Dec. 7, 2009 issue
Leader looks back on a time of change
Retiring MC USA director writes the story of merging two denominations
By June Galle Krehbiel Mennonite Church USANEWTON, Kan. — The words of Isaiah 6:8 — “Here am I, send me” — didn’t impress 13-year-old Jim Schrag at the time.
Joel Schroeder, associate pastor at First Mennonite Church in Newton, Kan., speaks to Jim Schrag and his wife, Judy, during a time of recognition on Nov. 29 for Schrag upon his retirement as executive director of Mennonite Church USA. — Photo by Paul Schrag/MWR
Pastor Arnold Epp of First Mennonite Church in Newton presented that verse to him at his baptism in 1958.
Only later, when his father called attention to their meaning, did the young man recognize the significance of the words.
During 36 years of congregational and denominational leadership, the Isaiah verse has inspired Schrag, who retired Nov. 30 as executive director of Mennonite Church USA.
Beginning in 1996, he served three years as general secretary for the General Conference Mennonite Church, including two years as project leader for the team that guided the General Conference and the Mennonite Church toward a merger. Since 2001 he has worked at the helm of the new denomination.
Someday Schrag might put stickers on a map to show all the airports he’s been at, especially in the last 13 years, while attending denominational and area conference meetings.
His most recent call from God, however, finds him not on the way to a meeting but writing a book-length manuscript about the years leading up to and including the merger.
Faith and culture stand together as his way to describe the union.
“God is in the future more than the past, but God is certainly in the past,” he said last month at his office here.
Favorite quotations and Bible verses, including the Isaiah words, hang on the walls. Boxes crammed with paper files cover a table. Three-ring binders fill the shelves. A laptop computer sits on his desk.
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