My Brethren Background
Denominational Identity
For a while, I wasn’t sure what to tell people when they asked “What denomination are you?”. For the first couple years of my life, my family attended the Church of the Brethren. However, I spent the rest of my childhood in the United Methodist Church. Somewhere in the middle I was interdenominational, all just to end up back where it all started - Church of the Brethren. What can I say - I have deep roots here.
But I would like to share that my commitment to the Church of the Brethren is more than family roots. I truly believe in the mission and values of this denomination, and have been looking forward to the day when I could make my commitment official as I continue to serve in ministry here.
Faith of my Mother
But my Brethren story does start with my family, long before I was even born. My mom’s side of the family is connected to the Frantz clan, who emigrated from Europe in the 1600’s to escape the persecution of the Anabaptists. They settled in Berks County, PA near Little Swatara Creek. You can still see the Frantz house in Frystown today. Much of my mom’s family is still in central PA, in the heart of Pennsylvania Dutch traditions that are largely Anabaptist - either Brethren or Mennonite.
Faith of my Father
The family lineage on my dad’s side is harder to trace, but his family has undeniably strong Brethren roots as well. My sister recently found a small black journal titled “Pastoral Records of Russell K. Showalter”, my great grandfather. The first page details his calling to the ministry in 1920 while he was at work in the Eastern Shore of Maryland. He said “I preached (or rather tried to) for the first time in the spring of 1921 at Beaver Creek”.
I find it interesting that over 100 years ago, my great great grandfather answered the call to ministry in the same place I find myself making a commitment to this denomination today. His commitment to faith has trickled down the family tree, as my grandmother was committed to teaching the word, she taught my father that same passion that my father eventually taught me.
So even though I rarely participated in Brethren traditions growing up , I knew they were there, and they shaped the values, traditions, and worldview of my family (what I like to call “Brethren adjacent”). Whenever we would visit my grandma on my mom’s side, her PA Dutch accent was a reminder of that heritage. Or when we would visit my grandma on my dad’s side and you’d see Sunday church services dotted with white prayer coverings, I knew that tradition was a part of me.
Owning My Faith - My Denominational Journey
Camp Swatara
When I later started working at Camp Swatara, a church of the Brethren camp in central PA, I learned a lot about my Brethren heritage. I had many conversations with staff about the traditions and the theology of the denomination. I loved that these conversations and questions were not off-limits. As a child, my faith was built by asking hard questions and wrestling with them, like Jacob and the angel. The attitude of peace that permeated the atmosphere made it feel like such a safe space for faith to grow.
Church of the Brethren on Mission
It was through Camp Swatara that I learned this phrase - peacefully, simply, together. Linetta Ballew, the Administrator at Camp Swatara at the time, had given me a tag with this encouragement from the staff at camp to take with me on my mission trip in 2019. I didn’t realize that it was the tagline for the Church of the Brethren. I found it to be an encouraging phrase in its own right, and I thought about it frequently while on my mission trip.
While interacting with so many different groups each month, we constantly had to practice living peacefully with each other. We traveled with the bare essentials, and learned how to live simply, stewarding what little we had for the glory of God and the service of others. And of course, this did not happen in a vacuum. We did this all together in teams we traveled with for the whole year.
Denominational Crisis
After my mission trip, 2020 hit, and I had a faith crisis of sorts. I didn’t lose my faith, but rather, I got overwhelmed trying to unpack the sheer volume of traditions, philosophies, and world-views I encountered in the past year. I gained some valuable insights alongside some straight-up heresy.
As I tried to unpack this, I felt like I couldn’t find 1 denomination that addressed all of the theological problems and values I had.. I felt like the only theology I was comfortable with was one that was open to considering all Christian faith traditions, and willing to grow and learn from each other, because it felt like no one group had it all right.
Learning to Walk Through a Door
Around the time I moved to the Eastern Shore, I found that that sort of faith is not practical. One day, I was talking with my Dad, as I do every day. At the time I was reading Mere Christianity, and was expressing my difficulty landing in one church denomination because of this problem.
That’s when he shared another C.S. Lewis illustration with me of Christianity being like a house with many rooms. Each room is a denominational theology. They’re all within the same house, but each room has its own characteristics, cultures, and pros and cons. When you become a Christian, you now live in that house, but eventually, you have to choose a room to live in. You can’t live in the hallway by yourself.
Faith is individual, but is meant to be practiced communally, and it is far better to choose a room to live in and a community to invest in than try to live in the hallway, trying to make the perfect Christian theology by yourself, which is impossible, and how incredibly prideful it is to even attempt that. And that hit home.
Landing in the Church of the Brethren
The Eastern Shore
When I moved here, I obviously was working at a Church of the Brethren camp, and that seemed like a logical door to walk through, but I didn’t want to walk through that door just because it was convenient. I wanted to do a little more investigating, to make sure that this was the right door for me. I attended a couple other churches of several denominations, but none of them felt like home the way the Church of the Brethren did, and this church was where I found myself coming back to time and time again.
My Final Brethren Investigation
I had talked to Jody about what membership would look like, and asked if she had any resources on Church of the Brethren theology, since I had never really learned much about it beyond conversations with my friends and co-workers. She gave me several books, and I found that they painted an incredibly compelling picture of the denomination. In reading these books is where I saw that little phrase again - peacefully, simply, together. The more I sat with these words and read about their Biblical foundation of the denomination, the more I found this to be the most freeing representation of what Jesus preached and how He lived. There are three scriptures I found that I feel make the best case for this theological stance.
Peacefully, Simply, Together - A Compelling Vision of Christ’s Mission
Peacefully
2 Corinthians 13:11: “Strive for full restoration, encourage one another, be of one mind, live in peace. And the God of love and peace will be with you”.
This reminds me of my time on the mission field, having to work with people from various faith traditions and cultures. We did not always agree, but we were able to have healthy, peaceful conversations where we could each express our views, and even if at the end we had not convinced each other to change our perspectives, we went away with deeper respect for each other. To me, this is what living in peace requires. An ability to talk about the hard things without fear or force.
We see the disciples and the apostles reflect this as well. They preached alongside service, and when they encountered differing views, they sometimes had tense conversations, but never resorted to force or violence, and when they did, they were rebuked by Jesus Himself. They always sought to ask questions and find answers, even if the answer Jesus would give was just another question to provoke thought. We will never arrive at the perfect theology, because it is impossible to know the depths of God in this lifetime. That is why being able to have peaceful discourse is so important to living out our faith, as we grow by learning from others.,
Simply
Romans 12:2: “Don’t be conformed to the patterns of this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind so that you can figure out what God’s will is – what is good and pleasing and mature”
This reminds me of the value of camp, and why it is such an important milestone of growth in maturity and growth in faith. Many people nowadays do not know what it is like to go for one day without their devices, and the day they do often feels like they are helplessly disconnected from society. We have gotten so used to our creature comforts that we have forgotten what a privilege it is to have them in the first place. Camp is a place where we can remove those things without fear, and realize that the world still goes on, and we can still have fun, and make meaningful connections without all of the extra “stuff”.
The disciples lived in this way, too. When they followed Jesus, they were asked to leave behind their comforts, and only bring along the essentials. I think this was in part so that they could travel easily, and accept hospitality when it was offered, but also this was a way of humbling themselves so that they could focus only on Jesus and His ministry, and also understand more what it was like for the people on the lower levels of society that they were seeking to serve. Putting ourselves in this simple and humbled position allows us to focus on what is important, and to remove the arbitrary dividers of society, so that we can live as equals.
Together
1 Peter 4:10: “As each one has received a special gift, employ it in serving one another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God”.
As I said earlier - the commitment to faith is individual, but it is practiced in community. By ourselves, we will never sufficiently live out the gospel. We need each other - we need to lean on the skills, wisdom, and gifts that are present within our communities to reach others in ways that we could never do by ourselves.
Jesus established this model by calling a group of disciples to follow him in a small community that reached many in ancient Palestine. Jesus may have been able to do this by Himself, but his goal was not just to preach and heal, but to create a model of religious life that could be replicated when he was no longer on the earth.
That is why the church, otherwise known as the body of Christ, is so important. It is so much more than meeting for 2 hours on Sunday morning. It is about creating a community that you can lean on, and a community that can reach out and help others. It is about surrounding yourself with people who will sharpen you, so that when you are out in the world, you can be a more effective agent of God’s love. Like the story with choosing a room, we must commit to a community of faith, because that is where we will grow, and where we can create an environment for others to grow, too.
A Commitment to the Brethren
A Convincing Case
It was these things that convinced me that the Church of the Brethren has beautifully articulated the values of Jesus that we can apply today. Jesus broke down the middle wall of separation to bring peace among His people, so that they could be together. In one breath, Ephesians 2:14-16 (my favorite Bible verse) illustrates that Jesus’s mission was exactly this:
Because of the Church of the Brethren’s strong commitment to peace, I feel that they are open to discussing matters of faith, and allowing people to ask questions and have their own journeys with Jesus as we each seek Him in our lives, which was my deepest desire in a faith community. In a world that is becoming more polarized, more technologically advanced, and more divided, this message of living peacefully, simply, together is more relevant than ever.
We are willing to listen to all of the voices, and find ways to make them join in harmony as we all sing together about the grace and glory of God. We do this without expecting anything elaborate or flashy. We recognize that the most profound spiritual moments are simple: sitting around a campfire, singing a simple hymn a capella, washing someone’s feet.
Excited to Join - Hope for the Future
I am so excited to be joining with a denomination and a church that values these things and lives out the message of Christ so beautifully. I can’t wait to work together to find ways to create peace, to show people the value of simple living, and the profound impacts we can make when we work together. It is a mission I whole-heartedly believe in and commit to, and that’s why I am here today, joining you in this mission.
Response
As I just shared a part of my faith journey, and how I ended up at this church, take time to reflect on where you are in your faith journey:
Where has God brought you from?
What is he teaching you?
Where is he taking you?
While you do this, reflect on the words of this hymn - “In The Garden”. It shows a beautiful image of how Jesus is with us in every moment of our journey, not watching from a distance, but walking with us, talking with us, and sharing our emotions in each moment. Think about where Jesus was with you in your journeys this morning, and let the reminder of the work He’s done in your own lives minister to you this morning in this time of response.