Tuesday, July 15
Highlights of the Day

[Business | Feature | Photo | Worship]

Photo by Ken Wenger

The Conference today consecrated new leadership: (kneeling at left) 2009 Annual Conference moderator David Shumate, district executive minister of Virlina District; (kneeling at right) moderator-elect Shawn Flory Replogle, pastor of McPherson (Kan.) Church of the Brethren. Photo by Ken Wenger

The 2008 moderator James Beckwith hands the gavel to 2009 moderator David Shumate. Photo by Glenn Riegel

M&M candies have become an informal symbol of the 300th Anniversary celebration, and were a tasty handout at the 300th Anniversary booth in the exhibit hall. The 300th Anniversary Committee continues to collect names of congregations who have achieved the goal of sending 300 percent of their average attendance numbers to this year's Conference. The committee also has a goal of giving away 300 pounds of M&M candies. Brethren are encouraged to take up the challenge through the close of the Conference. Photo by Sarah Kovacs

QUOTES OF THE DAY

“We are Brethren come to celebrate 300 years of history.”
-- The children’s choir, singing for worship this morning. The words are sung to the tune of “Siyahamba,” a southern African hymn translated “We are marching in the light of God.” The children also sang verses in German and Spanish.

“It’s the dude!”
-- A member of the junior high group from Michigan District, on sighting Annual Conference moderator James Beckwith in the hallway. Beckwith reported the encounter at the morning business session, and displayed a prayer shawl he received from the Michigan youth.

OVERVIEW OF THE DAY
The day at Conference brings another Church of the Brethren emphasis on worship, led by preacher Robert Neff, and morning and afternoon business sessions. About 25 members of Ekklesiyar Yan’uwa a Nigeria (EYN--the Church of the Brethren in Nigeria) were expected to attend the Brethren World Missions breakfast this morning, among a variety of meal events and insight sessions. A peace witness and public rally for nonviolence took place this afternoon, sponsored by the Brethren Witness/Washington Office and the Richmond Peace Education Center, and other peace groups in the area. The annual quilt auction sponsored by the Association for the Arts in the Church of the Brethren took place after the business session. The day closed with a drama on the life of Ted Studebaker, a Church of the Brethren martyr during the Vietnam War, “Life Is Great. Yea!”

REGISTRATION AND OFFERING NUMBERS
As of noon today, a total of 6,175 people have registered for the Conference. The number includes 864 delegates.

Monday’s worship offering received $11,403.56 and evening concert offering received $8,063.91. Today’s worship offering received $10,958.99. The total of Conference offerings received through this morning is $73,423.39.

A BIT OF BRETHREN HISTORY: THE FIRST BRETHREN BAPTISM
August 3, 2008, is the Sunday designated to celebrate the first Brethren baptism. It was an act not only of faithfulness, but of great bravery, for it was illegal.

Following the horrific religious wars of the 17th century, in which unspeakable atrocities were committed by Christians of several stripes in the name of Jesus, the Treaty of Westphalia established that there were only three official churches in the German states. You were either Roman Catholic, Lutheran, or Reformed, and the choice was made for you. You shared the same church as your local prince. If your prince changed churches, for economic or political reasons, you changed as well.

Against this rather cynical backdrop there were those, known as Pietists, who believed that it was not the outward observances mandated by the state, but inward belief and practice according to the Bible, which made one a follower of Jesus. Many of these Pietists continued to hold membership in the established churches, but some, including the eight who participated in the first Brethren baptism, decided that scripture gave them no choice but to separate from the established churches.

Writing 66 years later, Alexander Mack, Jr., son of the first Brethren minister, remembered how it had been described to him. “Finally in the year 1708, eight persons agreed together to establish a covenant of a good conscience with God, to accept all ordinances of Jesus Christ as an easy yoke, and thus to follow after their Lord Jesus--their good and loyal shepherd--as true sheep in joy or sorrow until the blessed end....”

The group decided that Alexander Mack, Sr., would perform the baptisms, but the question arose--who would baptize him? After prayer and fasting they decided to cast lots to determine this.

Mack Jr., said, “They promised one another never to reveal who the first baptizer among them was, so that no one might have cause to call them by someone’s name. They found such folly reprimanded already by Paul in his writing to the Corinthians.

“After they were thus prepared, the said eight went out to the water called the Eder in the solitude of the morning. The brother upon whom the lot had fallen, first baptized that brother who wished to be baptized by the church of Christ. When the latter was baptized, he baptized him who had first baptized, and then the other three brethren and the three sisters. Thus all eight were baptized in an early morning hour. After they had emerged from the water, and had dressed themselves again, they were all immediately clothed inwardly with great joyfulness.

“...This happened in the said year, 1708. However, they have left no record of the month of the year, or the day of the month, or of the week.”

To this day we have no idea who performed the first Brethren baptism, nor when exactly it took place! It is believed to have been later in the summer. The Brethren did not wish to be identified by anyone’s name--and since they believed they were restoring the first church, and not forming a new one, they did not take a name for their group. Ultimately others named them according to their practice of baptism, Dunkers, and their close family relationship to each other, Brethren.

-- Frank Ramirez’ “Tercentennial Minute” for Aug. 3. Ramirez pastors Everett (Pa.) Church of the Brethren, which has offered the weekly Tercentennial Minutes through 2008 as a celebration of the 300th Anniversary of the Brethren.

Voting continued today on key business items, including the Resolution Urging Forbearance, an update to the Ethics in Ministerial Relations document, and a Resolution on Slavery in the 21st Century. Photo by Glenn Riegel

The Eyes Wide Open exhibit of boots of those killed in the Iraq War was on display outside the Richmond Coliseum today, sponsored by the Brethren Witness/Washington Office and On Earth Peace. The exhibit is organized by the American Friends Service Committee. Since the numbers of American military killed in the war have risen over 4,000, the exhibit is now divided into state groupings. Today's display was the Virginia grouping, including boots and shoes representing Virginians who have died in the war, as well as shoes symbolizing more than a million Iraqis who have been killed. Photo by Keith Hollenberg

The 300th Anniversary quilt (above) and other quilted items were auctioned today, to benefit hunger relief efforts. The annual quilt auction is sponsored by the Association for the Arts in the Church of the Brethren. Photo by Ken Wenger