 Okay, and then to questions proper which is what you're all waiting for. I've got a number of questions, more than we can possibly address in the next 20 to 25 minutes here, but I will make this commitment on air so Reagan and the rest of the team is going to have to back me up on it and that is that somebody will respond to more of these questions as bonus material for Patreon and quite possibly they could end up with some more episode ideas for our main channel as well, so your questions are not going to be completely in vain even if we can't talk about all them tonight. So the first I'm going to give a pair of questions here to kick us off. So one listener here wrote, Fundamentalism is still tough for me to follow. What are some things we practice today in Weaverland or Graffdale conference that would reflect bad fundamentals? Now obviously our point here is not going to be to make negative statements about any conference or group of people, but I found this question interesting because Weaverland and Graffdale are both old order groups. So there's a parting of ways between old order Mennonites and the old Mennonites that Chester was talking about and so the way that fundamentalism played into their history is going to be a little different and right along with that I'm going to jump to the second question which is about John Funk and the reason I'm jumping to that is that the things mentioned in this question probably helped to inspire that division between the old order and old Mennonite churches. So this question says did John Funk help to open the door to dispensational premillennialism? He was from a revivalism background and brought that to Mennonites. Did that influence indirectly helped Mennonites to look to broader evangelicalism for their answers with some finding dispensationalism rather than looking back to their story? So we'll throw you some tough ones here whoever wants to go first can go ahead. I'll answer the first one and then maybe Chester can go with the second one. So one of the things for Weaverland or maybe more commonly what we call horning in our area, am I getting the right conference there? I'm not mixing that up, would not have been as directly influenced because of some of the choices they made. For example the Lancaster Conference, the derivative churches took up, this is one of the things we didn't actually talk about, they took up the Christian fundamentals Mennonite statement of faith which really dramatically influenced the Lancaster Conference derivative churches Eastern, Hope, Mid-Atlantic, Pilgrim, not sure which all are using precisely the Christian fundamentals Mennonite but if your statement of faith is based on that then that is what you're using. Weaverland has not so in many ways they have cut off those influences and are only seeing them by their association with other Lancaster Conference derivative churches and I think Chester can maybe continue that thought. Thank you that's very perceptive. One of the things we should mention here is that Anabectas have historically used the Dortrich Confession up until the garden city fundamentals of 1921 but you're correct if your orders did not buy into that but in the more recent years they have looked across the fence and they saw how some of these other churches have handled their issues and they have adopted a fundamentalist way of dealing with some of their issues. Let's go to the other John Funk question. The first question in this is did John Funk help open the door to dispensational premillennialism and the answer simply is yes. He was from a revivalist background and brought that to the Mennonites. The answer is no. He was from Franconia and he moved to Chicago and he was worked with Moody, White Elm Moody's Sunday School movement and he was introduced to the broader Protestant way of revivalism through his experience in Chicago and only got on track I guess you could say by taking a trip out to Yellow Creek, Indiana and actually spending several days among Mennonites who were having a conference there and he came back. He was so deeply impressed. His brother-in-law thought he was crazy for not continuing on in the lumber business but John Funk decided he's going to cast his lot with these people who needed help instead of enriching himself personally. I don't know if that's answering everything that's looking we're looking for there. Yeah there's a number of questions that continue to come in around the dispensationalist question. The one is just a historical question and that was we're not most Anabaptist Mennonites more all millennial before premillennial became popular. May I I'd like to answer that question traditionally Anabaptists have always been all millennial it's only through Moody Bible Institute and some of those teachers like A. D. Wenger the premillennialism have even arrived in their consciousness and Amish Mennonite people have always been all millennial except the ones who lived in Pennsylvania who were influenced by the Bible schools and and the meetings the prophecy meetings among the old Mennonites and it's they the only premillennials are the eastern Pennsylvania located geographically Amish Mennonites all the rest of them are all millennial. And maybe to add on top of that a little broader view that historically Christians have been premillennial now that's a very historic Christian view and I would say early Anabaptists also were premillennial in their views some early Anabaptists. It depends on how you're defining premillennial I think like Justin Marder was a Chilean Chileanism is a version but it's not exactly the same as premillennialism. Does it help to make a distinction between premillennial as in the simple belief that Jesus will return before the millennium described in Revelation between that on the one hand and dispensational premillennialism which adds a whole another layer of God dealing in dispensations and makes the millennium about Israel according to the flesh or national Israel. Traditionally Anabaptists have not been dispensational premillennials they are premillennial without being dispensational. Yeah okay so a number of questions related to statements about rules and I will read several of those to put those out there. So one questioner writes it seems that Chester's core thesis is that until the fundamentalist influenced the Mennonite church there were no rules or focus on externals. I'd really like to hear some evidence from Brother Chester on the absence of external rules. It's a profound shift in my thinking if it's verifiable and then two more that I'll put with that one somebody writes ideally a church of convicted people is best. However fundamentalism can also help protect your young children when one family allows Disney and the other doesn't what is shared between children and what I hear in that question is a sense of rules aren't just about what an individual does they shape what kind of community you are and then a final one again on rules. Would the way the rules were enforced by the fundamentalists have been different than the Anabaptists historically enforced the rules? So I'll kind of throw out that trio of questions. I'd like to speak first to that one. I probably am not saying it accurately by saying that there's no rules but I'm saying the kind of rules that had developed in the last 100 years are different from the kind of rules that were given earlier. The original rules were more on the negative we're not going to do this or we're not going to do that and they're very simple it's not very very detailed at all and those are all written you can go find them in history it's a it's a small F fundamentalist concept to pigeonhole everything to define everything out in detail and that is the influence of fundamentalism we find among ourselves today. Now that's true of an adult level when it comes to children I've been a school teacher for a number of years you've got to have some rules you can't have too many but you don't have order or routine you can't function and so there are organizational rules that I think are a little different from ethical rules and so we're not reflecting against what it takes to make an organization run. I think that what I'm concerned about is that when you go too far with rules you enter into legalism and that's that's a negative. When it talks on this about Disney one family allows Disney and the other family does not well every family is proper to have its own rules and every family's rules are going to be different but I do think that if that's a case then one father needs to talk to another father about why he does not want Disney and why he doesn't appreciate his children being influenced by Disney and so when there's conversation like that and parents understand one another you don't even need a rule it's possibly a difference and maybe this is what Chester or what you're saying even in relation to let's say John Horsch and his book and I think you held it up modern religious liberalism one author has noted that nothing he wrote was non-orthodox for Mennonites but the dogmatic tone which became characteristic of his pen was different than you typically heard from Mennonites as well said. Another thing that may so I'm you know I I think Christians historically have had quite interesting rules in the form of church orders statements of faith and instruction class manuals and they're quite detailed you when you when you look at Clement of Alexandria he both positive and negative and it's so detailed now you know a question could come up how widely was it was it authoritative and how widely was it used but possibly a difference that fundamentalism may and I I offer this as a possible difference arguing against myself is that it had the institutional machinery which was broader and wider than typically that detail would typically have which had a different flavor when you have a congregational order for a congregation it feels a whole lot different than something that is for the whole United States so that is possibly a difference it it's interesting here that the Amish Mennonites many times don't even write their rules old order Amish completely refuse to write in fact too much organization is anathema to them even the word conference is like a bad word for them yeah I think the old river brethren new conference old conference think also they have that oral versus written and it brings up the interesting thought that written is technology so you're utilizing technology to roll out this congregational order as opposed to not using technology or just using the oral more human humanized version but not to go on too long about that well I would like to comment when you're thought about the spirit of fundamentalism I think there's three words that could define the spirit rather than just the little words if you say it's hard-line, polemical, and exclusive in doctrine and practice that gives you a kind of a flavor and John Horsch was that way unfortunately two questions or sets here I want to address yet before we close this so this first one or this next to last question I'd like to be brief but just to hit it briefly and that question is is uppercase fundamentalism equal to historical orthodoxy and if I understood the way you're using that chester uppercase fundamentalism you defined as the beliefs like the beliefs that fundamentalists espoused historically early 1900s and lowercase fundamentalism was more a set of attitudes or a way of approaching things and so if we're going off of that is that or the beliefs that the fundamentalists put forward equal to historic christian orthodoxy see matt shaking his head that's not some of it was but not all of it and maybe a maybe way to say that is typically it was it was narrower than typical so for example um uh atonement theory required that you believed penal substitutionary atonement theory when historic christianity has always an anabaptist in particular have always allowed multiple views christus victor um and other views of atonement so you know maybe a light touch of a substitution and I think it was jc wanger said that the the the the anabaptist view was um a kaleidoscope of all of the different atonement theories and fundamentalism's required fundamentalists required that you had that very narrow penal substitutionary atonement which is dubious um it could be somewhat questionable but much narrower than historic christianity and then not only that sometimes you often hear this and now maybe we're bleeding over into evangelicalism and reform theology but you know even calling that the gospel which is far you know far narrower than historic christian that's just picking one we could also look at eschatology you know fundamentalism being rooted in dispensational premillennialism is not surprising that they feel that that's the eschatology and some even have it in their statements of faith that you have to believe uh premillennialism if not dispensational premillennialism and historically that's not in go ahead chester one of the things that i really like to go on record is saying it's important to understand that fundamentalism morphed into evangelicalism and the reason there was i have to say morph it's like a stepchild evangelicalism realized that there are some problems theologically and otherwise with fundamentalism so they took a different chart but evangelicalism is still not what anti-baptism is there's still a difference there and so i would say that uppercase fundamentalism is not historical orthodoxy and evangelicalism is not historical orthodoxy either there are aspects of it yes but not total so maybe a simplistic view would be that it's narrower and has some odd oddities yes so narrower but definitely inside orthodoxy but narrower that's right our last set of questions uh set of questions it's very important to me and it does shift our focus a little bit from talking about fundamentalism to maybe um reflecting about how we've been conducting this whole discussion and that is we've conducted this whole discussion kind of as as how did an abaptist respond to fundamentalism how should we have responded to fundamentalism and so on within this story but obviously there's lots of other people who are looking for similar ideals to an abaptist so two questions here one is put very short what can an abaptism offer for those who are not part of chester's us uh we look at our back look at our background and it's not our direct history and then a longer one here bottom line question for me i am so glad that people like chester are here calling calling and talking about let's see are here calling us back to healthy biblical practices but the way he and others speak of it leaves those of us that don't share the tradition in the dark is it worthwhile for someone like me why not just be a biblical christian embracing the sermon on the mount in other words why should we care about an abaptism why not just start our own thing so yeah some of the real questions about implication with believers coming together with different histories and i'd like to hear a little bit from both of you on that i would say by being in texas this is a very relevant question and i'm glad that it came up but the answer is simply the core message of love faith relationship with jesus christ is essential wherever you are but one of the old anabaptists said no man is in christ apart from his brother you cannot just simply be an obedient person all by yourself you have to have some kind of group of people to love to get along with you can't submit to yourself you can't submit only just to the abstract concept of god you've got to have real people in your life interact with and so there's no perfect place and uh people sometimes who are not quote us join us and discover how imperfect we are and then leave and uh i'm embarrassed about that we haven't done a better job at it but uh if we can be humble enough about our weaknesses and they could be humble enough about our weaknesses i see no reason why couldn't work starting over and why the investment of uh hooking to a a body with some history maybe is another way to say that clearly new groups can start if that logic wasn't true then neither could anabaptists have started on the other hand individuals do need to be firmly as i noted before and my encouragement was individuals need to be firmly placed in christ's body the kingdom where we live and i think it is local um and around the world and throughout time there is some there's some kind of benefit i don't know that i would i would just say people have to be connected to to me or my church and i'm not speaking for for chester i'm speaking for me but um there are also those who recognize the some benefits in living through trying to be jesus followers for a certain amount of time you do get some benefits from from some history you also get baggage you get them both um and it's if you flip it around the other way starting something new um you don't get the baggage but you get all the all the all the chaos of starting up which certainly anabaptists had that so there's kind of there's kind of a trade-off um i'm not sure if i'm answering the question real good but um certainly certainly it can start again you know the anabaptist belief and christian belief throughout history did not depend on us staying alive christ's body stayed alive um but martyrs never worried about the annihilation of the church and that's one of the things that i feel we shouldn't get too worried about that the gates of hell will not prevail against the church and it will continue um maybe i'll just let it there i'm gonna take moderators liberty to make just a couple comments here and then we'll just end with allowing matt and chester to make one final sentence each about anything we talked about um to wrap up the evening um first of all i really want to thank you for asking those questions about you know what does anabaptist history mean when it's not my history um one thing is i think that it gives something to look at um for positives and negatives uh whether or not you end up at exactly the same place it gives a lot of i think both inspirations um and warnings and i assume that's part of the reason you're attracted to a lot of the content that's coming through anabaptist perspectives um second i want to say it's not a new question so go back to germany in the 1700s and you see a revival of serious christianity and the people that became the brethren notable leaders like alexander mac they admired a lot of anabaptist ideas but they didn't feel like they could join the anabaptists of their day because they felt like the anabaptists weren't living up to their ideals and out of that you got the brethren movement which interestingly has largely merged with anabaptism at least sections that have merged with anabaptism over the centuries so you get the old order river brethren very comfortable now interacting with omission metonites um you saw the same thing with brethren in christ and other metonite groups yeah and then you come a little later and i can't pull the exact country to my up but the apostolic christian church shared a similar story and to my knowledge the apostolic christian church has never really merged with the anabaptists um but they share that same thing of having started another movement very similar and liking anabaptist history but not liking present-day anabaptists um and i guess what i want to say is especially the anabaptist perspectives we're aware that blending heritage is hard and it's i think one of the great challenges for anabaptist churches and kingdom christians in general to bring those together and let's work together for god's kingdom even if we can't get everything in perfect agreement and i thank you all for doing that so yeah matt you got a parting sentence about anything for the evening well i would say that let's keep uh jesus the unthrown jesus who is king at the center of our view and because of that we don't we don't have to get we don't have to get um sharp and dogmatic and fearing because um fear not i have overcome the world your your closing comments are profound marlin we're not as far apart as we tend to think even if we struggle with fundamentalism for example the amish menonites piggybacked on the old menonites the brethren people associate with menonites river brethren do so it's really almost one pie so it's all said and done okay thank you to our guests thank you all for listening and if you enjoy these kind of discussions come back for more of our regularly scheduled episodes released every thursday in a variety of platforms uh thank you all and god bless you