Baptist History in America, Mission Workand the Future of the Lord’s Churches

Quarterly Aim: To show that through many difficulties the New Testamentchurch has a continuous history in America, has expanded its ministrythroughout the world through missions and has a glorious futurethroughout eternity.

Lesson 1 December 3, 2000Baptists and Expansion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

Lesson 2 December 10, 2000Baptists and Slavery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

Lesson 3 December 17, 2000Baptists and Mission Societies . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

Lesson 4 December 24, 2000The Social Gospel Affect

upon Baptists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .17Lesson 5 December 1, 2000

Arminian and Calvinist Influenceupon Baptists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .21

Lesson 6 January 7, 2001Baptist Confessions of Faith . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .25

Lesson 7 January 14, 2001Origin of Baptist Associations . . . . . . . . . . . . . .29

Lesson 8 January 21, 2001Missionary Baptist Work

in the Far West . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .33Lesson 9 January 28, 2001

Why We Are Called Landmark Baptists . . . . . .37

Lesson 10 February 4, 2001Baptists Refute Heresies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .41

Lesson 11 February 11, 2001Missionary Baptist Leaders in Missions . . . . . .45

Lesson 12 February 18, 2001Great Men Among Us . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .50

Lesson 13 February 25, 2001Harvesttime in the Twenty-first Century . . . . . .54

ADULT QUARTERLY, Winter Quarter, Baptist Training Course, is published quarterly at 83 cents perquarter. Volume 87, No. 1. Issued December 1, 2000 Cover design by Jeff Allen.© Copyright 2000, BAPTIST SUNDAY SCHOOL COMMITTEE of the American Baptist Association, 4605N. State Line, Texarkana, TX 75503-2928.

Baptist Training Course

Prepared byDavid Robinson

Bill JohnsonEditor in Chief

Wayne SewellBusiness Manager

Introduction Jesus gave His church a commission to go into all the world

and preach the gospel to every creature. Since that time NewTestament churches have taken this work seriously. The meth-od of mission work may differ from time to time, but the heartbehind the work has been constant and consistent. In one wayor another every one of God’s churches is to be involved in thework of spreading the gospel.

We have a message that never changes, but we must presentit in a world that is always changing. This tells us that we mustuse the means at hand to spread the gospel. We must nevercompromise the truth in a misguided zeal for success. We useonly those ways and means that are in accord with the teach-ings of God’s Word, but we must use what we have available.For instance, today we have wonderful ways to communicateacross great distances. We can sit down at a computer and lit-erally reach people on the other side of the world in just min-utes. Our fathers did not have this technology, but they wereable to make great advances in spreading the gospel using thetools that God gave them.

1. _______________ Baptists Come to AmericaThe first Baptist church in America was started by Dr. John

Clarke in Newport, Rhode Island, in 1638. To put this in per-

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LESSON 1, December 3, 2000

Baptists and Expansion

By the end of this lesson the student will explain the move-ment of Baptists to the Midwest.

LESSON AIM

Text: Mark 16:15.Background Scripture: Matthew 5:16; Luke 10:1, 2; John

20:21.Devotional Reading: To All the World, Acts 1:8.

SCRIPTURES TO READ

spective, this was one hundred thirty-eight years before theAmerican Revolution. At this time Baptists and other groupswere persecuted. The Congregational church or Church ofEngland was the established church. This meant that the gov-ernment only recognized the Church of England. Other churchgroups were in effect outlaws. Remember, this is one hundredforty years before the constitution and the Bill of Rights.America was a part of the British empire and was subject to therule of the king of England.

This was a harsh atmosphere for the truth; nevertheless, thetruth prevailed. Our religious liberty was literally purchasedwith the blood of men who died refusing to submit to the tyran-ny of an established religion.

In March of 1639, Ezekiel Holliman baptized Roger Williamsand ten others, and the First Baptist Church in Providence,Rhode Island, was constituted.

From this time on Baptists have had a witness, first in thecolonies and subsequently in the United States of America.

2. _______________ How Baptists Came to New AreasOne of the most interesting Baptist experiences in coming to

America was that of the Welsh Tract Church. In 1701, a num-ber of Baptists in Pembroke, Carmarthen, and Cardigan, Wales,desired to immigrate to Pennsylvania. The churches where theywere members agreed to allow them to go. Since there were six-teen members and one ordained minister, it was decided that itwould be best for these people to be organized into a church andauthorized to receive other members when they got to the NewWorld.

When these sixteen arrived in the colonies, they werereceived by the Pennepack church in Philadelphia. The Penne-pack church was the only Baptist church in that area. TheWelsh brethren spent about a year and a half in that vicinity.They had regular meetings and operated as a church. By 1703,this new church had received twenty-two new members by let-ter and baptism and purchased a large tract of land, The WelshTract, and had built a church building.

This experience set the tone for Baptist expansion in colonialtimes. Churches blossomed as individuals and groups movedinto new territories. Churches brought their faith with them,

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and through this means were able to organize churchesthroughout what was then frontier territory.

3. _______________ Baptist Contribution to LibertyWe must remember that our world was quite different in the

colonial period. The colonies were primarily British, and thechurches were mostly those found in England; Anglican orEpiscopalian, Presbyterian and Methodist. In much of the colo-nial period the Anglican church was regarded as the establishedchurch. The church was a branch of the government of the kingand was treated as such. It was supported by tax dollars andwas not responsible to its individual members. As you mightsuppose, Baptists opposed both of these ideas.

True Baptists have always held to the twin tenets of freedomof conscience—that each believer in Christ had the right tostudy His Bible and determine for himself what he should andshould not believe and practice, and for freedom of worship—that no government body should interfere with the beliefs andpractices of a church. We may take these liberties for grantedtoday, but our forefathers paid a high price to insure them forus.

One of the heroes of the fight for religious liberty was JohnLeland, a pastor at Orange, Virginia. From 1607 to 1786, Vir-ginia was firmly entrenched in a state church situation. Thestate offered licenses to preachers, mostly Episcopalian. Manyothers, including Baptists, chose to preach without state licens-es and were often arrested and imprisoned.

When the new federal government was being formed and theConstitution debated, Leland got involved in the debate.Through his written articles and his influence over JamesMadison, Leland was instrumental in getting a guarantee of aBill of Rights, securing religious liberty. As historian Joseph M.Dawson has said, “If the researchers of the world were to beasked who was most responsible for the American guaranty ofreligious liberty, their prompt reply would be, James Madison;but if James Madison might answer, he would quickly reply,John Leland and the Baptists.”

This was very important to the westward expansion ofchurches. Without the guarantee of religious freedom, Baptistwork would have literally been against the law in this countryand would have been severely restricted.

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4. _______________ Baptist Expansion WestwardAt this time there were no mission societies or formal organ-

izations to promote mission work or the westward expansion ofchurches. This brings us to an important point. Each individualchurch is responsible for carrying out what we call the GreatCommission. We cannot and should not try to shift the respon-sibility for obeying the commands of Christ onto an associationof churches. In the early years of our country, churches weredoing very effective mission work without any denominationalmachinery. How did they do it?

Mostly it happened as people moved west. As the countryexpanded, so did the churches. Many Baptists from Virginiaand North Carolina began to move westward into Kentucky andTennessee as early as 1765. Baptist churches were formed inKentucky in 1782. Baptists came to the upper Midwest fromVirginia in the 1700s. All this was the natural result of people’sbeing evangelized in their hometowns and then moving intonew territories and carrying the gospel with them.

A tremendous door to westward expansion was opened withthe Louisiana Purchase. This vast territory that now is thestates of Louisiana, Arkansas, Missouri, Iowa, Kansas,Wyoming, Nebraska, North and South Dakota, Oklahoma, Mon-tana, and parts of Minnesota and Colorado became a part of theUnited States in 1803. This led to a great period of westwardexpansion and with it the coming of churches of all kindsincluding Baptists.

Much of the Baptist work in the Midwest owes a debt ofthanks to John M. Peck, a missionary to the region west of theMississippi. He was commissioned by the Triennial Conventionand began his work in Saint Louis. The Triennial Conventionwent on to pursue the evangelization of the Far West territo-ries.

5. _______________ A Lesson for UsFrom a study of history it is obvious that various means were

used to evangelize the New World. Sometimes single preacherswere sent out by individual churches to preach the gospel, bap-tize those who believed and organize churches. Sometimes, asin the Welsh Tract church, entire congregations moved, evenacross the ocean, to establish a work in a new land. Others fol-lowed these patterns as the United States reached from sea to

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sea. History reveals that often brethren would come into a newterritory and form a congregation before they had a preacher ormissionary to assist them. When the pioneers packed their wag-ons, they did not leave their faith behind,

All of this suggests that each church should take the NewTestament seriously and personally. Preaching the gospel toevery creature, going into all the world and being witnesses ofChrist are not options that we can take or leave as we see fit.These are our divine obligations. You heard the gospel becausesomeone else took his obligations seriously, and others can onlyhear as we take them seriously.

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Introduction From the beginning of this nation until the end of the war

between the states, no issue has been as divisive as that of slav-ery. Like many sociological customs of the New World, slaverywas imported from Europe, but it found fertile ground in thevast undeveloped areas of North America. In this new landthere was a seemingly unlimited opportunity for agriculture,and the success of farming beyond the subsistence level depend-ed on a never ending source of cheap labor. Slavery providedthat labor. From the beginning of our nation, many prominentmen were slave owners. Most of these were the owners of largefarms and plantations. Although many recognized slavery as anevil system, it was regarded as an economic necessity.

Eventually the evils of slavery were exposed, and this prac-tice ended, but not before a bitter and devisive struggle withinmost organized religions including Baptists.

1. _______________ A Few FactsIt is easy to be ethnocentric, to believe that everyone else in

the world is just like we are. Societies differ one from anotherin our time, and they were quite different in times past. Forinstance in 1800, there were 5,308,483 people in the United

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LESSON 2, December 10, 2000

Baptists and Slavery

By the end of this lesson the student will discuss positionsof Northern and Southern Baptists on the slavery issue.

LESSON AIM

Text: 2 Peter 3:9.Background Scripture: John 10:9; Galatians 3:26-28; Titus

2:10.Devotional Reading: Jesus Draws All Men, John 12:32.

SCRIPTURES TO READ

States. The black population was 1,002,037 or 18.9 percent. Ofcourse, not all of these were slaves. In 1860, there were 8 mil-lion people in what we today call “the South,” and 6 million ofthem did not own a slave. One monstrous fact is that afteremancipation 40,000 black people owned 100,000 slaves them-selves. Even preachers owned slaves.

All of this shows how deeply slavery was ingrained in the fab-ric of life. The issue that would divide the nation would likewisedivide Baptists.

Consider also that the nature of Baptist work and the fellow-ship among churches made a formal and universal condemna-tion of slavery difficult. True Baptists have always believed inlocal church authority. Each individual church was solely re-sponsible for its own affairs. Opinion on the slavery issue var-ied widely from those churches that were openly abolitionist tothose that were proslavery. No national body existed or existstoday that could speak for all Baptist churches. This was not soamong other groups who had such ecclesiastical machinery andoften used it for social and political purposes.

Baptists did care about the plight of slaves even when theywere not opposed to slavery. Although slaves were not permit-ted to have their own churches, a few were in existence prior tothe Civil War. The oldest black Baptist church on record in theUnited States was at Silver Bluff, South Carolina, which begansometime prior to 1775.

Many Baptist churches in the South had slaves as members.In the late 1700s, whites and blacks in backcountry congrega-tions worshiped together. They called each other by the respect-ful titles “brother” and “sister” and wept and prayed with eachother. Some white Baptist ministers in Virginia declared slav-ery to be a sin, freed their own slaves and advocated liftingrestrictions on black men who wished to preach the gospel inpublic. This sentiment was not widely accepted and by the mid-dle of the 1800s, black members were relegated to a kind of sec-ond class status as members. They were enrolled only by theirfirst names and were segregated in all worship times.

In spite of all this, the gospel was presented to many slaves,and many were truly saved in spite of the social evils of the day.

2. _______________ Before the DivisionMany causes have brought God’s people together. Antislavery

was certainly one. Antislavery societies were organized around

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1780 and by the 1840s, the issue had become divisive in politicsas well as religion.

In 1814, there were about 120 associations of Baptist church-es in America, made up of about 2,000 churches, with 160,000members and 1,500 preachers. The General Missionary Con-vention was organized in Philadelphia with messengers from 11states and the District of Columbia. This convention was tomeet every 3 years and was called the Triennial Convention.This group had as an immediate purpose the support of thework of Adinoram Judson in Burma.

As Baptist churches and associations grew numerically andgeographically in the early nineteenth century, the groundworkwas laid for a system of ventures which would blanket the coun-try. The Triennial Convention inspired the formation of a num-ber of voluntary societies which collected funds from interestedindividuals and churches for various projects. Among those wasAmerican Baptist Home Mission Society, organized in 1832. Itplayed a central role in work among the freed slaves after 1865.

Slavery ruptured nearly every American denomination andsplit Baptist benevolent societies along sectional lines. Main-line Northern Baptists, mostly antislavery but also anti-aboli-tionist, tried unsuccessfully to mediate the conflict betweenabolitionists and proslavery Southern Baptists. The divisiongrew bitter in the early 1840s, when Northerners contested theappointment of slaveholders as home missionaries. SouthernBaptists threw up test cases to judge whether their Northerncolleagues would put political beliefs above spiritual work. In1844, Southerners demanded a policy statement from NorthernBaptists engaged in home mission work. They replied, “Onething is certain: we can never be a party to any arrangementwhich would imply approbation of slavery.” Deeply angered bythis action, and impressed with their duty to evangelize moreactively in their own region, white Southern Baptists convenedin Augusta, Georgia, in 1845, and organized the SouthernBaptist Convention.

Thus was born the Southern Baptist Convention, but it wasnot as simple as a split over slavery. Instead of organizing sep-arate societies for separate purposes as had been the practiceamong Baptist groups prior to 1845, the founders of the South-ern Baptist Convention formed a single denomination with thepower to appoint boards to oversee separate missionary pro-grams. Membership was limited to individuals, churches and

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associations which made specific contributions to the denomi-nation.

Thus, Baptists were divided. The Baptists not in the South-ern Baptist Convention, and there were many, both in theNorth and in the South remained in loosely organized groups,often consisting of no more than local associations. It was notuntil 1907 that the Northern Baptist Convention, now knownas the American Baptist Convention, was organized. It is safe tosay that no other single issue so divided the Baptists of thenineteenth century as that of slavery.

3. _______________ Baptists Before the Civil WarWith the division of 1845 and the organization of the South-

ern Baptist Convention, Baptist thought began to proceed alongtwo very divergent paths.

The Northern Baptists, though not represented by a formalbody, generally took an antislavery position. Apparently manyof these churches were in word and form against slavery, buthistory records only a few that were socially or politically activeagainst it. This is explained by many factors, not the least ofwhich was the great debate of the day over hardshellism.

The hardshells, or Calvinists, opposed most of the work of theTriennial Convention. Their belief in fatalism obviously forbadeinvolvement in any way in political affairs. If what would bewould be, then slavery was unavoidable as were other social illsof the day. Such sentiments were widely held in the early nine-teenth century. Preachers such as David Parker preached pre-destination, so as to “deny any responsibility in man for his ownconduct or condition.” You can easily see how this idea couldexcuse slavery and most any other conduct.

The Southern Baptists rationalized slavery in an altogetherdifferent manner. Historians seemed to agree that Southernchurches in general languished in “cultural captivity.” Southernchurches rarely sought to overturn the Southern social andracial hierarchy, but reinforced and even defined it. This cul-tural captivity to some extent explains the moral failings ofSouthern religion, but there is more to it than that.

Southern culture has been identified closely with decentral-ized, local, traditional patterns of life. Well into the twentiethcentury, Southerners remained intensely defensive of localnorms and reluctant to break from entrenched practices. Theyfound in Baptist churches a powerful, theological and ecclesias-

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tical tradition—congregational independence—which taughtthat God had granted local churches the right to run their ownspiritual affairs. The fierce localism of Southern Baptistchurches, the tenacity of rural religious practices and the con-flict between these practices and the centralizing desires ofdenominational reformers and progressive-era activists offeredanother way to look at Southern religion and Southern culture.Since each congregation was independent, there could be nomovement against slavery or anything else. If an individualcongregation were tolerant of slavery, there was no superiordenominational authority to set it straight. If a congregationadmitted slaves as members, there was no one to say that theyshould not. Perhaps this explains the lack of an organizedresistance to slavery.

4. _______________ A Lesson for UsThe purpose of a New Testament church is not to socially

reform or set right the world around us. Instead we are com-missioned to preach the gospel. We must do this in the social cli-mate of our day. Remember the words of the Text. “God is notwilling that any should perish.” We can never set aside ourresponsibility because of adverse social conditions. Slaverycould not be used as an excuse to refuse to spread the gospel toslaves as well as to the free.

We should not be easily diverted from the main duty given usby our Master. We are to be the workmen of God, carrying outthe spiritual principles of the kingdom of Christ. We mustalways remember the word of our Lord, “My kingdom is not ofthis world” (John 18:36).

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Introduction Time may not be important to an eternal creature, but tim-

ing certainly is. This explains the imperative of the Text verse.Jesus put it simply when He said, “I must.” The reason for theimperative is clear. Time was short; darkness was approachingwhen no work could be done.

Time is vital in all our spiritual endeavors, but nowhere is itso evident as in mission work. When God opens a door, we mustgo through it. We cannot tell how long the door will be open, orif it will ever be opened a second time. Wise men down throughthe ages have grasped this principle.

When the British and European nations began to occupy andcolonize North America, a great door of mission work wasopened. Many realized this and responded to the great oppor-tunity to spread the gospel to the New World.

1. _______________ Missions in Colonial TimesBefore the United States gained independence from England,

there were those in England who saw the New World as a mis-sionary project. No doubt some of this was a pious excuse togain wealth and respectability in doubtful endeavors, but it isclear that many who came to the New World brought with them

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LESSON 3, December 17, 2000

Baptists and Mission Societies

By the end of this lesson the student will explain the pur-pose of these mission societies.

LESSON AIM

Text: John 9:4.Background Scripture: Acts 11:27-30; 13:1-4; 14:26-28;

15:36-41.Devotional Reading: Commissioned to Missions, Matthew

28:19, 20.

SCRIPTURES TO READ

a responsibility to convert the Indians or native peoples of thisland.

On most pilgrim ships one man and sometimes two werecharged with this responsibility. This was not a church sendingout a missionary, but it did show that a part of the duties ourforefathers took on themselves was to “Christianize” the Indiannations.

Even the charters of some of the colonies stipulated that oneof the primary purposes of the new communities would be theconversion of the Indians.

A man named John Elliot was a missionary of the Congrega-tionalist church as early as 1646. He learned to speak theIndian language and translated much Scripture into that lan-guage. In 1701, a Society for the Propagation of the Gospel inForeign Parts was established. This may be the oldest missionsociety in the English speaking world. As you might expect,scant information is available on this subject.

We do know that between 1607 and 1732 all the majordenominations of Europe were planted in what would becomethe United States. Interestingly it was not until the early 1800sthat organized missionary efforts emerged.

2. _______________ Missions in the New NationWe must make an important distinction at this point.

Because there was no organized mission effort or interchurchmission effort among Baptists does not mean that there was nomission work being done. The opposite is true. Baptists werespreading to all the colonies and beyond through the individualwork of local churches and their church sent missionaries.

Remember Jesus gave His commission to a church. The localchurch is responsible for carrying out that commission, andlocal churches can do this without any other societies or organ-izations whatever. Properly understood the mission organiza-tions are servants of the churches. The churches do not servethe mission organizations.

From 1638 and Dr. John Clarke on, preachers were called,ordained and sent out to start churches all over the colonies.There was no organization because none was needed, and con-sidering the limitations on travel and communication none wasprobably possible.

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We do not see this readily, but all associated work dependsentirely on communication and travel. When it is impossible totravel and to communicate, each church is forced to do its workwithout outside assistance. In earlier times travel was difficultand expensive, and communication was almost nonexistent.This did not mean that there was no church fellowship, butapparently it was confined to individual localities.

As families moved westward into unsettled territory, theytook their religion with them. Those who were Baptists led inthe organization of new Baptist churches. Other organizationslikewise increased with the spread of the population. This wasa natural and quite successful mission work.

At the beginning of the Revolutionary War, there were fourhundred ninety-eight Baptist churches in America. By 1795,that number had grown to one thousand sixty-seven.

Before 1814, Baptist associations in the Northern states andin North and South Carolina had commissioned and supportedmissionaries on the frontier. In addition, churches formally sentout missionaries into Indian territories. The First BaptistChurch in Providence, Rhode Island, sent missionary David Orrto preach in North Arkansas and paid his salary from 1833 to1839. At that time Arkansas was mostly wilderness, and therewere fierce tribes of Indians present. This was what we wouldcall foreign mission work in every way. It was more difficult totravel from Rhode Island to Arkansas in 1833 than it is to goaround the world today.

3. _______________ Mission Societies BeginOne great source of increased mission activity and one of the

leading causes of the organization of mission societies was theGreat Awakening that began about 1734. George Whitefieldwas sent to establish an orphanage in Georgia in 1740. HenryBarclay began a work among the Indian tribes in New YorkState. His congregation numbered over five hundred. JonathanEdwards was an intellectual preacher and also a successfulmissionary to the Indians.

As revival fires spread across the country, concern for mis-sions grew. Many churches of the day were small and isolatedand realized that their individual contribution would be limit-ed, but by working together they could further the cause of mis-

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sions. Out of this simple yet profound idea of churches helpingchurches came the first Baptist mission societies.

The earliest society formed by Baptists with a distinctivemissionary purpose was the Massachusetts Baptist MissionarySociety, formed in Boston in 1802. Its goal was to help sendpreachers to isolated settlements on the frontier. The societywas able to evangelize many Indians and to help small strug-gling Baptist churches.

The second awakening of 1786 brought renewed interest inmissions. About this time the midweek prayer meeting wasadded in many churches as a stimulus to prayer, and SundaySchool was instituted for the instruction of the Word of God.Numerous colleges and seminaries were established, andorganized mission programs were initiated to reach out to theexpanding nation.

One great contribution that must not be overlooked is theBaptist belief in absolute religious liberty. This idea, incorpo-rated into the Bill of Rights, forbade a state church and madethe work of individual churches and mission societies possible.Baptists would have had a far more difficult time of it had thisnation retained the English system of union of church andstate.

4. _______________ Mission Societies in EnglandWilliam Carey was born at Paulersbury, England, in 1761.

He was baptized at twenty-one and became a preacher at twen-ty-four. He served as a pastor for six years. While reading aboutthe voyages of Captain Cook, who had traveled around theglobe, he began to think about the four hundred million hea-then who had never heard of Christ, and at that moment themodern missionary movement was born.

When Carey proposed preaching to these regions beyond, itshocked even the most visionary men of his day. On May 31,1792, at an association meeting in Nottingham, Carey preachedfrom Isaiah 54:2, 3, “Expect Great Things from God and AttemptGreat Things for God.” In October of that year in AndrewFuller’s study at Kettering, the English Baptist MissionarySociety was constituted with twelve members. Fuller becamesecretary. In June of 1793, Carey and a surgeon named Thomassailed for India. Within forty years, Carey had translated partsof the Bible into forty different languages that were spoken

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then by one-third of the human race. Throughout his ministryhe and Fuller operated on the principle that “Fuller would holdthe rope while Carey went down the well.” This was the oper-ating principle of mission societies in the beginning, and itremains a viable plan for our day. We cannot all go into theworld, but we can “hold the rope” for those who do.

5. _______________ Baptist Mission Societies in AmericaOne of the most thrilling mission stories, especially for

Baptists in America, is that of Adoniram Judson and LutherRice. Judson was born in Massachusetts in 1788. Judson wasthe son of a Congregationalist preacher. Judson and Rice begantheir ministries as Congregationalists. Judson was educated atBrown University and Andover Theological Seminary where heand other students organized the American Board of Commis-sioners for Foreign Missions. In 1812, Judson and his wife, Ann,were sent to India where they knew some English Baptist mis-sionaries were working. Judson thought he would have todefend his Congregationalist position on baptism, so on the shiphe began to study baptism seriously.

The more he sought to find scriptural authority for infantbaptism and for sprinkling, the more he was convinced that nei-ther could be found in the Bible. After landing at Calcutta, theysought out the English Baptist missionaries. Convinced thatthe Baptist position was right, Judson and Ann were immersedin the Baptist Chapel at Calcutta on September 12, 1812.Shortly afterward, Luther Rice had the same experience andwas also baptized. This left them in a confused situation. Theirconvictions had cut them off from the board that sent them outand was supporting them. It was resolved that Rice wouldreturn to America and seek support from Baptist churches. Hearrived in Boston in September 1813, and almost at once theBaptist churches of the vicinity took responsibility for supportof Rice and Judson. That gave rise to the American BaptistMission Union, organized in Philadelphia in 1814, and eventu-ally the General Missionary Convention of the Baptist Denom-inations in the United States, better known as the TriennialConvention.

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Introduction The good can become the enemy of the best. Such a situation

began about a century ago with the introduction of what hascome to be called the “Social Gospel.” Until the time period fol-lowing the American Civil War, most true churches had as theironly goal to preach the gospel and carry out the mandates of theGreat Commission. It was commonly believed that the entiremission of the churches was spiritual in nature.

With the coming of the social gospel, a dramatic shift inemphasis took place in many churches. The physical well-beingand, moreover, the social situation of individuals began to takeequal and in some cases superior importance in church work.This notion has advanced today to the point that few recognizethe social gospel for what it is. Instead, it is taken for grantedthat this is an integral and necessary part of church work.

1. _______________ What Is the Social Gospel? The essence of the social gospel is in the perception of the

mission of the church. What is the church’s purpose and what isit to do? The answers to these questions have a profound influ-ence on the nature of church work.

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LESSON 4, December 24, 2000

The Social Gospel Affectupon Baptists

By the end of this lesson the student will discuss the affectof the social gospel upon Baptists.

LESSON AIM

Text: 2 John 2.Background Scripture: Psalm 25:5; 117:2; 1 Timothy 3:16;

2 Timothy 2:15.Devotional Reading: Knowing the Truth, John 8:32-36.

SCRIPTURES TO READ

For centuries churches had recognized their mission in theworld as primarily spiritual. Churches were to be primarily con-cerned with the spiritual welfare of people, including the salva-tion of their souls and their knowledge of the truth. The socialgospel teaches that the primary concern of churches is the phys-ical well-being and social conditions of people. The relief ofsocial problems from poverty to racism is seen as the primaryfunction of a church. Spiritual matters, when they are dealtwith at all, are of secondary importance to the physical welfareof individuals.

It is important to note here that these two ideas do not haveto be mutually exclusive. Both have a basis in the Bible andproperly understood, we have responsibility in both areas.

2. _______________ The Origin of the Social GospelThe modern social gospel movement began with a single

preacher, a man named Walter Rauschenbusch of Rochester,New York. Rauschenbusch pastored the Second German BaptistChurch in the “Hell’s Kitchen” area of New York City for elevenyears in the late 1800s. His insights did not come from thechurches of the day or from the Bible but from his own person-al experiences with the dreadful conditions of his day. He wroteof his experiences in a book, Christianity and the Social Crises,published in 1907. This book had a profound affect on Baptistchurches in the North and led to many congregations shiftingtheir focus from the spiritual to the physical needs of thosearound them.

About this same time two other movements were coming tofruition in Europe. One was the Salvation Army led by Williamand Catherine Booth. Founded in London on August 17, 1865,this was a movement originally designed to help drunkards.Just before this, the first Young Men’s Christian Associationwas founded in London by George Williams. This took place onJune 6, 1844. The Young Men’s Christian Association wasfounded to help those who were suffering as a result of theindustrial revolution. Many young men had come to the citiesand were living in horrible conditions in company shops andtenements. By 1851, the movement had spread to America, firstto Montreal and then to Boston on December twenty-ninth.Through the influence of D.L. Moody and John Mott, who dom-inated the movement in the last part of the nineteenth and first

18

part of the twentieth centuries, The American Young Men’sChristian Association grew and prospered. By the 1890s, thepurpose of the Young Men’s Christian Association was trans-formed into the triangle of spirit, mind and body.

By the time of World War I, the influence of the social gospelon churches was sufficient to have many churches declare thatwar was not and cannot be made holy. Many Northern BaptistConvention churches were concerned for fair treatment for con-scientious objectors. By the Korean War this convention took aposition opposed to the war itself. By the mid 1960s, churcheswere involved in the civil rights movement, all on the basis ofthe social gospel, the teaching that a church was primarilyresponsible for improving the world and bringing about socialchange.

3. _______________ Two Divergent PhilosophiesLike so many lies, there is a grain of truth in the social

gospel. The men who began the movement had good intentionsand good hearts. No one can sit idly by and watch others suffer,but this or any other area of our concern must be examined inthe light of God’s Word. The men who began this movementnever claimed that it was based on the Bible. Instead, theybased their involvement and intervention on what theyobserved around them. They saw what they perceived aswrongs and set out to right them.

A basis for right thinking on this matter can be found in Luke12:13, 14. Here a man came to Jesus and asked for the resolu-tion of a social injustice. The man’s brother would not rightlydivide their inheritance. Jesus flatly refused to get involved.Did Jesus care that a man had been done wrong? Yes, Jesuscared, but there were more important things at stake than whogot what. Jesus came to seek and to save that which was lost,not to divide inheritances.

In this exchange we see two divergent philosophies of churchwork. One is that the churches are to try in every way toimprove the conditions of those around them, to right wrongsand to generally make things better. The other is that achurch’s main duty is toward the souls of men. Like manythings each of these can be taken to extremes. The social gospeltakes the care of the physical world to such an extreme. From adesire to get children out of slums, this movement has grown to

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embrace such extreme positions as political and environmentalactivism.

We can see our duty as spiritual to the exclusion of anyresponsibility to share a physical burden. This, too, is an ex-treme position. We are in the world. We can help when we can,but our main duty is to prepare precious souls for eternitythrough faith in Jesus Christ. To see this clearly, we mustanswer one simple question, “Can this physical world besaved?” If you believe the Bible, then you know that it cannot.This world is reserved for a fiery judgment, and most socialactivism is just rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. Theship is going down, and we must do all we can to rescue our-selves and everyone we love.

4. _______________ Our ResponsibilitiesWhat should our response be to social disorder and disaster?

We find valuable information in the book of James. First, we arenot to be respecters of persons. We are to serve all men. We can-not do this materially, but we can do it spiritually. We cannotfeed all the hungry, but we can preach to all the hungry souls.Then we are to be concerned with those in distress. Jesustaught this in the story of the good Samaritan. When we haveopportunity to help those in need, we should do so, but we mustalways remember our primary mission in the world.

We are to love our neighbors as ourselves. Now realizing thatno matter what we do we cannot stay here, do we want to gosomeplace better? The best thing you can do for your neighboris to see to it that he has what he needs to go Heaven when hedies. Everything else that you can give him will perish. It isgood to do good, but it is better to do best.

Jesus could have healed every sick person in the world. Hecould have wiped out disease and poverty. He could havereformed government and brought social justice to every cornerof the globe. He did not. Instead, He died on the cross so thatour souls can be set free from the curse of sin. That freedom isstill the greatest gift ever given and the greatest need in theworld.

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Introduction One of the amazing things about a study of the Bible is how

things that are so simple when God says them can be made socomplicated when men interpret them. Such ideas are the sub-ject of the lesson today. James (Jacob) Arminius (1560-1609)was a Dutch theologian who studied, taught and eventuallybroke with Calvinism. He was particularly at odds with JohnCalvin’s emphasis on unconditional election and irresistiblegrace. The Synod of Dort (1618-19) strongly reaffirmed ultra-Calvinism in reaction to Arminius’ growing influence. Arminius’strong emphasis on free will, salvation for all and resistiblegrace continued to be influential, finding perhaps its strongestproponent in John Wesley.

On the other hand, John Calvin came to Geneva,Switzerland, crossroads for exiles and expatriates in 1536. Herapidly became more influential than Zwingli, second only toLuther. He wrote a popular, systematic presentation ofChristian doctrine and life, titled The Institutes (1536, final edi-tion in 1559). Most important of Calvin’s Institutes was obedi-ence to God’s will as defined in the Scriptures. Salvation, hewrote, came by faith in God’s grace, mediated through word andsacrament by the power of the Holy Spirit. Good works were

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LESSON 5, December 31, 2000

Arminian and CalvinistInfluence upon Baptists

By the end of this lesson the student will tell how the wordmissionary became a part of the Baptist name.

LESSON AIM

Text: John 3:16.Background Scripture: John 5:24; Acts 2:21; Romans

10:13; 1 John 4:15.Devotional Reading: Water of Life, Revelation 22:17.

SCRIPTURES TO READ

consequences of union with Christ in faith, not the means of sal-vation. Calvin considered the law an indispensable guide andspur to the Christian life; prayer provided nourishment forfaith. He argued that faith was a divine gift resulting fromGod’s unconditional decree of election.

A Bible scholar could easily see that both these men heldextreme positions. We shall proceed to examine them and theirinfluence on Baptists.

1. ______________ Baptists and ArminianismIt is fair to say that those doctrines influenced many groups

beside Baptists, but the Baptist work is the focus of this lesson.The Arminian theology has found its largest reception amongthose called Freewill Baptists. Among the Freewill Baptist pio-neers in America was Paul Palmer in the 1720s. The NationalAssociation of Freewill Baptists was formed in Nashville,Tennessee, in 1935. The Arminian influence on Freewill Bap-tists is found in their belief concerning the perseverance of thesaints or what we would call security of the believer. This groupholds that a saved person who has sinned may fall into thepractice of sin and make shipwreck of his faith and be lost. Theyalso teach foot washing as a church ordinance.

The belief that salvation, once obtained, can be lost can betraced directly to Arminius. As noted earlier, John Wesley,father of the Methodist church was a proponent of Arminius, asare most Pentecostal and Holiness works.

It is important to note here that the doctrine of “falling fromgrace” is not only a cosmetic difference in the Baptist work. Theidea that once we are saved we are saved forever is a basic anddifferential Bible doctrine, taught throughout the Word of God.Jesus repeatedly taught that those who trusted in Him hadeternal life and that they would never perish. To teach that bysome post-salvation action we can undo our spiritual birth is todeny the power that made us whole.

2. _______________ Baptists and CalvinismOn the other side of the theological extreme is Calvinism,

often referred to as hyper-Calvinism. This doctrinal position,originating with the theology of John Calvin, teaches an ex-treme form of predestination to the extent that the salvation ofa soul is a predetermined decision of God and that men havenothing to do with it. Whatever will be will be, and nothing that

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we can do will change it. If God wants you saved, you will besaved and if not, you will be lost.

This doctrine is comforting to the flesh. It takes all decisionsout of our hands and all responsibility off our shoulders. If weby our actions or decisions cannot change things, then we arenot responsible for things, especially the welfare of our souls orthe souls of others.

Calvinism and its extremes have given rise to the namesHardshell Baptist and Primitive Baptists. These people believethat, “God’s elect were chosen in Christ before the world beganand were therefore appointed unto faith and obedience in love.”This idea takes away any responsibility you and I might havein the salvation of our souls. It means that God has made all ourdecisions for us and we cannot change our eternal destiny. If weare lost, we are lost; if we are saved, we are saved.

This, too, is a basic departure from truth. This is not a smalldifference. If we adopt this heretical notion, we remove frommen and churches any obligation to mission work or witnessing.What good would either do if there could not possibly be anyresults?

3. _______________ Arminianism and Calvinismand Missions

As we have seen, both of these heresies have had an adverseaffect on the truth in the lives of individual believers. They havealso had an adverse affect in the life of churches and associa-tions of churches. The predestination movement renders mis-sion work irrelevant, and this led to an antimissions movementin America that took shape in the early 1800s. The KehuckeeDeclaration of 1827 and the Black Rock Address of 1832 wereboth strong statements against missions. The purpose was todiscard all missionary societies.

By the mid 1800s, Baptists were divided along the lines ofpromission and antimission churches. These were named Mis-sionary and Antimissionary. Over time the term antimissionarywas dropped, but the term missionary became a part of thename of many Baptist churches. Originally this term was not atitle, but was a description of the anti-Calvinist position of thechurch with regard to missions; however, by the early 1900s,the term had lost much of its force as a descriptive adjective andwas incorporated into the name of many churches.

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With the rise of the Pentecostal and Holiness movements inthe early 1900s, the Arminian influence on Baptists dwindled.Those seeking Arminian doctrine found a ready source in thesenew movements, often leaving the Baptist work altogether. Asfar as can be seen, there was never a descriptive term such asmissionary that was applied to distinguish an anti-Arminiangroup.

Missionary Baptists today should proudly wear the titleMissionary. Although we no longer need it to distinguish usfrom the Calvinists, it does set forth a great part of what webelieve the Bible to teach about the way God spreads His mes-sage of salvation in this church age.

4. _______________ The Truth Among ExtremesDid God foreknow all things? Of course He did. Is a man

responsible for the destiny of his own soul? Yes, definitely. CanI reconcile these two ideas? No, not a chance. There are somethings we cannot understand with our limited abilities. To par-aphrase Paul, “We see through a glass darkly.” Our under-standing is limited, and this is where our faith must take over.We can ponder many hours over what we do not understandand in the process ignore things that are crystal clear. God nowcommands all men everywhere to repent (Acts 17:30). God isnot willing that any should perish (2 Peter 3:9). These are obvi-ous and easy to understand teachings. We are to preach thegospel to every creature (Mark 16:15). We are to go into all theworld. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God(Rom. 10:17).

Can I reconcile all the things I would like to understandabout the Bible? No, I cannot. But I cannot let what I do notknow get in the way of what I do. God does not look to you andme for reconciliation of theology. He looks to us for obedience toHis commands. It is not important that I understand His com-mands; it is important that I obey them.

Many around us today, as did our forefathers, are getting lostin doctrinal sophistication to the point of excluding the simpleand readily understood actions expected of all of us. The Textverse is simple and easy enough for children to understand. Weneed to make it our motto and our message. God loves us; Hegave His son for us; we can believe in Him, and we can haveeternal life. This message will save your soul and change yourlife. Stick with it.

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Introduction Since there have been believers, there has been the need to

define the things believed. Luke had this purpose when heintroduced the Gospel of Luke: “Forasmuch as many have takenin hand to set forth in order a declaration of those things whichare most surely believed among us” (Luke 1:1). The Text teach-es we are to “speak things which become sound doctrine.” To do this on a consistent basis, it is necessary to have a concisestatement or declaration of the chief or principal things we be-lieve.

This became especially necessary during the ProtestantReformation when many groups were splitting from theCatholic church. Baptists were never Protestants. The historyof true churches reaches back to the ministry of Jesus. SinceJesus started His church during His personal ministry, therehave been Bible patterned churches in all ages. In the earlyyears these churches had no difficulty distinguishing them-selves from other groups. With the coming of the ProtestantReformation and a proliferation of churches opposed to Rome, itbecame more and more necessary for true believers, who weregiven the name Anabaptist—shortened to Baptist, to stateplainly what they believed. Thus confessions of faith were born.

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LESSON 6, January 7, 2001

Baptist Confessions of Faith

By the end of this lesson the student will discuss charac-teristics of these confessions of faith.

LESSON AIM

Text: Titus 2:1.Background Scripture: Romans 6:17; Ephesians 4:14; 2

Timothy 3:16, 17; 2 John 9.Devotional Reading: Confess with the Mouth, Romans

10:9, 10.

SCRIPTURES TO READ

1. _______________ What Is a Confession of Faith?All true churches hold that the Bible is the all sufficient stan-

dard for belief and practice. As Baptists we base our beliefs onthe Word alone. This is different from many groups which holdthat the traditions of men or the pronouncements of leadershave the same force as Scripture. Remember that no confessionof faith, church covenant or doctrinal statement has the sameforce as Scripture. The Bible was given by the inspiration ofGod. Confessions of faith were written by men.

A confession of faith is a brief statement of the beliefs of a cer-tain group of people at a certain time. They are intended toemphasize common beliefs, not to point out minor differences ininterpretation. It may be fair to say that no two individualsagree on every point of Scripture. Certainly no two churcheswill. However, churches may and indeed must fellowship withone another, and to do so in harmony it is necessary to havecommon ground based on biblical principles for such fellowship.

So that this could be accomplished, confessions of faith wereborn, short statements supported by Scripture, that set forththe ground for fellowship among like-minded churches.

2. _______________ Why Were They Needed?Confessions of faith were needed to serve two purposes. First,

they were to educate those outside the church to the basicbeliefs of the churches. Then, they formed a basis for eitherassent—stating what their church believed both as the basis forunity of the local body, or for dissent—the reason for refrainingfrom remaining in or joining other denominations.

In times when there are many groups, each claiming to haveand teach the truth, it becomes important to know exactly whateach group believes and practices so that intelligent decisionscan be made. An individual might want to join another groupand would need to know what it believed. A person might comefor membership, and the church would want to be clear thatboth shared the same doctrinal position. In order to accomplishthis, a statement of belief or confession of faith was written andadopted. This educated those outside the churches and servedas a standard for exchange and reception of members.

Among many important confessions of faith is the LondonConfession of Faith which came out of the Particular churches,mainly Calvinistic, in 1644. A second, slightly revised version

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was written in 1689. The Philadelphia Confession of Faith waswritten in this country in 1742. It was based on the LondonConfession of Faith although new articles were added. The NewHampshire Confession of Faith was adopted in 1833. It includ-ed additional articles dealing with repentance, faith and sanc-tification. The New Hampshire Confession of Faith was adopt-ed by the General Association of Baptist Churches in 1902. In1924, the General Association of Baptist Churches became theAmerican Baptist Association.

Amended over the years, our Doctrinal Statement still servesthe purposes of education and identification. You can read it,see what we believe and identify a church in fellowship with theAmerican Baptist Association by using this document.

3. _______________ Some Strengths of Confessions of Faith

Most confessions of faith have served their original purposewell. They enabled those outside a church or fellowship ofchurches to clearly identify their beliefs. In matters of doctrinethere should be no equivocation. We should believe what webelieve, and we should be proud of it. Faith that cannot be test-ed is faith that cannot be trusted.

Any statement in a confession of faith or doctrinal statementshould be carefully and thoroughly tied to the Scriptures. First,the content of these documents should never be the opinions ofmen. Second, these documents should be changed or added towith caution. A matter of great importance to men of our daymay seem of little consequence to those who will live manyyears from now. Because of this we should confine ourselves tostatements of the things surely believed among us upon whichwe must agree to maintain our fellowship.

Confessions of faith also serve to maintain our corporateidentity. To the world and to ourselves, they define us. Theyenable those who may be outside with a question to see what webelieve, and they allow those who come to us without a thor-ough investigation to see what it is that they should believe. Aproperly written doctrinal statement provides a touchstone anda center to any work. It allows growth within a common stan-dard and conversely prevents error by excluding it at the begin-ning. Read the Doctrinal Statement of the American Baptist

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Association, and you will readily see what we believe and whatwe do not.

4. _______________ Some Weaknesses of Confessions of Faith

Although good for their intended purposes, there are somethings these documents cannot do. First, they can never be usedas a substitute for Scripture. There are times when these docu-ments have been held up as reasons to continue in a particulardoctrine. Our fathers said it, then it must be so. This is anappealing but false argument. Our rule and guide for faith andpractice is the Word of God. We must never substitute a confes-sion of faith for Scripture. Our fathers were only men and couldbe wrong. So can we. Everyone may agree on a bad idea, but itis still a bad idea. Consensus does not make right. We must becareful to base our faith only on the Bible.

Second, a confession of faith cannot deal with every issuethat could possibly come up. If we try to answer every questionin such a document, it quickly becomes too large to be useful.Over the years these documents may become massive with theissues of the day until they become irrelevant. Yesterday’s prob-lems have been solved, yet the statement against them lives on.This is why we must alter such documents with care.

Also, a confession of faith can become so particular as to beexclusive instead of inclusive. Remember the purpose of thesedocuments is to set forth a shared or common faith. If we makethe document so particular as to exclude all but a few, we havefailed. Good and true Christians can and do disagree on manypoints of Bible interpretation. This does not mean that theycannot fellowship together and share the work of the Lord. Wemust be careful not to do what Paul warned against in Romans14:20, “For meat destroy not the work of God.” We can easilymajor on minors, and sometimes it is difficult to tell the differ-ence.

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Introduction The history of associations in many ways parallels the histo-

ry of the churches themselves. While Jesus walked the earth,He called out and organized His church, one church. As soon asthere was a second church organized, there was a need for asso-ciation. Association is simply the means by which one churchfellowships or shares labor with another.

Churches can only biblically fellowship when they do so asequals. The individual local church is the biblically recognizedunit of the kingdom of God. There is none higher. No body orgroup of churches can claim to represent Christ in some way alocal church cannot. This principle is taught in the Bible, butover the years many associations have taken on a life of theirown, becoming super church institutions and as such seeking toregulate the behavior of local churches.

God gave His commission and power to a local church. Thebehavior of a local church is regulated by the Word of God andthe Holy Spirit of God. Each local body is sovereign under Godin each of its own decisions. Any other system, though appeal-ing to men, is contrary to the Scriptures.

1. _______________ Associations in Bible TimesWhen the church at Antioch in Syria sent out missionaries to

the Gentiles, the first real interchurch trouble arose. The prob-

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LESSON 7, January 14, 2001

Origin of Baptist Associations

By the end of this lesson the student will discuss thebeginnings of Baptist associations.

LESSON AIM

Text: Acts 4:32-37.Background Scripture: Acts 11:26; 2 Corinthians 8:1;

Galatians 1:2; Revelation 1:11.Devotional Reading: Associated for Relief of the Brethren,

Acts 11:29, 30.

SCRIPTURES TO READ

lem as mentioned in Acts 15 was that some of the brethren fromJudea taught that the new Gentile converts needed to be cir-cumcised in order to be saved. Jesus never taught that, but youcan see how easy it was for the Jews to believe it. To resolve thatdifficulty, an associational meeting was held in Jerusalem. Thatmeeting was not unlike those of our day.

First, all who came there came voluntarily. No one had tocome. They came in the interest of the work of the Lord. Theywanted to solve a problem. Second, they all acted peaceablyeven though they had different opinions. That was made possi-ble only through equality. When we come together, not as greatand small, not as important and unimportant, but simply asbrethren, we can find common ground. Third, there was freeand open discussion. Everyone was permitted to freely expresshis opinion. Free and frank discussion is vital to good decisions.Everyone did not get his way, but everyone got to voice hisviews. Finally, a decision was reached that everyone could ac-cept. No one there won a victory or imposed his will on others.There was agreement, and the agreement was acceptable to all.

This pattern of associated work should be studied and putinto practice in associated work today.

2. _______________ Origins of Modern AssociationsAssociations of churches as we know them today had their

origin among Baptists in the last half of the seventeenth centu-ry. These associations were born out of necessity. During thattime travel and communication were extremely difficult. Roadswere mostly fiction, not fact. Personal experience rarely tookpeople beyond their town or the next town and times whenchurches could come together were hailed as seasons of holy fes-tivity.

The reason for such association was fellowship, not conform-ity. Many of the churches did not hold the same views even onthe nature of the association, yet they could come together toshare burdens, blessings and to engage in mutual labor.

Even in Bible times churches supported work beyond thelocal field. A number of churches contributed to the missionaryefforts of Paul and no doubt of other missionaries. We know thatwhen Paul and Barnabas parted, Barnabas took John Mark,and Paul went with Silas. Both pairs were supported by variouschurches. We do not have to agree on every point to share thework of God.

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It is difficult to identify and categorize these early associa-tions. They tended to be highly localized. Most of them held atleast in part to the London Confession of Faith, but many ofthem were divided by various issues of their day. Most of themseemed to have two purposes for meeting. One was to denounceand reproach immoral conduct, and the other was to prevent orsuppress heresy often reconciling differences between membersof churches. These things would seem strange in associations ofour day, but they occupied a large place in early associations.

3. _______________ Associations in Early America Associations were in America as early as the 1670s, only thir-

ty or forty years after they began in England. The first Baptistchurch in Pennsylvania is believed to be the Pennepack churchin Philadelphia. There was a small group at Coldspring, but thePennepack church outlived it. Churches such as the WelshTract church in Delaware and churches at Middletown,Piscataqua and Chohansie in New Jersey were organized. Soonafter, the Philadelphia Association was founded in 1701.

The Philadelphia Association set the pattern for associatedwork for Baptist churches in America. The purposes of the asso-ciations were to promote fellowship among the churches, tomaintain uniformity in faith and practice, to provide counseland assistance to churches and to establish a structure for thesupport of missions. From the beginning the Philadephia Asso-ciation maintained a high and prominent standing among thechurches that composed it.

From its beginning the Philadephia Association maintainedhigh doctrinal standards and held that the New Testament wasthe only rule of faith and practice. In 1742, the PhiladelphiaAssociation published its Confession of Faith and Discipline.

New churches were being organized rapidly, and soon theassociation embraced churches in a territory covering over fourhundred miles distance from Virginia to New York. Its contri-butions include Brown University and from the minutes of1788, it was the first association in America to take a stand ontemperance. Morgan Edwards and John Gano were sent out asevangelists or missionaries in 1771.

This group became the prototype for all Baptist organizationsthat have followed it.

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4. _______________ Our Associational WorkChurches are local. Associated work began locally. Churches

in a local area came together usually once a year. Local associ-ations are unique to Baptist work. They form a close link toindividual churches. In Arkansas the Little Rock Associationwas organized in 1824. It had eight churches by 1828 but wentout of existence by 1832. The Spring River Association wasorganized in 1829, the Saint Francis Association in 1831 andthe Saline Association in 1836. So it would go in other states.

The first state association was the East Texas Convention,now known as the Baptist Missionary Association. The GeneralAssociation of Arkansas was formed in 1902 under the leader-ship of Ben Bogard. Joining with the Texas work, it became theAmerican Baptist Association in 1924.

As communication and transportation improved, associationbecame easier, and in response, associated work has grown.Thank the Lord for His blessing.

It is important to note that there is no hierarchy in the workof the American Baptist Association. Local associations are notmembers of state associations, state associations are not mem-bers of the national association. Each church decides when andif it will participate in any association. Our work is purely vol-untary. No one is forced to attend or to support any program.This is the biblical basis for association, and we pray that it willalways be so among us.

As times change, it is tempting to change with them. Thereare two dangers in our associated work. One is that we willthink that association is irrelevant. Communication and trans-portation have become so efficient that we just do not need whatour fathers needed. As Solomon said in Proverbs 27:17, “Ironsharpeneth iron; so a man sharpeneth the countenance of hisfriend.” Fellowship will never go out of style. The other dangeris that individual churches will give up rights and responsibili-ties to a group of churches. Remember that the church is theunit of the kingdom of God. No association or group of church-es, no matter how well intended, can do what a church can do.Ephesians 3:21 states, “Unto him be glory in the church byChrist Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen.”

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IntroductionAccording to the 1999 Yearbook of the American Baptist

Association, there are one hundred ninety-seven churches list-ed in the states of Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado,Hawaii, Idaho, Oregon, Montana, Washington and Wyoming.This vast region encompasses most of the land area of theUnited States and much of the population. In our lesson today,we will see how our work spread west. Baptists, like all Amer-icans, began on the East Coast of the country. Many churcheswere started as the natural outgrowth of the relocation of thepopulation, but others were the direct result of mission-mindedmen going into what were then the regions beyond.

The spread of churches into this area is a great example ofmission-minded men and churches reaching out to preach thegospel and fulfill the Great Commission of our Lord.

1. _______________ The Work When the ABA BeganEarly Baptists in Western states were affiliated with the

Triennial Convention. The constraints of travel and communi-cation, especially before World War I made association far moredifficult for these brethren than their counterparts in the East-

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LESSON 8, January 21, 2001

Missionary Baptist Workin the Far West

By the end of this lesson the student will explain how thework of Missionary Baptists expanded to the Far West.

LESSON AIM

Text: 1 Corinthians 3:6.Background Scripture: Luke 10:1, 2; 14:21-23; Acts 9:1-6;

1 Corinthians 3:7-10.Devotional Reading: The Need for Laborers, Matthew

9:35-38.

SCRIPTURES TO READ

ern states. Associational mission work was done in Californiaby the Baptist General Association in 1905. Perhaps Californiawas more accessible because of the regular ship routes fromNew York to San Francisco in the late nineteenth century. Twoearly leaders in this work were J.T. Moore and J. H. Milburn.

In early 1923, the Baptist General Association had threehome missionaries in the Far West. They were E. E. Rice inMesa, Arizona; T. E. Griffith in New Pine Creek, Oregon; and J.T. Moore in Portland, Oregon. When the American BaptistAssociation was formed in December of 1924, fewer than fiftyWestern churches were in sympathy with the new association.

Many churches had been organized in Oregon and Californiafrom the 1850s on, and most of these were doctrinally sound;however, under the influence of liberal leaders, and the comingof the Northern Baptist Convention in 1907, many of thesegroups drifted away from Bible truth.

In 1905, the only strong local associations on the West Coastwere the Middle Oregon Association and the Eastern BaptistAssociation of California. In 1925, three of the twelve interstatemissionaries endorsed by the American Baptist Associationwere working on the West Coast. The most notable of these wasR. Y. Blaylock, endorsed by the Middle Oregon Association.From 1924 through 1932, the Middle Oregon and EasternBaptist Associations cooperated closely with the AmericanBaptist Association. The papers, mission work and schools wereall endorsed and supported.

2. _______________ Movement During the DepressionThe Great Depression that began in 1929 lasted for the most

part until the beginning of World War II and left its mark onmany American institutions. There is no real way to recount thesuffering that took place on every level of society, and churchwork was no exception. Mission support dried up. Schoolsfailed. Travel was prohibitively expensive. During much of thedepression the American Baptist Association had only twointerstate missionaries on the field, and both worked in theEast. At the beginning of 1940, twenty-one churches were list-ed in two Oregon associations. Although the situation lookedbleak, God would use this social upheaval for good.

One side effect of the depression was the relocation of thou-sands of people from the states of Oklahoma, Arkansas, andTexas to the West Coast, mainly California. The dust bowl con-

34

ditions on the farms of the Midwest left little choice but to relo-cate. Many were Missionary Baptists, and they took their faithwith them, leading to additions to churches that were alreadyin place and the organization of many new works. Many fami-lies in West Coast churches today have family ties or other rootsin Texas, Arkansas and Oklahoma.

What could have been a death knell for church work wastransformed into a great opportunity, and the work of the Lordbenefited. By the end of the 1930s, the work in California wasenjoying a season of great growth. New associations wereformed; men surrendered to preach, and the work progressed.

3. _______________ The Cooperative AssociationA California association was formed in 1932 and adopted an

unusual article of cooperation in 1937. This article providedchurch admission to the association only by the unanimous voteof the messengers, enabling a small minority to set policy forall. If a church or its pastor were held in disfavor by even onemessenger, the church could not be admitted to the association.This situation became intolerable and on February 12 and 13,1952, a new association was organized. Twenty-four churcheswere represented at the new association.

Division often causes hard feelings, and this case was noexception. Many churches in the old association would not fel-lowship with the new group. The new group took the name ofthe Cooperative Association of Missionary Baptist Churches ofCalifornia. This association has continued to grow and prosper.At its first annual meeting 7 new churches were added and by1968 there were 102 churches reporting 1,348 baptisms withover $105,000.00 given to missions. The churches had a com-bined membership of 11,971.

No work for the Lord is without trouble, but God is still onHis throne and good can come even from bad situations. TheGreat Depression brought people to the West Coast and church-es grew. The division in 1952 brought Bible principles to theforefront, and good and true men continue to apply them.Despite the division the work of the Lord has prospered, andthe Word of the Lord has spread through the firm stand thegood people of California took for Christian principles andBaptist liberty.

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4. _______________ The Work in Other StatesOf the one hundred ninety-seven churches mentioned in the

Introduction, over half are located in California. Of course, thework of God is not confined to one place. The Oregon StateAssociation was formed in 1958 in Portland, Oregon. TheCooperative Association of Missionary Baptist Churches wasformed in 1963 in Auburn, Washington. The Arizona State Asso-ciation was formed in 1957. The work of God was spreadingthroughout the region.

As time went on, many missionaries would go to this area.Notable among them were Alvin Krebs and Don Vice. Thesemen did much to establish and strengthen churches in theNorthwest. In 1988, there were thirty Oregon churches listed inthe Yearbook of the American Baptist Association. Oregon wasa starting point for many churches on the West Coast, althoughmany of them have been lost to our associated work mostlybecause of internal wrangling. As L. D. Perdue, a great advo-cate of the truth and a faithful pastor of West Coast churches,put it “When one takes a close look at the history of theLandmark churches on the West Coast one will find that ourworst enemy has been ourselves.” (L.D. Perdue, The History ofthe American Baptist Association in the Western States, page 65)

However, in spite of division and dissension, and let me stressit was no worse in this area than in other geographical regions,the work of the Lord has grown and prospered. Churches havebeen started in Arizona, Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, Colorado,Alaska, and through the pioneering work of Missionary H. K.Begley, even in Hawaii. He was sent out in 1939 by CalvaryMissionary Baptist Church of Minden, Louisiana. All in all, toGod be the glory.

NOTE: The writer is indebted to L. D. Perdue for much of theinformation presented in this lesson. Much of it comes from hisbook The History of the American Baptist Association in theWestern States.

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Introduction The term Landmark, unlike the term, missionary, is a title

not a descriptive term. The name came into common use fol-lowing the Civil War, although the name itself was first used in1854 by J. M. Pendleton of Kentucky. The scriptural basis forthe term is found in several verses in the Old Testament, themost notable in Proverbs 22:28, “Remove not the ancient land-mark, which thy fathers have set.” The idea behind the move-ment was that changes were creeping into Baptist work, andthese changes were of the world, not of the Lord. Since we hadthe “ancient landmarks” we should stick to them and notremove them.

No doubt this term was also used as a refutation of the heresythat was creeping into Baptist churches of the day. Constantvigilance is the price of liberty, and it is also the price of doctri-nal purity. As Galatians 2:4 warns, “And that because of falsebrethren unawares brought in, who came in privily to spy outour liberty which we have in Christ Jesus, that they mightbring us into bondage.” Satan is always ready to dilute andweaken the gospel and to make the witness of Jesus’ churchesineffective.

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LESSON 9, January 28, 2001

Why We Are CalledLandmark Baptists

By the end of this lesson the student will discuss the ori-gin of the Landmark movement and its influence uponBaptist thinking.

LESSON AIM

Text: Acts 16:5.Background Scripture: Galatians 1:2; 2 Thessalonians 1:4;

Acts 2:1; 7:38; Revelation 22:16.Devotional Reading: Glory in the Church, Ephesians 3:21.

SCRIPTURES TO READ

As we study this lesson, you will see that the need is as greatas it ever was for men of faith and conscience to take a firm andunwavering stand for Bible truth.

1. _______________ The Situation in the Mid 1800sAs we have seen in prior lessons, the first half of the 1800s

was a time of rapid almost uncontrolled growth, both in popu-lation of unsettled areas of the nation and in church expansion.There were few roads; communication was almost nonexistent,and many on the frontiers of Kentucky and Tennessee were forpractical purposes isolated and alone.

The missionary societies of the East Coast were beginning topromote the sending of missionaries, both to witness to theIndian tribes and to establish new congregations in the frontiertowns that were emerging in the territories.

The isolation of the frontier gave rise to a compromise of doc-trinal position by many Baptists and by other groups as well.Some groups readily adapted to any new doctrine that camealong, and some like most Baptists reluctantly went along withcompromise. Different congregations often shared the samebuilding and often the same preacher. In a land hungry for theWord, not much attention was paid to the denomination of thespeaker.

Congregations were also cut off from those in the East so thatthere was no transfer of heritage other than that brought by thepeople themselves. When difficult questions arose, there was noway to obtain the counsel of wiser brethren.

By the mid 1850s, all of these forces caused many churches tobecome indistinguishable. It was a common practice to have aMethodist preach one Sunday, a Presbyterian the next and aBaptist after that. Any group that called itself a church was rec-ognized as such, and members were even exchanged often with-out regard to whether or not they agreed with a particular doc-trinal position.

2. _______________ J. R. Graves and OthersJames Robinson Graves was born on April 20, 1820, in

Chester, Vermont. When he was fifteen years old, he was bap-tized in the Baptist church in Springfield, Vermont. His motherwas a Congregationalist though all her children were Baptists.Graves was driven to learn. By giving eight hours a day tostudy, he completed a college course in four years and also

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learned four foreign languages at the same time. This remark-able man would have a profound influence on Baptist thought.

Graves became convinced of the supremacy of the localchurch as the institution of the kingdom of God. During hisearly years missionary societies were on the rise. One of thefirst inklings we see of Graves’ emerging stand was when a mis-sionary society attempted to extend its work to the poor andfreed slaves of the South. Graves objected to this stating thatthe society was attempting to displace the obligations of thechurches that were already in the South.

Other leaders of the last half of the nineteenth centuryincluded J. N. Hall, J. M. Pendleton and Ben M. Bogard. All ofthese men were strong advocates of the local church position.They believed and taught that all associations and conventionswere properly the servants of the churches.

Ben M. Bogard was famous for his, “Come in and hang upyour hat” illustration. He often stated that an association was agathering of like-minded people. You joined when you came inand fellowshipped with the group and you left when you left. Hebelieved, and rightly so, that a local church should never sur-render any sovereignty or independence to any ecclesiasticalbody.

3. _______________ The Cotton Grove ResolutionsIn 1846, Graves took charge of the paper The Tennessee

Baptist. He soon began to editorialize against the propriety ofalien immersion and the common practice of having those whobaptized infants to fill Baptist pulpits. His editorials stirredsuch controversy that a meeting was called at Cotton GroveBaptist Church outside of Jackson, Tennessee, on June 24,1851. In this meeting these matters were discussed and a seriesof resolutions were adopted. These caught the attention ofBaptists throughout the South and formed the basis for theLandmark movement.

At the Cotton Grove meeting, J. R. Graves offered the follow-ing questions:

1. Can Baptists with their principles on the Scriptures,consistently recognize those societies not organizedaccording to the Jerusalem church, but possessing dif-ferent government, different officers, a different class ofmembers, different ordinances, doctrines and practicesas churches of Christ?

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2. Ought they to be called gospel churches or churches in areligious sense?

3. Can we consistently recognize the ministers of suchirregular and unscriptural bodies as gospel ministers?

4. Is it not virtually recognizing them as official ministersto invite them into our pulpits or by any other act thatwould or could be construed as such recognition?

5. Can we consistently address as brethren those profess-ing Christianity who not only have not the doctrine ofChrist and walk not according to his commandments butare arrayed in direct and bitter opposition to them?

Each of these questions was unanimously answered in thenegative, and the Baptists of Tennessee endorsed the decision.

4. _______________ The Movement Takes HoldFrom that time on Landmark, a name coined by Pendleton,

came to be applied to churches who held to a strict interpreta-tion of the Bible and a firm belief in church authority. Accordingto the Yearbook of the American Baptist Association of 1987,“Characteristic beliefs of Landmark Baptists are: an insistenceupon a historic succession of Baptist like churches from NewTestament times until the present and a rejection of the prac-tices of pulpit affiliation, union meetings, and the receiving ofalien immersion. Also rejected by Landmark Baptists is the con-cept of “conventionalism,” that is a centralized denominationalorganization that sets policy and initiates programs. LandmarkBaptists also practice restricted or “closed” communion, limit-ing participation in the Lord’s Supper to the membership ofeach local church.”

These beliefs resonated in the hearts of many, and the move-ment became a fixture of Baptist work. Pardon a personal ref-erence, but the church I pastor, Landmark, in the LandmarkCommunity south of Little Rock, Arkansas, was started in thesummer of 1885 as a result of plans by another Baptist churchto have a union meeting that summer involving preachers fromother denominations. Several members held that this waswrong and believed strongly enough to withdraw and startanother congregation.

What we believe is important. It defines us and we either willor will not align our beliefs with Bible truth. Graves, Pendleton,Hall and Bogard were going no further than to insist that thebasis on which we associate and fellowship be a biblical basis.So should it ever be.

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Introduction From the very beginning, Baptist churches have been

plagued by heresies. In the church Jesus started, an unbeliev-er, Judas Iscariot, was the treasurer. In the writings of theapostles, we have repeated warnings to identify heresy andthose who practice it. As Galatians 5:9 tells us, “A little leavenleaveneth the whole lump.” A church is not necessarily unsoundbecause it has some unsound members. Remember Judas,heresy is a powerful force for evil and should be treated as such.

As we look at some heresies that have plagued Baptistchurches over the years, remember this is not an all-inclusivelist. Surely additions could be made to it. Also be careful not tothink that since we have identified and dealt with these prob-lems others will not come. As long as men are sinners, there willbe heresies. New ones will arise, and we need to be constantlymindful and watchful. As Paul told Timothy in 2 Timothy 4:5,“But watch thou in all things, endure afflictions, do the work ofan evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry.”

1. _______________ Hyper-CalvinismJohn Calvin, one of the reformers, gave his name to the doc-

trine that teaches the lives of men are fixed beforehand in themind of God and that little or nothing we do can change the out-

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LESSON 10, February 4, 2001

Baptists Refute Heresies

By the end of this lesson the student will discuss heresiesthat have influenced Baptists.

LESSON AIM

Text: Titus 3:10.Background Scripture: Galatians 1:1-5; 1 John 1:8-10; 2

John 7-11; Revelation 22:18, 19.Devotional Reading: The Blood-bought Church, Acts

20:28.

SCRIPTURES TO READ

come of life. In our modern day this is sometimes referred to asfate, and it has influenced the thinking of many people.

Calvinism is built on a series of logical deductions, supposed-ly based on Bible passages. The Bible clearly teaches that Godis all-knowing. The Calvinists take it one step further and saythat God’s knowledge of the future predetermines the future,and men cannot change it. This leads to the twin heresies ofirresistible grace and limited atonement.

Irresistible grace teaches that those who are going to besaved will be saved no matter what men do or do not do. We canpreach or not preach. We can witness or not. If God wants youto be saved, you will be saved. The grace of God will save youwhether you want it to or not.

Limited atonement teaches that only a certain number ofpeople will be saved. Some are going to be lost, and they will belost no matter what men do. They cannot be saved, and thegospel will have no affect on them.

Like most heresies, these are comfortable things to believe.They just slip easily over our souls and relieve us from any obli-gation to do the work of God. After all, if the saved are going tobe saved no matter what we do and if the lost are not going tobe saved no matter what we do, what is the point of doing any-thing. We might as well take it easy.

This heresy overlooks the limited knowledge of men. We can-not understand the mysteries of the mind of God. Yes, God doesknow everything, even things that have not taken place, butthat does not release us from our responsibility to obey the sim-ple and direct commands of the Word. You do not have to be assmart as the Master to be a servant.

2. _______________ New LightismThe heresy called New Light or New Lightism began in the

late 1940s and early 1950s. It seems to have grown out of vari-ous interpretations about the second coming of the Lord andagain out of logical inference about how present conditionsrelate to future events. Central to its teachings is an overem-phasis on the church to the point that you must be a churchmember to know that you are saved and to have any leadershipof the Holy Spirit.

Other features of this doctrine are that some kind of worksare needed to maintain salvation, that one is not really bornagain until baptism and that only churches, not individuals, areindwelt by the Holy Spirit. All of these teachings are supported

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by misinterpreted parables and conclusions about the secondcoming based on inference.

Although it is difficult to get anyone to admit that he teach-es New Light doctrine, many do. There have been many overthe years who in one way or another led churches to believethese things. The result is to make a church a kind of secretsociety where the real truth is taught.

The response to this heresy is in the fact that one is savedbefore he is a Baptist. Being a church member will not saveyour soul. Being baptized will not save your soul. The ordergiven in the Bible is always salvation first and church next. Achurch is here to bring honor to Christ and to carry out His com-mission. A church is not some kind of holy repository for a frag-ile truth. Truth is strong and God has given His Word so thatwe can know it and share it.

3. _______________ EcumenismThis is a dangerous doctrine with a fancy name. It has influ-

enced Baptist thought for ages in one way or another. Perhapsit had its beginning as early as the Council of Nicea in A.D. 325.Certainly by the early part of the twentieth century, it was anaccepted idea among most groups. The idea is simple. Allchurches that call themselves Christian should cooperate andfellowship together. After all, we are all going to the same placewhen we die, and we should learn to live together while we arehere. It sounds good. Remember that false doctrine is comfort-able to the natural man.

There is a vast difference between a man who thinks he isgoing to Heaven when he dies because he was sprinkled whenhe was a baby and a man who has consciously placed a livingfaith in Jesus as his Savior. The difference is that one wayworks and the other way does not. To say that one is as good asthe other is to plainly lie.

Can we come together? Absolutely, but only in the truth. Twocan walk together if they are agreed (Amos 3:3). The first agree-ment has to be between one man and God. When we all agreein the Word and meet at the cross, we can walk together. Wecannot walk together when we are going in different directions.

This does not mean that we should be rude or hostile to thosewho believe differently, but truth is truth. It does not do anyoneany good to compromise truth for the sake of feelings. Ecumen-ism is wrong. Matthew 7:13 states, “Enter ye in at the straitgate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to

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destruction, and many there be which go in thereat.” Do not beone of them.

4. _______________ Universal ChurchThis heresy follows closely on the heels of ecumenism. It was

born in the twin heresies of baptismal salvation and infant bap-tism. If baptism saves you, and you have been baptized; thenyou are saved and you are in the church. If you were baptizedas a baby, then you are in a universal body, a church, and nofurther ceremony is necessary. A codicil to this notion is that onelocal church is just like all others. If there is a universal church,then it does not make any difference which door you came in;you are in it.

Many heresies are dead-end beliefs. They are the conclusionto a line of thinking, but the universal church heresy is differ-ent. This is a gateway doctrine. Once you accept this, there is ahost of other heresies available to you. If we are all members ofsome great universal body, then we can practice alien immer-sion, pulpit affiliation and open communion. When churchmembership is taken from the local to the universal, the door isopen to any practice of any group no matter how far out in leftfield it may be. After all, those people are church members, too.

The problem here is a misunderstanding of the nature ofchurches. Jesus started the only kind of church there is, a local,visible body. There are millions of them, but each of them isindependent of each other, and they are all dependent on Jesusas their head. Much confusion comes from the use of the termchurch in a generic sense. To speak of something generically isnot to speak of it universally. It would be fair to say that theautomobile is responsible for thousands of deaths each year, butdo any of you really think that there is an invisible, universalautomobile driving down the roads killing people? Of coursenot. The only kind of automobile is a local, visible one—one youcan drive and sit in. The only kind of church is a local, visiblebody. You can meet with it and you can join it. But you are nota member of the church, you are a member of a church.

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Introduction From the time the term missionary became descriptive of

those churches which refused the heresy of hyper-Calvinism,the term Missionary Baptist came to describe a principle activ-ity of the Lord’s churches. Of course, mission work did not beginwith the term. Long before this specific term was used, the workof spreading the gospel and planting new churches was under-taken by all New Testament churches. The terms mission andmissionary do not appear in the Bible, but the concepts behindthem are clearly taught.

The churches which fellowship in the American BaptistAssociation have a rich history of spreading the gospel. As welook at some of the methods, means and men who have con-tributed to this great work, to God be the glory! You heard thegospel because someone preached it to you, and this fact aloneis the motivation for everyone of us to reach out and preach toothers.

1. _______________ The Why of Mission WorkMission work by whatever name it is called has never been

an option in a church that follows the pattern of the New

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LESSON 11, February 11, 2001

Missionary Baptist Leadersin Missions

By the end of this lesson the student will name leaders inmission work of the churches of the American BaptistAssociation.

LESSON AIM

Text: Acts 20:20.Background Scripture: Acts 8:4, 26-39; 14:1-5; 1 Thessa-

lonians 1:8.Devotional Reading: Missionary to Dry Bones, Ezekiel

37:1-10.

SCRIPTURES TO READ

Testament. The simplest and most compelling reason to go intothe world and preach the gospel is because Jesus told us to. TheScriptures are plain. Read them for yourselves in Matthew28:19, 20, Mark 16:15 and Acts 1:8. We need no further reason.

However, we would do well also to take the example of thefirst churches into account when we consider mission work.Even though Jesus specifically directed the church in Jerusa-lem to go into Judea, Samaria and the uttermost parts of theworld, it was content to remain in Jerusalem. Only when thepersecution arose following the stoning of Stephen, was thechurch literally scattered abroad (Acts 8:1). What was it aboutthis sermon that moved men into mission work at the very handof God?

Until Stephen’s sermon, most men seemed to think thatChristianity was another form of Judaism. Jesus was anotherprophet, and His disciples were like the disciples of John theBaptist or even of Moses. Stephen firmly declared that Chris-tianity was not another form of Judaism, but it was a replace-ment for Judaism. There was a new covenant being written thatwould surpass the old. This was a wonderful message for theentire world. God wanted it spread, and it has been.

When any church, no matter how large or how small, willhonestly follow the New Testament pattern, that church will beactively engaged in mission work.

2. _______________ The How of Mission WorkOver the years many schemes have been proposed to accom-

plish the spreading of the gospel. Most of these have failed, andmany of them have been downright fanciful. Most of them seemto involve some way a church or individual can shift the respon-sibility on to someone or something else. One vital piece ofinformation we always need to remember is that God gave Hiscommission and command to individual local churches.Churches can and should cooperate in their various endeavors,but no church can assume the responsibilities of another. Yourneighbor may serve the Lord with all his heart and soul, butthis will not earn you any reward. As a spiritual entity, eachchurch must do its own work. This is how God intended missionwork to be done. Some will say that this will not work in ourmodern age, but it has worked well down through the ages.

Only a local church has the scriptural authority to send out aman to preach the gospel. No association or group of churches

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has this right or privilege. Other churches can and should helpthat church in the support of the man and further his work inany way possible, but the authority lies in the local churchalone.

Recognizing this, many individuals and local churches havecontributed sacrificially over the years to see that the gospelwas spread around the world. You would do well at this point tosee if you could find out a little history about the church youattend. It might surprise you to learn the names of those whomade it possible for you to be worshiping where you are rightnow.

3. _______________ The Where of Mission WorkNo matter where you are going, you have to begin where you

are. God has used this simple fact to spread His Word through-out the church age. As people moved throughout Europe, Amer-ica and other continents, they took the gospel with them. Thisall began at Jerusalem, but by the end of the first century A.D.,the gospel had reached as far as the British Isles.

In recent times, God has used events as varied as relocationduring times of economic depression to service in the armedforces to spread His Word. Missionary Baptists have been in-volved in all parts of life and living, and they have not beenashamed to take their faith with them wherever they went.Many churches are in the world today because someone’s jobmoved across the country, and they sought a missionary to comeand preach to them. Others were saved, and soon a church wasorganized. Other works have been done because men traveledto foreign countries in wartime and became burdened for thosein faraway lands.

Often, though, there have been other causes. Often Godseems to have burdened someone’s heart for a particular peopleor a particular region, and the individuals and churches havelaunched out in faith to the regions beyond. This is difficult toexplain, but those who have experienced it know what I amtalking about. God leads us along, and we always do well to fol-low.

Another where of mission work has to do with the openingand closing of doors due to the politics of the world situation ata particular time. For many years the doors to Communistcountries were closed. Even today, a card carrying Communistcan have no religious affiliation, yet God has destroyed this

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awful system and in recent times opened the doors to the coun-tries in Europe and Russia behind what was once the “IronCurtain.” Thankfully, many good men have answered the calland seized the opportunities to go and begin works. We have yetto reap the harvest possible because of the steps of faith.

4. _______________ The Who of Mission WorkIn a real sense any list we might make of those among us who

have contributed to missions would be incomplete. God aloneknows how many have been involved in this wonderful work.Many names stand out, and I apologize if I leave off someonewho should be mentioned; yet, these are some who have madenotable contributions over the years.

Our first obligation is at home right where we are, and overthe years local and interstate missionaries have filled this need.Many churches are worshiping today because local associationshelped send men into local fields. There are literally too manyof these men to mention.

One name that comes to mind is Don Johnson. He was bornin Oklahoma and was a missionary to the East Coast. He wasinstrumental in starting churches in Maryland, Virginia, WestVirginia and New Jersey. Up until his last moments on earth,his heart and soul were in mission work.

Another great work has been done by J. L. Mitchell throughthe Mexican Baptist Institute and the churches in McAllen,Texas, and Reynosa, Mexico. When he went on the field, therewere just a handful of churches affiliated with the AmericanBaptist Association in Mexico. Today there are over one hun-dred there through the work of the Mexican Baptist Institutealone. God has mightily blessed this work.

Perhaps the largest number of churches in a foreign field isin the Philippines. Much of the credit for this work goes to theTuazon family and Ernie Hopper. The Philippines may be thefastest growing mission field on earth right now. How excitingit is to hear of the blossoming of the work of God in this farawayplace!

Right after World War II Eugene Reagan, a great missionary,was burdened for the nation of Japan. Through his work andthat of Shigeo Kanoya, the gospel has been planted in Japan,and the fruits are coming in every day. Japan is a difficult mis-sion field. The work has much opposition, but God is great andthe churches that have been planted there are doing well.

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Men like Walter Goulding and Gene Ray Ward have beeninstrumental in taking the gospel to Costa Rica and CentralAmerica. Gene Ray Ward has labored in Costa Rica for most ofhis ministry, and the fruits of his labor have been great. This isa rich mission field, and the Lord is blessing in a great waythere.

God opened a door to India through P. J. Abraham andThampi Joseph. There are many churches in India, mainly onthe Malabar Coast, through the work of these men. A seminaryis there, and native men are being trained to keep the workgoing.

In Africa, men like Lynn Raburn, Ernie Hopper and WilliamAdegbola have helped open up this continent to the message ofChrist. A great work has been done there.

John White was among the first from our fellowship to go tothe continent of Australia. Soon after, men like Gary Max fol-lowed to New Zealand, and God has blessed this work throughthe years.

What names can you add to this list? I am sure there aremany others, but I know most of these men personally and noneof them would want any credit for what they have done. Theywould say, and we can say, “To God be the glory, great things hehath done.”

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Introduction The work of the Lord does not just happen. It is easy to take

for granted the things that men have given their lives for. Inmany ways we sit at the top of a spiritual mountain. Othersbuilt from the ground up, and we enjoy the fruits of their labors.This is not wrong, but it is the way things are. We should neverbe guilty of taking our blessings for granted.

The work of the present is possible because of the work of thepast. We should honor those to whom honor is due and respecttheir memories for the great contributions they made. John theBaptist paved the way for the ministry of Jesus, and those whohave gone before have given us a wonderful opportunity to buildon the foundation they laid.

We do not need to reinvent the wheel in every generation. Weshould learn from the mistakes of the past, and we shouldcheerfully imitate the success of the past. To do otherwisewastes the only resource we have in limited quantity, our time.

1. _______________ The Needs of Associated WorkWhen the American Baptist Association began in 1924, the

needs were obvious. We needed everything. There was almostno coordinated effort among the churches of the association inany way. Whatever ways and by whatever means the churcheswould cooperate had to be determined.

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LESSON 12, February 18, 2001

Great Men Among Us

By the end of this lesson the student will name some of theformer leaders in the churches of the American BaptistAssociation.

LESSON AIM

Text: Isaiah 40:3.Background Scripture: Matthew 10:2-7; John 1:6-8, 29, 33,

36.Devotional Reading: Paul’s Call, Acts 9:1-7.

SCRIPTURES TO READ

We have a difficult time realizing how much wisdom and fore-thought went into getting our associated work to the place it istoday. These things did not just fall from the sky; instead, theywere born in the hearts and minds of good men who sought todo God’s will and build a work for Him.

For any work to continue, it needs a centralizing effort, somemeans of identifying and harmonizing the works of many indi-vidual churches. In our work this is brought about through thethings we share on an associational level. We share in the workof publishing literature for churches to use. We share in thesupport of missionaries sent out by local churches. We share inthe work of youth camps, the Chaplaincy Committee and theHistory and Archives Committee. We share in the often unher-alded work of our associational clerks who faithfully record theproceedings of our meetings and keep a list of the churches whorepresent in our meetings.

Without these things we lack the basis for fellowship whichreally means shared labor. If we are to share labor, there mustbe a labor to share.

2. _______________ The Limitations of Associated WorkWe must point out that there are many things that an asso-

ciation of churches cannot do. Those who have been greatamong us have realized this and included this simple truth inall their planning. An association of churches can never usurpthe labor of any individual church. The American BaptistAssociation is unique in that each church represents equally. Itis equally unique in that the most the association can do ismake a recommendation to the churches which fellowship in it.No motion, resolution or action taken by the association is everbinding on any church. No one has to do anything the associa-tion says. This makes the wisdom of our founding fathers evengreater. To devise a plan that would work through voluntaryparticipation takes the grace of God as well as the wisdom ofGod. We operate under such a plan.

Often there are churches who may oppose a certain part ofthe associated work. No one tries to force them into it, yet thereare always those who want to see the work grow and prosper.Through God’s love and grace our working together has donethat.

It is truly something we should thank God for. We have fel-lowship, the opportunity to share our labors and we still have

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complete liberty, the right to refuse any and all things we indi-vidually find disagreeable.

3. _______________ The Work That Has Been DoneGod has blessed us wonderfully. The American Baptist

Association has literally everything the churches need. We havea publications business that serves over three thousand church-es throughout the whole world. It is wonderful to note thatmany churches who do not fellowship in our national meetingsstill use our literature because of its close adherence to theScriptures. This work has largely been accomplished throughthe unselfish work of our Sunday School Committee and thevarious Business Managers and Editors in Chief over the years.

We have a way to help missionaries. The association does notsend out missionaries. Only local churches do that. Yet manychurches take the recommendation of the association seriously,and men are faithfully supported. Much credit should go to ourSecretary-Treasurer of Missions. Many men have filled thispost, and all of them have had a heart full of love for the mis-sionaries.

We have a wonderful youth work, including youth camps anda wonderful ladies auxiliary. We have a means for men to servethe Lord as military chaplains. I could go on, but I fear I willomit a part of our work. The important thing is that as theneeds have arisen, God has raised up men to meet the needs;the work has grown and prospered, all the while staying true tothe principles that brought us together in the first place.

4. _______________ The Men God Used To Do His WorkAny list we might make would be incomplete, and I invite you

to add names out of your own knowledge. However, consider thefollowing leaders of our work.

Ben M. Bogard helped form the American Baptist Associationin 1924. He was pastor of Antioch Baptist Church in LittleRock, Arkansas, and a founder of the Missionary BaptistSeminary, the oldest seminary among our churches. He waspresident of the seminary from 1945-1946, following the deathof J. Louis Guthrie, another great man among us. J. LouisGuthrie was a noted educator and was instrumental in teach-ing two generations of preachers.

Ben M. Bogard was instrumental in founding the publica-tions business of the association, and the book publishingdepartment, the Bogard Press, still bears his name.

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A. J. Kirkland was instrumental in establishing the TexasBaptist Institute in Henderson, Texas. This great school hasproduced some of the finest preachers in our work and contin-ues to serve the Lord. A.J. Kirkland served as president ofTexas Baptist Institute. He served on the Sunday School Com-mittee for twenty-seven years. He was president of theAmerican Baptist Association, and God used him to build someof the largest churches in our associated work.

Conrad N. Glover was a cofounder of the Missionary BaptistSeminary in Little Rock. He was a noted historian. His book, AHistory of the American Baptist Association 1924-1974 coau-thored by A.T. Powers, is a standard work noting our historicalpast. He pastored many churches in central and southernArkansas and was a stabilizing influence in many troubledtimes in our associated work. Today we still miss his calm wis-dom and simple grace. He served as president of the associationand was parliamentarian for many years.

L. D. Foreman was a noted teacher and author. His book, TheBible in Eight Ages, serves as a text in many seminaries today.He was president of the American Baptist Association andserved as president of the Missionary Baptist Seminary from1946 until 1966. He was an important helper in the beginningof the Texas Baptist Institute, the California MissionaryBaptist Institute and the Gulf Coast Baptist Institute. Heserved for many years on the Baptist Sunday School Com-mittee.

Austin T. Powers was a giant in every way. He was a largeman physically and spiritually. He was a messenger to the orig-inal meeting in 1924. He served as an instructor in the TexasBaptist Institute and was Dean of the Louisiana BaptistInstitute. He coauthored A History of the American BaptistAssociation with Conrad N. Glover. He pastored many church-es and contributed greatly to God’s work.

Roy M. Reed was a pastor and educator. He served as aninstructor in the Oklahoma Missionary Baptist Institute. Hewas also president of the California Missionary BaptistInstitute for twenty-four years. He was an author who wroteseveral books and served on the Sunday School Committee. Healso wrote literature for the committee. He was president of theAmerican Baptist Association in 1976-77. He was activelyinvolved in mission work in Korea.

We could go on, but you can make your own list. Rememberto give honor to whom honor is due.

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Introduction We have come a long way since that December day in 1924

when the American Baptist Association was born. God has rich-ly blessed the churches that make up this fellowship, and byblessing them individually, the blessings have been shared cor-porately. How wonderful it is to meet together and learn of theblessings God is giving to others!

We have come a long way, but we have not arrived. God is notfinished with us. We can get lost in a look back and fail to seethe wonderful opportunities all around us.

1. _______________ Opportunities at HomeThere are still great mission fields right here in the United

States. There are many churches affiliated with the AmericanBaptist Association in some parts of the South, but in otherareas you can drive for hours and not find one.

One place that has been largely neglected has been the largepopulation centers of our nation. There are many cities withover one million inhabitants without a single MissionaryBaptist church.

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LESSON 13, February 25, 2001

Harvesttime in the Twenty-first Century

By the end of this lesson the student will perceive thefields are ripe for a spiritual harvest in the twenty-firstcentury.

LESSON AIM

Text: John 4:35.Background Scripture: Jeremiah 8:20; Ezekiel 3:16-21;

Acts 4:31-37; 5:14; Galatians 6:7, 8.Devotional Reading: David’s Promised Seed, Acts 13:23.

SCRIPTURES TO READ

In addition to the large cities, there are many rapidly grow-ing suburban areas that our churches have not yet reached.These, too, need to hear the gospel message.

The population of the world is increasing at a rapid rate.There is literally room in this country for an explosion of newchurches. Souls are hungry for the love and compassion ofChrist. We need to pray about sharing the gospel right here athome.

2. _______________ Opportunities in Other CountriesA few years ago the doors to central Europe were closed. No

one could penetrate the Iron Curtain with a gospel outreach.Now, as the new century dawns, this area is open. Thank Godchurches and missionaries have seen this wonderful field open-ing and are seizing the opportunity to go and preach there.

As we grow nearer the second coming of our Lord, we see dra-matic and even drastic changes in the world political situation.We need to be ready to meet the challenges. The cost will begreat, and many may stumble at the great opportunities.However, we need to get our attitude adjusted so that we cantake the gospel wherever the doors open.

3. _______________ New Days, New ToolsThe invention of the printing press brought about an infor-

mational revolution. It took several hundred years to changethings. Today technology is changing things yearly, sometimesdaily. The first lesson I ever wrote, I wrote with a fountain pen.Then I went to a manual typewriter. I thought I had died andgone to Heaven when I got a Smith Corona electric typewriter.Now I am writing on a word processor, and I do not know how Iwould ever do without it. As God gives us new tools to use tospread His Word, we must face the challenges these new thingsbring.

Right now seven new people are going online on the Internetevery second. Imagine how the world will be connected in just ashort while! We can sit in our homes and speak around theglobe with a technology that is both affordable and useable. Wemust be ready to use these tools for the honor and glory of God.

Do not be afraid of technology. Paul wrote with a stylus onpapyrus or lambskin. We do not have to do this to be scriptural.Imagine how little information you would have access to if all

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books were handwritten! Times have changed before, and it hasnot destroyed the work of God. It will not in this century either.

Our challenge is to present a truth that never changes in aworld that is constantly changing.

4. _______________ Gathering the HarvestWe can change our method, but we cannot change our mes-

sage. High tech men and women are as lost as their low-techancestors. No matter how the world changes, lost people willstill need the Lord, and we will have a message to share.

The first thing we must do is pray that the Lord will sendforth laborers into the harvest. We cannot call men to preach,and we cannot direct people around in the service of the Lord.Only the Holy Spirit can make us spiritual, and Jesus is stillthe head of His churches. We can go in many directions, but itis imperative that we follow where Christ leads.

Some things have not changed and will not change. The Bibleis still the all-powerful and all sufficient Word of God. That willnever change. Jesus is still the only Savior. There is no othername under Heaven given among men whereby we must besaved. The local church is still the unit of the kingdom of Christhere on earth. No institution or organization can ever replace alocal congregation. We must plant our feet firmly on the foun-dation of the past before we reach for the future.

Remember, we are time travelers. We are going into thefuture, ready or not. We have no choice. Wherever you may go,you cannot stay here. One day our lives will be over, and we willall give an account of how we have used the wonderful opportu-nities God has given us.

As Jesus put it in Mark 14:37, 38 when He came and foundhis disciples asleep, “And he cometh, and findeth them sleeping,and saith unto Peter, Simon, sleepest thou? couldest not thouwatch one hour? Watch ye and pray, lest ye enter into tempta-tion. The spirit truly is ready, but the flesh is weak.” This is ourhour. It is the time for the people of God to seize the great oppor-tunities God has provided in our own neighborhoods and allaround the world.

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