Discussion Questions

Stephen Russell argues that the Reformation and the Enlightenment together pushed the West toward “hyper-individualistic” and even “materialistic” thinking; where do you see that mindset shaping your own instincts about church, salvation, and daily decision-making? JumpstartAnother way to ask: Where do you notice “me-first” or money-focused thinking shaping how you view church, salvation, and everyday choices?

Dean Taylor described the “categorically different” thing about modern life as our remarkable secularism (his Sugar Creek Fair vs. ancient Greek sacrifices comparison); what practices or habits would help a church recover a living sense that God is truly present and “this really matters” without sliding into superstition? JumpstartAnother way to ask: What habits could help a church feel that God is truly present and what we do really matters—without becoming superstitious?

The speakers repeatedly return to the idea that earlier Christians (and even 1500s Europeans) assumed the “layer” between the natural and supernatural was thin; how would that assumption change the way we read Scripture, pray, confess sin, or talk about spiritual warfare today? JumpstartAnother way to ask: If we believed the spiritual world was close and active, how might that change how we read the Bible, pray, confess sin, and talk about spiritual warfare?

Dean says the Anabaptists agreed with Catholics and Protestants on core orthodoxy (Trinity, creeds, even Menno affirming the Apostles’ and Nicene Creeds); what does their combination of deep continuity and sharp protest teach us about how God preserves truth in the church across messy history? JumpstartAnother way to ask: What can we learn from the Anabaptists holding to basic Christian beliefs while strongly protesting the church of their day about how God keeps truth alive through messy history?

The conversation frames infant baptism as “the root of the problem” (Sattler calling it “the chief abomination of the pope”) because it changes how the church is formed; in what concrete ways does a “born into it/citizen-church” model still survive in our churches even when we don’t practice infant baptism? JumpstartAnother way to ask: Even without infant baptism, how do churches today still act like people are “born into” the church or are Christians mainly because they belong to a culture or nation?

When they discuss the Lord’s Supper, they stress “discern the body” as the gathered people—“grace…comes to me through my brothers and sisters,” not automatically through a ritual; what would need to change in our church life for communion to become that kind of communal, grace-mediating reality rather than a private moment? JumpstartAnother way to ask: What would need to change so communion feels like God’s grace comes to us through the whole church family, not just a private moment for me?

Dean highlights the sacramental idea of *ex opere operato* (“by the work it is happening”) and Marpeck’s warning from 1 Corinthians: “what you’re doing…is not the Lord’s Supper”; where do you see “automatic Christianity” operating today (in sacraments, prayers, worship services, political identity), and how does that expose a lack of faith? JumpstartAnother way to ask: Where do you see people treating Christianity as automatic (through rituals, prayers, church services, or politics), and how might that show a lack of real faith?

They contrast the Anabaptist limit—“our limit is the ban”—with the state-church instinct to execute heretics; what does that reveal about God’s character and goals for correction, and how should it reshape the way we handle discipline, exclusion, and restoration in our own communities? JumpstartAnother way to ask: What does the difference between church discipline and executing “heretics” show about what God wants, and how should it shape how we correct, exclude, and restore people today?

Dean says nationalism and patriotism among evangelicals and even “Amish, conservative Anabaptists” breaks his heart because it forgets “the very origin of who you are”; what specific signs would reveal that a congregation has traded Jesus’ kingdom-building blueprint for confidence in the state? JumpstartAnother way to ask: What clear signs show a church has started trusting the state or nationalism more than Jesus and his kingdom?

The speakers warn, “The same theology, given the same situation, will very likely create the same result,” using WWII Germany and the way people “didn’t want to know” what was happening; what teachings or emphases in today’s Christianity could produce similar moral blindness under pressure, and what would it look like to build churches that resist being “swept into it like a revival”? JumpstartAnother way to ask: What teachings today could lead Christians to ignore evil when it’s costly to face it, and what would churches look like that resist getting swept along by that pressure?