Baptists, General Sketch of the… (I would say this is one of the better very brief outlines of )…Baptist History out there by Jim Curran

Baptists, General Sketch of the… (I would say this is one of the better very brief outlines of )…Baptist History out there by Jim Curran

Jim Curran admin  · BAPTIST CHURCH HISTORY Group FB

July 12, 2022·  from Daily Baptist Encyclopedia
Baptists, General Sketch of the.—(I would say this is one of the better very brief outlines of) Baptist History out there- Baptist Church History | Daily Baptist Encyclopedia | Facebook

Jim Curran Admin  · July 12 at 10:00 AM  · Daily Baptist Encyclopedia

Baptists, General Sketch of the.—(I would say this is one of the better very brief outlines of Baptist History out there- I would disagree however with the assertion that Providence was the first Baptist Church in the new world- however this is just before more research on Newport and Dr John Clarke began to surface.) The Baptist denomination was founded by Jesus during his earthly ministry. Next to the Teacher of Nazareth, our great leaders were the apostles, and the elders, bishops, and evangelists, who preached Christ in their times. The instructions of our Founder are contained in the four Gospels, the heaven-given teachings of our earliest ministers are in the inspired Epistles. The first Baptist missionary journal was the Acts of the Apostles. For the first two centu- ries all the congregations of the Church Universal (Catholic) were Baptist communities. During the two succeeding centuries the baptism of unconscious babes had such a limited existence that it is scarcely worthy of notice. During the fifth and sixth cen- turies the baptism of catechumens, that is, of cate-chized persons instructed beforehand for the sacred rite, was still common throughout Christendom. Though the candidates were constantly becoming younger, they always professed their own faith. Nor was the baptism of catechumens laid aside en- tirely in Rome itself in the ninth century. From the beginning of the fifth century infants commonly were baptized when very ill to take away Adam’s guilt, lest they might die and be lost. And though there were a few cases of infant baptism before this period, it was about this time it began to spread, but it required a good many centuries to gain the complete mastery of the Church Universal (Cath- olic); and before it succeeded, heretics, so called, flourished outside of the great corrupted Church Universal (Catholic). And even infant baptism itself, when it sprang up, had to take the apostolic idea that faith was a prerequisite to baptism, and borrow faith from the sponsors or parents of the child, or from the whole church, to make good its claim to the initiatory rite of the Christian Church. And it follows this course still.

The first great error among Christians was that water baptism in some way removed the sins of penitents. This heresy was common in the third century. About the same time the Lord’s Supper began to be regarded by some as possessing soul- healing efficacy for him who partook of it, and a magical power to protect the dwelling, or a ship at sea, if a portion of the bread was in the one or the other. These two follies led Christians to magnify the minister enormously, who could impart the soul-cleansing immersion, and consecrate the heart- healing, and house- and ship-protecting, sacramental supper. ‘These heresies, with their priestly rever- ence, fostered sacerdotal ambition, and led to the creation of gradations of rank among the clergy, until in process of time the Universal Church had little to show but a pyramid of priests, with the inferior ministry as its broad base, and the pope at its head, and two sacred ceremonies, the one giving imaginary salvation through baptismal water, and the other the supposed body and blood of the Lord, through real bread and wine. And as evils grow at a rapid rate, these perversions of baptism and the Lord’s Supper generated the whole brood of Romish ceremonies and superstitions.

When this conviction about the power of bap- tism to take away the sins of believers became common in the third century, then for the first time the baptism of unconscious babes was thought of; but in that century there is only one case of the kind, and not many more in the fourth ; but in the fifth, Augustine of Hippo began to frighten the Christian world with the falsehood that infants would perish through Adam’s sin without baptism. At the same time bits‘of the bread of the Lord’s Supper were forced upon the unconscious child, or a little of the wine, to give double salvation from two redeeming sacraments. As we have said, for long ages after this hosts in the Church Universal fought this wicked rite, which usurped the place of Christ’s holy sacrament, and induced the Saviour’s servants to trust saving water, instead of the blood of atonement and the arm of omnipotence.

When these superstitions gained extensive sway in the Church Universal (Catholic), communities of Christians sprang up in various quarters, some of which held the old truths of our mighty Founder whom John baptized in the river Jordan when he had reached the age of full manhood. The Pauli- cians, originating in the seventh century in Arme- nia, were Baptists. This community, brought into life by reading the Word of God, flourished for a time in its native place, then it sent missionaries into Thrace, Bulgaria, Bosnia, Servia, Italy, France, Germany, and other countries, and gathered mil- lions of adherents, and terrified popes, and drew kings with crusading armies of vast strength to kill its members. Between five hundred thousand and a million of them were put to death in France in the thirteenth century.

This people was most commonly known in Europe as Albigenses, but they bore many names and ma- lignant reproaches; and the worst doctrines and practices were falsely imputed to them. The Paulogician, Bogomilian, Albigenses existed in strength in Bosnia till 1463, and were found there till a later day.

From the twelfth century till the Reformation the Waldenses occupied a conspicuous place in the hatred of Catholic Europe, and in the violence of fierce persecutions. And some of these illustrious sufferers were Baptists.

In the same century which gave birth to the Waldenses the Henricians and Petrobrusians com- menced their existence as gospel communities, and held forth the lamp of life to the perishing, so that large numbers were saved. These so-called heretics were Baptists.

During that mighty upheaval in the days of Luther which shook the papacy to its lowest founda- tions, men with Anabaptist principles appeared in every direction with a suddenness that startled the world, and they were welcomed immediately with cruel greetings to foul dungeons and barbarous deaths. Their blood flowed in torrents upon the continent of Europe, and even in England it was wickedly shed.

It is not improbable that the ancient Britons were opponents of infant baptism when the Romish missionary Augustine met them in 603. But the evidence furnished by Bede, Eccles. Hist., lib. ii., cap. 2, is not sufficient to establish this. In the early period of the Reformation Anabaptists be- came quite numerous in England, and they excited the indignation of King Henry VIII. and the clergy, and they are often alluded to in denuncia- tory language in public documents. A little fur- ther on they were subjected to cruel persecutions. In the time of Edward VI., Joan of Kent, who car- ried Bibles into the palace of Henry VIII. for dis- tribution, concealed under her apron, when the penalty for the act was death, was given to the flames by King Edward by the over-persuasion of Archbishop Cranmer. Others shared her harsh fate, but Baptist doctrines spread, to the dismay of the clergy, and found a place in hearts opened of God in all parts of the kingdom. And even in Scotland mighty John Knox found it necessary to write a book against them. Queen Elizabeth and James I. treated them with royal barbarity, and Charles I. would have imitated their example had not the rising spirit of Anglo-Saxon liberty put a bit in his mouth, and finally cut off the tyrant’s head. For some years preceding and following 1649, the date of this event, the Baptists enjoyed extraordinary prosperity ; they filled the English army in Ireland with officers, and they had a large number over the troops located in Scotland and England, and even in Cromwell’s own regiment. So sturdy was their republicanism that many of them could see no difference between Charles I. reigning without a Parliament and Oliver Crom- well governing without a Legislature. The Pro- tector distrusted them, and procured a letter from the celebrated London Baptist minister, William Kiffin, which others signed, exhorting their brethren in Ireland to submission. (Hanserd Knollys So- ciety’s Confessions of Faith, p. 322.) Cromwell was so concerned about the opposition of some members of this now powerful body that he had spies to watch their movements and report their supposed conspiracies. ‘Thurloe gives the letter of ‘one of these spies describing the proceedings of a Baptist Association in England, and mentioning its prayers, letters, sermons, and speakersjust as the pro- ceedings of such a body might be described to-day. Generals Harrison, Lilburn, Overton, and Ludlow, and others in the army; Admiral-General Richard Deane, of both the army and the navy, Admiral Sir John Lawson, and a large number of other dis- tinguished officers of the navy, reflected a glory upon themselves and their Baptist brethren which ereated fear or joy throughout their island home. It was said that alarm lest the Baptists should seize the government after Cromwell’s death actually led the Presbyterians to unite with the Episcopalians in bringing from Holland to the English throne Charles II., the greatest profligate that ever dis- honored the family relation. In the reign of Charles, and his brother James, the most wicked persecutions were applied to Dissenters, and while the English Presbyterians from them and from subsequent heresy were annihilated, the Baptists received blows the effects of which they feel in England to-day.

They are now divided into General and Particular Baptists, the former being the smaller body. The word ‘‘General” was put in their name to de- scribe their doctrine of the atonement; they hold Arminian views of it and of all the doctrines of grace; the word “ Particular’ was originaily as- sumed to show that this section of the English Baptists held a limited atonement, and Calvinistical views of the doctrines of grace. These British Baptists have been enterprising, and have had many distinguished men, but they have been sadly hindered by persecutions and by the social tyranny of a powerful and intolerant state church. There are in England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland 2620 Baptist churches, with a membership of 269,836.

Roger Williams, a Welshman by birth, an Episcopalian by training, a Congregationalist by choice, and a graduate of the University of Cambridge, England, came to New England in 1631. Two or three years afterwards he was appointed assistant minister to the Congregational church of Salem, Mass. While there he denied the right of the magistrates to punish offenses of a purely religious character, and ‘‘in one year’s time he filled the place with principles of rigid separation (from the Church of England) and tending to Anabaptism.” For these “ high crimes and misdemeanors” he was finally ordered to leave the colony; and failing to render obedience to the lordly Puritans of that day, and learning that he was about to be sent home by force, he fled in the depth of winter to the Narra- gansett Indians, and established the city of Providence in 1636, and the first Baptist church in America in that city in 1639. The community which gathered around him adopted from him the old Baptist doctrine of absolute freedom of con- science, and incorporated it in their laws; and when Joshua Verin, a little time after the settle- ment of Providence, restrained his wife from at- tending some religious meetings, he was disfran- chised as a punishment for his offense.

The church founded by Mr. Williams is still in existence, and it is regarded with veneration as the first Baptist church in the New World. It wor- ships in a noble building erected one hundred and five years ago.

In Massachusetts cruel persecutions were inflicted on Baptists and Quakers for a long period. In Virginia the hand of legal violence was frequently raised with wicked force against our saintly fathers, but in Rhode Island, long under the control of the Baptists, whose governor at this time worships in a Baptist church, no man ever suffered any penalty for his religious convictions.

Bancroft, the historian, says of Roger Williams: ‘Tle was the first person in modern Christendom to assert in its plenitude the doctrine of the liberty of conscience, the equality of opinions before the law; and in its defense he was the harbinger of Milton (a Baptist), the precursor and the superior of Jeremy Taylor. . . . Williams would permit persecution of no opinion, of no religion, leaving heresy unharmed by law, and orthodoxy unpro- tected by the terrors of penal laws.”’ Vol. i., 375. “Freedom of conscience, unlimited freedom of mind, was from the first the trophy of the Baptists.” ii., 67. This is justly said of Roger Williams, and it is all true except the statement that he was ‘‘ the first person in modern Christendom” to assert this doctrine. Leonard Busher, an English Baptist, published in London in 1614 “ Religious Peace,”’ in which Williams’s doctrine is repeatedly asserted. This was more than twenty years before Mr. Wil- liams broached it, and Busher had many predeces- sors in announcing his inspired principles. This little work is in the Hanserd Knollys volume of “Traits on Liberty of Conscience,’ London, 1846. The blessed truth Mr. Williams unfolded on this continent his Baptist brethren everywhere preached, and they have given it sovereign sway in all this land.

The Baptists of this country hold that the Word of God is the only authority in religion, that its teachings are to be sacredly observed, and that to religious doctrines and observances there can be no additions except from it; they hold that a man should repent and be saved through faith in the meritorious Redeemer before he is baptized; that immersion alone is Scripture baptism; that only by it can the candidate represent. his death to the world, burial with Christ, and resurrection to new- ness of life; that baptism is a prerequisite to the Lord’s Supper; they hold the. doctrines of the Trinity, of eternal and personal election, total de- pravity, regeneration by the Holy Spirit, justitica- tion by the imputed righteousness of Christ, pro- gressive sanctification, final perseverance « special providence, immediate and eternal glory for the righteous after death, and instant and unending misery for the ungodly. They hold the doctrinal articles of the Presbyterian Church, and they only differ from that honored Calvinistical community in the mode and subjects of baptism, and in their congregational church government. They hold that all regenerated believers are saved, whether they are immersed or sprinkled, or lack both cere- monies; and they insist on the immersion of be- lievers because Christ was immersed, and because he enjoins immersion upon all believers.

In this country we have 38 colleges and theolog- ical seminaries, and many superior academies. We have in North America 63 religious periodicals. The Baptist motto ever has been, “ Let there be light, secular, sacred, and redeeming, till it covers the earth and bathes humanity in its shining wayes”

In the United States, we have 24,794 churches, 15,401 ministers, and 2,200,000 members, which, with adherents, young and.old, give us more than 5,000,000 of persons who hold our principles. In the various provinces of Canada, and in the British West India Islands, there are 849 churches, with 89,938 members. Baptist missions in Germany, France, Sweden, and other sections of Europe, and in Asia and Africa, will be noticed under the names of the countries in which they are located. In the world there are 29,400 Baptist churches, with a membership of 2,663,172, which, with other adherents in Sunday-schools and congregations, would probably give us between 7,000,000 and 8,000,000 of Baptists. This does not include de- nominations in the United States that hold be- liever’s immersion, which are not Regular Baptists, such as the Old-School Baptists, Winebrennarians or Church of God, Seventh-Day Baptists, Six-Principle Baptists, Tunkers, Disciples, Adventists, and Free-Will Baptists. These communities have 6951 churches and 615,541 members.

The origin and growth of the denomination in each of the United States will be found in sketches under the names of the States in this work.

The Baptists have a firm confidence in the truth, and in the ultimate triumph of their principles; and while they will not sacrifice a jot of inspired teaching to gain the goodwill of the whole Chris- tian family, they love all true believers of every name, from Pascal, the Catholic, to Joseph John Gurney, the Friend.

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