. Both would be easily recognized by other people, the Pharisee by his dress and manner, the tax collector because many had argued with his evaluation of their assets.

Both men stood to pray-the Pharisee in a prominent place, to be seen by God and by people, the tax collector, Jesus said, "at a distance." His purpose in coming was quite different

What Jesus says about their prayers is fascinating. The Pharisee "prayed about himself." His prayer is a thanksgiving, with a twist. He was not thankful for what God had done for him, but rather for what he had done for himself. By contrast , the tax collector wouldn't even raise his eyes to heaven. He knew he had no right to expect God to listen to him. He struck himself on the chest, repeatedly, as if to beat out the full extent of his confession.

The Pharisee prayed a prayer of comparison. His prayer didn ' t need God . As long as he could compare himself with others, he would be satisfied He was thankful that he had no sin to confess. He was holy beyond all measure. He began piously enough: "God, I thank you " But he was not thanking God for what God had done for him He was thanking God for what he had done for himself. By comparing himself with others, he made a general appraisal of himself, and he concluded he was righteous

After all, he said, he was not a robber. No, indeed He wasn't an evildoer either, nor an adulterer And, to complete the recitation, he proclaimed he was not like the tax collector. Perhaps he noticed how difficult it was for the tax collector to pray. The Pharisee was grateful that prayer didn't come that hard for him . Praying was easy, if one just knew how to do it .

The Pharisee went on to recite the practices he pursued His fasting was far above that required by religious law, and his tithing record would make any church member proud. He not

only went beyond the minimums of proper practice, he exceeded the maximums!

By contrast, the tax collector stood out of the way. His prayer began with the same word the Pharisee ' s had: "God." That was the end of their similarity. He exclaimed, "God, be merciful to me the sinner!" He didn ' t say, a sinner, but the sinner, as if he was the only sinner there ever was. One word describes his entire prayer: humility. Now, here's what Jesus was driving at. Do you know the basic characteristic of humility? It is self-knowledge . The Pharisee thought he knew himself. All his prayer described was what he had and had not done. But, contrary to appearances , he did not know himself, because he did not see himself as a sinner standing in the presence of God. The tax collector, because he saw himself as a sinner, showed he knew who he really was Humility is not a pious self put-down; it is a fearless selfappraisal which does not minimize achievements or exaggerate failures. The tax collector prayed with humility

However , even knowing that, you and I might still prefer to be like the Pharisee. Wouldn 't it feel good to remind God of all the things we don't do, and to suggest he consider the things we do? It would feel good. Except for one thing : Jesus's "punch line." He ended the story by saying only one of the men went home justified. The Pharisee went home a sinner, just as he came . He asked for no change in himself, and he received none. The tax collector asked to be transformed, and he was.

Both men went to the temple to worship. Both prayed. But only one came to worship to be changed. Both men were seeking justification, God's stamp of approval. One tried to prove he deserved it; the other cast himself on the divine mercy.

When you pray this Thanksgiving, to whom will you compare yourself? To compare with people is to look the wrong direction. The right question is, "How do I compare with God? " The Pharisee had everything, except the one thing he needed, and the tax collector had only that one thing : the sense of his own unworthiness and his need for the grace of God.

This Thanksgiving season, come to God humbly, broken, leaving yourself open to his mercy . Thanksgiving begins with a call for mercy, with an acknowledged need for his grace. With that spirit, God's Spirit, give thanks ef2

Do you know the basic characteristic of humility? It is selfknowledge.

Jim Holm is from Reedley, Calif.

Enrollment points to optimism

• Tabor sees a huge boost while Fresno Pacific keeps campus housing filled

ENROLLMENT AT the two U.S. Mennonite Brethren colleges has personnel at each institution optimistic about the future . Tabor College in Hillsboro, Kan., reports a significant increase in students this fall while Fresno Pacific College, Fresno, Calif., held steady.

Tabor College enrollment is up by a whopping 15.9 percent. Total head

count totals 503 students. That includes 28 full-time students enrolled in the adult-degree program offered in Wichita, Kan. The number of firsttime freshmen totals 121 and transfer students number 31 . This is the first time since the mid-1970s that enrollment has exceeded 500.

That good news prompted the college board of directors in October to approve a retroactive 4 percent salary increase for faculty and administrative personnel employed more than halftime .

Strong retention among eligible returning students played a key role in

APPOINTMENT

Tabor College president

• David Brandt brings to the task 20 years experience in higher education

DAVID BRANDT, 56, has been named the 11th president of Tabor College, the Mennonite Brethren liberal arts college located in Hillsboro, Kan. The announcement was made Oct. 26 to the college community by Lee Jost, chair of the school 's board of directors. Brandt will begin his new assignment Jan. 1.

Brandt brings to his new assignment more than 20 years of experience in higher education and a wealth of leadership experience. He has held administrative positions at Bethel College in St. Paul, Minn., and Messiah College in Grantham , Pa., and has served 17 years in Christian higher education administration.

Brandt Brandt is currently vice president and provost at Bethel College. While at Bethel, Brandt was instrumental in developing a new vision statement for the institution. He provided leadership for multicultural efforts across the campus and developed nontraditional programs, including degree-completion curricula in three majors and graduate programs in three areas. He directed the reorganization of the school's academic structure and conducted two program reviews.

Brandt currently serves on the Christian College Coalition Student Academic Program Committee which governs the CCC study programs in the United States ,

the enrollment increase Retention is up 6 percent, reports Glenn Lygrisse, vice president for enrollment management. College officials have been told that Tabor's retention rate , 85 percent, was the highest of any college in the state.

Daryle Baltzer, director of retention, says the percentage increase in retention is a direct result of a concentrated effort between his office and all other areas of campus life. He cites the strong effort by coaches, proactive advising by faculty members, and diligent work by personnel in the department of student finances

Central America , Russia and the Middle East. Tabor is a member of the coalition and Tabor students have participated in these study programs.

Brandt is also chair of the Christian College Consortium ' s Dean's Council Executive Committee and from 1989 to 1993 was a member ofthe Dean's Task Force of the Council of Independent Colleges.

Prior to coming to Bethel in 1988, Brandt served Messiah College as dean of the college and vice president for academic affairs. He was responsible for the development of Daystar University College in Nairobi, Kenya, into a four-year Christian liberal arts college which granted degrees from Messiah College with Middle States Association approval. During his tenure , Messiah developed five new majors and an engineering program

Brandt has taught physics at Messiah College , Gordon College in Wenham , Mass., Wheaton College in Wheaton, ill., Brock University in St. Catharines, Ont., and the University of Omaha in Omaha, Neb. He chaired the physics department and then the division of natural sciences and mathematics while at Gordon College. He has worked as a consulting engineer for International Telephone and Telegraph Corp. in Roanoke, Va., and as an engineer for Raytheon Co., Equipment Division.

Brandt has a master's degree and doctorate in physics from the University of Oklahoma in Norman, Okla. He did his undergraduate work at Wheaton College in Wheaton , ill.

Brandt was one of two finalists interviewed for the position of Tabor president following the surprise resignation of LeVon Balzer. Balzer left Tabor in August to become president of John Brown University , Siloam Springs, Ark.

Brandt and his wife , Melva , have two adult sons, David and Stephen.-Connte Faber

Sister schools live in different working environments

TOTAL ENROLLMENT at the two U.S. Mennonite Brethren colleges numbers more than 3 ,000 students for the fall semester. That 's an amazing figure given that each institution recruited about 120 new freshman.

So where do the big numbers come from? The two sister colleges are really quite different beyond the question of freshman students (see table).

1994 ENROLLMENT STATISTICS (head count)

as contributors to the strong retention.

Lygrisse attributes new·student growth to a revamped financial aid program and a more directed search by the admissions office for students who match the college. He notes that not only did the college surpass enrollment goals, but also scholarship goals.

Future enrollment growth for Tabor will come in two areas, he adds. The admissions staff will continue to work at increasing their share of the prospective student market. They will also search for other sympathetic, evangelical circles from which to recruit students.

Pacific reports a fall enrollment of 739 undergraduate students and an unofficial graduate total of 591. An additional 120 students are enrolled in the college's teacher-certification program The college also enrolls about 1,200 students in its professional development division, which provides teachers the opportunity to

503 )

College recruiters for FPC and TC also face noticeable differences as they search for freshmen students. Fresno Pacific College in Fresno, Calif., issues an array of enrollment figures indicative of its urban, commuter undergraduate and graduate character. Fresno boasts a population in excess of 600,000.

FPC is the only Christian college in the San Joaquin Valley, explains Art Enos , advancement vice president. Ninety percent of the student body comes from that area.

Meanwhile , Tabor College is located in Hillsboro , Kan., an agricultural community of 3,000. The school'S program is designed primarily as a traditional, residential undergraduate college

Tabor recruiters face stiff competition in Kansas, a state with limited numbers of high school graduates and almost unlimited post-secondary options-six private colleges within a 60-mile radius of Tabor. Yet , Tabor continues to increase its share of the market , says Glenn Lygrisse, director of enrollment management. -CF

keep their certification current and to expand areas of certification.

FPC's undergraduate head count of 739 includes 144 students registered in the degree-completion program. New students number 235-of those, 117 are first-time freshmen. The admissions office reports that while applications increased significantly prior to fall, fewer students chose to attend FPC. This trend was common among West Coast colleges.

For the past several years, FPC has experienced a steady increase in firsttime freshman. The number peaked last year with 146 first-time freshman Despite this year's unexpected drop in new freshman, the FPC admissions office continues to be pleased with the overall improvement.

Grace Peters, admissions office manager, attributes the increase in new student enrollment to two factors . First, the college began a telemarketing recruiting plan in 1991 which uses trained FPC students to phone prospective students.

Second, FPC's visibility has

increased since being rated in the top 10 regional liberal arts colleges by u.s. News & World Report for 1992 and 1993. Eight of the colleges previously ranked in the top 10 were missing from the 1994 list, including FPc. According to Art Enns, vice president for advancement, FPC was dropped from the list because the magazine no longer considers it a college. It is now classified as a university because of its graduate program. The new classification dramatically changed the institutions to which FPC is compared.

Campus congestion has prompted the FPC Board of Trustees to limit the number of undergraduate students to 650, excluding the degree-completion program, for the foreseeable future. The college is planning to increase enrollment by adding to the number of graduate programs offered.

Enns reports that the current graduate focus is in the field of education, where 14 programs are offered. He says FPC would like to expand into the corporate management area, focusing on administrative leadership

North American boards grapple with funding challenges and vision

• Fund-raisers and cutbacks enlisted in response

ONGOING FUNDING challenges hovered like a pesky fly-persistent and bothersome-over the agenda of the five boards of the General Conference of Mennonite Brethren Churches during their annual joint sessions in Fresno , Calif., Sept. 28 through Oct. 1.

During the Saturday morning session of the Council of Boards, which includes the conference executive and members of all five boards, participants heard again the familiar buzz about shortages-and a few ideas that might help shoo them off:

• Neil Fast, representing the Board of MB Missions/Services (MBM/S), reported that audited figures revealed that the deficit MBM/S thought was $435,000 was actually $556,000 To counter declining income, he said, the board had reduced next year's operating budget from $5 million to $4.5 million, and had hired veteran conference promoter Peter Funk as a fundraiser (see sidebar).

• The Board of MB Biblical Seminary (MBBS) reported progress in helping the two national conferences raise the guaranteed subsidy portion of the MBBS budget. Their "working document" suggested capping the subsidy amount, continuing to work toward a 60/40 funding ratio between Canadian/U.S. conferences, and helping the national conferences each pay for a fund-raiser. U.S. Conference leaders had requested that the subsidy arrangement be reviewed after falling short of their goal by about $130,000 over the past two years.

• Jim Ens, chair of the Board of Trustees, reported that the three remaining General Conference boards-Faith and Life, Resource Ministries, and Trustees-were running about $26,000 in the red as of Aug. 31. But the deficit could have been worse. Ens said the three boards had underspent their budgets by $50,000 and the General Conference had received grants of $50,000 from Stew-

ardship Ministries of Canada and $25,000 from MB Foundation of the U.S In response to the shortfall, however, the Executive Council mandated that budgets for the coming biennium not exceed this biennium's.

Several items were processed by the Council of Boards through the Executive Council, which is composed of the chairs of the five boards, the executive of the General Conference, and the chairs of the two national conferences. Among those items:

• A proposal to change the name of the General Conference of Mennonite Brethren Churches to simply "Mennonite Brethren Churches" was referred back to the executive for further study. The proposal came in

Back on the

Presponse to a task-force survey that discovered little agreement in the constituency about changing the name, or portions of the name.

• A request was approved from BRM to change the marketing name of their products from Kindred Press to Kindred Productions. According to BRM, the new name would better reflect the broader mix of media they intend to develop.

• Loretta Snider, a teacher from Kitchener, Ont., was appointed to the Board of MBM/S. She fills the unexpired term of John Wall, who has assumed part -time administrative duties with MBM/S while Dave Dyck is on sabbatical.

• Following a review of his work, Marvin Hein was appointed to another two-year term as half-time executive secretary of the conference

• Edmund Janzen, reporting for the International Committee of Mennonite Brethren (lCOMB), said former medical missionary Jake Friesen of Reedley, Calif., had been asked to travel to India to "be a brother" to P B. Arnold,

fund-raising trail again

ETER FUNK, a well-known veteran promoter of many Brethren causes, has come out of retirement to raise funds for MB MISsions/ Services.

Funk 's appointment indicates "our strong commitment to balance the budget this year," says MBM/ S general director Harold Ens. "That will require not only continuing fiscal restraint but energetic efforts to boost

Funk and his wife , Hilda , plan to give the next two years to therr new task, health permitting. The MBM/ S board made the appointment in late September, one week after Funk celebrated his 80th birthday.

Funk served as office manager and fund-raiser for MBM/ S from 1960 to 1969. He traveled throughout the United States making hundreds of friends and generating millions of dollars on behalf of missions. Before becoming a conference representative , Funk worked for 25 years as a real estate salesman and insurance broker in Reedley, Calif.

Following his tenure with MBM/ S, Funk served the MB Board of Stewardship for 10 years providing estate planning for constituents. After "retiring " in 1979 he was asked by the MB Biblical Seminary to raise funds for the conof classrooms at the seminary. He successfully completed this project in 1983.

Following the death of his first wife , Martha , Funk married Ruth Wiens in 1990. Wiens was a retired missionary to Japan and the two traveled extensively reporting on her 40-year ministry which culminated with flourishing Mennonite Brethren Church in Japan. Ruth Funk passed away m 1992.

Funk was married to Hilda in 1993. They are members of the Kingsburg MB Church, Kingsburg, Calif. MBM/ S staff began soliCiting individual donations for the global mission agency June 1.-MBM/ S

one of the key figures in the ongoing leadership dispute there. While working in India, Friesen became a respected friend and mentor to Arnold. Friesen was scheduled to leave for India Oct. 10.

In addition to the Executive Council agenda, the boards gave brief reports of their individual meetings. Following are some of the highlights.

Board of MB Biblical Seminary

• Requested permission to add up to four appointed members to the board, with the possibility of some or all of them coming from outside the denomination. The change would represent an effort to broade-n the base of the school as well as add specialized expertise and resources, according to Henry Schmidt, MBBS president. The request was provisionally accepted and will be studied by the Executive Council.

• Requested that rather than hav· ing a representative of the General Conference BOT serve on the MBBS Board, the two national conferences should each appoint a representative. The new configuration would better represent the interests of the two national conferences, according to Chuck Buller, MBBS board chair.

Board of Faith and Life

• Continues to work on the ordination issue, particularly to clarify the terms and issues involved. Ultimately, BFL hopes to create more uniform guidelines regarding entering and exiting ordination within the denomination.

• Is making progress on the Con· fession of Faith revision project. Also, the board will be releasing a revised version of Making Disciples, a teaching manual for church membership classes, by next summer.

• Announced that the topic for their next study conference will be "Creation and Human Sexuality " The conference will be held in spring 1996 at a site to be determined.

Board of MB Missions/Services

• Has made a 15-year ministry commitment to work among the Khmu people of Thailand, Laos and South· east Asia (see sidebar)

• Will evaluate their ministry in Germany next year

• Will increase the amount of their operating budget designated for mission work in the u.S. and Canada from 2 percent annually to 5 percent by the year 2000.

Board of Resource Ministries

• Has launched the Faith Focus Family curriculum project on the topics of missions, history and peace; first lessons are expect to be ready for use by January 1996.

MBMjS

• Reported that the Jubilee curriculum has been well-received in Canada, but has not taken off in the u.S. as yet.

• Is proceeding with the next installment in the Luminaire layman's Bible commentary series. The next volume, written by David Ewert, will be on the Book of Philippians

• Received permission, in consultation with the BOT, to accept designated, above-budget gifts for specific projects -Don Ratzlaff

looks to Thailand and beyond

DESPONDING TO A highly favorable evaluation by an outside consultant , --"..the MB Missions/ Services board Sept. 28-30 decided to begin a 15-year ministry with the Khmu people in Thailand and Laos.

Since 1992, MBM/ S missionaries Russell and Elizabeth Schmidt have been in Thailand doing a pilot ministry and researching the feasibility of a churchplanting program. Their work focused increasingly on the Khmu , an animistic Buddhist people who have not heard the gospel. Twenty thousand Khmu live in Thailand and 400 ,000 in neighboring Laos.

The evaluation , submitted by Reg Reimer, director of leadership development for World Evangelical Fellowship, praised the Schmidts' research and evangelistic work and recommended that the pilot project be affirmed.

While evangelistic efforts will be concentrated in Thailand , the network of Khmu relationships impacts thousands of Laotians across the border. The decision to enter Thailand led to the creation of another opening for a missionary couple. The board also noted that the Japan MB Church has a couple preparing for a possible assignment there.

• Former Soviet Union: Continuing to build the MBM/ S teams in the former Soviet Union , the board appointed Andrew and Julie Hershey-Bergen of Fresno, Calif. , as Good News Intern candidates to attend Missionary Training Institute in 1995. The Hershey-Bergens are prepared to teach theological education Other 1995 MTI students are Tim and Carolyn Gartke of Regina, Sask., who hope to minister in Lithuania. MBM/ S interns Bob and Susan Gulack will leave for their church-planting assignment in Panevezys , lithuania, inJanuary.

• Giving: Addressing the continuing need to increase giving , Dale Warkentin , U.S. secretary for constituency relations , demonstrated how bottle banks could be used in homes to collect spare change totaling about $100 a year. A bright, multicolor label that affixes to a two-liter plastic soft drink bottle urges savers to collect "Spare Change for the World. " MBM/ S will begin the bottle bank promotion in January.

• Salaries: Looking ahead to 1995-96 budget planning , the board called for a return to 1993 salary levels , with a small increase , if possible The action aims to reverse the 3 percent cut for the 1994-95 year

• Zaire: The Zaire MB Conference now reports a membership of 58,000 , a jump of 4 ,000 since last year. It is also sending a five-person health team to minister among the 2 million Rwandan refugees who have amassed on the eastern frontier.

• India: The board continues to withhold subsidies from the India Conference and will closely monitor the forthcoming visit by Jake Friesen, commissioned by the International Committee of Mennonite Brethren, to seek healing and reconciliation. Communications with India have improved since subsidies were suspended last spring. -Gary Hardaway, MBM/ S

was the featured speaker at Estes '89 Koons is a college administrator, author, national speaker and mother. As executive director of the Institute for Outreach Ministries at Azusa Pacific University, Koons has been responsible for taking 5,000

have not yet been finalized , according to Neufeld. The planning committee had hoped to bring a well-known performing artist or group and had budgeted accordingly. But that goal has not been met.

"The Lord wasn't in favor high school students The addition of of that," says Greg Schmidt, Estes ' 95 administrative director from Newton, Kan. "Our drawing card is relationships. "

FOCUS

Peace Sunday '95 to focus on crime in the community

new ethnic churches to the U.S. Conference

has created the into Mexico during Easter break for weeklong service projects. The story of Koons and her adopted son , told in Tony: Our Journey Together, has been a best seller and is being potential for a

The addition of new ethnic churches to the U.S Conference has created the potential for a significant increase in the number of convention participants Schmidt and Neufeld say the program will incorporate the developed into a fea- significant ture fIlm .

Worship during the weekend will be led by Neufeld and a band of

• Resources and articles available for assistance

A CRITICAL AGENDA for a growing .l"l..church is to reduce the conflict and violence in homes, congregations and communities. To focus on this agenda, the Peace Education Commission of the U.S Conference once again invites all congregations to set aside the third Sunday in January each year as Peace Sunday.

ethnic diversity among U S. Mennonite Brethren.

increase in the number of various languages and music represented by the different cultures to demonstrate the musicians composed of participants. members from various districts Seminars on the topics of missions and evangelism will be offered

Evening concerts will feature contemporary Christian musicians and comedians, though arrangements senseless kindness."

All teams wrapup the outreach with a debriefIng retreat on the California coast for three days.

YMI is targeting youth groups as well as individual teens interested in a summer missions opportunity. In an effort to recruit team leaders , one pastor or youth worker can attend free of charge for every fIve teens participating from that congregation. The cost for each participant is $500. SOAR registration materials will be received by all Mennonite Brethren churches in November. The registration deadline is May 15, but Friesen anticipates ftlling the program by April.

YMI is a cooperative effort of the United States and Canadian conferences as well as MB Missions/Se rvices. In addition to inner-city outreach, cross-cultural ministry and discipleship, YMI is particularly interested in helping start new churches and has worked with more than 35 Mennonite Brethren church plants.-CF

New faces can also be found among the national youth conference planning team members. Schmidt describes the make-up of the planning team as drastically different from the group that gathered to plan the national youth conference four years ago.

"We needed to pass the torch," says Schmidt His goal in formulating the new team was to put leadership of the event in the hands of individuals currently involved in district youth work.

In addition to Schmidt and Neufeld, returning committee members are Elgin Glanzer, treasurer, and Rolando Mireles, seminar coordinator and Latin America MB Conference representative

Regional representatives are Stuart Pederson and Charles Fender, Central District; Louise Jones and Jackie Kenan, North Carolina District; Cindy Patzkowsky and Tim Franz, Pacific District; Lynn Jackson and Curtis Karber, Southern District; Gordon Balisky, Oleg Derkach and Stanislav Velichiko, Slavic churches; and Habakuk Dalavai, East Indian Returning as campus deans for the weekend are Winnie Bartel, Shafter, Calif., and Doug Wiens, Fairview, Okla

Estes ' 95 registration forms should arrive in Mennonite Brethren churches this month. The registration fee is $170 per person. Registration deadline is Jan 15, 1995 -Connie Faber

In 1995, Peace Sunday will fall on Jan. 15. The theme this year will be "Christ Calls Us to Peace in the CommUnity."

Congregations are encouraged to use this day and the following week to study, pray, and discuss peace and justice issues as they relate to crime and violence in the community. The occasions could include morning worship services, Sunday school, study groups and women's ministries.

The January issue of The Christian Leader will offer a selection of articles and resource materials to enrich this emphasis on making peace in the community.

By setting aside a special day to focus on peace, the commission hopes to provide the context for conversation and teaching in the home and congregation on injustice and nonviolence.

A Peace Sunday Packet on the theme "A Commitment to Christ's Way of Peace" is available from Mennonite Central Committee, 21 South Street, P O Box 500, Akron, PA 17501-0500.

This packet includes stories, readings, prayers, a festival plan, and other resources Also included are a set of Peace Statement brochures and a bulletin insert for congregational reading of the affirmation of faith.

Members of the Peace Education Commission are Dalton Reimer, Fresno, Calif.; Sam Resendez, Del Rey, Calif., Don Isaac, Hillsboro, Kan ., and Katie Funk Wiebe, Wichita, Kan .

Rallying to a cause...

Jeffrey Anschutz, a counselor who attends the Buhler (Kan.) MB Church, leads a workshop on integrating new people into congregations. His workshop was part of the agenda for the Mid-Kansas regional rally of the Southern District Conference. The event, fourth in a series of six regional rallies, was held Oct. 15 at the First MB Church of Wichita. This is the second time the district has held regional gatherings in lieu of an annual fall district-wide convention. The experimental plan calls for rallies and a convention on alternating years According to Roland Reimer, district minister, attendance has been down slightly from the first series of rallies, but the response has still been favorable While an annual convention draws around 350 people, combined attendance at the rallies is expected to reach between 1,000 to 1,500 people. In addition to workshops, the program includes worship, brief commission reports, a fellowship meal and a final program of singing and encouragement.

YOUTH

New pastor's event postponed until '96

• Scheduling conflicts nix '95 orientation sessions

THEANNUAL orientation sessions for new Mennonite Brethren pas· tors, planned for January 1995, has been postponed until February 1996. Numerous scheduling conflicts have prompted the change, according to Marvin Hein, executive secretary of the General Conference.

Hein invites new pastoral staff members and others from the United States and Canada who would like an orientation to the General Conference to attend the event, which is sponsored by the Board of Faith and Life (BFL).

In the past, the orientation has been scheduled for January so it can be held in connection with the annual School for Ministry sponsored by MB Biblical Seminary. BFL is moving the orientation to February 1996 to give participants the opportunity to visit the campus while students and profes· sors are on campus and classes are in session. Few students are on campus in January.

"We covet your partnership in fostering this resource opportunity for many of our pastors, " says Hein. "Pray with us as we plan for 1996."

MINISTRY

Trio participates in MCC orientation

• 55 new workers prepare

for service assignments

THREE MENNONITE Brethren were among the 55 workers who participated in orientation sessions held at Mennonite Central Committee headquarters in Akron , Pa , Sept 6-16.

Althea and Tom Frantz of Shafte r, Calif. , are beginning a three -year assignment in Brownstown , Jamaica Aletha will be working in community development and Tom in agricultural

services. Tom is a member of the Shafter MB Church. He is also affiliated with the Shafter United Methodist Church, where Althea is a member. Their children are Cora and Emma.

Suzanne Barkman of Dallas, Ore., is beginning a two-year assignment in Atlanta, Ga., where she will work as assistant to the director of Samaritan House. Barkman received a bachelor's degree from Fresno Pacific College, Fresno, Calif., and is a member of the Dallas MB Church.

Janice Leppke of Fresno, Calif., began a two-year assignment in May. She works in Fresno as resource development coordinator for West Coast MCC. Leppke received a bachelor's degree and teaching credential from Fresno Pacific College. She is working toward a master's degree in reading education at FPC and is a member of the College Community Church in Clovis, Calif. Her husband is Kenneth.-MCC News Service

RELATIONSHIPS

Intermenno trip attracts three MBs

• Cultural interaction is aim of year-long program

THREE

MENNONITE Brethren are among the 27 North American young people who have begun a year in Europe with the Intermenno Trainee program.

Program participants spend a year working and living with European Mennonites, learning to know Europeans firsthand. Most participants in this program spend six months each in two locations.

Monica Detweiler of Kansas City, Kan., is beginning a one-year term with the Intermenno program in The Netherlands Detweiler is a member of Koerner Heights MB Church in Newton, Kan., and a graduate of Bethel College, Newton.

Kathleen Farren of Sacramento, Calif., is beginning a one-year term in Hannover, Germany, where she will be a kitchen and garden worker at the Bildungsstatte Kirchroder Turm conference center. Farren is a member of

Greenhaven Neighborhood Church, Sacramento and a graduate of Tabor College, Hillsboro, Kan.

Reggie Miller, Weatherford, Okla., is with the Intermenno program in Signau, Switzerland, where he will work as a farmhand with a local family. Miller is a member of Pine Acres Church in Weatherford.

Detweiler, Farren and Miller will probably move to other placements for the second half of the year. They

. NEWS BRIEFS

began their year of service with the 27 other North American young people at orientation meetings in Akron, Pa.

Intermenno is a one-year exchange program with Europe, administered by the Intermenno Trainee Committee in Europe. This committee is made up of representatives from The Netherlands, Germany and Switzerland. Mennonite Central Committee helps prepare participants for the experience.

-MCC News Service

• Fresno Pacific College and Fresno Pacific College Foundation have received a gift of commercial real estate valued in excess of $1 million. The gift, from international entrepreneurs Charles and Joann Ashley, includes five parcels of commercial real estate located adjacent to the Palm Lakes Golf Course in Fresno, Calif. The Ashleys say they are concerned about youth in the United States and they believe the college provides the spiritual and moral stability needed to strengthen youth College officials say the proceeds of the gift will be used to create student scholarships, provide permanent endowment, build needed facilities and complete a church facility for the Coursegold Community Bible Church (FPC)

• Philip Wiebe, Christian Leader columnist and a member of the Kingwood Bible Church, Salem, Ore., has been appointed editor of Rejoice!, the inter-Mennonite devotional magazine. He will assume the time role in January, succeeding Katie Funk Wiebe. In addition to his Ph'lip Side column in the Leader, Wiebe has had articles published in Focus on the Family, Decision, Christian Herald and other magazines. In the late '70s and early '80s, he traveled extensively in a full-time music ministry, which exposed him to the larger Mennonite community. Wiebe

• Ron and Faith Klaassen received their 1994 Tabor College Alumni Award Oct. 7 The Klaassens were recognized for their inner-city ministry through World Impact and Newark Christian School in Newark, N.J. Faith graduated from Tabor in 1968, Ron in 1970. In 1978 they joined the World Impact staff They are members of the Parkview MB Church in Hillsboro, Kan.

• Carol and Phil Bergen of Clovis, Calif , mission workers with MB Missions/Services, Africa Inter-Mennonite Mission (AIMM) and the Commission on Overseas Mission of the General Conference Mennonite Church, returned to Burkina Faso Aug 22 following a one-year North America assignment. In Burkina Faso they are part of a team involved in language analysis of the Nanerige language. Their goal is to record the language in written form and to eventually translate Scriptures.

• Jean Janzen of Fresno, Calif., considered America's leading Mennonite poet, presented several programs at Bethel College in North Newton, Kan , and Tabor College in Hillsboro, Kan. , Oct 24-26 While at Tabor, she gave a poetry reading Oct. 25 in the Historic Mennonite Brethren Church and spoke at the campus worship gathering the following day At that time she received an Alumni Merit Award from the college. Janzen, a member of the College Community Church, Clovis, Calif , attended Tabor in 1952-53.

• Buhler (Kan.) Sunshine Home, a retirement facility sponsored by the Buhler MB Church, will soon open a 20-bed nursing wing. This will increase the facility's capacity to 60 nursing beds and 25 assisted -living apartments The institution is also creating a new retirement community called " Sunshine Meadows." The project will include 12 duplex units and 32 congregate living apartments

more than $100,000 for benefiting persons in developing countries.

• Proclamation

NEWTON, Kan. (Koerner Heights)-Ron Penner, MB Missions/Services worker assigned to Mexico, was the speaker at a missions conference held Oct. 2.

DELFT, Minn. (Carson)-Roger Eng· brecht, pastor of Lincoln Hills Bible Church (MB) in Sioux Falls, S D , was the speaker at the Harvest Festival Oct. 16.

LODI, Calif. (Vinewood)-A Praise and Missions Festival, held Oct. 22-23 , featured Edmund Janzen as the speaker Janzen, who teaches Bible at Fresno Pacific College and serves as General Conference moderator, presented three messages.

HARVEY, N.D.-Dale Warkentin, MBM/ S secretary for constituent relations in the U.S ., was the guest speaker at the Harvest Festival held Oct. 9.

FREEMAN, S.D. (Silver Lake)-A recent Harvest, Praise and Missions Festival featured Dave and Shirley Larson, directors of the Campus Crusade for Christ program at the University of South Dakota. Walter and Amalia Preza, hispanic church planters in Omaha, Neb ., and seven other people from their congregation were featured during the evening missions rally.

MOUNTAIN LAKE, Minn.-Clint Grenz , Central District minister, was the speaker at the Harvest Festival held Oct. 23 .

FERNDALE, Wash. (Good News)-Otto Eck , MB Missions/Services missionary to

Portugal, preached the morning message Oct 2. In the evening, he talked about his work in Portugal.

• Teaching/Nurture

FERNDALE, Wash. (Good News Fellowship)-Men from the three Mennonite Brethren congregations in Whatcom Coun· ty met for a men' s retreat at Cedar Springs in Sumas, Wash., Sept. 16-17.

SAN JOSE, Calif. (Lincoln Glen)-The annual men's retreat was held Oct 21-23 in Santa Cruz. Activities included recreation, a concert, worship and study sessions

Hll..LSBORO, Kan.-Nadine Friesen, coordinator of discipleship ministries, and Dennis Fast, pastor, are leading a seminar designed to nurture personal prayer The first session began Oct. 19; the weekly series runs through Dec. 14

PosmON ANNOUNCEMENT

PUBliC RELATIONS DIRECTOR

Role: The public relations director is responsible to the advancement vice president for the general direction of campus publications, advertising and media relations. The director oversees the campus publication schedule, publishes the college magazines, plans, executes and directs all advertising and media information campaigns and reviews all campus publications for accuracy and consistency of quality and presentation The director is also responsible for maintaining college photo and media fIles and setting priorities for publications and media with the president and the advancement vice president.

Responsibilities: Plan, edit/ write and arrange mailing of college magazines, newsletters, advancement publications, news releases and feature stories

• Develop relationships with news and public service personnel in print, radio and television markets.

• Arrange for public service announcements and publicity, and maintain public relations records

• Develop copy and advertising material for special events and capital campaigns.

• Arrange for photography of campus events.

Qualifications: Required:

• Bachelor's degree with successful experience in publications

• Skill in journalistic writing

• Knowledge of photography, graphics, media relations and both evangelical and secular markets.

• Ability to manage student and professional staff Desired:

• Master's degree in English, writing, journalism or public relations

• Experience in magazine layout, electronic typesetting, darkroom, PR record keeping, media relations

• Experience in Christian higher education.

Compensation: Dependent on qualifications and experience. Benefits include insurance (medical, LTD, life), retirement (TlAA, CREF), Section 125 options, and tuition remission for dependents, one-month vacation.

College description:

John E. and Anne Friesen

Application instructions:

FRESNO PACIFIC COLLEGE is an evangelical liberal arts college sponsored by the Mennonite Brethren Church. The college offers the associate of arts, bachelor of arts, and master of arts in education degrees. Undergraduates number approximately 850, and graduate students 800. The college is accredited as a senior college by the Western Association of Schools and Colleges. Fresno Pacific is known for its academic excellence, community environment and Christian commitment. All employees of the college must be able to support the theological orientation and mission of the college, and express a personal Christian commitment.

Send a letter of application and resume to:

Personnel Office

Fresno Pacific College 1717 South Chestnut Fresno, CA 93702

Phone: (209) 453-2245

Fresno Pacific College provides equal opportunity for employment without regard for race, color, national origin, sex, age or handicap.

REGIER, ANNE GOERTZEN, of Reedley, Calif., a charter member of Bethany MB Church, Fresno, Calif., was born Dec. 23, 1915, at Henderson, Neb , and died Sept. 16, 1994, at the age of 79. On Nov. 4, 1934, she was married to Ike Regier, who survives. She is also survived by four daughters, Dorlene Heinrichs, Shirley Lansidel, Norma Regier, and Marilyn Ens; four sonsin law, nine grandchildren and three greatgrandsons.

SCIRlLTZ, ERNEST, Shafter, Calif., was born Aug . 26, 1916, to Samuel and Anna Schultz at Fairview, Okla., and died Sept 6, 1994, at the age of 78. On Sept. 5, 1937, he was married to Ethel Bergman, who survives. He is also survived by three sons, LeRoy and wife Kathy, Douglas and wife Linda, and David and wife Sheila; two daughters, Gloria and husband Henry Stinnett, and Teresa and hus· band John Soranno; and several grandchildren and great-grandchildren .

TESSMAN, DANIEL, Hillsboro, Kan., was born Feb 5, 1905, to John and Tena Huebert Tessman at Colony, Okla., and died Oct 15, 1994, at the age of 89. On April 2, 1937, he married Eva Janzen. In addition to his wife, he is survived by one son, Larry and wife Faye of Huntsville, Ala ; two daughters, Karen and husband Gary Wiens of Hillsboro, and Gail and husband Harold Loewen of Elkhart, Ind.; seven grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.

WEDEL, PALMER J., Carpenter, S.D., a member of the Bethel MB Church, Yale, S.D , was born July 1, 1925, to Henry and Sarah Hofer Wedel in Liberty Township north of Yale, and died June 5, 1994, at the age of 69. On Sept. 1, 1950, he was married to Goldie Hofer, who survives. He is also survived by two daughters, Winona and husband Delvin Stahl, and Helen Wedel, all of Huron, S.D ; one son, Paul of Carpenter; three grand· daughters, three brothers, three sisters and one sister·in-Iaw.

WIEBE, ELIAS, Fresno, Calif , former aca· demic dean and head of the teaching education division at Fresno Pacific College, was born July 6, 1920, to H.D. and Gertrude Wiebe, at Corn, Okla , and died June 12, 1994, at the age of 73. On June 11, 1943 he married Phyllis Roskam. In addition to his wife, he is survived by one daughter, Carol and husband Dean Hiebert of Illinois; one son, Dan and wife Dorothy Slabach of Mississippi; two grandsons; a Sister, Phoebe Glanz· er of South Dakota; and two brothers, Joel of Clovis, Calif., and James of Fresno, Calif.

WIENS, JACOB F., Hemet, Calif., was born May 24, 1909 to Frank J. and Maria Warkentin Wiens at Omsk, Siberia, and died Oct. 10, 1994, at the age of 85. In addition to his wife, Susie Willems, he is survived by two sons, Robert and wife Marion of Redlands, Calif. , and Kenneth and wife Judith of Col· orado Springs, Colo ; one daughter, Lorraine and husband Joe Colton, of Hemet; one brother, Frank]. Wiens, of Hillsboro , Kan. ; seven grandchildren and 10 great grandchil· dren ef2

Mennonite Central Committee invites applications for the position of:

Executive Secretary

Starting date: January 1996

Location: Akron, Pennsylvania Applications will be accepted through November 30, 1994.

Direct inquires and applications to: Paul Quiring, Chair, Search Committee 6548 North Thorne Street, Fresno, CA 93711

Work phone: (209) 432-2800

Home phone: (209) 431-8290

""- Mennonite Central ..611 Committee

Mennonite Central Committee and MCC U.S. 21 South 12th Street, PO Box 500, Akron, PA 17501-0500 (717) 859-1151 (717) 859-3889

Mennonite Central Committee Canada 134 Plaza Drive, Winnipeg, MB R3T 5K9 (204) 261-6381

The Past is Present

The Past is Present, a 7-minute video, explains how U.S. bombs dropped on Laos during the Vietnam War continue to maim and kill Lao people. Live bombs still explode in northern Laos, killing farmers who inadvertantly hit them while hoeing and children who mistake them for balls. Tells how MCC and a British ordnance disposal agency are training and equipping Lao teams to safely remove unexploded bombs. For free loan or purchase contact the MCC office nearest you.

( ,-- Mennonite Central .611 Committee

Pontius' Puddle

INTERNATIONAL

Continuing growth

Rapid Mennonite church growth in Ethiopia that began during a time of persecution in the 1980s is still going strong Membership of the Meserete Kristos Church, the Mennonite church in Ethiopia, has reached nearly 75,000, reports Bedru Hussein, MKC executive secretary. Most of the membership are attending 106 local churches in Ethiopia. Ethiopian Mennonites also have 340 church plantings. The MKC recognizes a church as an established congregation after it reaches set guidelines, including a certain number of members and leaders. The MKC grew rapidly "underground" in small house fellowships during the Marxist government rule in the 1980s. When the Mengistu government fell in 1992 and the churches were permitted to worship openly, the MKC found its member-

ship had multiplied several times to more than 50,000. (EMM News Seroice)

CULTS

Satan strikes back

A mass suicide in Switzerland Oct. 5 had its origins in satanism, according to George A. Mather, co-author of The Dictionary of Cults, Sects, Religions and the Occult (Zondervan, 1993). Officials found 48 bodies in several locations in Switzerland and five others in Canada, all linked to the Order of the Solar Temple, a cult founded more than a

1970-1995 - 25 YEARS OF TRAVEL EXPERIENCE

You can trust your travel to 25 years of experience. Join us for a tour in 1995!

Jamaica in January January 13-20

Jamaica January Journey January 20-27

Jamaica Family Business January 27·February 3

Tulip Tune in Holland April 18 to May 1

Lands of the Bible May 10-23

Vienna: Music & Culture May 30 -June 13

European Health Care July 3-18

European Anabaptist Heritage July 5-21

European PAX July 10-26

England/Scotland August 9-24

Wilmer & Janet Martin

Sam & Helen Lapp

Henry Landes & Leonard Geiser

Henry Landes. l'ieter & Martha Gotwals Postma

John & Naomi Lederach

Wilbur Maust

Joseph G. Landis &Aldred Neufeldt

John Ruth & Ruth Jantzi

Cal Redekop & Henr y D Landes

Wilmer Martin & Mary Rittenhouse Schwartzentruber

Mexico November 15-30 Cal

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decade ago. Mather says the cult is a satanic church. He cited the presence of identifiable symbols and emblems, the position of the bodies in a circle, and other evidence found at the scene. "There is no doubt in my thinking that with all the symbolism I have seen reported in the news, the Temple of Solar is not only a New Age representative religion, it is a satanic church," he says The cult, founded by 46-year-old Bel· gian-bom physician Luc

Jouret, is estimated to have lured some 200 members. (EP)

RESCUE

Better late than never

More than a half-century after the eruption of World War 2, Gennan Christians have begun visiting some of the sites in 29 European countries where Nazis committed war crimes, seeking reconciliation. "Ways of Reconciliation," a joint ini-

COMFORT

The hard truth about those pews

EVERWONDER why church pews aren't more comfortable? They're made that way on purpose, according to Virgil Miller, president of Sauder Manufacturing Co., the nation's leading designer and manufacturer of church seating. "We call it attentive comfort," Miller told the Toledo Blade. "Our goal is to help people pay attention, not put them to sleep." Sauder manufactures 20,000 linear feet of pews and 10,000 chairs each month for church use. The contoured pews provide sound lumbar support to help people remain comfortable while sitting through a church service. About 80 percent of church seating the company sells is upholstered and padded, and about half of a" churches use chairs rather than pews because chairs provide greater facility flexibility. (EP)

tiative of Catholic and Protestant charismatic groups, began Sept. 1 by visiting Auschwitz, Gleiwitz and Krakau, asking the local populations for forgiveness. One of the leaders of the initiative said Germany had "brought great sufferings to innumerable people" during the 12 years of the Nazi regime Through public apologies in church services, the group of Christians hopes to "ask God's forgiveness for ourselves and all those who cannot do so themselves." According to the information service of the German Evangelical Alliance, Chancellor Helmut Kohl and other dignitaries honored the efforts toward reconciliation. (EP)

TELEVISION

In the pole position

Promoters of the "See You at the Pole" (SYATP) prayer initiative estimate some 2 million junior high, high school and college students across the U.S. flocked to their schools Sept. 21 to pray for their schools, communities and country. If so, it would make the event the largest youth prayer meeting in history. SYATP started in Texas in 1990 with more than 46,000 youth participating on 1,200 campuses. It became a nationwide event the following year and grew quickly as more students became involved in the grass-roots movement. Promoters estimate, based on surveys returned by participants, that as many as 75 percent of the high schools in the U.S. had students involved in 1993. About 75 denominations and Christian organizations cooperated to encourage teenagers and

young adults to participate in this year's event. (EP)

COMMUNICATION

Mums the word

Rapid advancements in modem communications technology have left media consumers in a disquieting din of bells and whistles, with the "mute" button pushed on the once lively art of conversation, says Quentin Schultze, a media expert and professor of communication arts and sciences at Calvin College, a Christian liberal arts school in Grand Rapids, Mich. "We live in homes with four or five television sets and 10 or 12 radios, and yet there is very little real communication," he says. "The average parent in the U.S. spends only 30 seconds a day conversing with his or her child, and about four-and-a-half minutes a day talking with his or her spouse." In a new book and video series titled Winning Your Kids Back From the Media, Schultze says Christians living in a society he describes as "media-rich and communication-poor" need to become wise consumers of media and learn to be good partners with family and friends in conversation. "I don't think the Christian community understands that through communication we come to know each other-and through knowing each other we come to love each other and the God who made us." (EP)

MISSION

Easier said than done

Though pastors often tell their parishioners to change the world for God, a new survey conducted

by the Barna Research Group found that about half of all pastors of Protestant churches say the Christian church is not making a discernible difference in American society. Overall, 41 percent of pastors of Protestant churches claimed that Christian churches, in general, are having limited impact, with 3 percent saying

churches are "failing miserably." Among the half of the pastors who had more positive views, even their perspectives were mild in tenor. Only 2 percent said churches are doing "tremendous, highly effective work," while 41 percent claimed churches are doing a "respectable, if not wholly successful job."

(EP)

MORALITY

Is sex education flunking?

DESPITE

CLAIMS that more aggressive sex education in public schools is needed to stem the growing tide of teenage pregnancy and sexually transmitted disease, little evidence exists that such an idea works , according to Barbara DaFoe Whitehead

In her article " The failure of sex education," published in the October issue of Th e Atlantic Mo nthly, Whitehead examines modern sex education and statistical data on its efficacy. She focuses primarily on the New Jersey model of comprehensive sex education, which is mandated in 17 states The approach brings sexual instruction to children as early as grade school

Whitehead cites the research of Douglas Kirby, who surveyed all published research on school-based sex education for the Centers for Disease Control. Kirby found that " sex education has little effect on teenagers' decisions to engage in or postpone sex _" Kirby also found that while sex education programs emphasize parentchild communication, such communication is " far less important in influencing sexual behavior than parenting discipline and supervision ." He also found no evidence that teaching decision-making skills is effective, or that extending sex education into younger grades is effective

When New Jersey schools began implementing comprehensive sex education in 1980, 67 . 6 percent of teenage births in the state were to unmarried mothers . After 11 years, the figure had increased to 84 percent.

So, can anything slow sexual activity among the young? Whitehead cites evidence that " Abstinence messages can help students put off sex ." She also notes : " Religiously observant teens are likelier than others to refrain from early sex; the highest level of premarital intercourse occurs among teens with no religious affiliation _" (EP)