Yoder was born in Smithville, Ohio in 1927 and earned his undergraduate degree from Goshen College. After World War Two, he traveled to Europe to direct relief efforts for the Mennonite Central Committee. While in Europe, he married Anne Marie Guth, in 1952. He completed his Th.D. at the University of Basel, Switzerland, under Karl Barth. Anecdotally true to form, the night before he was to defend his dissertation on Anabaptism and Reformation in Switzerland (2004), Yoder visited Barth's office to deliver an entirely different document—a thorough critique of Barth's position on war which he had written in the meantime. This long essay has now been published in Karl Barth and the Problem of War (2000) Yoder was instrumental in reviving European Mennonites following World War II.