Hello, my name is Marcus Girod.

I was born and raised in a Swiss Amish home. Both my parents gave their lives to the Lord

before I was born, and at the age of 16, we left the traditions of the Amish. In this letter, I will

share with you in brief about the Ordnung idol, which the Amish have come to worship.

Simply stated, the Ordnung is a set of rules set up by the Amish leadership, differing in each

individual church. Everyone who is a member of that specific church must follow those specific

Ordnung rules, or they will be excommunicated with no exceptions.

The Amish, Mennonite, and Hutterite people all stem from the same people group called the

Anabaptist.

This movement came out of the dark cages in 1521, breaking away from the reformed

Lutheran and the Roman Catholic Church. Many were the misdeeds of the Roman Catholic and

the reformed Lutheran Church, but I will only touch on one, the Roman Catholics at that time

and still do, baptize infants, claiming them to be accepted into the kingdom of God while still

babies. A number of common people began to read the Bible and to understand that being

born again had to be done when one was old enough to understand that they were a sinner

and needed to be saved by the blood of Jesus, and only then could they be baptized.

Immediately, the Roman Catholic and the reform Lutheran Church began to persecute these

new and young believers who began to rebaptize each other in their newfound faith. The name,

Anabaptist, simply means one who is baptized again. With extreme persecution, Parents were

burned at the stake for their faith, as their children were taken away. The church authorities

would chop off their fingers one at a time, insisting that they denounce this new faith. If they

continued to refuse to denounce Christ, they were either killed by the sword, burned at the

stake, or drowned in the local river. For some 250 years, countless thousands were killed.

Menno Simmons, in the 15 th century, became a born-again rebaptized leader among the

Anabaptist people. This is where the Mennonite denomination came from.

Jacob Hutter, in the 16 th century, became a figurehead among the Anabaptists; from him

came the branch of the Hutterites.

In the early 1600s, a man named Jacob Amman from the Reform church, who was a Tailor by

trade, gave his life to the Lord and became an Anabaptist. In time, Jacob Amman became a

bishop among his congregation. As pride would have it, Jacob Amman got into a severe dispute

with the Mennonite Ordnung on the style of clothing they wore. He believed everyone should

wear clothing such as the state reformed church wore. And also giving him job security. This is

where a branch of people stepped away from the Mennonite church and followed Jacob

Amman, who became known as the Amish.

In the late 1600s, after long and persistent persecution, the leaders of Switzerland made a deal

with the Anabaptist people. If they would stop preaching the gospel outside of their churches,

they promised to end the persecution. Persecution, weary people agreed to these terms, giving

up the great commission found in Matthew chapter 28-16-20.

Within just a few years, the focus on saving the lost, the great commission, Matthew chapter

28-16-20, disappeared completely among the Amish. Hear the infighting began.

This one compromise branched off into countless others until the Amish view became so

distorted that they no longer believed that one could be saved through the blood of Jesus

alone. But would have to follow every rule of the Ordnung.

Where excommunication had been rare, it became the public norm. Their individual church.

Ordnungs became the standard they lived and died by.

Today, from the outside, looking in, the Amish look quaint, kind, respectful, forgiving, and

plain. If you would look with me a bit deeper, and let us see what we can see.

Every Amish Ordnung are rules, such as buggy type, top buggies or open buggies, steel wheels,

or rubber wheels, reflector or light configuration on the buggies, gas engines, or no gas engines,

tractors, or no tractors, bicycles, or scooters, or neither, no electricity no running water, beard

length, bonnet size, shawl size, and color, shoe color, dress color, men’s pants style pocket

configuration, folds on the women’s caps has to be a certain number. Aprons are required or

not required. Snaps are specific, or buttons are specific to clothing. The list goes on and on and

on. Many of them are not allowed to pray unless they use a certain book filled with German

prayers. Many of the Ordnungs do not allow for prayer meetings or Bible studies. Bibles are

only allowed/read in the German language. In many of these churches, Bishops within the

church are the only ones who are allowed to study the Bible and preach from it, even though

many of them do not understand German at all.

If just one of the Ordnung idle rules is broken, they must immediately stand before the church

and repent, or they will be excommunicated on the spot. All this in light of violating the word of

God over and over again.

I could write a book on the things the Amish override in the Bible to fulfill the requirements of

the Ordnung Idol. Unfortunately, time and space limit me. So I will touch on only a few of the

many compromises found among the Amish.

We started out with Love, but we have now ended with hate, despising each other and

excommunicating each other. Refusing to eat at the same table with those whom we deem less

holy than ourselves. Churches will split over the smallest disagreement on the Ordnung Idol.

Perhaps a disagreement on the configuration of buggy reflectors, a church, and families will

split. Or perhaps a fold in the woman’s apron, a church will split and excommunicate each other

for this.

They claim holiness while some bishops look the other way and participate in vile drunken

parties, substance abuse, coarse joking, swearing, carousing, and the worst sort of behavior. In

direct violation of 1 Corinthians 6-9- 11. Which states that all who do these things are lost

without Christ. This is all done in the confines of the Amish communities. Rarely, if ever, seen by

those outside the community. This in itself would not be so bad simply because they are only

harming themselves, but due to the Ordnung idle worship that they have indulged in, the devil

has moved in and has taken over entire families with the worst kind of immorality.

The world calls it swinging, but the Amish have begun to swap wives. We have many

testimonies of young women and men coming out of the Amish communities, completely

broken and decimated from their dads and or their brothers’ sexually using them over and over

again, night after night, year after year. Some of them are getting pregnant as young as 13 by

their dad or their brothers. Older women are abusing young boys sexually. Thousands of them

are on heavy antidepressant medication from the hopeless treadmill of the Ordnung idol.

The Amish people have proven the Bible true. Isaiah 64:6 states. All of us have become like

one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags.

Jesus said, Worship the Lord, your God only. We will become like whatever we worship. That is

why He required us to worship him who is perfect Love. Instead, we as the Amish people have

traded perfect Love for a horrible substitute, the Ordnung idol. We have become like the idol

we worship. Divided, angry, hateful, abusive, violent, filthy, greedy, lust-driven, addicted to

pornography, addicted to sex, addicted to alcohol, addicted to nicotine, addicted to medication,

addicted to ourselves.

Matthew chapter 3-7-10,

But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to where he was baptizing, he

said to them You brood of vipers who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? Produce fruit

in keeping with repentance.

Matthew chapter 23- 2328

23  “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of

your spices—mint, dill and cumin. But you have neglected the more important matters

of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without

neglecting the former.  24  You blind guides! You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel.

25  “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside

of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence.  26  Blind

Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be

clean.

27  “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like

whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of the

bones of the dead and everything unclean.  28  In the same way, on the outside you

appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness.