The Bride
and
Seven Other Women
By Monroe Jones
A brief, comprehensive and authentic history
of the Baptist Church: For people
who are willing to learn the Truth
1948
Elder Harold Hunt
P.O. Box 5352
Maryville TN 37802
The Bride
and
7 Other Women
Foreword
I desire to greet my readers with a friendly hand-shake and a bouquet of good wishes.
We are going to take a trip down through the ages, down the pathway of history, to learn the TRUTH about the Church.
This Church spoken of in prophecy as a “kingdom which shall never be destroyed” (Dan. 2:44) and this prophet points directly to the old Roman Empire as the earthly kingdom in which the Church shall appear; and to the early ministry of John the Baptist, who baptized Jesus, as the TIME, or very near the time, when “the God of heaven” should set his Church up. Matt. 3:2; 4:17 and 11:12; Luke 7.6:16.
This Church, as we shall see, is the true Baptist Church. It is not “a part of the Church,” but IS THE CHURCH. God set up ONE Church and ONLY ONE. All other “religious” organizations that call themselves “the Church” are NOT churches. You and I can trace every one of them to some man who came on the scene as a “reformer” and set up a NEW THING and called it a church.
In a sense, all Baptists are spiritual kinfolks. They have been separated by family quarrels. Today there are more than 20 bodies of people calling themselves Baptist. Only ONE of these can be the TRUE CHURCH IN ORDER AND IN DOCTRINE. Some may have the doctrine without the order, others the order without the doctrine. Or maybe all need more tolerance !
This was caused by men, so called “great preachers,” who from time to time have led good brethren and sisters out of the old paths. Read Romans 16:17.
Besides Baptists, we must consider two false theories: Roman Catholic and Protestant. Protestantism came out of Catholicism. Baptists are in no sense to be classed as Protestants.
Then there are some minor so-called “churches” of very recent origin that are not to be classed as Protestant. One or these, as an example, was organized by Alexander Campbell after he was excluded from the Baptists for preaching heresy. These have gone under different names— the latest call themselves “Church of Christ.”
This last group was organized in 1926 according to the New American Encyclopedia.
Then there are the “holiness” organizations, calling themselves “churches.” One “holiness” preacher told me there are today “500 different kinds of holiness churches!” It’s amusing, so much “holiness,” and no one flying away to glory— not one Enoch nor Elijah in this “holy” crowd!
These came out of Methodism. Methodism came out of the Church of England and it came out of Catholicism. So all of these are Protestants of very recent date.
The three main lines of Protestantism are Lutheran, Presbvterian and Episcopalian.
Come with me now and we will trace the Baptist Church, follow its chain of Apostolic Church succession, without a broken link, from the banks of Jordan, where Jesus was baptized, down to the present time, February 4, 1948.
Monroe Jones,
Tishomingo, Oklahoma,
Rural Route No. 1
DEDICATION
In gratitude for services rendered me in helping me sell my book of poems, “Jingles and Heart Throbs,” to get the money to publish this Baptist History, I hereby dedicate this History to the Memory of Elder W. S. Smart, Arlington, California; Elder B. L. Huff, Ryan, Oklahoma; Elder W. R. Dale, Stanton, Texas; Elder P. L. Jones, Las Cruces, New Mexico and Brother B. H. Pace, Buckeye, Arizona. Besides these, I must thank “Baptist Trumpet” of Belton, Texas.
THE EVERLASTING KINGDOM
In the Bible the Church is spoken of as a Kingdom. The prophets pointed forward to the coming of this Kingdom: the Christian Church.
The word kingdom suggests a country inhabited by people, governed by a king.
The Church is Christ’s kingdom here on earth, and his OBEDIENT people live in it. Daniel foretold that it “shall not be left to other people.”
The scriptures also sometimes speak of the Church as the Bride of Christ. Solomon had a vision of this when he exclaimed: “Who is this that cometh up from the wilderness leaning upon her beloved?”
John the Baptist came preaching in the WILDERNESS, saying. “the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”
Nebuchadneezar, king of Babylon, saw an “image” in a dream. This image had “a head of gold, breast and arms of silver, belly and thighs of brass, legs of iron and feet part of iron and part of clay.” Dan. 2:32, 33.
Daniel interpreted this dream and foretold the fall of Babylon. To the king he said: “After thee shall arise another kingdom, inferior to thee, and another third kingdom of brass, which shall bear rule over all the earth.”
History records that Babylon fell and that these SECOND and THIRD earthly kingdom came into power, decayed and fell, just as Daniel had said they would.
The Medes and Persians overthrew Babylon (Dan. 5: 30,31) and Darius became ruler. In his reign he completed great military roads and the ancient canal from the Nile to the Red Sea. This SECOND kingdom was much inferior to Babylon. With all his military bombast, Darius went down, his kingdom passed away.
Next Alexander the Great appeared on the scene at the head of the Greek army, subduing peoples and nations, about 336 years B. C. The THIRD “kingdom of brass” now ruled the earth. Alexander was the world ruler. It is said that when he reached the zenith of his military glory, he “wept because there were no more worlds to conquer.”
Alexander’s power began to wane with the revolt of his soldiers, who objected to his humane treatment of conquered nations. The “kingdom of brass” was on its way out (Read Dan. 11:3, 4).
About 750 B. C. the Roman Empire began to be founded on the banks of the Tiber. It gradually grew into a power that dominated the world. The City of Rome was its capital. Rome was there, settling on her seven historical hills, when Alexander the Great went down with his “kingdom of brass.”
Cais Julius, the greatest of all the Caesars, appeared in Rome as the “Priest of Jove” 87 years B. C. Climbing swiftly to fame, he became dictator for life, and became the world ruler. The FOURTH kingdom, “strong as iron,” was now in full power. Dan. 2:40.
But ,this FOURTH kingdom had a WEAKNESS. It was “divided,” it was “partly strong and partly broken” Dan. 2:41, 42.
Time passed and Augustus Caesar, grandson of the sister of Julius Caesar, came on the throne. Augustus was the ruler of Rome when John the Baptist and Jesus were born.
Under Augustus Caesar were a number of smaller rulers, called kings. Herod of Judaea, in his jealousy, feared that Jesus had come to usurp his place and rule his little territory. Herod murdered a great number of little children in his efforts to kill Jesus.
It was another King Herod who beheaded John the Baptist for telling the truth about divorce (Mark 6:27).
There were other “kings” ruling locally over cities and provinces, here and there, all over Rome. But “these kings” were all under the “iron” rule of Caesar. These KINGS were no doubt jealous of each other, some secretly desiring to usurp the throne of Caesar. Therein lay the “WEAKNESS” of this fourth KINGDOM OF IRON. It was as a “mixture of iron and clay.”
When Daniel interpreted Nebuchadnezzar’s dream, he pointed his finger directly at the Roman Empire, “the fourth kingdom of iron,” and said: “In the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed; and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever.” (Dan. 2:44).
GOD’S KINGDOM
THE CHURCH
At God’s appointed time, John the Baptist came preaching in the WILDERNESS of Judea saying, “Repent ye: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matt. 3:2) (also S. of S. 8:5). John was “sent from God” (St. John 1:6).
John baptized Jesus and soon after, Jesus began preaching: “The kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matt. 4:17). His message was: “The gospel of the kingdom” (Matt. 4:23).
John said the Kingdom was at hand, Jesus said it was at hand. “The law and the prophets were until John. Since that time the kingdom of God is preached, and every man presseth into it” (Luke 16:16). Men were pressing INTO this Kingdom, which does away with the prepostrous argument of some that this “kingdom” is not an organization but is something spiritual “in the souls of Christians!” Men don’t press INTO the soul or hearts of Christians !
Remember, this kingdom was “at hand.” The preposition “at” means simple presence or near by. So, evidently, the Church came into existence about the time John baptized Jesus.
Why does the word “Baptist” begin with a “capital B” There is but one answer : BECAUSE IT IS THE NAME OF SOMETHING.
Yes, I know all the arguments that; “John was a baptizer, a dipper, an immerser, etc,” but all the frantic explanations on the part of the enemies of the Church can’t side-track the fact that the word Baptist was the NAME of something in the very beginning of John’s ministry.
John came as a forerunner of Jesus, his ministry and baptism was no doubt the harbinger of the Church.
The man-made organizations that claim to be churches would like to remove that “B” from Baptist and make it read: “John the baptist.” Perhaps the reading of Revelation 22:18, 19 may be all that keeps them from changing it to a “little b.”
The Church was persecuted from the beginning by religious hypocrites, heathen idol worshipers and traditionized Jews.
Jesus chose twelve disciples and sent them out to preach. Their message was: “The kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matt. 10:7). These twelve disciples were the called ministers IN THE CHURCH— the “kingdom” of Matt. 10:7. Of this kingdom, Jesus said: “From the days of John the Baptist (“big B”) until NOW the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force” (Matt. 11:12).
If you say this kingdom is the eternal home of the saints after death, then I ask, can the heaven above suffer violence at the hands of the wicked?
It is plain that the “kingdom” spoken of by Daniel and John and Jesus is the Christian Church.
There is ONE true Church and ONLY ONE. Its foundation is the STONE that “was cut out of the mountain without hands” (Dan. 2:34).
There was a great Church meeting on the Day of Pentecost. It may have been something like a Baptist Association. Peter preached a great sermon on that day, and about 3,000 souls were ADDED to the Church by baptism (Acts 2:41.)
It is a mathematical truth that we can’t ADD something to nothing To ADD is to bring forth OTHER NUMBERS, or quantities, to be united with quantities or numbers already existing. Adding new members to a Church enlarges the size of the body of worshipers.
Therefore after Pentecost the Church had 3 000 MORE members than it had BEFORE that time.
There were people at this great meeting who belonged to many different races; each race speaking its own language (“tongue”), and all these were astonished to hear these Galileans speak the languages of all those different races. God, manifested as forked tongues of fire, empowered these Galilaeans, fitted them, to go out and preach the gospel to the people of every nation, and language (“tongue”) on earth. That is the truth, the whole truth, in a nut shell. (Read Acts. 2:1 to 12).
The modern jabbering that the “Holy Rollers” call “tongues” is no kin to Christianity. These silly mutterings are the result of nervous break down of unfortunate and deluded victims of a false religion. This delusion, at times, seized IGNORANT people in the great revival of John Wesley and John Whitefield, in the early days of our country. These deluded and excited people imagined they had chased the devil up a tree, and they sometimes barked like dogs at the supposed devil in the tree top !
Wesley and Whitefield were too intelligent to encourage such ridiculous maneuvers in their revivals. So this “barking at the devil” ceased, and was not known any more until it appeared again, about twenty-five years ago, in so-called “holiness” meetings: this time the victim jabbers in “tongues” instead of barking! None of these silly things have ever happened in the true Church.
THE BRIDE
After baptism, God’s believing people walking, in obedience in the Church, commune and wash each others feet, and manifest their Christian love for one another in the every day walks of life (I Cor. 11:23 to 27; John 13:1 to 10).
Revelation 21:9, and John 3:29 sets forth the Church as the bride of Christ. Jesus chose his bride, and he was not a polygamist. He chose ONE bride, and not “a part” of his bride and then leave it to Protestant “reformers,” centuries later, to choose the balance of his bride. The thought is preposterous and ridiculous! Yet we hear preachers say they belong to “a part of the Church.” All Protestants believe this.
There are about 700 organizations in America today, claiming to be churches. Every one of these false churches can be traced to some man as their founder. Every one of these, each and all, have their own man-made creeds or faiths, and they are as conflicting as light and darkness. They can’t all be true. But our school text book writers throw all these conflicting creeds into one pile, and label the whole conglomerated mess: “The Christian Church!” Baptists have been permitting their children to be taught this monstrous falsehood without entering a protest. No wonder confusion, infidelity, atheism and wickedness are stalking rampant everywhere, defying every code of decency. The ONE and ONLY true Church is the Bride of Christ. She walks with him, trusts in him, leans on his arm, and has never strayed off into some spiritual “red light” district and needed reforming.
The ministers in the true Church preach “Christ and Him crucified.” (I Cor. 22). They preach salvation by God’s free grace. (Eph. 2:1 to 11).
Paul didn’t “learn” to preach. The brethren didn’t address him as “The Reverend Paul!” He drew no salary, he made tents for a living.
There was no Missionary Board in the early Church to “throw out the life line” to the heathen. The sisters in the Church didn’t sell hamburgers and coffee on the streets to get money to “save the heathen.” There was no “auxiliary,” no “mite society,” no church dances, no card parties, no box suppers, no Sunday Schools, and no B.Y.P.U.
The sermon on the mount furnished all the guide posts for Christian conduct for the early church, and for all time.
THE REFINER’S FIRE
“Like a refiner’s fire and like fuller’s soap” (Mal. 3:2), Jesus came on earth preaching the purest code of morals that the world had ever known.
Society in the old Roman Empire was morally rotten. Hate and violence was rocking the peoples of earth. Caesar was brutally cruel. He belonged to that tribe of earthly rulers who have ever stooped to the lowest depths in warfare, and have never hesitated to use any weapon of murder from the stone hatchet to the ATOMIC bomb.
The whole world was in confusion. Conscripted armies were on the march and legal murder stalked everywhere.
John the Baptist, was beheaded for taking a stand for decency and condemning divorce. (Luke 3:19 and Matt. 14:1 to 11).
The average Roman citizen trusted in his own physical prowess. His pastime was the cruel sports of the ampitheatre. The Olympic Games were brutalizing Greece.
Into this social cesspool, Jesus came preaching LOVE instead of HATE, kindness instead of violence, decency instead of divorce. No wonder that generation of religious hypocrites, militarist, bribe takers (Acts 24:26) and luring libertines (winked at by covetous priests) began at once seeking to kill Christ.
Finally when his work on earth was finished they nailed him to the cross. It was a soldier that thrust a spear into his side, though John the Baptist had told the soldiers to “do violence to no man.” (Luke 3:14).
Jesus had come on earth to save his people from their sins (Matt. 1:21) and to establish his Church on earth. (Matt 16:18). He finished the work he came to do. (John 19:30).
The early Church was made up mostly of poor people. It did not tolerate covetousness. (Acts 5:5 to 10).
No one in the Church at the beginning claimed property exclusively as his own. (Acts 4:32; also 34:35). On this account we read of a certain young man who turned sorrowfully away from the Church. (Mark 10th ch).
They pooled their property, MAYBE NOT COMPULSORY, and owned all things in common. (Acts 2:44, 45).
It is uncertain how long the Church practiced this collective ownership. According to the New American Encyclopedia, the Ana-Baptists were still following this practise in the 16th century, and they did not allow their members to TAKE OR CHARGE INTEREST.
It also states that these Ana-Baptists were persecuted for refusing infant baptism, and for REBAPTIZING all who came to them from other churches.
THE SECOND CENTURY
The world hated Jesus because he condemned wickedness. His followers, in the Church, practiced strict discipline, and lived righteous lives. The scripture furnished all for them. (2 Tim. 3:16, 17).
There was no COUNTERFEIT Church posing as “Christian” for more than 200 years after the days of Paul and Peter. Centuries later the true Church began to be known as “Baptist” to distinguish it from the false “churches” that men began to set up. The true Church has ALWAYS held to IMMERSION as the proper mode for baptism. Jesus was IMMERSED and said thus (IN THIS WAY) it becometh us to fulfill all righteousness.” The false churches SPRINKLE or POUR for baptism. This is one distinguishing “mark.”
Pagan Rome hated the Church and put forth all her power to destroy it. Many Christians died as martyrs for their faith in the first century. Some were burned alive, some were crucified, many were beheaded or stoned to death and still others were torn to pieces by wild beasts in the amphitheaters for the amusement of the pleasure seeking people of Rome!
At least 3,000,000 Christians were murdered by these pagans in the first three centuries after Christ.
Sixty-six years after Christ John was banished to the Isle of Patmos, and there received the Revelation, a thrilling account of things that should “shortly come to pass.” This message was to the seven churches of Asia and was a prophecy of historical events that should, and did, begin to unfold soon after.
Those who would learn the truth must study Revelation in the light of history. Baptists should know history.
We now step out into the second century after Christ’s baptism in Jordan. The Church is now 100 years of age. It has triumphantly survived all opposition. It is shining “as a city set upon a hill.” God’s ministers are persuading people everywhere to quit the pagan worship.
The fiercest opposition had failed to keep God’s people from assembling themselves together for worship. The Church was growing rapidly in spite of periods of a revived persecution.
A time came when these early Christians had gained in numbers till they could have defended themselves with the sword but they refused to fight, preferring persecution rather than disobey Jesus.
In a time when the Church was free from violent persecution the advocates of lax discipline let the bars down and a great multitude of worldly minded people came into the Church. It was popular to be a Christian. This is always a danger signal.
It was a beautiful day, the sun was smiling on a blossom-painted landscape, not a cloud in sight. It seemed there would never again be trouble.
Suddenly the wind changed, a black cloud came rolling up over the mountains and swiftly threw a gloomy shadow across the world. Deadly persecution was upon the Church again, like a raging tornado !
In cowardly fright the “sunshine Christians” quit the Church and ran away. They denied that they had ever been ,connected with it.
They had come into the Church like rising waters, muddy waters overflowing a clear stream— now they were gone and the stream was clear again.
Christians met martyrdom, died for their faith, then the world was tranquil again.
Time passed, changes came; the Church went tripping on down the pathway of years, like a maiden dressed in snow-white garments.
It was another beautiful day: the enemies of the Church seemed to have vanished, flown away like a great black vulture disappearing beyond a far away horizon.
Then the deserters came back, knocking at the door asking to be admitted back into the Church again.
THE BEGINNING OF TROUBLE
At that time there were two great leaders in the Church; Elder Cornelius and Elder Novation. Cornelius was ardently in favor of the LOOSE DISCIPLINE that would permit these DESERTERS to reenter the Church. Elder Novation stood unfalteringly for STRICT DISCIPLINE as taught by Paul and all other New Testament writers— he opposed these deserters; holding that in deserting the Church in the time of danger, these people had denied Christ; therefore, they were not fit to live in the Church.
Elder Novation and his followers WITHDREW (2 Thess. 3:6; 1 Tim. 6:5) from those of loose discipline and traveled onward down the path where the early church had walked before that time.
Cornelius, with the big crowd following him, stepped out into a new road (Matt. 7:13) traveling in an opposite direction.
Bevin, in his history of Christianity, page 75, says: “Novation and his followers withdrew from those of loose discipline. ”
This trouble came about A. D. 252. It was not a”split.” The Church merely withdrew from the CORNELIUS DISORDER and left it behind OUTSIDE the pale of the Church.
Fifty-two years before this time Elder Tertullian had stood unwaveringly for strict discipline. He held that seven kinds of sin should cause perpetual exclusion from
the Church; namely: murder, idolatry, theft, apostasy,
blasphemy, fornication and adultery.”
Some of the landmarks of the early churches are: (1) Belief in the foreknowledge of God and an elect people (Titus 1:1, 2) (2) Baptism for believers only and that by immersion only. (3) Baptized believers, members of the Church, assembled together to take the Lord’s Supper. No outsiders permitted in that communion. (John 13th Chapter). (4) Standing steadfast for STRICT discipline. (5) The INDEPENDENCE of’ each local Church body, free from all interference FROM OUTSIDE THE LOCAL BODY. (6) Religious freedom and complete separation of Church and state. (7) Ministers of the Early Church received no salary, but received voluntary help from their people when needed. (8) The sending out of a divinely qualified and called ministry by the Holy Ghost to preach the gospel to every creature, and especially to the “sheep.” (John 21:16; Mark 16:15, 20).
Elder Novation held firmly to these landmarks. Soon after Cornelius and his followers were left behind, out in the world, he (Cornelius ) began to organize a “religious” movement that in time became known as the “Universal Church,” and later became known as the “Catholic Church.” The Catholic Church, therefore is about 300 years too young to be the Church that Jesus set up. Yet on this false offshoot, calling itself “the church,” hangs the hope of all protestant so-called churches! Truly the Catholic Church is “the mother church “— THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS.” (Rev. 17:5).
We have traced the footsteps of the Baptist Church from the time John the Baptist baptized Jesus down into the third century. We have seen it purge itself of the Cornelius disorder, and out of the DROSS of this purge, we have seen the Catholic Church arise, boasting that she is “no widow.” (Rev. 18:7).
THE WOMAN IN SCARLET
Seventy-three years after the Baptists withdrew from Cornelius we see his followers meeting in the Council of Nice. This political machine calling itself “the Church” was reaching for power.
Constantine the Roman ruler became a Catholic: claiming a miraculous vision from above had directed him, but in reality he also was prompted by an ambition for power. This made a bad combination–a mixture of religion and politics!
This Council branded the Novation Baptists as “heretics.”
The Baptists fled for their lives. The Church was “given two wings of a great eagle” and flew away to the wilderness. (Rev. 12:14). The great tribulation was now on God’s people.
Backed by Constantine and full political power, the Catholics were determined to wipe the Baptists Church from the face of the earth.
On every hand the enemies of the church were training soldiers to kill Baptists. For centuries he people of earth heard the drum beat and the tramp, tramp, tramp of armies sent out on this awful mission.
Out of the Council of Nice we see the gowdy woman (Catholic Church), of Revelation 17th chapter, come riding on her “scarlet colored beast.”
She is decked in “purple and scarlet” and her flashy jewels mark her as an unclean woman from the brothels of the religious underworld. We see the “kings of the earth” committing fornication with her. She is, in a spiritual sense, to become the mother of harlots. In the years ahead the world will call her “the mother church!”
As the years passed Catholic persecution of Baptist became more brutal. Fires were kindled to burn “heretics” alive. The false woman was bent on destroying the Bride.
The terrible beast of Dan. 7:7, 25 and of Rev. 13:1 are figures of the Catholic Church.
That old Church is also spoken of, figuratively, as we have seen, as a BAD WOMAN. In Revelation we see her come strutting across the world, speaking “great words against the most High,” claiming the right to “change times and laws. ”
From its very beginning the Catholic Church began to introduce NEW THINGS into its worship. It soon adopted much of paganism, and began to claim the right to dictate to mankind in matters of religion.
In the year 397 the Council of Carthage met and the institution of “monkery” was ordained.
That was the beginning of the idea that Jesus must have help to save souls. The monks denied themselves sufficient food, drink and clothing. They loaded themselves with grievous burdens, and did many other foolish things to “help Jesus” save souls.
It is said that they would sometimes sit on the tops of posts by the roadside for hours, in self-inflicted torture to ADVERTISE their saintly intentions! They thought this would insure their salvation after death.
According to this, Jesus did not finish the work of saving his people (Matt. 1:21) when he died on the cross. It takes aa little more work, a little more suffering by priests, preachers and lay members to finish the job Christ started!
The big idea among false religions is that some one must “throw out the life line” and “bring in the sheaves” or Jesus will fail! If that theory is correct, then a monk sitting on a fence post may not be so foolish after all.
Up to this time there had never been a Pope. It was in the 6th century that the Catholic Church introduced popery.
It was back in the 4th century that Catholics “thought to change” the Christian mode of baptism and began to “sprinkle” or “pour” for baptism. Their priests had begun preaching that people must be baptized in order to be saved. They taught that both infants and adults must be baptized WITH WATER or hell would be their doom.
This was a NEW theology. It originated in the Catholic Church.
In the standard Catholic book, “The Faith of Our Fathers,” page 21, we read: “Our soul is bathed in the precious blood of Jesus Christ at the fount of Baptism, from which we come forth new creatures * * *.” “We are then and there incorporated with Christ, becoming bone of His bone and flesh of His flesh.”
Before the 4th century, only “BELIEVERS” were baptized. Infants can’t believe, hence no one thought of baptizing them. Besides this, immersion could not very well be practiced with infants.
The one main aim with Catholics, and all others who sprinkle or pour, is to get the babies tied with their churches before these infants develop minds to think and act for themselves. It is a clear case of intolerant religious fraud to handicap the child for life. Immersion is the Christian mode of baptism, “sprinkling” is the Catholic mode.
“Saint Augustine introduced the idea that owing to Adam’s original sin infants must be baptized to save them from some kind of hell— maybe a milder hell than the one for sinful adults.”— Encvclopedia Britanica.
Roman Catholics also hold that no one can be saved outside the Catholic Church, and that he who receives baptism, even if it be in the circles of “heretics,” is “incorporated into the community of Jesus by uniting with the Catholic Church.” This union will save him without rebaptism!
Pope Gregory originated the doctrine of purgatory. It is not found in the Bible, but is merely a Catholic scheme to prey upon the friends and relatives of the dead. It brings in the jingling coin you know!
Among Catholic inventions are: the use of “holy oil,” the celebration of Lent, praying to inanimate things, obedience to the pope, the use of relics and images in worship and the worship of the Virgin Mary.
The modern system of tithing is also of Catholic origin.
The Encyclopedia Britannica says: “Tithing is a Roman Catholic way for getting money for the church.”
Pope Gregory originated the plan of “missions to carry the gospel to the heathen. He sent Augustine and others on a mission to save the “heathen Saxons” in England. These were the first missionaries that were ever sent out by any religion to save souls. This was in the 6th century. (See New American Encyclopedia., page 603.)
From this spiritual “missionary” ragweed the foul system of foreign missions has budded and blossomed until today all Protestant denominations, and the majority of Baptist denominations, have adopted it.
In the Council of Ravenna, A. D. 1311, the Catholics first legalized sprinkling for baptism. They had been practicing this “mode” for centuries before this, but this Council put the final O. K. on the practice.
Catholics were first to use the organ in church.
In the 4th century, by edict, Constantine set apart Sunday, the FIRST day of the week as the day for rest and worship. He dropped the SABBATH the SEVENTH day of the week, and demanded that the people keep the FIRST day, “the day of the sun.”
This change was made to please the heathen sun worshipers, and to draw them into the Catholic Church.
Catholic priests were the first to draw a salary for preaching. The “collection plate” is also a Catholic invention. This “plate” is shoved up under your nose in all Protestant churches, and in most “Baptist” churches today.
“Good Saint Nicholas’ was a Catholic bishop. We call him “Santa Claus” today. He is the guy who puts candy in the kiddies socks ! He drives his reindeer right down the chimney! Rome winks and says, “All the world is following us!”
The “man in the moon” is doomed to stay up there in that “cold, dead country” because he dared to “burn brush on Sunday,” after Constantine had made a “holy day” out of the first day of the week!
But this old fake “church” has two many feast days, fast days and other tomfoolery to tell it all here. It would fill a big book.
Right here I will call your attention to the fact that the true gospel was first preached in China, by the Baptists, in the 7th century. This was a long time before Protestantism was born.
The Catholics have been sending their missionaries to China only a little more than 300 years.
The true gospel was “carried to China by Baptists” and not by Catholics “Faiths Men Live By,” page 5.
These early Baptist preachers who went out from the Novation communities, hid away in the mountains in the 7th century, are in no way to be classed with the modern missionary who draws a big salary, dresses well, rides in a good car, and dines at a table loaded down with good things to eat.
The traveling evangelists of the early Baptist Church, like the Methodist “circuit riders” of the early days of our own country, were often poorly clad and hungry. They walked or rode burros over mountains and across valleys, deserts and plains; often suffering with hunger, cold or heat. They drew no salary but went as common laborers, peddlers or some other occupation, preaching whenever an opportunity presented itself. Like Paul, who made tents, every one of these early preachers had an occupation and WORKED WITH HIS HANDS. In this way they went to China and many other countries, and preached the gospel.
There is no doubt that it is the duty of every local church to see that its pastor has the material needs for himself and his family (Read 1 Cor. 9th. Chapter) and see that traveling preachers are not sent away empty-handed, hungry and ill clad. But preachers should not LIVE IN IDLENESS AND ABUSE THE “THINGS” THAT PAUL NEVER “USED.” (1 Cor. 9:15).
Paul is a fine example for all preachers to pattern after but, by no stretch of the human imagination, can he be classed as a “missionary” in the sense that Sunday School literature teaches it.
A LONG DARK NIGHT
We are now entering the ninth century, stepping out into the time that is known as the Dark Ages. Ignorance and superstition, the fruits of Catholicism, have sunk mankind into midnight darkness.
The Catholic Church had supreme political power. Its intolerance was choking Christianity. The old hag on the “scarlet colored beast” was riding down the pathway in rage, applying the sword, the torch, the headsman’s axe, the faggot, the rack and the gibbet to “heretics.”
The Baptists were the “heretics” they were after. Baptists were forced to flee and hide in caves, deserts, forests and mountains. Yet, through all this awful time, the Baptists did not “forsake assembling themselves together.” They met in caves, isolated mountain glens and in hiding places in the deep forests to worship God. They preached and held PRAYER MEETINGS at least once every week. No earthly obstacle could prevent them from assembling for worship.
Beginning with the flight of the Church into the wilderness, and lasting through the 16th century, it was a common thing for Baptist ministers to be shut up in filthy dungeons, or to be beheaded or burned alive.
These martyrs marched boldly to the stake and died in the flames with songs of praise on their lips. Thousands of Baptists, almost every year, gave up their lives rather than deny their faith in Jesus.
“And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus. (Rev. 17:6).
At least 100,000 Baptists were tortured to death by Catholics in the year 845.
The 10th century dawned behind a cloud. The earth was wrapped in a black shroud of ignorance and gloom. The rule of the popes had crushed almost every scintilla of human hope. Tolerance, justice and mercy were crushed beneath the heel of government everywhere.
The Catholic Church abolished schools to keep mankind in ignorance and superstition. Only the monks and priests were permitted to learn to read and write. The common people were degraded, drunken and cruel, almost to the level of the beast.
No artist’s brush, no pen can paint or discribe the 10th century as black as it really was.
Under the pretense of needing money to “save souls,” the priests held out their hands continually, begging for money to send missionaries to foreign fields.
The climax of Roman Catholic greed for money came when some church leaders set a date for the world to come to an end. This frightened the ignorant people, rich and poor alike. Multitudes of men and women donated all their property to the Catholic Church to get the priests to pardon their sins.
The date for the end was set just right to contact a total eclipse of the sun. The eclipse darkened the sun and the people quaked with fear. Stricken with terror they fled and hid among rocks, in caves and ravines, expecting a trumpet to announce the end of time.
For months before this the priests were busy COLLECTING MONEY and “forgiving” sins!
In the 11th century Pope Gregory VII ascended the papal throne. In defiance of the authority of King Henry IV, Gregory excommunicated the King, compelling him to stand barefooted three days and nights and in a January snow. This humbled the King and he begged pardon of the Pope, swearing to be “obedient in all things” to the will of the Pope in the future.
The church that invented purgatory was now in full political power and collecting TITHES and selling INDULGENCES.
THE BAPTIST CHURCH MARCHES ON
In the year 622 the false prophet, Mohammed, came out of Arabia with the Koran for his Bible. He was backed by an army which got possession of Jerusalem. This angered the Catholics.
Beginning in the 11th century the Popes waged SEVEN CRUSADES against the Mohammedans, trying to wrest Jerusalem from them. These “holy crusades” lasted 300 years, and more than 3,000,000 men lost their lives in these wars.
During these wars the Baptists were, as it were, between two fires; both Mohammedans and Catholics killed every Baptist leader they could get their hands on.
In the thirteenth century the Baptist were known as Waldenses, or Waldensian Baptists.
Down through the centuries the Baptist Church had come, stepping, stepping, ever onward; through dangers, seen and unseen, through joy and sorrow, through sunshine and shadow ever trusting in Jesus, ever leaning on his arm.
Earthly kingdoms rose and fell, forgotten Empires blossomed into fleeting glory, then vanished like a bursting bubble, but the kingdom of God, the Baptist Church, went marching on.
This “little flock” (Luke 12:32) of Waldenses rejected, defiantly, all the false doctrines of Catholicism, declaring (A.D.1120):”We firmly believe that there is no other MEDIATOR, or advocate with God the father, but Jesus Christ.”
The Catholics were enraged by the above declaration, because it left the pope and the priest entirely out of the plan of salvation.
The Waldenses trace back, connecting with the Novation Baptist that withdrew from those of LOOSE DISCIPLINE, A. D. 252. Both were called ana-Baptist because they REBAPTIZED all who came to them from the Catholics. Both practiced immersion and rejected, sprinkling for baptism.
Archer, the historian, says: “Baptist are remotely apostolic, for BAPTISM BY IMMERSION was doubtless the practice of the EARLY CHURCH. They were heirs of ana-Baptist (the rebaptizers). They were classed as heretics by both Catholics and Protestants,” Faiths Men Live By, page 423.
Archer also says: “The Baptists were persecuted, driven from one country to another, and were later known as Mennonites” Page 422. On page 423 he says: “Baptists held that faith must precede baptism,” and they opposed infant baptism.
Continuing, Archer says, Baptist hold to “close communion and insist on complete separation of Church and State.”
Myers in his school text book, says: “The Catholic is the original church.” Then follows with the very significant statement: “From the earliest times there were also OTHER Christians called Waldenses” hiding away from persecution.
A noted Catholic inquisitor once said: “The Waldensian heresy is the OLDEST heresy in the world.”
In saying that this Catholic unintentionally linked the Waldenses with the Novations. Thus out of the enemies mouth we are able to prove that Baptists trace back to the Novations who withdrew from the DISORDER from which Catholicism came A. D. 252, thereby proving that the Baptist is the original Church in New Testament times.
In the 12th century Elder Peter Bruys preached Baptist doctrine and, for this was burned alive by Catholics.
Walter Lollard came from Germany to England in 1315, preaching Baptist doctrine. About the same time John Wycliffe became a great Baptist preacher. Then the enemy began to call the Baptists, Lollards and Wycliffes.
In 1382, Wycliffe gave the world the first Bible in the English language. The woman on the scarlet beast shrieked with rage.
Many of these Bibles were piled up in the streets of London and publicly burned.
Catholic fury against Wycliffe was so rabid that after his death and burial they dug up his bones and burned them.
In Italy the Novations began to be called Baptists as early as the 3rd century. In other countries including France and England, they were at different times known as: Donatists, Waldeneses, Henricans, Puritans, Albigenses, Lollards, Hussites, Paulicans, Huguenots, Mennonites, Wycliffites. All of these were called Ana-Baptists, because they rebaptized all who came to them from other so-called churches. These all rejected sprinkling and practiced immersion for baptism.
The Huguenots were in France. “In the massacre of 1572, 50,000 Huguenots were killed”— New American Encyclopedia.
One historian tells us that a bell tolling at midnight was the signal for the beginning of this massacre of Huguenots. Men, women and children were dragged from their beds and murdered in cold blood, till blood ran in the gutters.
Pope Gregory XIII received the news of the fate of these Huguenots with unbounded joy.
During the seven “holy” crusades Catholics waged against Mohammedans, the Baptist were. between two fires, both Mohammedans and Catholics were killing Baptists.
For centuries, under Catholic rule, ignorance, cruelty, murder stalked the world like the shadow of a grinning skeleton. Civilization became extinct everywhere except in the circles of Baptist communities, hid away in the forests.
Under Catholic influence 500,000 women, branded by public opinion as “witches” were burned alive in Europe in the 13th and 14th centuries.
If –a1l these unfortunate (and innocent) women who were sacrificed to the cruel god of ignorance were alive today and marching in single file, it would be a ghostly procession nearly 300 miles long.
The Baptists never burned a “witch” nor a”heretic.”
The Baptist Church, beset on every hand by deadly foes, lived on through the Dark Ages. She carried the lamp that sent forth the light that kept civilization alive. Jesus walked by her side and led her through the gloom, onward, ever onward.
From her hiding places in the wilderness the Bride (Baptist Church) held up the light, the gleaming moral and spiritual light, that “shineth in the darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.”
THE UNBROKEN CHAIN
We have now reached the 15th century. Looking back we see the wonderful chain of Baptist Church succession reaching backward across the centuries behind, without a broken link, clear back to Apostolic times— even to the banks of the Jordan, where John THE BAPTIST IMMERSED JESUS.
We will now go forward, following the footsteps of the Bride as she journeys into the future. As in the past, we must trace her footsteps by her Bible doctrine of salvation by free and unmerited grace from the hand of God as a GIFT, by her doctrine of the final perseverance of the saints, by her refusing to commune, or fellowship, with all other religions, by her holding to immersion as the ONLY CORRECT mode of baptism, and refusing the baptism of all other so-called churches, and by her STRICT DISCIPLINE: as taught and practiced by the Apostolic Church.
We may also trace her footsteps by the blood of the martyrs, and by her clinging to the Bible as a thorough furnisher, the only correct guide for good works, and the doctrine of God’s salvation of His people without human help.
Jesus foretold that the world would hate his church. This hatred by a wicked world has followed her all the way.
We may also TRACE HER BY THAT HATRED.
A law was passed in the 15th century making it legal to hunt Baptists down and kill them.
For centuries a colony of Baptists had been hiding away in the valley Piedmont along the border of France. This little colony was living in peace, for away from the prying eyes of priests and popes. It seemed the world had forgotten them. Perhaps they hoped it had forgotten.
The Catholic powers had been so busy killing Mohammedans, burning “witches” and Baptists in other parts of the world that perhaps they had overlooked these Waldensian Baptists living in rural happiness at the foot of the Alps. But suddenly, unexpectedly, the “beast with seven heads and ten horns” leaped upon its prey with the fierceness of a great tiger cat.
It was mid winter, when a deep snow was on the ground, when the attack was made. These Baptists fled to the mountains, leaving all their possessions behind.
Hundreds of men, women and children were frozen to death in the flight. The Catholics plundered and burned their homes.
This persecution commenced in the beginning of the 14th century and lasted more than 200 years.
In 1408 England passed a law against Lollards (Baptists) preaching, and commenced destroying Wycliffe’s Bible. Thousands of Baptists fled, carrying their Bibles with them. This persecution lasted down into the 16th century.
Then the whole world began to revolt against the WOMAN IN SCARLET. It was sick of her atrocities. A revolution was also forming within the Catholic Church.
THE PROTESTANT BEAST
“And I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth; and he had two horns like a lamb, and he spake as a dragon.
“And he exerciseth all the power of the first beast before him.” (Rev. 13: 11, 12).
Continuing the description of this two-horned beast in verses 16, 17: “And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond to receive a mark in their right hand or in their foreheads; and that no man might buy, or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast or the number of his name.”
This second beast, that John saw, looked lamb-like, innocent, but he had the voice and spirit of a devil. He was a fraud, a deceiver, and his mission was to persuade men and women to “make an image to the (first) beast” and worship it. (Rev. 13:14).
Remember the mission of the two-horned beast was to make an image to and worship the 10 horned beast— that is to persuade or force, men and women to worship the last named beast.
Watch now for we are close on the trail of a new false religion. The old “Mother of Harlots” (Catholic Church) is now in TRAVAIL and her first two daughters (twins) will soon be born!
Here again I wish to remind you that the Catholic Church is regarded by some historians as “the mother church” and Revelation calls her “the mother of harlots.” (Rev. 17:5).
This is making it plain about the character of the Protestant churches. They are spiritual harlots. They came from Catholicism.
We must remember too that a fountain can not rise above its head, and that we can not drink pure water out of a polluted spring.
A revolt had been brewing WITHIN the Catholic Church for centuries. This underground revolt burst forth in open rebellion in the 16th century. Martin Luther and John Calvin came in the Catholic Church as “reformers.”
These two men knew almost nothing of the Baptist Church. They had been taught that Baptists were “heretics.”
Environment and tradition had taught Calvin and Luther, from their infancy, that the Catholic Church was the “bride of Christ.” They became convinced (each for himself and of different countries) that the “bride” had become corrupt, low in morals, and so unfaithful in general, that it was TIME FOR JESUS TO DIVORCE HER if she didn’t soon change her ways!
These two men (Calvin, a Frenchman and Luther, a German) set out to reform the “bride!” Dear readers, is that your idea about the Church? Do you think that the Bride of Jesus ever became so unfaithful to her husband that she strayed away into the brothels of a low, dark, filthy, ungodly-spiritual back alley: way down into the slums and foul dens of the devil’s “red light district” and so needed Calvin and Luther to “reform” her! To me that is an awful thought.
But Luther and Calvin believed that very thing. Millions of people from that time to this have believed the same.
These people are blindly sincere, but sincerity don’t make truth. The heathen mothers that used to worship at the religious shrine that required them to feed their babies to hungry crocodiles were SINCERE. The worshipers of stone idols are SINCERE.
Blind to the truth, but in all SINCERITY, Luther and Calvin set to work to pull the church out of the slimy gutter and “reform” her!
Presbyterianism was introduced by Calvin, in the year 1523, in Zurich, capital of Switzerland. From this so-called church came the Calvinistic Methodists in the 18th century, near kin to these is the United Free Church of Scotland.
Martin Luther did all his work within the Catholic Church, trying to reform her. His “Order of Divine Worship” was introduced in many Catholic Churches in different parts of Europe in 1526. Attempts at other reforms were also put forward by Luther but rabidly rejected by the Romish Church.
Some of Luther’s closely connected followers organized the Lutheran Church later. Lutheranism soon became popular in Scotland and Sweden and, of course, in Germany.
Thus the Presbyterian Church and the Lutheran were born— the first two daughters of the “mother of harlots.”
These first two Protestant daughters of Rome conformed in many ways to the manner of worship in the Catholic Church. They made “an image,” a picture, a likeness, a counterpart, a duplicate; something very nearly like the doctrine the BAPTISM and practice of Catholicism.
These two “daughters” inherited all the traditions, superstitions and INTOLERANCE of their mother. They were, and are, images of her. The Catholic uses the priest and the missionary as mediators between Christ and the sinner, and collects vast sums of money to help Jesus “save souls;” the Protestants use the preacher, the missionary and collect vast sums of money to help Jesus “save souls.”
Following in the foot prints of THEIR OLD MOTHER, Protestants, sprinkle or pour for baptism; and then continually reach out their “right hands” for “tithes”— it’s money, more money, all the time— money to “help” Jesus!
Here we have the TWO IDENTIFYING “Marks” of the BEAST. (Rev. 13:14,15,16,17)
John Calvin the father of Presbyterianism preached FATALISM; that God predestinated every act (good or bad) of man. Then contradicted his own theory by having Michael Servetus burned alive as a”heretic.” Calvin brought this spirit of INTOLERANCE with him out of Catholicism.
In the 16th century James Harmenson, a Dutch reformer, came preaching Arminianism in opposition to Calvin’s theory of absolute predestination of all things.
About this time the freak religious belief, known as ANTINOMIANISM, appeared. It taught that Christians are free from all obligations to obey the moral law.
There seems to have been no particular founder for this belief. It existed perhaps only in the minds of certain individuals who may have been in communion with various “religious” bodies.
Fatalism, Arminianism, and antinomianism certainly played no part in the true Baptist faith, but individuals in the Baptist Church may have been tainted with “beliefs,” more or less, in line with one or all of these three “ISMS.”
The enemies of the true Church, of course, accused it of standing for all the bad things that appeared.
In justice to modern Presbyterianism, I will say the Cumberlands withdrew from the harsh theory of original Calvinism.
Fatalism is no longer the creed of Presbyterians. The birth of Protestantism was merely an event in the unfolding history, fulfilling Revelation. It WAS NOT THE CHURCH.
The true Church was still hiding in far away mountains and deserts from Catholic persecution.
Protestantism came out of the Catholic Church 16 hundred years too late to be called Christian; the Catholic Church, as we have seen, was born outside the Church of God, from a collection of worldly minded people who were excluded from the true Church, about 252 years after Christ.
Today (1947) Protestantism has many daughters and granddaughters, all posing as “the Church,” or “a part of the church. ”
With the advent of Protestantism we enter the period of time that Isaiah had in mind when he said: “And in that day seven women shall take hold of one man, saying, We will eat our own bread, and wear our own apparel, only let us be called by thy name, to take away our reproach.” (Isa. 4:1).
The strumpet churches of Protestantism are all reaching frantically for the garments of Christ to take away their shame, but they can never take hold of him— they can never be the Bride.
The Protestant religion became the state religion in England in 1592. Germany also threw off the Catholic yoke during this reformation. Here we have the TWO Protestant powers; the two-horned beast of Revelation. It appeared lamb-like but proved to be a furious intolerant beast.
All students of prophecy and Revelation are agreed that “horn” in connection with these “beasts” refers to a POWER, or GOVERNMENT of a country. The two horns on the dragon-voiced beast evidently represents England and Germany, for it was in these two countries that Protestantism first became the ruling power. When this beast first appeared in these countries it appeared harmless as a lamb.
Baptists in other parts of the world, suffering persecution, looked with hope on the new order that seemed to offer a rest from persecution. They felt that they would have freedom in the two countries. It must have been a great day, in the minds of Baptists, as multitudes of them began to emigrate to these lands of Protestantism. But they were doomed to disappointment, especially in England.
The beast snorted with rage when he saw Baptists worshiping in his realm. Then he began to “speak like a dragon.”
Backed by the king, Protestants passed a law in England to STOP BAPTISM BY IMMERSION, making “sprinkling” the LEGAL mode!
Death by drowning was the penalty for being an Ana-Baptist, or for refusing to accept Catholic or Protestant baptism. Many Baptists were drowned every year. In 100 years 70,000 Baptists were put to death in England for refusing to allow their children to be sprinkled.
THE MARK OF THE BEAST
The two-horned beast was now in possession of the English government and was “exercising all the power of the first beast before him.” He demanded that Baptists receive the “mark”— that is accept sprinkling!
All the way down through the past Baptists had contended for baptism as John the Baptist and Jesus taught and practiced it. The “mode” of baptism had been a battle ground between Baptists and Catholics since the Council of Ravenna, A. D. 1311.
In the early days of the Catholic Church, in administering baptism, each candidate for baptism was required to answer the three-fold question; Did he believe in the Father, Son and Holy Ghost? With the prescribed formula, he was submerged at each confession. The VICTIM (Matt. 23:15) was, therefore, submerged three times in baptism and then, immediately, anointed with “holy oil” (Chisma) on the FOREHEAD.
That old church continued the use of “holy oil” when it changed from immersion to sprinkling.
The definition of “chisms” is: “A sacred oil blessed by the priest and used in other sacred rites
Note that the holy oil is applied to the “FOREHEAD!” To refresh your memory, I repeat: “And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their FOREHEAD; and that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. (Rev. 13: 16).
The “mark of the beast” is not a political mark, but a RELIGIOUS mark. This must be plain to the reader. But some have preposterously supposed that the “blue eagle” of New Deal fame is this mark.
Baptists continued to practice immersion for baptism in spite of the Protestant law forbidding it in England. Like the ancient Waldenses, they also condemned the use of “holy oil. ”
No true Baptist ever permitted himself, nor his children, to receive the Catholic “MARK” of sprinkling for baptism, though the TWO PROTESTANT POWERS kept demanding it.
Because of this refusal to “receive the mark,” Baptists did not dare to go into the market places in London, and other cities, to “buy or sell.” Do you see?
Baptists should rejoice over the fact that 70,000 of our spiritual brethren and sisters STOOD FIRM AND SUFFERED DEATH rather than accept the Catholic form of sprinkling for baptism.
The law to force sprinkling on Baptists caused many to apostatize. For personal safety they compromised with SATAN and permitted their children to be sprinkled.
Of course, the “wrath of God” was poured out on these deserters. (Rev. 14:9, 10). The true worshipers withdrew fellowship from them. They saved their lives but carried a bad conscience the balance of their days, as the “wine of the wrath of God” pointed to the “mark of the beast” on them and their children.
Revelation 14:9, 10 does not apply to those unfortunate people who receive the “mark” because they are blinded with tradition and know no better than to accept sprinkling for baptism.
Even John Bunyan, the writer of “Pilgrim’s Progress, weakened, but the great body of Baptists stood firm, refusing, to take the mark. Bunyan consented to sprinkling children; King Henry II (in the 13th century) ordered that Baptists be branded on the forehead with red hot irons.
Both Catholicism and Protestantism failed to destroy the Baptist Church.
BEGINNING OF RELIGIOUS FREEDOM
Today both Catholic and Protestant are claiming all the honor for the freedom of the nineteenth century.
Well, let’s not forget the kind of “FREEDOM” mankind had in the gloom of all the centuries of the Dark Ages when Catholics held all earthly power! Then remember the FREEDOM Baptists had in Germany and England under Presbyterian and Lutheran rule !
Some try to offer the excuse that the intolerance, superstition and ignorance of the DARK TIMES of the history behind us were only “in keeping with the times” in which the people back there were living. They forget that Catholic and Protestant rule and environment created those times.
Speaking of the persecution waged against Albigenses and Waldensian Baptists by Catholics, H. G. Wells (Outlines of History P. 686) tells us that Innocent III permitted the enlistment of “every wandering scoundrel” to carry fire and sword and rape and every conceivable outrage among the most peaceful subjects of the King of France.
Catholicism is responsible for the cruelty and intolerance of early Protestantism, for it came up out of Catholic environment. Such men as Calvin grew up under Catholic influence, were educated in Catholic schools and knew nothing of the true Christian Church. The world was sunk deep in the bogs of ignorance, superstition and cruel intolerance when Protestantism came.
But Baptists, way out in frontier communities, were free from all this bad environment. They (each community) had a little WORLD OF ITS OWN, where freedom and education was encouraged; and, above all else, they had the Bible. The Bible furnished their DOCTRINE, RULES OF CHURCH GOVERNMENT, and blazed the path for the every day walks of life. The Bible furnishes everything we need for the moral, spiritual and, hence, the civilization of mankind (2 Tim. 3:14, 15, 16, 17). The Baptists carried the Bible through the fires that Catholics kindled to burn “heretics” in the dark, sad years behind us— today the Bible is OUR BOOK.
Early in the 17th century a small assembly of Baptists declared: “The magistrate is not to meddle with religion, or matters of conscience, nor compel men to do this or that, form of religion.”
This was the first declaration of religious freedom in all the ages of the world, according to Encyclopedia Britanica, Vol. 3.
This declaration of liberty, the first glint of budding democracy, startled the entire Catholic and Protestant world. It was like waving a red rag at a mad bull.
Those brave Baptists, pioneers of freedom, laid the foundation on which our United States Government has been built. Patrick Henry was catching the echo of that Baptist declaration when he shouted: “Give me liberty or give me death.”
The Baptist Church is the kingdom that is “not of this world.” It is in the world but the world has never understood the Church. This kingdom is the place for God’s people to meet in fellowship and communion.
Baptists must keep Church and state separated. But to be good citizens in a democracy, we MUST VOTE. We must each vote as an individual and not as a combined body of church people. We must not allow church leaders to dictate to us at the ballot box. Too much of this has been done in the past.
It is the right of every free man to choose political affiliations for himself— do his own thinking.
It was the political machine within the Catholic Church that brought on the Dark Ages. That church reaches out for power in all lands. It hates democracy.
Catholic missionaries have ever been emissaries sent out by the church, when possible through the state, to gain political power. Catholic soldiers have often been sent out on “holy crusades” against peoples of the earth to force them to bow in submission to the Pope.
Everywhere that Catholic power controls, mankind is degraded, freedom perishes and ignorance reigns.
Catholic missionaries found so much gold in Peru, in the Spanish invasion under Pizarro in 1553, that they forgot their mission to “save souls.” Overcome by covetousness, avarice and greed, they began to plunder, rob and steal.
The ‘remains of the pyramids and temples of that dead civilization of the Incas stand today as mute evidence of a proud people who were murdered for the love of gold and the enrichment of Rome.
In Peru there was not a hungry or ill clad man, woman or child. The government was a benevolent despotism. All worked and all lived from a common store house.
The blight of Rome is in evidence all over South and Central America, Old Mexico, and the South West of the U. S.
Catholic priests and missionaries have moulded the lives, of the native. Look at the common class of Mexicans in Mexico, and the southwest part of the United States, and see the miserable specimens of men who have grown up under Catholic teaching! They are the exact kind of people that the priests want, because they can use them for slaves and lackeys.
This is a dark but true picture of men and women whose lives have been cast in the shadow of Catholicism.
The hills and valleys and mountains of New Mexico, Arizona and California, are beautiful beyond description, but the Catholic cross is seen on every hand, and that gives intelligent people a”creepy” feeling, close kin to the midnight shadows of the Dark Ages. You may find children there who “have seen the bones of Jesus” in a certain old church!
The Catholic “missionaries” were SENT BY THE CHURCH into new territory to teach their false religion and get more political power. Power was the main thing the popes were continually seeking.
They claimed the divine right to make any changes in religious worship that suited their purpose.
A monarchal government, with the pope as dictator over the monarch, is the Catholic ideal. This has been the Catholic ideal from the days of Constantine to the present time.
In democracies Catholics may give lip-service to freedom, but at heart they are for the pope as spiritual rulers of the world; and popes have always been for RULERS LIKE Mussolini, Franco and Hitler.
These three rulers were Catholics and, through them the Catholic Church hoped to crush all democratic governments and become the ruling power of all the world again. The outcome of World War II, crushed this Catholic hope.
The Catholic priest IS SENT BY THE CHURCH to preach in foreign fields. The Baptist preacher IS SENT BY THE DIRECTION OF THE SPIRIT OF GOD to preach the true gospel. The Protestants claim a “divine call” for their ministry, but THE CHURCH SENDS the missionary out to work.
“The Angel of the Lord spake unto Philip (a Baptist preacher), saying, “Arise and GO toward the south unto the way that goeth down from Jerusalem unto Gaza, which is desert.” (Acts 8:26).
Read all of the 8th chaper of Acts and learn what this Baptist preacher did when God was directing him.
You will note that both Philip and the eunuch went down “into the water.” (Acts 8:38).
This scene of scriptural baptism was about 300 years before Catholics began to sprinkle for baptism, and nearly 16 centuries before the protestant powers made sprinkling the LEGAL way to baptize in England.
THE DAWN OF A NEW DAY
Leaving the persecution in Europe, we will now follow the Baptist Church into a new world— the wilderness of America! Fleeing from religious persecution, Baptists came to this country.
There were a few Baptists on the Mayflower. A tradition handed down to the descendants of one of these Baptists has it that they communed and WASHED EACH OTHER’S FEET while on board the Mayflower.
While attending a Missionary Baptist Association in New Mexico a Brother Koger told me of this tradition in his family. He said they “communed and washed feet on board the ship just before they landed on the New England shores.” But the writers of our school text books are extremely careful to hide this fact.
In the beginning there were a few Baptists in all the New England Colonies, but they were denied equal rights with others in religion. The Church of England had full power, backed by the King of England. Those of that faith were rabidly intolerant toward all others. They even persecuted Catholics.
All over Europe at that time Protestants were persecuting Catholics. Catholicism was now reaping what it had sown in the years behind. Quakers were also being persecuted.
In the New England colonies Catholics, Quakers and Baptists were forced by law to support Protestant preachers. But at heart, Catholics were as intolerant as ever. Here the Catholic Church submitted to Protestant rule, it was like a snarling beast, in an iron cage. Protestantism and state were united now.
To avoid persecution the Catholics settled in Maryland. They wanted freedom of religious worship, FOR THEMSELVES, not for others.
As I write this, I have a school text book before me, a “history” of our country. It holds the Maryland colony up to our school children as a shining example of Catholic tolerance in religion. It tells them that people of all faiths were welcome to settle in Maryland, which proves that sometimes a HALF TRUTH IS WORSE THAN A DELIBERATE LIE.
It is true that Maryland did tolerate other religions— but why? Was it because Catholic’s loved freedom for everybody? Not at all. It was because Lord Baltimore, the founder of the colony, wanted money. Sweet, the historian, tells us: “Lord Baltimore granted religious tolerance in Maryland to sell land to Protestants— a purely business proposition for money.” — Religions In America.
There we have the truth, plain and blunt ! There were not enough Catholics to buy all the land; so, “FOR MONEY,” Baltimore sold land to Protestants and permitted them to settle in this Catholic colony.
The Catholic Church, nor the Catholic people, did not grant religious freednm in Maryland; Lord Baltimore granted this “tolerance,” FOR MONEY.
But our school children today are being duped by the LIE that Catholics were the vanguard, the watch dogs, for freedom of religion in America!
In the Virginia colony, from 1620 to 1625, the Church of England was fining Baptists for not allowing their children to be sprinkled.
In 1651, Elder Holmes, a leading Baptist minister, was publicly whipped with a “cat-o-nine-tails” in the City of Boston, Massachusetts, for preaching Baptist doctrine. Those “liberty loving” old Protestants gave him 39 lashes with that “religious” weapon: He was so severely beaten that he could not stand up, nor sit, nor lie down. For weeks, his only rest was on his knees and elbows.
Those “Pilgrim Fathers,” of colonial fame, came to America for FREEDOM for THEMSELVES, not for Baptists.
The Baptists in Massachusetts colony were banished for not having their children sprinkled. Elders John Myles and James s Brown were fined in 1667, for preaching Baptist doctrine without the consent of the court.
In 1665 Baptists were ordered not assemble for worship, because of their opposition to infant baptism. They often assembled secretly.
The Baptists built a church house in Boston in 1678, and officers nailed up the doors and fobade them to preach.
Up to 1728, Baptists were taxed to help support those “liberal” old Protestant preachers in Massachusetts. Nearing the end of the 18th century much of this persecution ceased.
THE CRADLE OF LIBERTY
Rhode Island was the cradle of religious freedom. Baptists rocked that cradle. Above all other people, Baptists should be tolerant, and democratic.
In mid winter, when a deep snow was on the ground, Roger Williams was banished from Massachusetts, because of his liberal opinions. Suffering many hardships he made his way to Rhode Island. He had heard that a few settlers had fled from persecution in Massachusetts and established a community in that wild, new country and were practicing religious tolerance.
The main charge the authorities in Boston had against Roger Williams was that he was a Baptist. They had no evidence to prove this charge. He was not a Baptist.
Roger Williams arrived in Rhode Island in 1639. Elder John Clark was living at Newport, Rhode Island when Williams came to that country, and had already organized THE FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH IN AMERICA, at Newport, in 1638. Keep these dates in mind; 1638 and 1639.
Elder John Clark had organized the FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH IN AMERICA in Rhode Island, ONE YEAR BEFORE Roger Williams came to that country.
Our children are taught in school that Roger Williams organized the first Baptist Church in America at Providence Rhode Island! The truth is that Roger William was never a Baptist. The true Baptist Church has never recognized him as a Baptist.
Mr. Sweet, in his book, “Religions In America,” says: “To term Roger Williams as founder (or his church as mother of Baptist Churches) is historically incorrect. The part Williams played in Baptist history is EXTREMELY SMALL.”
Roger Williams knew that the Baptists were the people who stood for “peace on earth, good will,” and for religious freedom; but evidently he knew nothing of the practice of Baptists, for he attempted to organize a Baptist Church without due authority. When he arrived at Providence, he got a Mr. Holliman (not a Baptist) to baptize him, and then he (Williams) baptized Mr. Holliman and a few others, and then organized what they called a Baptist Church.
The best authorities agree on this point and also to the fact that this Williams so-called Baptist Church “never increased any.” It just sat there and died as its members passed out or moved away. It NEVER GAINED ONE NEW MEMBER!
The Encyclopedia Britanica says, “Some people who were persecuted fled to Rhode Island. Roger Williams was baptized by one of these and then he (Williams) baptizing others in turn and then establishing what has been considered the first Baptist Church in America.” Continuing, this Encyclopedia again says, Roger Williams remained in this church” only three or four months” and then “became what was known as a seeker, or independent.”
Turning again to “Religions In America,” we read that Roger Williams soon quit HIS CHURCH, “because he believed HE HAD NO APOSTOLIC SUCCESSION in the church.”
No true Baptist Church, at any time, ever recognized Roger Williams’ baptism, nor his church. It began with Williams and ended with Williams. Yet, our children are taught in school that Williams was a Baptist.
The “Board” Baptists seem to be the greatest sticklers for Williams. I wonder why? They can’t trace their church succession even as for back as Williams.
While I pen these lines there are 19 different “religious” organizations masquerading as Baptist, and the true Baptist Church is lulled to sleep by a false feeling of security in our so-called land of the free and home of the brave.” Satan is making a final effort to destroy the church and wipe its memory from the mind of man. The enemy is in the saddle right here in America, controlling every source of knowledge. They can’t kindle a fire to roast Baptists alive, but they are handing out falsehood through our schools, the press, the radio and the Catholic and Protestant pulpits— and through others who are posing as Baptists.
For example, here is an item that appeared in the newspapers in 1939: “Atlanta, Georgia, July 23, 1939-World Baptists, eager to grapple with grave problems of civilization opened their sixth international congress Saturday with a message from President Roosevelt urging them to hold high their peculiar heritage of religious freedom.
“Cheers greeted the President’s message read to a crowd of 30,000, among them messengers from sixty nations, by Dr. J. H. Rushbrook of London, general secretary of the Baptist World Alliance.”
“Institutions of free government are challenged” and the “freedom which we cherish can be maintained and perpetuated only at the cost of eternal vigilance,” the President wrote.
“The members of the great Baptist communion,” he continued, “have a peculiar heritage of devotion to the principles of religious freedom. As inheritors of the noble tradition of Roger Wlliams (founder of the first Baptist Church in America) their place must ever be among those who uphold freedom of conscience.”
No doubt, President Roosevelt got his knowledge of the Baptist Church from the poisoned wells of knowledge that I have already mentioned. He did not know true Baptist history and, therefore, his message had two misstatements of fact: (1) Baptists have stood for religious freedom through all the centuries back to John the Baptist; hence, DID NOT get this “noble tradition” from Roger Williams, and (2) Roger Williams was NOT A BAPTIST; therefore, DID NOT “found the first Baptist Church in America.”
I was so surprised and shocked when I read that such a vast assembly of people, claiming to be Baptists, had greeted the President’s message with “cheers” that I immediately sent the following communication to Semi-Weekly Dallas News for publication :
“SOME BAPTIST HISTORY”
“To Semi-Weekly Farm News: I have just read in your paper the account of the Baptist World Alliance, which met in Atlanta, Georgia, July 23. President Roosevelt sent a message to that body in which he states that Roger Williams was founder of the first Baptist Church in America.”
“The statement that Williams founded the first Baptist Church in America is utterly without foundation. In fact, I am shocked that a Baptist Congress with so many world leaders should cheer a message like that. Such lack of knowledge among so-called leaders is pitiful to behold, and should make all true Baptists hang their heads in shame.
“In behalf of truth, I want to give you some historical facts which I have spent many years sifting from the chaff in history. I have spent much time digging for historical golden nuggets in libraries and assembling them, and will soon commence writing a true history of the Baptist Church.
“Here is the truth about Roger Williams. He was never a Baptist, and the church (?) which he organized has never been recognized, by well informed Baptists, as a Baptist Church. When Williams arrived at Providence, Rhode Island, he got a Mr. Holliman (who was not a Baptist minister) to baptize him, and then he (Williams) baptized Holliman and ten others and founded what they called a Baptist Church.
“In Religions of America, by Sweet, a standard authority, found in all high class public libraries, we read that Williams soon quit the pastorate of that church, because he saw that it could not have apostolic succession.
“Roger Williams only preached for this church three or four months and then quit and became a`seeker,’ or independent. The church never increased but gradually went down. It was not a Baptist Church.
“Sweet says: `To term Roger Williams as founder (or his church as mother of Baptist churches) is historically incorrect.
“Wade through the deliberate fog of Encyclopedias and church histories, sort the wheat from the chaff, and you will find that Williams was never a Baptist. He recognized that TRUTH himself.
“To get the truth before the readers of Semi-Weekly Farm News, I want to state this fact: Elder John Clark, M. D., organized the first Baptist Church in America at Newport, Rhode Island, about 1638. This church had apostolic succession without a broken link) reaching back to the banks of Jordan where Jesus was baptized.
“Dr. Clark was much persecuted because he opposed infant baptism. He and Elder Obediah Holmes were publicly whipped on the streets of Boston for preaching Baptist doctrine, and the Baptist Church house doors were nailed up by the city authorities.
“Dr. Clark was a man of learning and influence, and served two terms as deputy governor of Rhode Island.
“The first Baptist Association in America Was held in Philadelphia and seated no delegates from the church Roger Williams founded.”
“Monroe Jones.”
The Semi-Weekly Farm News refused to publish my letter above, and sent me the following reply:
“Dallas, Texas
August 7, 1939
Mr. Monroe Jones,
Las Cruces, New Mexico.
Dear Mr. Jones :
We are returning the letter, you recently sent us, to you herewith for the reason that it is of a nature that we are confident will provoke discussion in the paper and since it is never profitable to argue politics, religion, et cetera, from doctrinal standpoint, we do not give space to matter that is likely to provoke a controversy. We are quite sure you will understand this.
Semi-Weekly Farm News.
Very truly,
A. H. Belo Corpn. Pubs.
By DeWitt McMurray, Editor.”
Can any reasonable person see why they should deny me the right to correct a historical error that this paper had published. They had given plenty of space to false history about the Baptist Church, but refused to published one line of the true history. Is this the “freedom of the press” that some are boasting of in the land of Uncle Sam?
In conclusion of this matter, I want to say that I have been writing for Semi-Weekly Farm News for 40 years. They have published many “controversial” letters from my pen on politics and many other subjects, as thousands of readers of that paper will testify. Thousands of people are living today who will remember the CONTROVERSIES I have had on land reform through this paper, beginning in 1911 and lasting until now.
Why then, I ask again, should I not be permitted to correct an error about Baptist history?
THE FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH
Elder John Clark was driven from Massachusetts because he was a Baptist. He organized the first Baptish Church in America, and “served two terms as deputy governor.”— Religions In America.
After years of research for Baptist History in America, Mr. S. Adlam discovered many interesting facts. He visited Newport, Rhode Island, and copied the following inscription from Elder Clark’s tombstone :
“Dr. John Clark”
“One of the original purchasers and proprietors of this island (Rhode Island) and one of the founders of the first Baptist Church in Newport, its first pastor and magnificent benefactor. He was a native of Bedfordshire, England, and a practitioner of physic in London. He, with his associates came to this Island from Massachusetts in March 1638 O. S. and on the 24th of the same month, obtained a deed thereof from the Indians. He shortly afterwards gathered the church aforesaid, and became its pastor in 1638 0. S. He died April 20th, 1676, in the 66th year of his age, and is here interred.”
The above on Elder Clark’s tombstone proves beyond a doubt that he organized the FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH IN AMERICA in 1638— one year before Williams came to Rhode Island. Roger Williams knew this himself.
The little Baptist Church at Newport had in its communion at least one of the Baptists that came over on the Mayflower, according to the tradition that has been handed down to the descendants of that member.
This church at Newport is the link, in America, that establishes the unbroken chain of Apostolic Church succession.
It had no “board,” no Sunday School, no B. Y. P. U., no “Aid Society,” no music in church— it was just a plain New Testament Baptist Church.
This first Baptist Church in America was what the tittering world calls, “Hardshell.” It was, as we shall see later, the corner stone of Democracy in America.
AS SHEEP AMONG WOLVES
Keep in mind that from the beginning, in the New England Colonies, there were always a few Baptists in every community; and, everywhere, the Baptists were hated and discriminated against.
The “Pilgrim Fathers” seem to have had a particular hatred for Baptists. The whipping post, the pillory and the cat-o-nine-tails were kept handy in the Plymouth Colony to frighten Baptists.
Scarcely one-fifth of the people in the original settlement of that colony belonged to the English Church, but this minority was backed by the king, and the high church men, and compelled everybody to pay taxes to help support the ministry of that church.
Baptists had no salaried ministry and they objected to being taxed to support other preachers. They were opposed to all “Sunday laws,” and to infant baptism. They refused to have their children sprinkled. The two-horned beast demanded that Baptists take this “mark of the beast.” Baptists stood firm and through their influence and example the spirit of freedom was growing.
Not one iota of our freedom in America do we owe to those “Pilgrim Fathers,” much as they have been boosted.
The “Puritan” religion was cold as an iceberg, stern and grasping; greedy as a miser, and its influence as relentless as an army of vandals marching across a beautiful landscape. That religion discouraged gaity, or even a sunny disposition in men and women. It put a ban on all amusements. Religion is not always Christianity.
Under rule of Puritanism, the people were almost sufficated in a dense, cruel, black fog of RELIGION. Religion was jammed down their throats by the decree of tyrants by legislation, and informed by the strong arm of the law. Anyone, who failed to go to their church on Sunday was fined, ostracised and boycotted.
They were sticklers for the heathen “day of the sun.” Once two lovers were fined for sitting under an apple tree on Sunday. A man who had been away on a voyage into the sea for a long time returned home and kissed his wife on Sunday and was fined for “desecration of the Sabbath!” A farmer was fined for driving his cows “without need” on Sunday.
I could repeat incident after incident like these, but what’s the use? No wonder Baptists fled to Rhode Island for LIBERTY. The Baptists opposed a state church, religious intolerance and superstition— they wanted freedom.
On September 25, 1742 five Baptist Churches assembled by delegates, and otherwise, and formed the first Baptist Association in America. The spirit of liberty was growing everywhere and this spirit was fought by the people of the ‘`conservative,” Puritan type.
Thomas Paine, the revolutionary patriot was hounded to his grave by the super religious Protestants of his time. Payne was a deist, not an atheist. He fought RELIGIOUS INTOLERANCE, stood for freedom of conscience, and did more to bring about the American Revolution against English tyranny than any other one man. He was libeled by Protestant preachers continually. The same old pack of CONSERVATIVE wolves, religious hyenas and jackals, that snarled at Paine were also yapping at Baptists.
THE MORNING STAR OF LIBERTY
The Baptist Church has never gone into politics. It is God’s Kingdom here in the world, but has ever been separated from the world. It is in the world but not of the world.
But we must remember that each individual member of the Church owes allegiance to the country he lives in. I point here to Elder John Gano, a Baptist minister who was Chaplin in George Washington’s army of 1776. He was baptizing soldiers one day. Washington saw this and exclaimed: “I have never been scripturally baptized.” He had received Episcopalian baptism in his infancy, but touched with the scene of his Chaplin immersing the soldiers, he also demanded baptism. Elder Gano immersed George Washington in the Potomac River.
The Register of the Kentucky State Historical Society states that Elder Gano baptized Washington. According to Virginia Baptists who witnessed the event, it was in 1780 or 1781.
Washington attended Episcopalian services with his wife regularly but he was a Baptist. “He refused to take communion” in the Episcopal Church.
Elder Gano was “a predestinarian” Baptist and was in the Philadelphia Association in 1784. Hon. William J. Bryan was kin to Elder Gano.
It was the spirit of freedom coming from Baptist influence, like the rosy dawn of a spring morning, that shaped the political ideals of such men as Franklin, Henry, Jefferson and Washington.
Patrick Henry was a member of the Episcopal Church, but opposed the law that forced Baptists, and all others, to pay taxes to support the ministry of that church. But, to my surprise, one historian (?) claims Henry was a Catholic!
Thomas Jefferson got his first ideas about democracy, when he was very young, and was attending an Old-Time Baptist Association with his mother.
Hon. Thomas E. Watson says in his Baptist History that Jefferson observed the sincerity, simplicity and the democracy of that body of Baptists in permitting its poorest and most humble members to vote on all questions. Watson says that Jefferson’s democracy had its beginning in that Baptist meeting.
It is certain that Jefferson, then and there, began to think that this Democracy might be extended to the government of a nation.
On July 4, 1776, fifty seven brave men signed the Declaration of Independence. Two of the signers of this Declaration were from the little colony of Rhode Island. It contained the following, which was the death knell to tyrants :
“We hold these truths to be self-evident: That all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. That, to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute a new government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.”
That was a daring declaration. It was a glint from the lamp of liberty that Baptists had lighted in the 17th century, when they declared “that the magistrate is not to meddle with religion, nor matters of conscience, nor compel men to do this or that form of religion.”
The American colonies at the time of the Declaration of Independence were divided into three parties or schools of thought, viz: The old Roman Catholic, loyal to the pope, and resentful toward any other authority on earth; another followed the lead of King Henry VIII, of England who was head of the Church of England, but the third group (nearly all Baptists) rejected the authority of both king and pope.
When the Constitution was finished and the convention adjourned, there was much opposition to its ratification. Baptists objected to it because it did not provide for trial by jury, nor guarantee the right of religious freedom.
Men like Samuel Adams and Benjamin Franklin, friends of the common people, objected to the constitution; but Alexander Hamilton, the aristocrat, and a friend of the rich class, was for it.
Knowing they couldn’t get a square deal, the Baptists of Rhode Island refused to heed the call for the Constitutional Convention.
The first amendment to our Constitution was in 1791. Here it is: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.”
Benjamin Franklin had voted for the adoption of the Constitution against his will. It almost broke his heart to do so. He was in the front ranks, working for this first amendment. The liberal minded citizens of the colonies, combined with the Baptists, forced this amendment. Conservatives called it “RADICAL.”
It was a, great day of victory for Democracy. It was the first time in all the ages that Baptists had been free to meet and worship God without a haunting fear that their meetings might be broken up by their enemies.
The influence of the stone that “was cut out of the mountain without hands” (Dan. 2:45) caused the harsh government of the Old Roman Empire to pass away: this refining influence, at times seemingly almost crushed, had been at work continually all the way down through the years; it lighted the lamp of liberty early in the 17th century and now, in the 18th century, it had ushered in a glorious new day in America !
THE EMIGRATION WESTWARD
As the population became more dense in the East, along the Atlantic coast, land monopoly got a death grip on that country and the poorer class of people, who had no homes, began to move westward in search of better opportunities.
Every normal human being wants a home of his own. The rat dens we call apartment houses, the Gypsy camps, and trailer houses, of today (1948) do not bring out the best qualities in our race.
Recognizing this truth, Baptists were among the first emigrants westward from the New England states. Over hills and mountains and plains, their covered wagons, drawn by horses, mules or oxen, went in trains westward, ever westward, on and on, exploring new territory.
One historian says, “The Baptists emigrating west across the Alleghany Mountains were poor people and stood for democracy.” He also says, “Their preachers came from the people and were SELF SUPPORTING.”
Mr. Sweet tells us that these pioneer Baptists, and their ministers, were farmers looking for cheap land, and were “ideal western emigrants.”
Typical Baptist preachers in pioneer settlements worked five or six days on their farms every week and often walked to their “appointments” to preach on Saturday night and Sunday.
Nearly all of these pioneer Baptist preachers were uneducated. The church in those days practiced STRICT DISCIPLINE and opposed “armenianism.”
Baptists in these new communities were classed among the very best citizens, standing for the strictest moral principles and practices; ever alert at the ballot box, to defend liberty for all people, and yet always keeping their politics out of the Church. Historians agree perfectly on this, and some of them stress the fact that the Baptist Church of pioneer days “opposed all missionary societies.”
The first missionary society in America was organized in Philadelphia in 1814.
Andrew Fuller, and a few others in England, startled the Church by organizing the first missionary society ever known in the Church, October 2, 1792. This missionary spirit came from the Roman Catholic Church, we must remember, and was adopted by Protestants, but had always been rejected by the Baptists.
This “mission” trouble started with Andrew Fuller in England: it spread to America, and the “missionary society” in Philadelphia was the outcome. It started trouble among the Baptists at once.
The Apple Creek Baptist Association of Illinois, in 1830. declared: “We as an association, do not hesitate to say, that we declare non-fellowship with foreign and domestic mission and Bible societies and Sunday Schools.” Illinois became a battle ground at once. The false spirit of Missions was spreading like a foul epidemic.
Alexander Campbell was a Baptist preacher. He began preaching the Catholic heresy of salvation by water baptism, and was excluded from the Baptist Church in 1826. He immediately organized the disorder then known as “Reformers,” later called “Campbellites” (and didn’t deny it!) and then “Church of Christ.” Dissenting off-shoots of this disorder sometimes masquerade as “Christian!” This so-called church is about 1826 years too young to be connected in any way with Apostolic Church succession. Campbellism is a modern freak.
THE MISSIONARY SERPENT
About 1792, the missionary serpent was gradually tightening its coils around small groups of Baptists all over the world. When William Cary of England was sent as a “Baptist Missionary” to “save souls” in India, all true Baptists were shocked.
The Baptist Church had survived the heathen and Jewish persecutions of New Testament times; it had stood firmly on the Rock of Ages through Catholic persecutions of the Dark Ages; it had survived the storm of hate in England under Protestant rule; then stepped across the turbulent Atlantic and established itself in America; the hand of God ever leading the Church in this long, long journey. But now, a new enemy had appeared and was, like Judas, slyly “boring within. ”
The New York Missionary Society, composed of weak Baptists, Presbyterians and Dutch Reformed, was organized in 1796 “to carry the gospel to ‘the southern Indians.” We might note here that Catholic priests had already “carried the gospel” to those Indians at the point of the sword !
The Missionary Society of Connecticut, a Congregationalist society, was organized in 1798 “to Christianize the heathen in North America and to support and promote Christian knowledge in the new settlements in the United States.”
The American Board of Foreign Missions was founded by the Congregationalist Church of Massachusetts in 1810. Among others it sent Adoniram Judson and Luther Rice as missionaries to India. These two young men “became converted to the Baptist faith” while sailing for India, and when they landed in Calcutta they were baptized into the Baptist Church there and THEN “became Baptist missionaries.”
American Baptists did not send Judson and Rice to India.
They were sent there by the Congregationalists; yet, some “Baptists” today (1948) claim them, along with the “Board” that they have borrowed from the Congregationalists.
THE MISSIONARY STAMPEDE
The missionary serpent was slipping into the Baptist Churches in America, via the Congregational, the Dutch Reformed and the Presbyterian routes— but it was getting into the Church just the same. It was creeping in like a thief with padded footsteps at midnight.
Rice returned to America to stir up Baptists to support missions. Judson remained in India. These two enthusiastic young men set in to save the “heathen” by human means, throwing the doctrine of God’s free grace to the winds, and substituting the “Board” they brought with them from the Congregationalists. Judson and Rice threw the Baptist doctrine and practice overboard when they brought their missionary theories onboard the old Ship of Zion. Soon their followers wanted to add Sunday Schools and other societies to “help Jesus.”
Ladies “mite societies” sprang up on every hand to get money for missions. Then the organ began to appear in Baptist Churches.
The first organ ever used in a Baptist Church was at Pawtucket, Rhode Island, about the year 1819. No such thing had ever happened in all the history of the church before, but the “reformers” were bent on smashing every Baptist tradition and practice. The organ had always been associated with cathedral pomp, where church and state were combined, and the rich assembled to make a dazzling show of worldly splendor.
Benedict, a Missionary Baptist historian of that time, had many doubts and fears about the outcome of this worldly innovation. In his “Fifty Years Among the Baptists” he says, “Staunch Old Baptists in former times would as soon have tolerated the Pope of Rome in their pulpits as an organ in their church.
From Apostolic days, Baptists had held that the Bible is the only authority for doctrine, order and practice; that Christians should hold to all the ordinances of the early Church. But now the groups of Baptists who were falling in line with the missionary spirit, and putting organs in their churches, began to practice LOOSE DISCIPLINE; they quit washing each others feet in connection with their communion, had a salaried ministry and began to build theological schools, or advocate them, to teach young men to preach!
In the early part of the 19th century John M. Peck and James E. Welch came on the scene as “home missionaries to carry the gospel to Missouri and other parts of the newly settled country.” The Federal Government donated money to carry on a Baptist mission in Missouri. This was begun in 1820. It is the first time in all history where Baptists accepted money from a government to carry on church work. The missionary element in the church did this to the shame and humiliation of every true Baptist of that time.
This was a direct departure from the old path, and the old practice of keeping church and state separated. Politics was creeping into the church along with the missionary spirit. A storm was gathering, a rush of worldly minded people were coming into the church, like the crowd that was knocking for church membership in A. D. 252, when the church withdrew from the disorder that hatched Catholicism.
The NEW Baptists, following the lead of Andrew Fuller, and urged on by Judson and Rice, began to call their brethren who stood firmly in the old path many ugly names, such as: “Do Nothings,” “Iron Jackets,” and “Hardshells.”
Benedict, the most noted missionary historian of that time, acknowledges that THE “HARDSHELLS,” IN OPPOSING MISSIONS, WERE STANDING ON THE SAME OLD GROUND WHERE THE CHURCH HAD ALWAYS STOOD BEFORE THAT TIME.
Mr. Rice spoke of those who helped in his mission schemes as “Brethren who came to the help of the Lord against the mighty.”
Did Rice mean a little, dwarf, weak God and a. big, strong, giant devil? I will let the modern Missionary (“Board”) Baptists answer this question.
About 1819 large bodies of Baptists were in a state of agitation over the writings and sermon of Andrew Fuller of England. Fuller held that the atonement of Christ was “general,” that Jesus died for “all men.” Baptists had always taught that Jesus died for the “elect” only, that the plan of salvation was determined before time (Tit. 1:2), and embraced a great multitude, people of all nations (Rev. 7:9, 14) of earth.
John saw a numerous host that “no man could number,” but God could number that host. Did God number it? If so, then could Fuller ADD ONE MORE to that number by his missionary system for “saving souls?”
Fuller was exactly in line with Catholicism, and Protestantism and Arminianism.
Dr. John Gill of London, one of the most distinguished Baptist elders of that time opposed Fuller, and held to old doctrine of predestination, as taught by Paul, and Novation, and the Waldensian Baptists and John Wycliffe, and Elder John Clark, and as has been taught by all true Baptists down to our time.
Young college preachers were the ones that were agitating loudest for a salaried ministry, and for missions, in the 1830’s. The ministry to them was a profession. They desired special distinction and began to be addressed as “Reverend,” and “Doctor of Divinity,” something not known among Baptists before.
Out of the rugged influence of the Baptist settlements west of the Alleghanies came some of the greatest men of our nation. For example, Abraham Lincoln’s parents were Primitive (“Hardshell”) Baptists. Their membership was in the Little Pigeon Church. This Church exists, today, and is known today as the Little Pigeon Primitive Baptist Church. It is located in the Lincoln Memorial Park, near Lincoln City, Indiana. This church was organized June 8, 1816. Thomas Lincoln, Abraham’s father, was at one time clerk in this church. A deerskin bound book with minutes written in Thomas Lincoln’s handwriting has been preserved to this day. Today (1948) Elder W. A. Fleener of Lincoln City, Indiana is pastor.
But back to the trouble that young college preachers were causing. This and the mission trouble had been brewing in the Baptist Church for years. All true Baptists; were shocked when the “Home Missionary Society was organized in 1832. The church had tolerated this missionary spirit in some of its members for a long time. The advocates of “missions” became more dissatisfied, more aggressive and more intolerant of the old way of worship as the years rolled by. They established their first theological seminaries about 1808. These religious schools were opposed by all true Baptists.
The slogan among this NEW BRAND of Baptists was, “Every state its own Baptist College.” Baptist tract societies began to be organized by these NEW Baptists in 1824. True old-time Baptists opposed all these new things. True Old Baptists suffered much abuse from those of missionary views; the latter often accusing those of the old faith of holding to “antinonianism.”
The mutterings of this storm began to be heard about 1825. After every reasonable effort to reconcile these mission advocates to the old path that the church had traveled in from the days of John the Baptist, there came a time when patience ceased to be a virtue; THE CHURCH WITHDREW FROM THOSE WHO FAVORED MISSIONS IN 1832.
Following the example set by all former groups who had been excluded from the church, these excluded “missionaries” soon organized a NEW “church” of their own, and called it the “Missionary Baptist Church.” This new church was more than, 1800 years too late to ever have Apostolic succession.
The true Old Baptist Church marched on, LEAVING THESE “MISSIONARIES” BEHIND AND OUT OF THE CHURCH. Multitudes of worldly minded people began to join these NEW “Baptists.” They soon had the big crowd, but it was a consolation to those of the ANCIENT FAITH to remember that Jesus had said: “Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.” (Luke 12:32).
AND NOW: THE CONCLUSION
For centuries Baptists all over the world lived in terror, fearing their children would be stolen, or taken by force, for “religious training” in Catholic homes or Catholic institutions. Such was the goal of the Catholic missionaries. In countries where Catholics held political power this situation lasted almost to the end of the 18th century.
In America the persecution against Baptists came from Protestants. This ceased with the granting freedom of religion to all, in 1791. Baptists were in the vanguard fighting for this amendment.
Beginning at 1948, looking back down through the annals of time, we find that in all the ages since Jesus was on earth, the Baptist Church has had only 157 years of absolute rest from violent persecution. The Church has had that rest in our United States of America.
Since 1832 “divisions” have occurred, “off-shoots” sprung up, till today there are about 20 different communions claiming the name Baptist!
The Catholic Church boasts that it “never changes.” But it has had one big division and now we behold the Greek Catholics and the Roman Catholics.
It is the Roman Catholic Pope that has his hands in the politics of every nation on earth continually. Just now he is fighting “Communism in Russia,” but in reality this fight is not against the Russian form of government. If the Russians would embrace Catholicism and turn Catholic priests loose to teach Russian children the Catholic religion, the Pope would cease to condemn “the Red menace.”
With the great number of Roman Catholics who are holding political high places in our United States today, we shudder when we think of what might have been if Al Smith had been elected president in 1928. Can you name ONE Catholic who voted against Smith?
In 1939 General Franco in Spain was holding 600,000 prisoners for personal revenge because these prisoners were against the Catholic Church ruling that country. The Pope sent the following message to Franco:
“Lifting up our heart to the Lord we give sincere thanks with your excellency for Spain’s desired Catholic victory.” — Christian Century of April 12, 1939.
Thus we see that Franco’s victory was a Catholic victory. Franco crushed democracy in Spain and the Pope gave thanks.
Today Catholic influence is so powerful that even the “United Nations” don’t interfere with Franco’s brutal rule.
Here are a few news items of very recent date :
“The grand cross of the order of Pope Pius XII was recently conferred on Michail Antonescu, Hitler’s puppet premier of Rumania, according to an Associated Press dispatch in the New York Times of July 15, 1943. The newspaper added that this is the highest decoration that the Vatican can confer.
“This papal honor not only testifies to Pius XII’s pro-Nazism but also implies commendation for Antonescu’s recent persecution of Romanian Protestants.
“The Baptist Watchman-Examiner of July 15 (1943) said: `The present Rumanian government has issued a decree closing all 1,602 (Baptist) Churches and taking away all their properties
The 70,000 Baptists of Rumania are now in the fire of a great tribulation.”— The Converted Catholic Magazine.
Again we copy from the same magazine: “Hitler is listed in the German `Who’s Who’ (Wer Ist’s) as a Roman Catholic, and is on record as publicly reaffirming it. The reliable Irish Catholic author, William Teeling, on page 127 of his book, Crisis For Christianity, admits this when he tells about the signing of the concordat (contract) between the Vatican and Hitler. He says:
The concordat was signed on July 20th, 1933 and that the text was published on July 22nd. On the previous July 2nd, Herr Hitler made an official public statement that he is a member of the Roman Catholic Church,”
In 1944 Spain had a ban on Protestantism, according to a report received from the World Council of Churches, Here is the message.
“Most Protestant Chapels are still closed, and no Protestant schools are allowed. There is compulsory Catholic religious education for Protestants in all state schools, according to recent reports. There, therefore, does not appear to have been any change or improvement in the Protestant situation in Spain.”
These news items in the light of today sound like echoes from the Dark Ages and they prove that “Rome never changes.” Give Rome the power and she will burn “heretics” today, and remember that Rome looks on Baptists as the arch heretics.
Some Baptists are sleeping, lulled to a carelessness in regard to anything political by a false feeling of security. Remember: “Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.”
There was a time when there were so many wide awake Old Baptists on the frontiers of Kentucky, Tennessee. Illinois, Indiana and Missouri that the “Hardshell”, vote kept the political crooks quaking with fear.
Following the Civil War, Baptists were divided on the question of human slavery, so today we speak of “Northern” and “Southern” Baptists. That has caused division and grief.
Then down here in Texas and all adjoining states we have held so many “Councils” that we have lost count of them. Will not try to record them, because councils belong to Catholics and not to Baptists.
Jealousy among preachers has caused plenty of trouble too.
We have allowed too many busy-bodies, tattlers (I Tim. 5:13) and talebearers (Lev. 19:16) to run loose, rambling over the country spreading slander and falsehood, seasoned with hate.
It has not always been this way. Sixty years ago when a new preacher came along we arranged for him to preach. We didn’t hold back in fear of his “order.” The Old Baptist Church was a force for good in many communities in those good old frontier days.
Elder W. S. Broom spent many years traveling over Texas and adjoining states preaching peace, love, kindness and forbearance. He is gone but his memory lives on, His advice unheeded !
Perhaps a little real persecution might draw us closer together. If Catholics should light a torch, sharpen the headsman’s axe and turn their hell-dogs loose to trail Baptist “heretics” down, we might see a “Northern” Baptist, a”Southern” Baptist, and a few others from smaller factions flee to the top of the mountains, and hold a PEACE meeting on the highest crag ! Sometimes history repeats itself.
Let us try to forget our troubles and remember that we are promised that, “While the earth remaineth, seed time and harvest, cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease.” (Gen. 8:22).
Do we deserve any of these blessings? Do we deserve anything good?
We as individuals, may fall down; we may divide up in little groups, we may hate and hate.”As a man thinketh in his heart so is he.” We may fail, sit down and quit; but the Kingdom of God shall never fail. The Church shall continue on down through all coming ages. There will always be a few people fit to inhabit the Kingdom, and “it shall not be left to other people.”
The Baptist martyrs who have died for their faith have spilled enough blood to fill a basin 10 feet deep, 10 feet wide and 25 miles long (Rev. 17:6). The pathway that Baptists have traveled for nearly 2,000 years is a crimson trail, a road painted red with the blood of our spiritual brethren and sisters of the past who boldly faced the ridicule and hatred of a vicious, intolerant, unrelenting and murderous foe, and dared to stand steadfast in a frowning world. (Luke 21:1, 5, 16, 17).
May God have mercy on us today as we stand apart; divided up in little envious, contentious, bickering groups, each with an “holier than thou” attitude. May the sunshine of God’s eternal love for His people come streaming through the rifts in the broken clouds and warm our souls again is the prayer of this unworthy writer.
THE END