The 7 Articles that Defined the Peaceful Radical Reformation - Stephen Russell & Dean Taylor

Before we get into today's episode, a little context. This year we filmed a 10-part documentary series called Anabaptist Origins, which explores the first hundred years of the Anabaptist story. And for that, we did an entire episode on Michael Sattler and the Schleithaim Confession. For that episode, we filmed a roundtable discussion about what is the Schleithaim Confession and why does it still matter to us today, 500 years later. And that discussion is today's episode. We had the privilege of filming at a beautiful castle in the Czech Republic, the same castle where the Anabaptist theologian Hubmeyer was imprisoned before his execution, and the same city where the first Hutterites were expelled for not taking up the sword.

Be sure to check out the Anabaptist Origins YouTube channel for more content like this, and enjoy this special episode.

All right, so let's get deeper with Schleithaim. Yeah. We talked some more of the backdrop, the context, things like that, but let's get into the actual confession itself. And the first question I have is, why should we even care about a confession that was written almost 500 years ago, 1527? Is it relevant? Does it matter? Why should we care? Oh, it should go. It's remarkable to me how much it matters. You know, I look at the Schleithaim Confession, and it's good stuff. I mean, you can tell the things that were written in the times, but the topics that it covers, and we'll, I guess, be getting into a few of these, but they're very pertinent.

And I find it something that really is a good way to look at the things that are important to a brotherhood. And the whole idea of coming together and doing things like this to settle issues is important even of itself. But yeah, yeah, I like it. So could you give us a broad outline of what is it even about? What is Schleithaim about? Well, some of it you can actually miss. First of all, in the cover letter, it's clear they're Trinitarian. So they are not disagreeing with their Catholic forefathers on the Trinity or the divinity and manhood of Christ.

And the Protestants have the same view. So these seven things are where there's two points to them. One is this is where we disagree with the Catholics and Protestants. And the other is in the confusion of the beginning, this is where some of the people who want to be Anabaptists, who have been rebaptized, have made some mistakes. So it's about two things. And there's a real significance to what they chose and even the order. The order is important. First of all, there's baptism. That's how you get into the church. That's how you receive the grace of God through Jesus.

The Anabaptists recognized that order was necessary and problems could come up. Either a person came into the church not fully believing or slipped back. And so the next one is, what do you do when that happens? It's the ban.

And they also say, when they write about the ban, it should be done just before communion. So that brings us to the next one. So baptism brings us into the church. There may be a time when someone needs to be excommunicated. Disciplined that's in the way. Or disciplined, yeah. But the next thing is, when you're in the church, the baptism plants you into a new community of love. That's the breaking of bread. And what do these people do? So that's one, two, three, baptism, ban, breaking of bread. And so what do these people do? They separate themselves from the evils of the world. That's four. Five, pastors in the church.

They were people that believed in order. And so the question of what does a pastor do? And then two things that apply to everyone who is baptized and part of the church. Do we take up the sword? This was a huge question at this time. For many reasons, so I'll just leave it at that for right now. And then Jesus and James said, don't swear.

So how do you take that? Exactly. We're going to do this forever. And so that's one that came up all the time. Oh, and the government almost always required us. Yes. I know. So that seventh point is the oath, which would have been a pretty big thing at the time, right? Where you're having to swear allegiance to, blah, blah, blah, this and that. Okay. So that's the number. The order is important. And we can talk about it from there. Yeah. Well, so let's go through each of those and hit a little more detail of why were these particular seven chosen? What were they communicating about that? What do they say? What's the context around it?

So let's go back to baptism. So point number one, baptism. Get into some more detail, whichever one of you would like to go first. Well, it says something very beautiful. This baptism is for the person who is willing to walk in the resurrection. I love that line. And so you are committed. And they make it clear, this doesn't mean you're perfect. That's an accusation that was lobbed at the Anabaptists over and over again. And they're not claiming perfection. They're saying that God gives us grace if we come into the body of Christ. And that's our intention to walk in the resurrection. And then there is another line which hits the nail on the head of what the problem is.

What's problematic with both the Catholic and the Protestant churches? And Sattler used language that I wouldn't use today for a couple of reasons. Well, he says infant baptism is the first and chief abomination of the Pope. Oh, that's really strong. It's very strong. It's very strong. And I do think it is the problem.

And I want to tell you a story. Years and years and years ago, I was at work. I was working just outside of DC. And for lunch, a bunch of us were eating together. And I was looking at the Washington Post after I finished eating. And the U.S. Catholic Bishops Conference was meeting. And I saw a headline. So I started reading this. And maybe two paragraphs down, one of the bishops got up and said, why do we have so many pagans in the pew? Wow. And I said, I read this to everybody that was there. And I said, I wish I were there. I'd raise my hand. It's because you baptize babies. It doesn't keep someone from later committing.

And if you're a Catholic, you never think about getting baptized then. So I don't think everybody who's in a Catholic pew is a pagan. And this bishop didn't think so either. But if you baptize babies, everybody thinks I'm a Christian already.

It is the chief abomination. Now, yeah, and so it leads to all kinds of horrible things. That's amazing. You know, again, this idea of faith being required, you know, not an empty sacrament, not something that you're just doing in ritual and it automatically guarantees it. But is there at least some kind of faith in a person that makes them ask and receive this? So I have the quote you mentioned. And I agree with you, Brother Stephen, that this line I have highlighted to walking in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Listen to how the context is it. It's actually beautiful. It said, "Baptism shall be given to all those who have learned repentance and admitted of life and who believe truly that their sins are taken away by Christ and to all those who walk in the resurrection of Jesus Christ and wish to be buried with him in death so that they may be resurrected with him and to all those who with this significance requested of us and demanded for themselves."

And so I agree with you. I think this idea, they're not looking at salvation as a just one-time entry into the club. You know, you either did this as a baby or you did it as an adult. You said the sinner's prayer. You did whatever. It's those who are signing up to walking in the resurrection of Jesus Christ, the power of the resurrection, death to yourself, alive unto Christ Jesus, and literally walking in it. I agree with you. I think that's a beautiful statement there.

So yeah, baptism number one. I like your emphasis there on the order. Well, then that takes us right naturally into point number two, the ban. So if you've got a front door that's getting you in, then if you've been turned away, what's the back door? Yeah. Well, the very fact they have a ban says they're not expecting that anyone's going to be living a perfect life. But they're recognizing there may be a need to discipline someone. Anabaptism is about discipling, but sometimes you come to the place where you have to discipline. And so they very specifically are saying a person who won't listen, this is mentioned in the article, a person who won't listen to the brotherhood after the third admonition should be excluded so that he understands the severity of what he has done.

And so it's not to make a perfect church, a church where no one is sinning. It's to make a church where everyone's trying to walk in their desires to walk in the resurrection. Now, it's interesting in the letters, we'll read later when he's in prison, he's actually appealing to them to be doing this very gently and not to forget love and to do this. And it's true that this was a point for the reformers as well. From what I understand, one of the marks of a church in the reformed setting is to have some sort of discipline, that it's not supposed to be just this church full of pagans, that we do have a disciplined life.

And so this was a cry in the Reformation to have something like this. But this does become a contentious point, right? As they work out the kinks in this, we're going to pick this up when we get in Holland and particularly, this does become an issue. So I have a quote here, and I'll just read it. Just a piece of this one for the ban.

From the Schleithaim Confession, I guess article number two. "The ban shall be employed with all those who have given themselves to the Lord to walk in his commandments. And with those who are baptized into one body of Christ and are called brethren or sisters, and yet slip sometime or fall into error and sin and are unaware of it or fail for some reason to be corrected. The same shall be admonished twice privately and the third time publicly according to the command of Christ. And if he will not amend after the third admonition, he shall be banned as a false brethren and cast out of the church."

Yeah. So they meant business. They did that. But also, maybe I'm getting off track here a little. But the other groups were saying, instead of banning you, we're going to actually literally exile you, kill you, beat you. That's right. Right? Isn't there some contrast here that's worth noting? Oh, yeah. They mentioned this. Yeah. Okay. Because it's like, wait a minute. Yeah, we may ban you from our congregation, but it's not like we're going to kill you. Whereas the Catholics and Protestants were actually doing that to the Anabaptists. There's some interesting contrasts going on there. And it was interesting you brought in. They did exile sometimes. They didn't always execute, but they didn't treat people well.

Yeah. Like they would maybe exile you and take all your possessions and your land or something, say. And when we get down to the sword. It's pretty aggressive. It's pretty aggressive. You know, and the Anabaptists say, well, we're not going to do that. You know? That's a great point. And I think it explicitly states that. So when it deals with the sword and how they use this for their punishment with the church-state situation, all we have for our maximum thing is to take you out of the church. Yeah. And you're right, to make the distinction. That was a pretty big difference. Yeah. So we had baptism was number one, ban, is point number two. And point number three is the breaking of bread.

So talk to me about that, because this was a big point of diverting from both the Catholics and the Protestants, at least initially. Yeah, initially. Well, and like I said, the order matters. So you get into the church through baptism. The ban is to make a person aware of the need for discipline.

Hopefully, nobody has to be banned. And then it mentions specifically under the article of the ban that it will be done just before we break bread. So we make sure that the whole congregation is walking in the resurrection. And then so the breaking of the bread, the importance here is that they don't really get into, you can tell from what they write that they don't believe what the Catholics are saying. I don't think they go transubstantiation. They're not agreeing with that. They don't really get into detail about what they mean, except this is the body of Christ meeting together to break the bread and drink the wine to remember what he's done for us. So it could sound just memorialist.

And there's no real clear wording that would make you know it's not or that it's only that. But the emphasis once again is we now have been planted into the body of Christ. And we're celebrating that. Yeah, I felt the same thing. When you look at it, I mean, you look at some other Sattler's records, particularly at the trial, you get a little more of this. But this Schleithaim Confession seems to be almost purposely vague on some of these nuances of, you know, it doesn't say. And I like when it comes to the mysteries, when it comes to the sacraments, since we don't know, I like these confessions that just say more of what it is and not what it's not.

And I think that you're right. It brings this importance of this gathering. I have just a little excerpt here from them on this point. It says this, "Whoever has not been called to one faith, one baptism, one body cannot be made one bread with us. And it is not to be admitted to the communion of the saints." And so that idea of this is my body and what that means to be coming together in a communion, worshiping God in spirit and in truth and in reality in that way meant more than just an empty ritual done in all the right procedures, but yet not having an effect on your life or a moral expectation of what you would have as you come together.

One of the things they like to bring out in the early days is the 1 Corinthians 11 passage where Paul is saying, "When you come together, it's not the Lord's Supper." So it's kind of a verse they would use against this concept of ex supera operato, where just because you're coming together and claiming all the right things, I can assure you it's the Lord's Supper. They're quoting Paul back saying, "It's not the Lord's Supper." And so this idea of this pure gathering or trying, not perfect, but just trying to walk together in the resurrection, that precious time is what they had for their communion. So I think that's special. So you had breaking of bread, and then that goes straight into the separation component.

So that fits very much with what you were just describing, this coming together, this group that, you know, but also we're going to be separate from the worldly system, the worldly empires, whatever, however they phrase that. Talk to me about that section. Because again, this is a major component, especially for Anabaptists today, you know, still. Yeah.

It would be interesting if Sattler had lived to see how his congregations would have worked this out under his leadership. But what is really clear is that everything is divided into two kingdoms, the good, the evil, the light, the darkness. And I mean, he just goes down through everything, basically. And we are to avoid doing and not doing, depending on what those who are in the kingdom of darkness, depending on what they either do or don't do, we're to avoid that. Now, that could become kind of we base what we do or don't do off of what the world does. And I don't think he would have meant that. And maybe sometimes we've fallen into that a little bit.

But rather, his emphasis is what is really the light, what is really the darkness. And let's be willing to stand and be different. Yeah, that's amazing. So separation means that we are non-conformed to the world. That's amazing. Yeah, it's interesting, this whole two ways. It sounds like an echo of the Dedecay. Now, the Dedecay wasn't even discovered at this time. So there was no way he was reading it. But just, I guess, reading the same scriptures, just this putting this, there are two ways, darkness and light. And it is a bit jarring to read the way he puts it. But, you know, if you look at 2 Corinthians chapter 6 and then going in, where it talks about, it is a New Testament principle.

A lot of times people hardly even look at that, what Paul is telling us in 2 Corinthians chapter 6, to come out from the world and do not be upon them. And I mean, do not be of them. And that idea that even comes with a promise that if you come out of the world, I will be a father to you and you'll be my sons and my daughters. And so those promises that are there, he then goes right into 2 Corinthians chapter 7, having these promises, let's cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the spirit, both the flesh and the spirit, perfecting ourselves in holiness and the fear of God. And so that's a paraphrase.

But the idea is this concept, this New Testament concept means something. It's going to mean something to different groups, even of the Anabaptists. We see, you know, the different groups doing this differently. It's going to mean something today differently. But the question it asked me, it challenged me still to this day, okay, so how am I applying it then? How am I applying the separation from the world? Since that is a clearly biblical teaching, and they're right to bring it out in my own application. I think it still matters.

So they go from that point to, they use the word shepherds, I believe, in the Schleithaim Confession, or pastors, church leaders, and so forth. What were they saying in that point of the confession? Well, the most obvious thing is, once again, we have order. So it's not just a free-for-all. They have order, and it even says what they expected the shepherds to do.

But I think there's even some deeper things here that I don't know if they just had. There are some issues here that are real and that they got, but they didn't necessarily spell out here. And one of those is we believe in the priesthood of the believers.

If the pastor is driven away or killed, we will immediately choose someone from the brothers to lead the church. This isn't like in that hour. Yeah, it doesn't happen. Yeah. I don't know that. Or that hour, that soon. Yeah. Yeah. So when that happens, the church should be those who have really committed themselves to Christ and are seeking to walk in the resurrection. And you can choose a brother from among them to lead the church. So one thing that's kind of implied, but not specified, is we believe in the priesthood of the believers. And I think anybody at that time would have understood that because that was part of the problem with the peasant revolt.

That Luther had preached the priesthood of the believers, and they were taking him seriously. And this is right around the same time. And so I think that when they heard, you know, that a brother could stand in immediately for the pastor who was taken, that would have made perfect sense to them. We're all brothers. We're all priests. Any one of us could take that position. And that's been something that Anabaptism, particularly conservative Anabaptism, has kept. I mean, it's kind of surprising when I started coming into the circles how, you know, common brothers, and then you go and be ordained, and then suddenly you take up that. And everybody should be willing and getting at a place where you could be used for that purpose in that servanthood.

Here's a quote from the Schleithaim. It says, "The shepherd in the church of God shall, according to the rule of Paul, be one who is of good repute among those who are outside the faith. He shall be a teacher, admonisher, and a disciplinarian, a man with good understanding, rightly dividing the word of truth. He shall exhort the church and teach and admonish from the word, and shall lead out in breaking of bread and in all things that the body of Christ needs." And then actually from that, then the congregation's response to them, it says that this brother should be supported by the church, which has chosen him, so that he may be able to serve at all times, whenever there is need, and to be present with all the brethren for teaching, admonition, and correction.

And if he should be expelled, apprehended, or fall by the sword, another shall be ordained in his place, so that God's little flock and people may not be destroyed. It's interesting. What do you think it means by the support there? We're not talking about, you know, they were on some salary or something, right?

No, but as he had need because he put time into the church, we should take care of him. And that could mean, you know, if he's a farmer and can't get all of his work done, well, we should help him. Yeah. It's obvious. It even gives the context so that he can be ministering. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. We need to make sure we do that. Yeah. Yeah. That's good. That's shepherds. And then it transitions to the next point, which is the sword. And this one, I think, is particularly important because some have said, "Oh, this teaching on not using the sword, you know, non-resistance." There was some ambiguity there, and there were lots of different approaches and opinions. But the Schleithaim Confession is very straightforward on their teaching on the use of the sword. So talk me through that and its significance for us today. Okay. Well, on the ambiguous side, you know, we looked at Hupmeyer, and Hupmeyer did think there could be a time to pick up the sword. So that would be, he wasn't ambiguous.

He was on the other side of the question. Yeah. And then there is a North Anabaptist confession from a place called Vismar. And there the document we have seems a little bit corrupted, but it does sound like that perhaps an Anabaptist Christian could be a watchman or a watchman on the walls, maybe. But it is ambiguous, and it's questionable whether we actually have the document the way they said it. But the vast majority of early Anabaptists followed through on what Conrad Grebel wrote about as far as we should be sheep, not people that pick up the sword, but we should be sheep in this world. And then Schleithaim picks that right up with this section on the sword.

And one of the interesting things it does is it actually brings the arguments that the non-Anabaptists would have. And then he will give an answer. The answer is, and then it, I think, always refers back to Christ. Christ did this, or Christ said this. Excellent. So like at one point, you know, it says, "Should we defend the good?" And at one point it says, "Well, if there's a disagreement about, let's say, an inheritance," and it's pointed, you know, they go right to Jesus said, "He doesn't, that's not for him to do, and we should follow him." So this sword thing kind of comes out of everything before this that we're called to something higher than what the churches, like the Protestant and Catholic churches, are saying.

They're saying there is a time when you may have to fight and maybe kill someone. And the Anabaptists are saying, "Well, we want to follow Christ. We want to walk in the resurrection." And they give specifics about what their neighbors ask them and what Christ's answer would be. That's good. You know, and what I think is one of the most significant things with this is the way he sets up the two kingdoms, which has hardly, I see, articulated this well since the early church. In the early church, we get it very clearly said that it's very clearly stated that God did institute human government, and those are given to us from God. Romans 13 is there, and we cannot hide from Romans 13.

It actually says, it even calls in Romans 13 that he is a minister of God and was not given the sword in vain. The deeper understanding of that, however, and in looking at the early church, is that that same sword that the Apostle Paul was speaking of in Romans 13 cut Paul's head off. And so God uses these swords. He brings order into this world, but we are given a different calling in this world. And that you see in the early church explicitly stated. You see Justin talking to the emperors in with this kind of language. You see Origen actually talking about this. Tertullian certainly talks about this. It is early Christianity. When I started looking into non-resistance, maybe it was the same way for you, Brother Stephen, is that the pacifist kind of argument sometimes confused me.

Because I looked at the Old Testament, and I believed all the word of God was true. Like I had to do something with the Old Testament, and I had to do something with the New Testament and these things. And when I, the early church kind of helped me to bring in these two kingdoms. But then when I started to look into different expressions of people who believed in loving your enemies and that kind of a thing, it got confusing. But when I read this, it actually is like, thank you. He understands it in a patristic, a very early Christian way, and it's profound. And so I'll give it to you here from his quotes.

I just think it's well done. The sword is ordained of God outside the perfection of Christ. It punishes and puts to death the wicked and guards and protects the good. In the law, the sword was ordained for the punishment of the wicked and for their death. And the same sword is now ordained to be used by the worldly magistrates. He recognizes that. In the perfection of Christ, however, only the ban is used for a warning and for the excommunication of the one who has sinned, without putting the flesh to death. Simply the warning and the command to sin no more. And so again, like you said, looking at the objections, now many who do not understand Christ's will for us will ask whether a Christian may and should use the sword.

The answer is this, just like what you were saying. Christ teaches and commands us to learn of him, for he is meek and lowly in heart. He himself forbade the woman taken in adultery to be put to death, even though the law of his father had commanded it. Christ wants to be Lord and King overall without force. Therefore, he gave his followers the rule: love your enemies, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them that persecute you. His disciples must not engage in worldly strife. And so I just think that's so well put. And then when you get that, it brings the whole Bible together. You see, even in the way in the Old Testament, the way that God would use a Nebuchadnezzar or the Assyrian armies, and he calls them things like my Rod of my wrath.

The Rod of my wrath and my minister. And so when they use that kind of terminology, we see that God has always operated like this. And we get to the New Covenant, it's the same way. And so this I consider brilliant.

And the way it's done is in retaining and bringing back this ancient early church understanding, I think, is one of the more profound things in this statement. Could I say a few things on the sword too? Because I was never in the military.

I was in the last draft for the Vietnam War, and my number was too low, so it didn't matter. But when I gave my life to the Lord, I thought I knew two things. One, I want to serve the Lord, and the other was his people don't kill anyone. That's not exactly non-resistance, but it's a beginning. And I'd just like to share a few things that I think are important about that. Absolutely. And one of them is you mentioned Romans 13.

N.T. Wright, I believe, did his first major work on the book of Romans. And one thing that he said is, "Watch the pronouns." Is it saying you, or is it saying they, or is it saying we? So watch the pronouns. Well, watch the pronouns in Romans 13. Mr.

Wright didn't do that. If you look at chapter 12, it's about receiving the gifts and then living the life, the Christian life, and it's you. Now in English, you is not, when it's a command, it's not expressed, but it's you do this, you do that. So it just says do this, do that. Okay, but that's you. Okay, it's talking to us. It's talking to us Christians. 13 then, the first seven or so verses are they. Interesting. They are the ministers of God. They bear the sword for vengeance and for protection for our good. And you pay them, them. Okay, you pay them custom, taxes, reverence, honor, whatever it says. And then it shifts back to, "Oh, no man, anything."

That's us. You, oh, no man, anything. And then it goes down after that. So for instance, one thing it says is overcome evil with good. You overcome evil with good. It also says, "As much as lies within you, live at peace with all men." All of 12 and the rest of 13 after the first seven verses, the non-Christian can't do. We can barely do it. Right, right, right. You know, we need the Spirit, and sometimes we just ignore him. Exactly. But anyway. Are you saying that N.T. Wright in this case was wrong? He missed. No, he's right. He was right in saying that. I'm saying he missed his own point. Ah, right, right, right. Because he is not non-resistant.

I saw, I wasn't there. I saw a time when he spoke somewhere, I don't remember where it was, and a young man, obviously hoping for a yes, got up and said, "Aren't you a pacifist?" And he said, "Well, I am a bishop in the Church of England. It's a state church." Okay, okay. Now I'm paraphrasing. Right, right. And I am in parliament. Okay. He was in parliament. He gives speeches. Well, he was in the House of Lords. Okay. And no, I'm not a pacifist, which means he wasn't paying attention to his own. Now, I do that too. I'm absolutely sure that I may hit the nail on the head about a particular issue and miss it somewhere.

But he missed it in 12 and 13 of Romans, which is Romans is kind of his theme, so to speak. That's excellent. I love that point that you're making of the difference there. It's his point. It's his point. I love it. You know, and you think of this whole concept, and he's talking about this walking the resurrection, being followers of Christ, this and about the we being like these cities that we're gathering a community, not part of this world, but a community of faith. It's truly putting to practice, you know, in Isaiah, when he gave the prophecy of the increase of this government and peace, there shall be no end when the Messiah will come.

And so we see that gathering together and putting the teachings of Jesus as the cure for humanity is such a powerful thing to get behind. And you just mentioned Isaiah, so I want to say a little bit about the Old Testament. Okay.

Most Christian and Jewish interpreters of the Old Testament would say that the government was established after the fall, after the flood, where it says in chapter 9 that an animal will be killed if he takes a man's blood, but so will a man. So if a human life is lost, it means that the blood of that other person must be shed. Now, that is not God's heart. You go back to where the first murder occurred. That's where you see God's heart. God warns Cain.

He says, "You don't have to do." We don't even know what's up, but Cain is angry because his brother was favored, because his brother did what he should, and God warns him. And nonetheless, Cain kills his brother. And then God doesn't say, he doesn't say, "I want everyone to go after you and kill you." He says, "I'm going to put a mark on you so that you will not be killed." There's a reason. God's heart is always to repent and come back. Wow. Now, the law is different because mankind is so corrupt, and the chapters from chapter 4 to 11 show how corrupt we became. So we need a really strong restraint, and that's where you get government.

God institutes government to really pull back on us. But even after that, in the Old Testament, you see so often this is a restraint. It's not God's heart. You hear it with the setting up of kings in the way, "You are rejecting me and that you've asked for a king." When the Israelite people demanded a king, yes. But God works with them where they are, and he gives them that king. But he sure doesn't give them what they want. But another thing that's interesting, God did establish government. And I agree with Augustine. In the city of God, he says that every nation, every empire was established by violence, and it will end in violence. But in between, now this is not Augustine, in between that establishment by violence and being wrecked by violence, one of the things that happens over and over again in the Old Testament is this area has been pacified, you could say, and all of a sudden it prospers.

And this is represented in the Old Testament by either calling this place a mountain with lots of fruit or a tree that provides shelter for animals and food and all that. And I remember being shocked when I think it's Ezekiel 31. It's either 31, I think it's 31, where God is warning Egypt, and he says, "Look at Assyria. They were this beautiful tree." Well, Assyria was probably the worst enemy the Israelites ever had. And they complained to God, "Why are you letting this happen?" Okay, but after any one of the, whether it's the Assyrians or the Babylonians or the Persians or the Romans, after the violence comes widespread peace, a peace that's imposed, but fallen man needs that, and then comes prosperity.

So there's this pattern all the way through, but that's what government does. It uproots, often it does this in a very, well, it always does in a very violent way. It uproots evil, provides possibility for good and prosperity, but then it's going to pay. Wow. Augustine says it's going to pay. So I think, oh, one more thing. The Anabaptists. So what I see in the Old Testament is, yes, we need government. Even now, we need government because of the evil of men's hearts. And the kinds of things that have to be done, the kind of wisdom that's needed is not the kind of wisdom Christians have, and it's got to be done. You know, the worldly men want prosperity, and they don't want violence, so they're going to use violence to get rid of the violence and then have prosperity.

The Anabaptists look back at this. We know they were being challenged, and they said, "Yes, God's people in the Old Testament bore the sword, and God let them bear the sword," although he also told them he doesn't really want them to have a king, but if you insist. Okay, so in the Old Testament, God's people were allowed to bear the sword. In the New Testament, we hear his heart, and it's that his people should not bear the sword. And the early Anabaptists said, so the early church got this, they were non-resistant, and God took the sword from the Jewish people in the Jewish-Roman War.

So he didn't even want them to have it. Wow. This is how the Anabaptists saw it. So I think it's very clear if one gets, this is one of those places I think that you need to go beyond just what the Bible says simply because it's important to know historically what happened. Yeah, what happened. Yeah, okay, I see what you're saying. Yeah. It's interesting. The other Anabaptist, Peter Riddeman, mentions, he said, "Whenever we see the government of God, it's a reminder to us of the wrath of God." God gave us this government, and Hosea mentions, "I gave you a king in my wrath, and I took him away in my, what is it, in my anger," I think it says.

And so this idea is. He works with that. He works with us as people. He has mercy on us. But I agree with you. It's not the best. So they're saying, "We were given this way of Christ to spread the kingdom of God on earth." They have a right, but that's not the church. That's not the people of God. But we can't rebel against him. We shouldn't be negative. We shouldn't be these rebels or anything like that, you know, but that's our place. And I think that is so well articulated in the Shlodheim Confession. Yes, we should honor them. I do think it does, I don't think it means we can't tell the truth. Yeah, to be prophetic still.

I'm talking about a ruler. We should respect him, but we can tell the truth. And be able to be prophetic to our generation. Yeah, amen, well said. It's weird. Separation from the world, right? Which is one of the points. You have the sword, like these different things that are removed, like pulling the Anabaptists back from what would have been mainstream expectations of society, so to speak. And there's another big one here, and that's the oath. That's the last one listed in the Shlodheim. I'm curious why it's last, and what does it say? What is it about? Talk to me about that. Well, I think some of the first ones are, they just build into each other.

And then I think some of the last ones are, "And if we're this kind of people, we will do this." And this is stuff that's done normally. So for instance, the sword, which we were just talking about, in an emergency in the Middle Ages and during the Reformation, everybody was expected, every able-bodied man was expected to pick up the sword and defend his city. So these last couple of things are telling us that there are certain things that our society does, and these are definitely not what we do. The sword clearly plugs into, well, they all do. They all plug into separation.

Okay. And the oath, medieval society was structured on a hierarchy, and you pledged loyalty to the man above you. Now, of course, the peasants, they were at the bottom, and I don't, I guess that, I don't know that they had to pledge their loyalty, but a citizen did. Okay, and go up the ladder. So one lord, a lower lord would pledge his allegiance to a lord above him, etc., right up to either the king or the emperor, or in the church to the pope, eventually, at the top. And so the society in their mind was structured by what I swear that I'm going to follow you and you tell me what I have to do because you're above me, which has some very interesting repercussions.

Thank you. If he and I are peasants and I hit him, then that doesn't matter. But if you're our lord and I hit you, I'm either going to be really badly beaten or killed. You know, what happens depends on how you are, where you are in that structure. So they're actually talking about, when they're not doing the oath, they're rejecting in a lot of, at least some ways, the hierarchy of the way society was structured. They were willing to obey. Right, right. But they also insisted, "We are in the image of Christ. I'm in the image of Christ just like you, my lord." And that means something. I'm going to obey you. But I think they would have been horrified at the fact that if I did something to you, I would be punished more than if I did it to my fellow peasant.

Yeah. So that's part of it. So this is why it's so disruptive on the one side, on the Catholic Protestant side. It's also a commandment. The Lord said it, and James said it. And it's pushing us, as it says very clearly in the scripture, "Make your yes, yes, and your no, no." And you can't do any more than just say, "I'll do this if it's possible." Yeah, right. The quote from it, and you're right, they come right out and quote the scripture, Matthew 5:37, "Let your yes be yes and your no, no, for anything more comes from evil." And then it goes on, it says, "Therefore we reject all swearing of oaths." And it says, "Particularly those of loyalty to kings and nations.

For Christ has forbidden his followers all swearing, whether true or false, by heaven or by earth or by Jerusalem or by our head. God's people trust in the invisible, not the outward things. Hence, oaths are forbidden to them by Christ." So I like your point there. And you know, again, they took their citizenship in the kingdom of God very seriously. Just like in the early church, when you said, "Jesus is Lord," it meant Caesar is not. And so it had some huge implications. So when they were trying to be followers of Christ and not parts of these worlds, and they were separated, they meant, but they were genuinely feeling like they were part, as Jesus is our king, he's our president, he's going to be who we put our loyalty to.

There was some differences, what Brother Steven, about some groups said, "Okay, you could affirm, I'm telling you the truth." You know, we see Paul sometimes saying that type of thing. And there were different discussions on how that would be worked out. I think Mark Peck had some different. Mark Peck says you can swear an oath in government issues, I believe. Just affirmations of, "I am telling the truth." Are you telling the truth? Oh, no, he actually did, I think. Okay, so we should look this up a little bit. Yeah, yeah. But here it's very strongly put, and it kind of ties into that whole concept of who they are as a people. It does. Yeah.

And that makes me think of one more thing that says this all hangs together. And it also points to the society that this was done in. One of the accusations against the Anabaptists was, "You're the new monks and nuns." Yeah, yeah, yeah. You don't live in a monastery. Yes. You do marry. But the very things we're reading here, it's amazing. I don't know that this always happened, but sometimes when a person, okay, first of all, if I'm living in medieval, well, my background is English. If I'm living in medieval England, and I really want to be a good Christian, I will separate from the world by doing what?

Living in a monastery? Go to the monastery. Oh, I see. Like that. Okay, separation from the world. And at least in some cases, I have read, this is my second baptism. Yes. Think about that. And that means that they even realized that baptism was this change in life.

Now, they, of course, thought that, well, in the infant, there's no change in life, but they thought, well, yeah, it provides for that, essentially. And they didn't go to war. The monks and nuns were not supposed to go to war. That's right. Later on, there was a corruption there, and there were some military orders. I recognize that. But essentially, monks and nuns were expected to be what we would call non-resistant. And so, and so all this stuff is, it's all Matthew, the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 5, 6, and 7. And in the early church, everyone was supposed to do that. As the church and the state grew closer and closer together, individuals who saw that started forming little communities, not withdrawing from the church.