 Marion Bontrager responds to receiving the 2006 Alumni Ministry and Service Award from Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary (AMBS), Elkhart, Ind. The award was presented by Ron Ringenberg, vice president for advancement and administration at AMBS, during the alumni banquet, one of the activities during Hesston's Homecoming Weekend September 22-24. |
October 4, 2006
A long-time Bible professor has been honored for teaching Bible courses to thousands of Hesston College students for 33 years.
Marion Bontrager received the 2006 Alumni Ministry and Service Award from Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary (AMBS), Elkhart, Ind., during the alumni banquet, one of the activities during Hesston's Homecoming Weekend September 22-24. The award was presented by Ron Ringenberg, vice president for advancement and administration at AMBS.
"Wearing the hat of pastor, professor, writer, conference youth minister, spiritual director, and speaker, and sometimes interchanging those hats at a moment's notice," Ringenberg said, "Marion has given the church his finest gifts and his heart in service to the church."
Ringenberg noted that Bontrager has served the Mennonite Church for more than 47 years. Born into an Old Order Amish family, he was the first in his family to attend graduate school. A 1957 graduate of Hesston College, he earned a bachelor's degree at Goshen (Ind.) College.
In 1963, Bontrager received a bachelor of divinity degree from Goshen Biblical Seminary. And in 1996, he completed additional requirements for a master of divinity at AMBS.
Bontrager served as pastor for six years at Friendship Mennonite Church in suburban Cleveland, Ohio.
He also taught for four years at Central Christian High School in Kidron, Ohio. During his time in Ohio, he also served as youth minister for Ohio Conference.
Bontrager came to Hesston College as a faculty member in 1973. He helped brainstorm the idea of Pastoral Ministries, and helped bring birth to the program for training pastors. "Marion has helped so many to see that we minister out of who we are," Ringenberg said. "And he has helped thousands of students process who they are, and how they will do ethics in classes like Peacemaking and Justice, and Anabaptist History and Thought."
Ringenberg said many of these experiences became the catalysts for what was to become Bontrager's greatest accomplishment. "The course Biblical Literature has become the keystone because Marion taught students the hooks," Ringenberg said. "Many people know the Bible stories, but most of us don't know how these stories fit together. We don't have the hooks to organize and retain the biblical material.
"In Bib Lit, as it is affectionately called, Marion has helped more than 2,500 students learn, then remember the biblical narrative," Ringenberg said. "He has explained in understandable language why those stories are there, and how those stories fit into God's purpose to create a chosen shalom people of all peoples, just like in Cleveland, just like here at Hesston College.
"At the end of each Bib Lit semester, students either write or recite the Heilsgeschichte, the salvation story," Ringenberg noted. "The feeling of accomplishment for each student after writing for three hours, or talking for 45 minutes, explaining the biblical story from memory, is profound. They can do it because they have the hooks of the unique timeline Bontrager created. He has introduced the God of the Bible to so many."
Bontrager's next accomplishment will be to publish a textbook based on the Bib Lit class. Bontrager expressed the hope that "by next summer, it will be at a place where I can have a publisher look at it."
In response to the award, Bontrager said, "The older one becomes, the more one is aware of how many people have contributed to your life and what you have become. So I am deeply humbled to be honored and want to recognize that I am a part of a larger Anabaptist community that has nurtured me, and has helped to shape and form my life.
"In many ways, I continue the teaching that I received at the seminary," Bontrager said, "especially Harold S. Bender in Church History and Howard Charles who taught me inductive Bible study. Millard Lind opened up the Old Testament to me through his lecturing. And John Howard Yoder helped me to be convinced about biblical non-violence because he helped me understand that the correct question was about faithfulness, not effectiveness. That made a whole lot of difference in my life.
"Here at Hesston College, Roy Roth's ethics class sparked the philosophical and theological in my mind," Bontrager recalled. "When I was a student here, it was a place where persons got personal attention just as they still do today. I am profoundly grateful for the opportunity to have been a part of the student body here at Hesston College."
Bontrager also expressed appreciation for his colleagues, and the supportive community of faculty and staff at Hesston College. "That is a bit unique, in terms of support we give one another," he said, "along with a little less competition among each other than at some academic institutions.
"I want to thank my wife and children for their sacrifice and support in my teaching here at Hesston College," he said.
"The Biblical Literature course I put together and started in 1987 had its origins when I was teaching Old Testament at Central Christian High School," he said.
He thanked those who have helped him teach Biblical Literature at Hesston College. "Keith Harder said he never worked so hard in his life that first year grading all the papers," he recalled. "Then I taught it with Duane Yoder for a number of years. Now I have the enjoyable time of teaching it with one of the more creative people I know, Michele Hershberger.
"Ultimately what is written on the hearts of people is more important than what one can ever write on paper," Bontrager concluded. "I hope that what has been communicated and taught and caught in relationships here will make a difference in the lives of many young people and ultimately to the Mennonite Church at large."
The plaque that Ringenberg presented to Bontrager reads: "Marion Bontrager is recognized for outstanding ministry and service in the continuation of the ministry of Jesus and the mission of God in the world today. The Alumni Association in cooperation with AMBS grants this award to celebrate the effective and faithful ministry of their graduates as they serve the church around the world."
The award entitles Bontrager to $500 toward future education events at the seminary.
Each year, AMBS names two winners of the award, recognizing devoted lifetime contributions to the church. This year, the seminary honored contributions in Christian education.
Honored in June was Paul M. Lederach of Lansdale, Pa., who served Mennonite Publishing House and Mennonite Board of Education for more than 30 years. Later, he held leadership and pastoral roles in Allegheny and Franconia Mennonite Conferences.