BAPTIST HISTORY Lesson 1

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BAPTIST HISTORY Lesson 1

• A Study in Identity and Distinctives

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What are we going to do and how are we going to
do it?
Focus Baptist life from its early 17th century
origins up to the present
Objectives
Factual
To obtain adequate familiarity with the events,
movements, and personalities in Baptist history
and to grasp the theological assumptions
necessary for understanding Baptist identity and
to learn how various units of Baptist life work
together
Attitudinal/ Functional
Using the facts acquired to develop an awareness
of and appreciation for our theological and
eccesiological heritage and to determine our own
biblical philosophy and methodology
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TEXTS
The Baptists Beginnings in Britain Tom J. Nettles
The Baptists Beginnings in America Tom J. Nettles
Baptist Confessions of Faith W. L. Lumpkin
Baptist Theology A Four Century Study James Leo
Garrett
The British Particular Baptists 1638-1910 (3
vols) edited by Michael A.G. Haykin
Baptist and The Bible, by L. Russ Bush and Tom J.
Nettles
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BAPTIST IDENTITY
Baptists must learn to appreciate anew the unique
identity forged by those who discovered
and refined these tenets. To misrepresent or
modify the tenets that historically have
distinguished Baptists is to belittle the labor
and sacrifice of those who have preceded us. In
addition, to redefine the essence of Baptist
identity destroys the foundation of association
of our Baptist churches. R. Stanton Norman
The Baptist Way Distinctives of a Baptist Church
Three Approaches to Baptist Identity
Baptists by Conditioning
Im Baptist born and Im Baptist bred and when
I die Ill be Baptist dead!
Baptist by Convenience
Im a Baptist because Im a member of First
Baptist Church
Baptist by Conviction
I am a Baptist because I believe that Baptist
beliefs best accord with biblical faith and
practice
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BAPTIST IDENTITY
Contemporary background
Baptists are not evangelicals
Baptists are freedom loving people whos
personal, internal experience of God is greater
that any exegetical truth greater than anything
that can be known outside of us
Soul Liberty
the competency of the soul in religion the
individual subjective experience and perceptions
of truths are the basic, fundamental
identification of what makes a Baptist
Coherent Truth
The tenets of freedom and voluntarism would never
produce a Baptist church apart from a broader
foundation of theological, Christological and
soteriological truths
Baptists must be Christian and Protestant
evangelical believers before they can be Baptist
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Four essential elements to the Coherent Truth view
I. Baptist are orthodox

• God is a revealing God

• God is a Triune God

• Jesus is the God/man

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Nicene Creed
We believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty,
maker of heaven and earth, of all that is, seen
and unseen. We believe in one Lord, Jesus
Christ, the only son of God, eternally begotten
of the Father, God from God, Light from Light,
true God from true God, begotten, not made,of
one being with the Father. Through him all things
were made. For us and for our salvation he came
down from heavenby the power of the Holy Spirit
he became incarnate from the Virgin Mary, and
was made man.For our sake he was crucified under
Pontius Pilate he suffered death and was
buried.On the third day he rose again in
accordance with the Scriptures he ascended into
heaven and is seated at the right hand of the
Father.He will come again in glory to judge the
living and the dead,and his kingdom will have no
end. We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord,
the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father
and the Son.With the Father and the Son he is
worshipped and glorified.He has spoken through
the Prophets.We believe in one holy catholic and
apostolic Church.We acknowledge one baptism for
the forgiveness of sins.We look for the
resurrection of the dead,and the life of the
world to come. AMEN.
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Four essential elements to the Coherent Truth view
I. Baptist are Orthodox
Sacramentalism the view that the sacraments of
the church convey the reality of what they
signify and are the actual means of the grace of
God

• God is a revealing God

• God is a Triune God

• Jesus is the God/man

II. Baptist are Evangelical

• Justification by faith

• Immediacy and necessity of the Spirits work for
  salvation

• Necessity and completeness of the Work of Christ

• Conversion above nurture

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III. Baptist are confessional and catechetical

• Confessions and catechisms have always been
  essential parts of Baptist church life

• Baptists have seen the necessity of the church
  being formed on a confession
• That is personal
• That is corporate

IV. Baptist are Separate
Baptist have a theologically integrated
ecclesiology vs. our paedobaptist friends who
have an inconsistent ecclesiology Dr. Nettles

• The Church is the body of Christ from all
  nations, a new identity for the people of God

• Visible saints/Believers church

• Baptism of believers only by immersion

• Discipline in the local congregation

• Absence of interference or special favors from
  magistrates

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• How did Baptist founder John Smyth publically
  demonstrate his break from the state Church of
  England in 1609?
• He wrote 95 theses and posted them on the door of
  Westminster Cathedral
• He baptized himself and his followers
• He translated the Bible into English
• He sailed to America to establish a colony of
  Separatists.

• Why was the idea of believers baptism by
  immersion so radical in the 17th century?
• It was a challenge to a very long church
  tradition.
• Infant baptism gave a person a Christian name,
  membership in the official church, and a
  recognized place in society.
• The public ritual of immersion seemed disgraceful
  and unhealthy to many people.
• All of the above.

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• The annual Southern Baptist Christmas offering
  for missions is named in honor of what missionary
  to China?
• Hudson Taylor
• Jonathon Goforth
• Eric Liddell
• Lottie Moon

• Though the earliest Baptists (called General
  Baptists) were Arminian in their theology, a
  second stream of early Baptists were Calvinist.
  What were they called?
• Particular Baptist
• Predestined Baptist
• Depraved Baptist
• Infallible Baptist

• Who of the following was not a black Baptist
  preacher?
• Martin Luther King Jr.
• Nat Turner
• Frederick Douglas
• John Jasper

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• When this Baptist missionary-to-be brought up the
  Great Commission at a Baptist Association
  meeting, one minister supposedly retorted, young
  man, sit down, sit down!...When God pleases to
  convert the heathen, hell do it without
  consulting you or me. In response, the young
  visionary wrote An Enquiry into the Obligations
  of Christians, to use means for the Conversion of
  the Heathens.
• Adoniram Judson
• William Carey
• David Livingston
• Hudson Taylor

• Whats so important about the 17th century
  Baptist leader, Thomas Helwys?
• He rebelled against his church and baptized all
  the infant children
• He was the first missionary to Iceland
• He wrote the first defense of religious liberty
  in the English language
• He predicted the rise of the Moral Majority in
  America

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• What pioneering missionary embarked from America
  as a Congregationalist and became a Baptist on
  the way to India?
• William Carey
• Hudson Taylor
• Adoniram Judson
• Lottie Moon

• slave-turned-Baptist preacher George Liele not
  only founded one of the earliest black churches
  in America, he also became one of the first
  Baptist overseas missionaries when he sailed to
  which country?
• India
• Jamaica
• China
• Ethiopia

• When this Calvinist Baptist Prince of Preachers
  died in 1892, the city of London went into
  mourning and 100,000 people lined the streets for
  the funeral parade.
• Dwight Moody
• A B Simpson
• Billy Sunday
• Charles H Spurgeon