My Favorite Video

Recap video of 2011 of the Maranatha youth group and all their shenanigans.

Christmas Letter 2011

Greetings from Pasadena!

Rebekka and I arrived back recently from Germany after spending the Christmas holidays with Rebekka's family. Our trip fulfilled a very important purpose - introducing Immanuel to our extended family and friends in Germany. Of course, the big news for us this year was the birth of our son, Immanuel Lee Stutzman. He was born on November 2, 2011 at Arcadia Methodist Hospital and sure is a cute little fella. The birth and hospital stay was truly a smooth experience and we are really thankful that Immanuel came into this world under good circumstances.

You can see pictures of Immanuel and of the Stutzlife by following us on our tumblr blog. 

We chose the name Immanuel for several reasons. We loved the meaning of the name - God with us – as it reminds us of the nature of God both as present in our lives and as incarnational in revelation. (Yes, Rebekka and I are both in seminary right now.) The name also has a history in the Stutzman family as David grew up in two churches, one in Munich and one in Harrisonburg, that had Immanuel in the name of the Church. We chose Lee after Dave’s brother, Jonathan Lee, and we came to learn after the fact that Lee was the middle name of Dave’s grandfather and uncle. That means with Immanuel Lee is a middle name now for the fourth generation. 

We couldn’t be happier with Immanuel and the new life we find ourselves in as parents. Already, we have experienced a small taste of the ups and downs of parenting and the way the responsibilities, challenges and rewards of parenting shape your life in unexpected and meaningful ways. 

On the whole our year was very busy. Last year we did not write a Christmas Letter so we will start with our move to California at the end of the summer in 2010. After almost a year of being gone from Southern California, through travel and helping out with the Middle East cross-cultural semester with Eastern Mennonite University, we returned to Pasadena so that Rebekka could continue her studies in the MA in Global Leadership and Dave could wrap up his studies. (Yes, Dave did start waaay back in 2006). After a year’s hiatus, the first order of business for Dave was to find a job and after two months of searching a position opened up in his old department at Fuller Seminary and he began working mainly with the Doctor of Missiology program as the Cohort Coordinator, where he works closely with students and professors in organizing their on campus seminars. Dave is enjoying the work and is very thankful to be working with his old colleagues and in a cutting edge program like the DMiss. 

Rebekka resumed her role as the Youth Pastor at Maranatha Christian Fellowship in the Fall of 2010 and remained busy with church all the way up till the last throes of her pregnancy. (Yes, she even preached a sermon the week before she gave birth!) Dave continues to support her with the youth ministry and both of us have taken on some new responsibilities this past Fall as Maranatha is now offering an English and Indonesian service simultaneously on Sundays. The church will still have monthly joint services, but it became more apparent that their needed to be space for both languages in order for the church to continue to be meeting the needs of the members and for the church to be invitational to newcomers. 

Highlights for the year revolved mainly around family visits to LA. Elias and Isaak, two of Rebekka’s brothers, came in March for three weeks. We had a wonderful time with them traveling around California, visiting Zion National Park and Bryce Canyon. They were even with us when we found out that we were pregnant and it was special to enjoy that news while family was in town. Miriam, Rebekka’s sister, came in November and was able to be with us the first week after Immanuel was born. She made that first week go by so much more smoother. Also, Dave’s family made a trip to Pasadena for Thanksgiving in order to enjoy the presence of the first stutzgrandchild. It was neat to see how Immanuel became the occasion to muster a dispersed family. Dave’s parents flew from Virginia, his brother and wife from Chicago, his aunt from Bangkok, Thailand, and his grandmother from Oregon. 

To all this New Year, may the LORD bless you and keep you; may he shine his face upon you, be gracious to you and give you peace (Numbers 6:24-26).

Grace and Peace,

Dave, Rebekka and Immanuel

Renewal from the Outside In?

In my last post, I wrote about the need for finding a new Anabaptist narrative. In part, this comes out of the experience that often Mennonites like to reach first for a particular history and particular set of distinctives as a way of telling our story. As Matthew Krabill recently pointed out, the way we understand the word Anabaptism is strongly shaped by our reading of the sixteenth century Anabaptist Movement. Another way to say this is that the content we give Anabaptism is determined by the way we tell our story.


I think Mennonites often reach for descriptors to distinguish Anabaptism like “radical”, “counter-cultural”, “marginalized” and so forth. With these words, for example, the meaning of Anabaptism becomes that of a socio-political critique, especially of Constantinian-shaped Christianity. I certainly want to stress that history and these distinctives are important. But questions arise, especially when we consider the changes taking place within and around the Mennonite church. Whose Anabaptist story? Distinctive in relation to what?
 
One word that I think often gets overlooked as a descriptor of 16th Century Anabaptism and is relevant as a descriptor of Anabaptism today is the word renewal. Renewal means a process of rediscovering the essentials of our faith and finding new meaning in our identity, spirituality, and vocation as followers of Christ and as the Church of Christ.

The early Anabaptists, for example, looked to the Early Church, Scripture, and the Holy Spirit for sources of renewal. Now, I am not going to go into much historical detail here other than to say that renewal of the church was a core understanding of what the early Anabaptists saw themselves to be a part of and what they were seeking. I believe that today renewal is a word that helps give Anabaptism content for the 21st Century and helps explain the emerging Anabaptist reality taking shape outside of the historic Anabaptist communities.

In order to explain why renewal is a helpful term for understanding Anabaptism today, I want to share about what I have been involved in recently. As part of my studies at Fuller Theological Seminary I am interviewing Anabaptist-minded students in order to understand their perception of Anabaptism: how they have experienced Anabaptism, come to understand it, and what role it holds for their faith and praxis.

Essentially, I have been talking to friends of mine who claim Anabaptism as part of their identity, but are not Mennonite in background or part of a Mennonite community (or any of the other historic Anabaptist churches). As this post is meant to correspond with a post from an Anabaptist friend of mine, JR Rozko, a church planter, prolific blogger, and someone with a keen sense for how the church can engage our contemporary culture, I will let him do most of the explaining why he has been drawn to Anabaptism.

What I have come to learn is that Anabaptism is something being claimed and applied outside of the historic Anabaptist communities, which leaves us, those that come from an Anabaptist background, with many questions of what Anabaptism means today. Who gets to claim it? What is the relationship between Anabaptism and an historical tradition like Mennonites? My interest in engaging these questions comes from the multiple encounters with those that have genuine appreciation and interest in Anabaptist theology and those who are looking to have a more meaningful relationship with the Anabaptist community.

What has become clear to me is that as the Mennonite church dwells on its identity during a period of profound transition and even liminality, Anabaptism is experiencing a significant renewal and is being infused with energy from evangelical, immigrant, emergent, and intercultural streams. Indeed, Anabaptism will exist increasingly in a multiplicity of forms and expressions as people identify Anabaptism as a resource and a relevant influence for their theology. Many of these folks will remain outside of the historic Anabaptist communities.

What stands out to me when I look back at the way we tell our story as Mennonites is that for centuries the Anabaptist story and identity seemed to be clearly defined. It was a particular people attempting to embody their particular Christian beliefs in particular communities. Juxtaposed to this are the profound changes Mennonites are facing today. A new identity faces the Anabaptist-Mennonite tradition as it changes from visible, traditional, ethnic, and cultural norms into a new and diverse mosaic of Mennonite communities and expressions in North America (and around the world). Mennonites are finding a new unfolding in their story and are not always sure how to explain it.

Thus, Mennonites, those who are on the inside, are looking out at what is taking place around us today and are confronted with the task of making sense of what it means to be Anabaptist. How do we relate to other expressions of Anabaptism while trying to make sense of a particular heritage that dates back to the 16th century?

It is my belief that Mennonites need to listen to those who are finding Anabaptism to be a theological resource, drawing deeply on it, and running with it. One way to go about this is to recognize and understand the intrinsic value of how those claiming Anabaptism out of conviction can help give fresh expression and a sense of vitality to what Anabaptism means in the contemporary context of North America.

What my Anabaptist friends are teaching me is that Anabaptism provides meaning for people because it is a faith that you take seriously and is only authentic when it is lived out as a witness to the church and to the world.

I believe that reclaiming renewal as descriptive of how we understand Anabaptism will have important implications as we try to figure out new meaning today. Recovering renewal as part of our story will help us relate to new Anabaptists and understand better how Anabaptism today is contributing to the faith and praxis of many Christians and why they are claiming to be part of the Anabaptist story.