Mosaic Mennonites

Missional - Intercultural - Formational

Dawn Ruth Nelson

Introducing Methacton Mennonite Church

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Methacton

Methacton Mennonite Church has been connecting people to Jesus since 1739.  The land on which the meetinghouse is located was deeded to the Dutch Anabaptist Society–Mennonite/Anabaptist families moving north from Germantown up Germantown Pike–for 5 shillings. The first meetinghouse was built prior to 1771 although the exact date is unknown. A second meetinghouse was erected of stone in 1805 and used as a community school and place of worship. The third and present meetinghouse was erected in 1873.

As Mennonite families moved further north towards Souderton/ Franconia in the following centuries, Methacton congregation found itself moving to the fringes of the larger Mennonite community.  This is its gift and its challenge. Without “ethnic Mennonites” (people of Swiss-German descent who grew up in the Mennonite Church) in the community, this church has always needed to draw people from the local community, from the Worcester/Collegeville area, to continue to exist.

We saw this need to turn to our community in the 1940s, when, after dropping to only one member in 1943, a large Summer Bible School program was begun with the help of several families from the Plains congregation. Thus began a new era in the church’s existence. Through this vigorous Summer Bible School outreach into the ‘50s and through the preschool (begun in 1958), community people were drawn into the church and preschool ministry. The preschool continues to the present day.

Methacton has never been a large Mennonite church; it has never been a congregation that could continue to exist on its past, or its own strength of numbers. It has to exist because of a mission and God’s purpose for placing us in our specific context. As we look to the future, we’re trying to reorient ourselves to our local community of Worcester, Norristown, and Collegeville.

We have a diverse membership representing various ethnic, racial, and religious backgrounds. The common bond is a faith committed to a disciplined life, which is both meaningful and evident in daily living. Our vision statement is “Connecting People to Jesus;” we love connecting, we love people, and we love Jesus.

How do you cultivate Mennonite spirituality?

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Dawn Ruth Nelson
Dawn Ruth Nelson is the author of the book A Mennonite Woman: Exploring Spiritual Life and Identity. Photo by Beth Yoder.

by Dawn Ruth Nelson, Methacton

What is the spiritual commitment that is at the core of our identity as an Anabaptist community and followers of Jesus, who “for the sake of the joy set before him, endured the cross”?

For me, figuring that out far from home, in the middle of the violence of Dublin, Ireland in the 1980s meant integrating other Christian traditions with the practices of my plain grandmother. All these practices – together – have nurtured my life as I try to live out discipleship, peacemaking, and witness.

I think other Mennonites in urban and mobile settings are trying to figure this out, too. I’ve received requests from churches in Toronto, Champaign-Urbana, Evanston, and Montreal to come and talk about spiritual practices, commitment, and depth. They want to talk about how to cultivate a Mennonite spirituality that makes sense in today’s world. (And also, interestingly enough, requests came from Franklin Conference, in central Pennsylvania. Even in our more rural heartlands we are asking the question: How can we be more aware of and intentional about our spiritual practices?).

To be conformed to Christ, to be formed by Christ, we need to spend very significant time with his words and in his presence, corporately and privately.  I am convinced of the centrality of Jesus and of the encounter with the Risen Christ through the Scriptures as a way to anchor Mennonites (and all Christians) in [what could be called a] Dark Night transitional time.

Nelson Kraybill, at the time president of Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary (AMBS), said the “church . . . must be centered on Jesus. . . . Transforming ministry requires sustained encounter with God made known in Jesus Christ. . . . When the risen Lord is the center of our lives, the Spirit will empower us to speak and act in ways that honor the One who shows us the face of God.”  The centrality of Jesus Christ is not an unfamiliar theme to Mennonite-Anabaptists, who grew out of medieval movements practicing the imitation of Christ (imitatio Christi).

“Finding a centering rather than a fracturing experience” is how one AMBS seminary student described what happened as he worked on spiritual formation in the 1980s at AMBS. Finding a centering experience is key. That is what [spiritual] disciplines and contemplative prayer do for us. Some people find themselves in a tremendous balancing act, juggling their lives, family and profession.  They need something to hold everything together—a deep anchoring in Christ. Centering or contemplative prayer allow us to center in on our experience with God, become anchored in Jesus, as a way to give some coherence to an increasingly fractured existence.

1954 Dawn with her Grandma
Dawn with her grandmother in 1954. Photo by John Ruth.

In my grandmother’s life, this coherence was provided by an ordered life that centered around a particular place that never changed for her. The place we meet God now is often “in Jesus” through the contemplative disciplines. Some Mennonites are using these now as spiritual formation tools—silence, solitude, daily personal prayer time, spiritual direction, contemplative/listening prayer, lectio divina.

One suggestion: Teach people in Sunday school how to practice listening prayer and lectio divina. Also offer special weeks of prayer where people commit to reading a Scripture daily, meeting daily for half-an-hour with a spiritual director, and meeting with a group for faith-sharing at the end of the week. Take Sunday school classes on weekend retreats following the suggested retreat outlines in the book Soul Care: How to Plan and Guide Inspirational Retreats. We need a concerted congregational effort to help people learn to pray, to listen to and talk to God, to read Scripture in a listening mode (lectio divina), to ask, What is God saying to me today through this Scripture? And we need to accompany them as spiritual friends or in spiritual direction as they try to pray.

–Reflections on and from A Mennonite Woman: Exploring Spiritual Life and Identity by Dawn Ruth Nelson, available from Cascadia, Amazon, or on Kindle.  E-mail Dawn.