Author: Admin account

  • Stories that Shape Us

    Stories that Shape Us

    This month, we’re pleased to feature a written contribution from Martin Hofkamp of Providence, Rhode Island.   Martin shares a personal experience that offered him an unexpected lesson anda challenging question for other Anabaptist readers to consider.

    As you read Martin’s story, we invite youto ponder an unexpected encounter with someone outside of your close circle or a risk you took that impacted your sense of identity and shapes your faith expression today. We encourage you to share that experience with Martin and/or with Mennonite Men. You can submit your story at the end of his article or by e-mailing mlhofkamp @ gmail.com and JonZ @ MennoniteMen.org.

    Digging a Ditch with a Former Marine in Mississippi

    by Martin Hofkamp

    Magnolia Grove Monastery in Batesville, Mississippi is a center for mindfulness and reflection in the tradition of Buddhist monk and peace activist Thich Nhat Hanh. Nine men had signed up for a 3-month retreat in order to learn the art of transforming our suffering together. Over the course of our time together, we became brothers.

    Over the three months we spent hundreds of hours in meditation — sitting, walking, eating, and working meditation. We also learned the practice of deep listening and loving speech. It was an incredibly healing experience for us. 

    During working meditation I was digging a drainage ditch with one of the men, a gruff looking former Marine who was in his mid-fifties and still wore a hat with the Marine Corps insignia — an eagle, a globe, and an anchor. He dropped it while we were working, and I joked that I was going to bury it, and then challenged him about wearing the hat at the monastery, which was founded by Vietnamese folks whose country was ravaged by the US military during the Vietnam war. 

    Through conversation, he swapped out the Marine insignia for the Brazilian flag, which is the country where his children live. It was a visual realignment of his values. He had let go of the identity he had built through the Marine Corps and embraced a symbol of his true true family.

    He recently sent me a text.

    “I heard from a colleague at Target today that we (the United States) have been at war with Iran 🇮🇷 for two weeks. I did not know as I do not consume news anymore. It wasn’t an overwhelming feeling, but I have this deep feeling of revulsion that is still lingering with me. The compassion I am able to feel has returned with a measured understanding now.    

    I remember watching a movie with a girlfriend in high school at the Cinema called “Boyz in the Hood” about the gang violence of the 80s & 90s and after; when we returned to her car to go home I just cried uncontrollably from the suffering that was portrayed in the movie.   

    I didn’t fully understand what I felt at the time. Joining the Marine Corps I closed my compassionate heart because I had to, and it has taken a long time to reopen it. A milestone of sorts.”

    At the monastery we are taught a very important lesson about community, which is that we always carry with us our spiritual community. I was able to minister to a friend, but I didn’t do it alone. I did it as a Mennonite who was able to use my Christian pacifist foundations to engage in difficult and important cross-cultural conversations — not only with the peace-loving Vietnamese monastics, but more importantly with my Marine friend.

    There are so many of us who are attached to identities and ways of being. My friend was attached to his identity as a Marine, and through our conversations he let it go.

    I wonder about the identities I’m attached to. I wonder about Mennonite men — I notice that we often choose not to engage in difficult conversations and relationships because we don’t want to put ourselves out there. Perhaps it’s time to let go of our identity of being “the quiet in the land,” and have some difficult, important conversations with other men in our lives.

    We now invite you to think about your own experiences. What moment, person, challenge, or unexpected encounter has shaped the man you are today?  Share your story in the comments below.

  • Pursuing Jesus-Centered Justice with Partnerships

    Pursuing Jesus-Centered Justice with Partnerships

    People who work closely with livestock may understand this imagery well, perhaps better than most in the US and Canada today.  Jesus calls us into partnership, side by side as companions and co-laborers.

    This imagery from Matthew’s gospel helps inform my understanding of partnership and following in Jesus’ way towards God’s shalom.  We walk in step with other followers to carry daunting loads together, not alone.  Mennonite Men aims to walk and work in solidarity with partner organizations, church conferences, and congregations towards a Jesus-centered justice.  We cannot do our work alone or in isolation.

    Pursuing Jesus-Centered Justice with Partnerships

    by Jon Zirkle

    28 ‘Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.
    29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will
    find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.’

    I love this passage from Matthew 11:28-30, especially given the agricultural imagery of taking on a yoke.  This passage didn’t make as much sense to me until I visited an animal husbandry organization where I saw and felt handmade yokes.  These yokes were purposefully made out of lightweight wood, and they were designed to bring together two animals—usually oxen—to share their work side by side.  Many cultures around the world rely on livestock to cultivate soil or carry heavy loads far distances.  Perhaps better than most in the US and Canada today’, people who work with livestock understand this imagery well.  Jesus calls us into partnership, side by side as companions and co-laborers.

    This imagery from Matthew’s gospel helps inform my take on the work of partnership and following in Jesus’ way towards God’s shalom.  We walk in step with other followers to carry daunting loads together, not alone.  Mennonite Men aims to walk and work in solidarity with partner organizations, church conferences, and congregations towards a Jesus-centered justice.  We cannot do our work alone or in isolation.  And we need Christ as our guide.

    I want to highlight some examples of how partnership is playing out for Mennonite Men right now and how we are confronted by Christ’s calling towards justice as we do so.  Our longstanding ministry called JoinHands (once called Tenth Man) has given out grants to newer congregations who wish to purchase their first building.  Over $2,000,000 has been given out over 40 years to over 90 individual congregations in the United States, Canada, and countries around the world.  Praise God!  

    Photo: Canva Pro

    In recent years Mennonite Men has not received many JoinHands applications from US and Canadian congregations.  Applications we do receive are often from immigrant and refugee congregations.  Congregations of immigrants and refugees in the United States may struggle in working with banks and getting loans, potentially facing hardships and discrimination when doing so.  I suspect many Mennonite congregations of majority European descent are funding the purchase of new buildings internally and perhaps are successfully acquiring traditional bank loans.  Matters of fairness, privilege, and discrimination quickly show themselves.  

    On the other hand, Mennonite Men is increasingly receiving more JoinHands and JoinTrees grant requests from congregations and organizations in Africa, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia.   With international grant applications, our partners play an essential role for Mennonite Men in better understanding the congregation and their context if we can’t dialogue directly with the congregation.  For example, I spoke with Mennonite Church Canada’s Witness Liaison, Norm Dyck, earlier this summer by Zoom who helped share insights about a JoinHands grant application coming from a congregation he knows of in Myanmar.  And our ongoing partnership with Africa Inter-Mennonite Mission (AIMM) has helped connect Mennonite Men with African congregations applying for JoinHands grants and JoinTrees grants.  As I’ve learned from the late Executive Coordinator, John Fumana (who died tragically in May 2026), and Interim Coordinator, Tara Burch, AIMM also does an incredible amount of cultural translation, language translation, and technological legwork to help some applicants fill out Mennonite Men grant applications.  

    Through partnership Mennonite Men discovers so much, and what we discover is humbling and transformative for North American Mennonites.   It is very humbling to discover the many layers of additional work that applicants whose first language is not English or who do not have reliable internet for digital communications have to go through simply to apply for a grant.  We are also humbled by the disparities of resources and stability (geopolitical and climate-related) between applicants that shapes the reasons they are applying in the first place.  JoinHands applications from communities in Global South countries are often worshipping outdoors with no structure, in structures with no roof, or in structures made of salvaged materials that are vulnerable to inclement weather and theft.  Many JoinTrees grant applications coming from the Global South propose growing trees that will provide food, fiber, and economic livelihood as well as protection from oppressive tropical heat.  Our international sisters and brothers applying for grants are living with realities of deforestation, poverty, hunger, violence, and war-ravaged landscapes.  

    I return to the Matthew 11 image Jesus gives us of being yoked together with him, the imagery and invitation this gives us for how to follow in his ways.  Jesus invites us into deeper and even more vulnerable territory of partnership.  When we agree to being yoked together with our partner and rooted in Christ, we see and hear and feel up-close what our fellow sister or brother is experiencing.  Sometimes it’s messy and uncomfortable being yoked together.  But both parties are changed.  Both partners have more stability and clarity to move forward together towards God’s shalom.  The burden is lighter indeed.  

    Mennonite Men is at a threshold, one in which I believe Jesus is showing us the disparities that exist among God’s people.  Following Jesus for God’s shalom may involve deeper looks into our policies and making policy changes.  Doing our work may mean getting more intercultural competency training and more intentional relationship building with partners of varying backgrounds.  I believe this can help build our capacities for relationship.  

    I welcome your responses and prayers about pursuing Christ-centered partnership.  I invite you, your congregation, your conference, or your company or organization to support our work and our commitment to partnership through prayer, through amplifying our messages (and sharing about our work online and verbally), and through financial gifts.  Help us continue taking steps forward into the work of love, rooted in the ways of Jesus. 

  • “…bringing our own stories, cultures, and gifts.”

    “…bringing our own stories, cultures, and gifts.”

    By Jon Zirkle

    Mennonite Men has a long history of carrying out its mission and ministry in Canada and the US, as well as having board members and leadership from both countries.  Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary (AMBS) is also a binational organization and has Canadian faculty and staff members as well as those based in the United States.  One such Canadian staff member at AMBS is Yoel Masyawong who serves as Development Associate for Canada.  Yoel also is a pastor in Ontario, the Regional Minister for Mennonite Church Eastern Canada (MCEC), a husband, and a father.   

    Photo: Yoel Masyawong

    I have had the pleasure to meet with Yoel recently to get to know him as a fellow brother in Christ and learn about his ministry as well as his life in Canada.  In talking with him I learned that he and diverse group of other Canadian pastors recently embarked on a five-day wilderness canoe trip together.  I wanted to learn more.   

    What Yoel shared was profound.   A number of the men present on the trip were from urban settings, some of them leaders of immigrant congregations.  I asked Yoel what felt special about this experience. 

      

    “The special thing about having men from diverse cultural backgrounds together was that we shared life in a very simple and meaningful way as men. There was a kind of common, unspoken men’s culture that connected us, something that could not be defined by our job titles, economic backgrounds, or different life experiences. We had one another’s backs, helped one another, and listened to one another. If someone could not paddle, someone else would paddle for him. If someone could not portage, another person would step in and help. One person could look for firewood while another started the fire. We learned to depend on each other. 

    In hearing Yoel bear witness to this story, I sensed the living Christ and asked Yoel where he sensed Christ showing up in the experience: 

    “One of the ways I believe Christ showed up was in the way we cared for one another. The most important thing I learned from the wilderness experience is that Christian community is not about everyone being the same. It is about learning how to live together as one body of Christ while bringing our own stories, cultures, and gifts. It was not only about conversations about faith, but also about the relationships we built with one another through sharing life together.” 

    I hope this trip inspires others in the US and throughout Canada to break bread and explore God’s creation together, including in groups that are comprised of different cultural and ethnic backgrounds, men from rural and urban settings, and men of different ages.  Click here If you would like to read the piece Yoel wrote for Mennonite Church Eastern Canada.  You can also read more about Yoel on the Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary website and learn about the intercultural worship gathering and potluck he is promoting and helping lead October 2026 in Kitchner, Ontario. 

    Please reach out if your men’s group, congregation, conference, or friend circle wants support or ideas from Mennonite Men regarding experiences that join men together.  In the mean time, you are in our prayers and please pray for Yoel in his work and ministry as a follower of Jesus for God’s shalom.

  • Trees for Food, Peace and Ecological Healing

    Trees for Food, Peace and Ecological Healing

    By Jon Zirkle 

     
    Mennonite Men’s JoinTrees campaign is proud to support a project in Kenya from Wakulima ni Sisi (We Are The Farmers) called “Trees for Food, Peace and Ecological Healing”.  Not only is this project generating native and edible trees and perennial crops but also providing education about regenerative agriculture to farmers, schools, and local communities in Kenya and beyond. 

    Samuel Lasiti and Ariana Perez Diener are the leaders of this project.  I spoke with them a few months ago by Zoom to learn more about the project and their lives in Kenya.  They shared that their location is quite dry and it is a challenge to retain the little moisture they receive from rainfall.  Practices like mulching, using biochar, and digging swales help slow down and retain precipitation.  Samuel and Ariana are promoting native trees and plants which are better adapted to the climate.  They are certified in permaculture, are trained in coppicing and silvopasturing, and both have worked on diverse farms in the US and elsewhere.  They also have been offering trainings to local farmers on sustainable practices for over a year now.  They plan to grow many trees from seed for this nursery project.  Clearly they care deeply about God’s creation and being stewards.   

    “We do a lot of seed collecting when we go on walks,” they told me.   

    Farmers in this part of Kenya face many challenges.   Overgrazing is a problem, and it is tempting for farmers to graze their animals in areas where trees have been planted.  Most tree nurseries sell exotic trees and the nearest tree nursery is over two hours away.  And in this part of the world, it’s possible for elephants to come through the area, making it important to put up fencing on new plantings.   

    These challenges don’t appear to stop Samuel and Ariana and the We Are the Farmers group to have big ambitions.  With help from the JoinTrees grant funding from Mennonite Men, they plan to plant over 24,000 trees, plant trees in partnership local schools, teach workshops for farmers for 50 farmers in the area selected for training.  These farmers will receive 200-250 trees for their farms depending on how larger their farms are.   

    Mennonite Men is so excited to support this work and to be part of a growing community of Earth stewards to raise and plant native trees, increase food security, and be part of healing God’s creation around the world.   

    To learn more about We Are The Farmers and their impressive work, visit their website at https://wearethefarmers.org.   

  • Creation, Healing, & Abundance

    Creation, Healing, & Abundance

    In its final chapter of Revelation, the Bible ends with imagery of the tree of life.  I love that Scripture is bookended with creation, healing, and abundance. 

    Mennonite Men’s JoinTrees campaign is rooted in the biblical call to care for God’s creation.  Our campaign is not only intended to reduce the harmful effects of climate change, but also to be life-giving to creatures, people, faith communities, and ecosystems.  Tree planting efforts create jobs as well as hope.  Together, the JoinTrees campaign enables you to participate in reconciliation and restoration as active agents in repair, rooted in love.  

    As our fiscal year comes to a close July 31 and a new budget cycle begins August 1, we hope for a strong finish and a strong beginning.  Tree planting efforts in central Illinois, Elkhart County (Indiana), Kenya, and Indonesia are being funded and getting underway.  Many of the trees being planted will help reduce pressures to cut down native forests.  

    Please pray for the JoinTrees ministry of tree planting and creation care, including our partners in North America and across the globe.  Gifts from individuals, family estates, companies, congregations, and conferences towards the JoinTrees campaign are welcomed, and these gifts make a difference! 

    And as always, JoinTrees grant applications can be found on our website.  

  • JoinHands Update

    JoinHands Update

    By Jon Zirkle 

    Mennonite Men is engaged in exciting work with the JoinHands ministry.  In the past few months, we have received requests from congregations on the African continent who are without a place to worship.  We are humbled to learn of the barriers that our sisters and brothers in Global South countries face which hinder their abilities to build or purchase a church structure and what it means to gather without a secure space.  Partnering across continents and across cultures takes relational commitment, patience for all partners, becoming educated about what a project actually entails to get started, and almost always more time than is often desired by both partners.  Our commitment to this work and ministry remains, and we are committed to remain rooted in the love and grace and teachings of Jesus Christ. 

    Being committed to learning, patience, relational care, and the ways of Jesus naturally means that we are constantly being confronted with needs to adapt and change.  There are new opportunities to not just share money with congregations but to root ourselves more intentionally in longstanding relationship.  We realize ministry involves more than financial transaction, and we long to deepen our commitments to congregations who receive JoinHands grants.  This could involve collaborative partnerships with church agencies and other nonprofits, Zoom calls to build connection and understanding with congregations receiving grants, follow-up communication, in-person visits where both parties mutually bear witness, and perhaps modifying our grant application and grant policies.  Who knows what the future might hold.  But surely the future involves more capacity and engagement. 

    As Mennonite Men wraps up its fiscal year and begins a new fiscal year August 1, we ask you as our partners to continue praying for the projects in North America and across the world that are in process and for new grant applications we have yet to receive.  We ask you to continue believing in our ministry by helping us grow the pool of available resources to new congregations and to spread the word to new congregations in your area, your province, your conference that we are open to receiving JoinHands grant applications.  Let’s be creative!  Contact us if you have ideas, dreams, and new energy for this longstanding ministry of Mennonite Men. 

  • A New Father’s Reflections

    A New Father’s Reflections

    by Jon Zirkle

    After a few years of waiting to adopt a child, my wife and I received an e-mail on a Sunday afternoon that changed our lives.  Hours before folks at church asked me for updates about our adoption. I didn’t have much to say.  After an afternoon nap, I awoke to hear my wife tell me we got an e-mail from our adoption agency titled “new adoption case—mother in labor.”   

    Before she had read the full e-mail aloud, we got a text from our adoption agency. This mom was choosing between us and just one other couple.  We were e-mailed four questions to answer as soon as possible.  After hitting send, we got a call minutes later. 

    “The mom read your answers, and she is choosing you two.  Can you buy plane tickets and fly out here tomorrow?” 

    We said yes, and the rest is history still unfolding.   

    This wild adoption story is our lived reality.  It’s far too fresh and too personal to share all details.  However, there is witness to bear.  Far from home, we’ve encountered the love of Christ and the gifts of the Spirit around every corner—in Uber rides to and from the hospital, in free meals from Ronald McDonald house, and in the holy and vulnerable conversations with nurses, doctors, hospital volunteers, and other new parents facing uncertainty.  My wife and I have sudden situations where we are asked about our faith commitments, including with random strangers and a birth mother.  I’m frequently in situations where I ponder gender and how masculinity gets expressed, experienced, and tested—in talking with other men (including total strangers) about fatherhood, being one of many fathers experiencing the stress of sudden and difficult births, and in being a new dad with a male baby boy spending many hours a day in a hospital wing filled with babies, young moms, and a female-majority nursing staff.   I’m learning to be a man in new ways.  And I’m learning to be a dad. 

    My wife and I joke that I’m in ‘Dad School’.  I’m an enrolled student, living the lessons and drinking from a firehose while doggy paddling.  Many males throughout the US and Canada, throughout MCUSA and MC Canada, and all over the world are also going through ‘Dad School’ too or will be in the future.  But many of us don’t have male friends, don’t have a men’s group, don’t have a positive father figure or male family member, and don’t have faith for guidance and support during the testing experiences of Dad School.  On the other side of that coin, there are many boys in need of love and support from a dad or father figure.  The tiny baby boy in many hands is one of them.  We all do. 

    Father’s Day may have been celebrated back in June, but being a father is an experience and an honor that many of us will practice daily for much of our lives. But being a father is not like a once-a-week Sunday worship service and not once-a-year holiday.   Fatherhood is an ongoing commitment.  In trying to practice Anabaptist faith, being a father will be shaped by trying to follow in the ways of Jesus, being rooted in community, and actively participating in reconciliation.  My journey as a father is just beginning, yet I am confident that I will need help from male peers, role models, family members, and my faith community along the way.  Being in a men’s group, having male friendships where I can be honest about what’s hard and what’s beautiful, and being in spaces where I am accountable to respecting women and supporting mothers suddenly feels more important than ever before. 

     

    I look at this new baby boy and hope I will try my best to be a good father. I hope we can navigate this crazy life together as a team.  I hope I can continue learning from him what it means to come to Jesus as a child.  And I hope I can model for him my attempts at serving God and being a co-creator in the peaceable kin-dom where all of God’s people and all of creation is cared for and respected.  

    To all the fathers, grandfathers, uncles, male mentors, and stand-in male father figures out there, thank you for taking part in the life of a child.  It will be hard, we will mess up, and there is much joy and reward to experience regardless.  It’s holy work. Let’s join together to walk the Good Road with each other.  Visit www.mennonitemen.org/joinmen and reach out to Mennonite Men for resources and ideas of how to join with other men on this journey. 

  • Blessing the Trees at Greencroft

    Blessing the Trees at Greencroft

    Submitted by Anne Birky

    In the fall of 2021 the small and new Greencroft tree committee started to correspond with Steve Thomas  in response to concerns about a high, piercing chirp (think one chirp from an very angry crow every 8  seconds, 24/7 except on Sunday mornings) from a foundry behind the Greencroft Oak and Maple courts.  Steve was then the US director of Mennonite Men. Also included in those conversations was the  supervisor in the forestry operations at NIPSCO (our local source for electricity), the wildlife biologist for  Indiana’s Department of Natural Resources, a persistent and frustrated resident in one of the courts who  had been in conversations with the foundry manager regarding noise abatement, the Goshen city forester  and Greencroft’s director of Resident Life Services. 

    Steve submitted a grant proposal that fall of 2021 to Mennonite Men JoinTrees, it was approved and the  money was set aside. It appeared to those of us living here that there was no substantial progress for a  sound & visual barrier made of trees. Our dreams and hopes for managing the foundry’s noise faded.  Residents had been complaining about the noise for at least 50 years. An untended, wild hedgerow had  grown up; it muted the noise a little bit but not enough for a legal limit in a residential setting.  

    After 2021, things changed: the director of Resident Life Services retired, the supervisor of forestry  operations at NIPSCO took another job, the Greencroft tree committee disbanded, mostly due to health  issues and a new tree committee formed. The chirping from the foundry continued, day in and day out.  Fortunately for us, Steve, the city forester and Greencroft’s director of facilities and plant operations really,  really wanted this project to come to pass. They kept our dream alive!  

    Steve revisited the proposal again in 2025 to plant 400 Norway Spruce and 215 Eastern Red Cedar trees  on land north of the foundry and in the bean field just south of the Greencroft boundary. Steve  established a good relationship with the plant manager and within 10 minutes, he helped Steve obtain  official permission from the landowner in New York to plant on the land. Steve arranged for a tree  company to plant the trees with their tractor; they planted over 600 trees on 2 1/2 acres in 2 1/2 —3  hours. It was impressive and fun to watch the planting!  

    About 15 of us gathered to bless the trees about 9 days after they were planted. A former Greencroft  CEO (now a resident) was there; Steve Thomas came; the city forester attended. Most of the members of  the first tree committee were there and quite a few of the watering volunteers came too. Some grateful  residents from the courts who listen to the constant chirping attended.  

    Steve reminded us that the ancestors of these trees are our elders; they have been on this earth longer  than we have. He asked us to consider what we can learn from them.  

    The city forester thanked us—his elders— for planting & caring for these trees. He told us he’s 52 and  when he retires here in 20 years, these trees will be just great! 

    BLESSING THE TREES 

    Norway Spruce and Eastern Red Cedar trees, we give you our blessings.  

    May you grow well—roots down, leaves up. May you care well for each other and for Greencroft  residents. 

    We give you thanks for doing what trees do: stay in one place, grow, provide a place for the birds to  build nests, inspire us, show us how to wait, (pause while others offer specific thanks). We thank you, trees, for your wisdom of photosynthesis. We thank you too for your shelter for us.  Especially right now we thank you for the sound barrier you will eventually provide from the noisy factory  nearby.  

    May we water in anticipation of our children, our grandchildren and others who will come to live at  Greencroft.  

    We give you thanks, Creator of our universe, for our planet which is our home. We are grateful for our  little corner of the world.  

    We give thanks to you, Sacred Mystery, for light, for the sun, water, oxygen, for your breath of life, (pause  while others offer specific thanks).  

    We give thanks, Creator God, for these trees and we give thanks for our energy to prepare this land for  the people who will come here after us.

  • Windsor Mennonite Fellowship

    Windsor Mennonite Fellowship

    JoinHands: A Story from Windsor Mennonite Fellowship

    Mennonite Men has given out dozens of JoinHands grants to new congregations throughout Canada, the United States, and in countries all over the world who wish to acquire a building where they can worship.   Many people have been blessed by owning a church building with help from JoinHands grants.  Church buildings can make it possible not only for folks to gather for worship and study, but also as spaces to share meals, host community conversations, build relationships, and bear witness to God’s Kin’dom and wide welcome.  And we celebrate the many ways that congregations gather.  This doesn’t always involve use of or owning a building.

    I recently followed up with Windsor Mennonite Fellowship (WMF), a congregation in Windsor, Ontario who received a JoinHands grant from Mennonite Men back in 1993.  Though pastor Riley was away at the time, I was thrilled to get an e-mail response from an elder named Nate Hope to share updates about the congregation more recently.  Nate came from a Pentecostal background and had worked in construction but now is a church elder at WMF and a full-time social work student working for the Downtown Windsor Community Collaborative.  I thoroughly enjoyed meeting Nate and catching a glimpse of Windsor Mennonite Fellowship, a Mennonite Church Canada congregation just miles from Detroit in the US.   

    “Our church building was once a laundromat in the neighborhood,” Nate explained.  “The congregation was able to purchase and renovate this structure.  We created a sanctuary, a nursery, and a kitchen and dining area in the back.  It’s a small space, but we’ve made it work.  Space is even becoming tight now.” 

    Nate shared that WMF shares the space with an Eritrean congregation called Shalom Worship and Healing Centre.  This sister congregation worships on Sunday afternoons, also utilizing the building for a prayer service and choir during the week.  Both congregations take turns with the space, requiring scheduling.  There have even been times when WMF held their elders meeting at another congregation’s building because their sister congregation was using the space. 

    Windsor Mennonite Fellowship has experienced a good deal of change in recent years, especially around the time the COVID-19 pandemic set in.  A new pastor came.  The congregation developed a statement to become an inclusive and welcoming congregation.  Also before the pandemic, many congregants came from Mennonite backgrounds.  Many families who moved back to smaller communities where they’d grown up decided to stay in those smaller communities when the pandemic subsided.  Meanwhile, many newer folks in Windsor began attending WMF.  

    “When our current pastor Riley came, he was well-known in town, and a number of new folks began attending who were new to a Mennonite faith.  But they felt comfortable coming here, and Riley and others made them feel welcome.  Like many churches during the pandemic, we began offering online services and changed our worship format to include 15-20 min sermons and the same amount of time devoted to sharing dialogue afterwards.  We have keep that format, which folks appreciate,” Nate shared.

    Thank you to all supporters of Mennonite Men’s ministry of helping new congregations purchase a worship space.  Pray for Windsor Mennonite Fellowship, for its collaborative sharing of space with another congregation, and the future relationships being deepened throughout Windsor, Ontario and throughout the wider church.  If you know of a new congregation looking to purchase a building, inform them about our JoinHands grant program.  We continue inviting your support for future grants to new congregations.

  • Following Jesus as Males in 2026

    Following Jesus as Males in 2026

    Submitted by Jon Zirkle

    The Christian Bible gives us four accounts of Jesus.  We see different angles of Jesus—Jesus as a baby, as an adolescent, and as an adult man. Jesus appears to his disciples after his death.  Stories describe his birth and his brutal execution, his adult experiences of escaping to wilderness for prayer, walking long distances, healing sick people and casting out demons, crossing boundaries and facing taboo head-on, feeding others, riding on donkeys unarmed.  As a male Jesus had a life full of experiences that involved risk.

    Here in 2026 living on the North American continent, displays of masculinity constantly confront us in the media, online, at sporting events, and in politics.  Boys and men daily see images of men who dominate on the field, in the bedroom, and in the workplace.  Often the images in ads are of men alone, solo heroes.  We see men who refuse to admit wrong-doing, men who abuse and steal without consequences, men driving big trucks through rivers and over huge boulders, men worshipped for their chiseled bodies.  Men are portrayed as above reproach, measured by their financial worth, have things under control and are in control. 

    These images are vastly different than what we hear in the stories of Jesus.  The Jesus I witness was a man who forgave others, a man who left behind a normal way of life in order to share good news and help others who suffer, a man who wept openly and cried out to God, centered love and service, could express joy and took time to celebrate with friends, and regularly depended on a group of men.  The Jesus I read about was not married with children, did not own a house or many possessions, was bullied and taunted and threatened, and didn’t retaliate towards enemies.  He was obedient to that which was beyond him, to his Creator.  He believed in the power of prayer.  He was willing to publicly die in a humiliating way. I can only imagine the kind of bullying, name-calling, and taunting Jesus would experience if living in 2026. 

    Are we—am I—ready to follow Jesus?

    Following Jesus as a male in 2026 in North America is feeling pretty radical.  Let’s be real.  We—myself included—are continually tempted to believe that we don’t need help from others, that work and making money are more important than offering love and service, that “our” time is better spent working out than in prayer and fellowship.  Porn, fierce competition, displays of unfiltered anger and violence, and celebrations of war and military service abound.  This can all feel overwhelming.  I believe we men need support, a healthy sense of self, a commitment to prayer, and vulnerable brotherly community to follow Jesus’ alternative path. 

    If you identify as male and you’re reading this right now, I hope you know that you are not alone if you are struggling to resist the forces that bombard us as men.  I hope you know that your life, your story, your gifts, your body, the person that you are really matters in this life and beyond.  I hope you can hear God’s voice that calls your name, that you feel permission to lean into the messages of Jesus, rejecting false idols of empire and domination. 

    I hope you’ll join other men who want to try to follow Jesus.  If you (or another male in your life) do not have community, consider attending a men’s retreat or to join or start a men’s group, which could be an online group.  Identify a friend, family member, co-worker, therapist, pastor, or another mature person you trust who might help you connect or might even join you in your search for fellowship.  Reach out to us at Mennonite Men by e-mail for ideas. Explore our resources, books, and videos found at https://mennonitemen.org/joinmen/.  Brothers, you are in our prayers.