Chapter 13
IDENTITY AND DISTINCTIVES
The first twelve chapters of this book have focused on telling the Baptist story. We have tried to focus on the grand narrative of Baptists, giving particular emphasis to Baptists in the English-speaking world. We have concentrated our attention on key figures, movements, themes, and controversies. In this final chapter we want to discuss Baptist identity and priorities. While these topics have been referenced, and sometimes summarized, in past chapters, they have not been discussed in great detail. Since we are historians, our narrative has been primarily descriptive to this point. However, in this final chapter we want to be more prescriptive as we discuss the convictions and emphases of Baptist Christians in the early twenty-first century.
Baptist Identity
As with any denominational tradition, Christians who identify with the Baptists do so for a variety of reasons. One can find at least three different approaches to Baptist identity. Some people are Baptists by conditioning because their Christian experience has been mostly limited to Baptist churches. They may have been raised in a Baptist church, or they may have been converted through the ministry of a Baptist church, or they may have married a Baptist and joined his church. While the circumstances of becoming a Baptist may vary, those who have been conditioned as Baptists have what Gregory Wills calls a “tribal identity” because their commitment to being Baptist is rooted primarily in their family heritage or their long-term church participation. Often someone who is a Baptist by conditioning has always been a Baptist, so he has a hard time imagining being part of a different Christian tradition. R. G. Lee, the famous twentieth-century Southern Baptist pastor, captured this approach with a quip: “I’m Baptist born and Baptist bred, and when I die I’ll be Baptist dead.”
Some people are Baptists by convenience because they presently attend a Baptist church. Baptists by convenience have an institutional identity because their commitment to being Baptist is rooted in their local church membership or participation. Often someone who is a Baptist by convenience could just as easily be Methodist, Presbyterian, or Pentecostal, but because he likes the Baptist church he is currently a member of, he is a Baptist—for now. This approach to Baptist identity is common in contexts where postdenominationalism has had significant influence. In many communities people commonly move from church to church based on preaching, music styles, or programs without regard for denominational affiliation.
Some people are Baptists by conviction because their beliefs and priorities match those that have been historically identified with Baptist Christians. A Baptist by conviction considers himself a Baptist ultimately because of what he believes, which in turn influences his decision to join a congregation or denomination that shares his beliefs. A Baptist by conviction would join a different type of church only if he decided that the other church better represented his understanding of biblical truth. While we appreciate the first two approaches to Baptist identity, we believe the third is the best option, even for those who have been raised Baptist or who really appreciate their current church membership in a Baptist congregation. What one believes about God, the Bible, salvation, and the church is ultimately far more important than one’s heritage or preferences.
Since convictions matter in understanding religious identity, determining the best sources for investigating Baptist convictions is important. Like all Christian groups Baptists express their beliefs primarily through their sermons, prayers, and hymnody. Some of these sources are widely accessible (hymnals) while others (sermons and prayers) are less so because they were normally not published for most of Baptist history. From time to time, Baptists have adopted catechisms for instructing their children in Christian doctrine. For example, in 1680 a London pastor named Hercules Collins published “An Orthodox Catechism,” which was a Baptist revision of the influential Heidelberg Catechism of 1563. When available, catechisms are valuable windows into Baptist identity. Of course, many Baptists have published books, periodicals, and pamphlets, and these documents also help us understand Baptist identity.
Confessions, covenants, and ecclesiastical records are particularly fruitful sources for determining Baptist identity. These three sources demonstrate that Baptist identity has often been worked out in community. As this book has demonstrated, from the earliest days of the Baptist movement in the seventeenth century, Baptists have written confessions of faith that summarize their beliefs. For at least the past century, some Baptists have adopted a negative posture toward confessions. They suggest that any prescriptive use of confessions is “creedalism,” or the elevation of a merely human standard above Scripture and an infringement on individual liberty of conscience. While this view is popular in some circles, it reflects a misunderstanding of Baptist history. As Timothy George argues, “The idea that voluntary, conscientious adherence to an explicit doctrinal standard is somehow foreign to the Baptist tradition is a peculiar notion not borne out by careful examination of our heritage.”
Baptist confessions have been written by individuals, as with Thomas Helwys’s Declaration of Faith of English People Remaining at Amsterdam in Holland (1611), and congregations, as with the confession adopted by First Baptist Church of Boston, Massachusetts (1665). Sometimes Baptist institutions have drafted confessions, as with Southern Baptist Theological Seminary’s Abstract of Principles (1858) and the doctrinal statement of Uganda Baptist Seminary (2005). Often, however, confessions have been adopted by groups of Baptists from multiple churches, as with the Standard Confession (1660), the Second London Confession (1689), and the Baptist Faith and Message (1925). Though Baptists have assigned varying levels of importance to confessionalism, confessions are often a good starting place for discussions of Baptist identity. As B. H. Carroll argues: “There was never a man in the world without a creed. A creed is what you believe. What is a confession? It is a declaration of what you believe.” Confessions summarize many key beliefs of the Baptists who affirm them.
Local church covenants, which we discussed briefly in chapter 8, are a second important source for understanding Baptist identity. As Charles DeWeese argues, “Baptists worldwide have written and used hundreds, and perhaps thousands, of church covenants since initiating that development in England in the early 1600’s. . . . Covenants deserve careful evaluation because they helped shape Baptist church membership standards and practices.” As Timothy George notes, “Church covenants were the ethical counterparts to confessions of faith. Confessions dealt with what one believed; church covenants spoke about how one should live.” The earliest English Baptists inherited a covenantal ecclesiology from the English Separatists, and like their forebears they made covenants central to their understanding of church membership. Even churches that were not constituted around covenants tended to adopt them later, as was the case with New Road Baptist Church in Oxford, which was founded in the 1650s but adopted a covenant in 1780. Many churches have written their own covenants while others have adopted generic church covenants. In America, New Hampshire pastor J. Newton Brown’s covenant, which he published in his book The Baptist Church Manual (1853), was widely adopted by Baptist churches well into the mid-twentieth century. Many rural churches still display copies of “The Baptist Church Covenant” (Brown’s covenant) on the walls of their sanctuaries or fellowship halls.
Ecclesiastical records constitute a third key source for understanding Baptist identity. From their earliest days, Baptist churches kept “minute books” of congregational meetings and sometimes deacons’ meetings. These minute books frequently offer a helpful glimpse into Baptist identity in a given church or era. Associations, conventions, and Baptist institutions have also kept detailed records. Associational “circular letters”—short treatises that were written at the request of the association and circulated among member churches—provide valuable information about Baptist identity. For example, during the years of the American Civil War, the Sandy Creek Baptist Association in North Carolina made little reference to slavery in their associational letters, but they repeatedly argued the war was judgment for “Sabbath-breaking”—working or enjoying recreational pursuits on Sundays. Other valuable records include resolutions or position papers adopted by Baptist denominations, entities, and local churches. Whereas confessions focus on beliefs and covenants emphasize practices, ecclesiastical records often include valuable information pertaining to both.
J. Newton Brown’s Church Covenant (1853)
Having been led, as we believe, by the Spirit of God to receive the Lord Jesus Christ as our Saviour; and, on the profession of our faith, having been baptized in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, we do now, in the presence of God, angels, and this assembly, most solemnly and joyfully enter into covenant with one another, as one body in Christ.
We engage, therefore, by the aid of the Holy Spirit, to walk together in Christian love; to strive for the advancement of this church, in knowledge, holiness, and comfort; to promote its prosperity and spirituality; to sustain its worship, ordinances, discipline, and doctrines; to contribute cheerfully and regularly to the support of the ministry, the expenses of the church, the relief of the poor, and the spread of the gospel through all nations.
We also engage to maintain family and secret devotion; to religiously educate our children; to seek the salvation of our kindred and acquaintances; to walk circumspectly in the world; to be just in our dealings, faithful in our engagements, and exemplary in our deportment; to avoid all tattling, backbiting, and excessive anger; to abstain from the sale and use of intoxicating drinks as a beverage, and to be zealous in our efforts to advance the kingdom of our Saviour.
We further engage to watch over one another in brotherly love; to remember each other in prayer; to aid each other in sickness and distress; to cultivate Christian sympathy in feeling and courtesy in speech; to be slow to take offense, but always ready for reconciliation, and mindful of the rules of our Saviour, to secure it without delay.
We moreover engage, that when we remove from this place, we will as soon as possible unite with some other church, where we can carry out the spirit of this covenant, and the principles of God’s Word.
When one examines all these sources, it becomes clear that Baptists hold the vast majority of their beliefs in common with other Christians. Like virtually every Christian tradition, Baptists have historically affirmed such foundational doctrines as the Trinity, the full deity and humanity of Christ, the virgin birth, God’s direct creation of the universe, the inspiration of Scripture, the importance of Christian ethics, and the reality and eternality of heaven and hell. Like virtually every Protestant tradition, Baptists have normally believed in the supreme authority of Scripture, justification by faith alone, the priesthood of all believers, and the two ordinances (or sacraments) of baptism and the Lord’s Supper. Like most evangelical Protestants, Baptists have historically affirmed the truthfulness and sufficiency of Scripture, the centrality of the atonement in securing salvation, the necessity of personal conversion, and the importance of Christian witness. In the case of the latter, Baptists have frequently been trailblazers among evangelicals in developing creative evangelism initiatives, participating in global missions, championing religious liberty, and advocating human rights.
In addition to these shared core beliefs, Baptists historically have also embraced certain beliefs they uniquely emphasize; we call these the “Baptist distinctives” or “Baptist principles.” Most of the Baptist distinctives are ecclesiological in nature. Not every Baptist uses the same terminology for the distinctives, and not every church or denomination applies Baptist principles in exactly the same way, but nearly all Baptists affirm the same core beliefs as central to Baptist identity. Though none of these convictions is found only among Baptists, collectively they are defining convictions of Baptist Christianity. Wherever you find these distinctives affirmed, you find a “baptistic” church, even if that congregation does not self-identify as “capital B” Baptist, participates in diverse ministry networks with nonbaptistic churches, and even claims to be nondenominational. The remainder of this chapter will focus on historic Baptist distinctives.
Baptist Distinctives
All true Christians believe that Jesus Christ is Lord. Indeed, this is the foundational confession of New Testament Christianity: “If you confess with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved” (Rom 10:9). However, the free church tradition, of which Baptists are a part, has always placed unique emphasis on Christ’s lordship by seeking to relate it to both individual discipleship and local church ecclesiology. Baptists believe Jesus exercises his sovereign, gracious, kingly rule over every individual believer and every local congregation. To be a Christian is to bow the knee to Christ’s rule over your life through repentance and faith. To be a church is to strive to conform every aspect of congregational life to the will of Christ as it is revealed in the Bible. Baptists believe their distinctives reflect their submission to Christ’s kingly rule over individuals and churches, closely following the practices of the New Testament churches, and reflect the gospel that Christ has commanded us to proclaim in word and embody in deed (Matt 28:18–20).
Regenerate Church Membership
Baptists believe that a local church’s membership should be comprised only of individuals who provide credible evidence they have repented of their sins and trusted in Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. We refer to this ecclesiological distinctive as either the believer’s church or, more commonly, regenerate (“born again”) church membership. Many Baptist scholars agree that regenerate church membership is the foundational Baptist distinctive. For example, John Hammett calls regenerate church membership “the Baptist mark of the church.” Regenerate church membership affirms that formal identification with the body of Christ is only for those who have acknowledged Christ’s lordship over their lives by faith. This principle also closely relates the gospel to the church by making belief a prerequisite to membership.
The New Testament indicates that the earliest churches included only professing believers in their membership. The consistent pattern in the book of Acts is that conversion is prior to identification with the church (Acts 2:41–47; 4:4; 14:21). To Baptists biblical arguments for infant membership seem strained, frequently based more on tradition or a theological system than the practices of New Testament churches. One key promise of the new covenant prophesied in Jeremiah 31:31–34 is that all members of the covenant will “know” the Lord. Theologically, a believer’s church is more consistent with the new covenant and the gospel it embodies than a church that grants any form of membership to non-Christians. Baptists, like all Christians, affirm the biblical command to raise their children in the “nurture and admonition of the Lord” (Eph 6:4 KJV). However, we do not believe this entails granting membership in Christ’s new covenant community to the unconverted children of believers. To apply this principle to a current discussion among evangelicals, the gospel way and the New Testament pattern is that you must believe before you can belong.
Regenerate church membership was a core principle of the earliest Baptists that was clearly embodied in their confessional statements. Helwys’s confession (1611) stated, “The church of Christ is a company of faithful people (1 Cor 1:2. Eph 1:1), separated from the world by the word and Spirit of God (2 Cor 6:17) being knit to the Lord, and one to another, by baptism (1 Cor 12:13) upon their own confession of the faith (Acts 8:37) and sins (Matt 3:6).” The First London Confession (1646) argues,
Jesus Christ hath here on earth a spiritual kingdom, which is his church, whom he hath purchased and redeemed to himself as a peculiar inheritance; which church is a company of visible saints, called and separated from the world by the word and Spirit of God, to the visible profession of faith of the gospel, being baptized into that faith, and joined to the Lord, and each other, by mutual agreement in the practical enjoyment of the ordinances commanded by Christ their head and king.
Every major Baptist confession of faith up to the present day affirms regenerate church membership.
Historically, Baptists have employed two practices that aid in the pursuit of a believer’s church. The first is the adoption of local church covenants, a topic mentioned earlier in this chapter. Charles DeWeese defines a church covenant as “a series of written pledges based on the Bible which church members voluntarily make to God and to one another regarding their basic moral and spiritual commitments and the practice of their faith.” Until the early twentieth century, to join a Baptist church meant to voluntarily embrace the church’s covenant as a general guide for life and godliness. Individually each member covenanted with the wider body. Corporately the whole body covenanted with Christ. While covenants were neglected for most of the twentieth century, the past couple of decades have seen renewed emphasis on covenantal church membership among both North American and British Baptists.
A second practice, often closely tied to church covenants, is redemptive church discipline. As we argued in chapter 8, Baptists historically have been committed to church discipline. John L. Dagg spoke for most Baptists when he wrote in 1858, “It has been remarked, that when discipline leaves the church, Christ goes with it.” Church discipline safeguards regenerate church membership by protecting sound doctrine and promoting godly living. Church discipline is intended to bring about one of two results in the disciplined individual: conviction and repentance in the case of a rebellious but authentic believer or awakening to the gospel in the case of a false professor of Christianity. Church discipline is intended to be redemptive, not punitive. For the wider church, discipline protects the purity of the congregation. Discipline communicates to the disciplined individual his need to repent and seek reconciliation with Christ and his church.
Church discipline declined for much of the twentieth century for a variety of reasons, including an emphasis on individualism (especially in North America), concerns about abusive applications of discipline, and an implicit prioritization of evangelism over discipleship in many churches. However, as with church covenants, greater emphasis has been given to church discipline in recent decades. For example, at their 2008 annual meeting in Indianapolis, Southern Baptists adopted a resolution titled “On Regenerate Church Membership and Church Member Restoration.” Southern Baptists from a variety of theological and methodological perspectives came together and promoted the resolution. Regenerate church membership and practices that aid us in our pursuit of this principle are helpful points of unity for Baptist groups that are sometimes divided in other areas.
Southern Baptists Reaffirm a Believer’s Church and Church Discipline
RESOLVED, That we humbly urge our churches to maintain accurate membership rolls for the purpose of fostering ministry and accountability among all members of the congregation; and be it further
RESOLVED, That we urge the churches of the Southern Baptist Convention to repent of the failure among us to live up to our professed commitment to regenerate church membership and any failure to obey Jesus Christ in the practice of lovingly correcting wayward church members (Matthew 18:15-18); and be it further
RESOLVED, That we humbly encourage denominational servants to support and encourage churches that seek to recover and implement our Savior’s teachings on church discipline, even if such efforts result in the reduction in the number of members that are reported in those churches, and be it finally
RESOLVED, That we humbly urge the churches of the Southern Baptist Convention and their pastors to implement a plan to minister to, counsel, and restore wayward church members based upon the commands and principles given in Scripture (Matthew 18:15-35; 2 Thessalonians 3:6-15; Galatians 6:1; James 5:19-20).
Believer’s Baptism
Regenerate church membership may be the foundational Baptist distinctive, but believer’s baptism is almost certainly the most well known. Believer’s baptism is simply the idea that baptism should only be applied to individuals who give credible testimony of personal faith in Christ. The earliest Baptists practiced believer’s baptism by affusion—pouring water over the head. The London General Baptist pastor Leonard Busher was the first Baptist to advocate believer’s baptism by immersion in his tract Religious Peace; or, a Plea for Liberty of Conscience (1614), though the practice was likely first implemented by Richard Blunt and the JLJ Church around 1641 (see chap. 1). Since that time Baptists have nearly universally practiced believer’s baptism by immersion. Baptists argue believer’s baptism by immersion was the New Testament practice because the Greek word baptizo literally means to immerse, dip, or submerge something in water. Furthermore, Baptists point out there is no evidence in the Bible of a known unbeliever being baptized. (Of course some professing Christians later turned out to be false believers.)
When pedobaptists argue that believers and their children should be baptized, Baptists typically respond that any attempt to argue infant baptism from the New Testament amounts to eisegesis—reading convictions into the text rather than allowing convictions to arise from the text. Furthermore, pedobaptists cannot agree among themselves on a theology of infant baptism. Presbyterians, Lutherans, Roman Catholics, and the Eastern Orthodox disagree with one another on why infants should be baptized. To Baptists infant baptism seems like a practice in search of a theology to support it. By contrast, nearly all credobaptists—those who advocate believer’s baptism—contend that believer’s baptism by immersion is a symbolic depiction of the gospel, is an outward sign of the spiritual transformation within the life of the new believer, and marks the public identification of a believer with the body of Christ.
In the New Testament baptism is tied to the gospel in at least two different ways. First, baptism is tied to the meaning of the gospel. The key passage is Romans 6:3–5:
Or are you unaware that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? Therefore we were buried with Him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too may walk in a new way of life. For if we have been joined with Him in the likeness of His death, we will certainly also be in the likeness of His resurrection.
According to Paul, baptism symbolizes important gospel realities like union with Christ, the washing away of sin, regeneration, sanctification, and the resurrection from the dead. While some of these realities could be depicted through infant baptism, only the immersion of professing believers depicts all of them.
Baptism is also tied to the proclamation of the gospel. The key passage on this point is the Great Commission of Matthew 28:18–20: “Then Jesus came near and said to them, ‘All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe everything I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.’” According to Jesus, part of what it means to evangelize the nations is to make disciples and baptize them. The goal is not a mere spiritual decision but a whole-life transformation that is evidenced in part through baptism.
Every Baptist confession affirms believer’s baptism, and nearly every confession from the 1640s onward has specified immersion as the proper mode of baptism. For example, the First London Confession (1646) states,
The way and manner of dispensing this ordinance [baptism], is dipping or plunging the body under water; it being a sign, must answer the things signified, which is, that interest the saints have in the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ: And that as certainly as the body is buried under water, and risen again, so certainly shall the bodies of the saints be raised by the power of Christ, in the day of the resurrection, to reign with Christ.
According to the Standard Confession (1660), “the right and only way, of gathering churches, (according to Christ’s appointment, Matt 28:19–20) is first to teach, or preach the gospel, Mark 16:16, to the sons and daughters of men; and then to baptize (that is in English to dip) in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, or in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.”
Though Baptists universally affirm believer’s baptism, normally by immersion, in several chapters we have shown that Baptists have periodically debated the relationship between baptism, the Lord’s Supper, and church membership. Historically, most Baptists considered baptism a prerequisite to both church membership and participation in communion. This view has been codified in most Baptist confessions, the one noteworthy exception being the Second London Confession (1689). However, not all Baptists have affirmed this view. As we discussed in chapter 7, Landmark Baptists sometimes restricted communion to members of their local churches, a practice they called “closed communion.” However, the more common variation, which dates to the seventeenth century, is for some churches to practice an open membership by inviting pedobaptists to join the church and celebrate the Lord’s Supper without first receiving believer’s baptism. John Bunyan took this position in his debate with William Kiffen (chap. 2). Other early examples of open membership congregations include the Broadmead Baptist Church in Bristol and some Welsh Baptists in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Many British Baptist churches have embraced open membership since the early twentieth century, though one also finds some examples of this practice in North America and Oceania.
A much larger number of churches have practiced open communion but maintained a closed membership; baptism is a prerequisite to church membership but not the Lord’s Table. Robert Hall Jr. and Charles Spurgeon advocated this view in the nineteenth century (see chap. 5). Many Baptists in America gravitated to this position during the twentieth century. This has created tension in the Southern Baptist Convention because all three editions of the Baptist Faith and Message affirm baptism that, “being a church ordinance, it is prerequisite to the privileges of church membership and to the Lord’s Supper.” In the 1960s and 1970s, churches were sometimes disfellowshipped from local associations and even state conventions for practicing open communion. However, by the early twenty-first century, polls indicated that Southern Baptists were nearly evenly divided between open and closed communion churches, with the open communion congregations holding a slight majority. It remains to be seen whether closed communion will remain a common practice among Baptists, at least in the English-speaking world.
Congregational Polity
Polity refers to a church’s basic structure and patterns of leadership. Congregational polity, or congregationalism, is the belief that local churches should be governed by their own membership. The Baptist Faith and Message (2000) offers a concise summary of congregationalism: “Each congregation operates under the Lordship of Christ through democratic processes.” Congregationalism can be contrasted with presbyterian polity, which invests final authority in church courts made up of elders, and episcopal polity, which affirms the final authority of a bishop or bishops. Congregationalism carried over into the Baptist movement from the English Separatists. Most Anabaptist groups also practiced congregationalism, which may have further influenced some of the early General Baptists.
A form of congregational polity is implied in several New Testament passages. In Matthew 18:15–20 and 1 Corinthians 5:1–13, two passages related to church discipline, the entire church is called upon to participate in excommunicating a wayward member. In Acts 6:1–6, the entire church at Jerusalem sets apart seven men to serve in a deacon role in the congregation. Assuming the epistles of Timothy and Titus were meant for a wider audience than simply the original recipients, in 1 Timothy 3:1–13 and Titus 1:5–9 churches are given specific qualifications by which to vet potential elders and deacons. Based on these passages, Baptists argue that, at minimum, the Bible suggests the entire church is responsible for maintaining its membership and selecting church officers. Prudentially, most Baptist churches also affirm the congregation’s budget and approve major expenditures. The procedure for deciding other matters is contextual and varies from church to church.
Congregationalism is a corporate expression of the Reformation principle of the priesthood of all believers. In Exodus 19:6, the Lord refers to Israel as a “kingdom of priests,” and in 1 Peter 2:9, Peter calls the church a “royal priesthood.” Based on this the Reformers argued against the “sacerdotal” view of medieval Catholicism that affirmed a special class of priests who mediated God’s grace to the laity through their administration of the sacraments. The Reformers argued for what might be called an “every-member ministry” that affirmed the dignity of all vocations as ways to glorify God, proclaim the gospel, and serve others. As Malcolm Yarnell has demonstrated, Anabaptists, English Separatists, and Baptists filtered their understanding of the believers’ priesthood through Matthew 18:15–20, which they understood to point to congregational polity. In recent decades some Baptists have promoted a novel, more individualistic interpretation of this doctrine that they call the priesthood of the believer. This approach confuses individual liberty of conscience with the believers’ priesthood. Furthermore, as Timothy George has argued, the idea of the priesthood of the believer has frequently been used to defend progressive understandings of biblical inspiration and authority, gender roles, and human sexuality. We advocate the older understanding of the royal priesthood, which we believe is more biblical and reflects the best of the Baptist tradition. For Baptists congregational polity is simply living out the priesthood of all believers in the context of the local church.
Sometimes Baptists use democratic language when they speak of congregationalism, but this can be misleading. Baptists argue that each local church is a “Christocracy” under the ultimate kingship of Jesus Christ and is to be comprised only of believers. Healthy congregationalism thus assumes a church is committed to the final lordship of Christ and is striving to maintain a regenerate membership. When these priorities are not affirmed, congregationalism can easily devolve into a mere democracy where various special-interest groups try to outvote one another in church member meetings. However, when congregationalism is practiced correctly, the church’s regenerate members confirm to one another Christ’s plan for their church as they seek to follow his will through submitting to his written Word. As J. L. Reynolds argued in 1849, “If churches are composed only of such as give credible evidence of having been taught by the Spirit of God, they may be safely entrusted with the management of their own interests.”
When discussing church polity, we need to state an important caveat: congregationalism does not perfectly mirror New Testament polity. The polity of the earliest churches could best be described as a combination of congregationalism and the direct rule of the apostles; the specifics varied somewhat, depending on context. Congregationalism is an attempt to adapt the polity of the earliest churches to a world without authoritative apostles in the New Testament sense of that office. Baptists and other congregationalists believe their views represent a better adaptation than episcopal or presbyterian polities.
By the early twenty-first century, congregational polity had become perhaps the most controversial of the Baptist distinctives. One reason for this is a perceived incompatibility of congregational polity and pastoral authority. Scripture makes clear in 1 Thessalonians 5:12–13 and Hebrews 13:17 that Christians are to honor and submit to their leaders. How can this be done when a pastor’s employment is dependent on the will of the members? Another reason some Baptists downplay congregationalism is their experience with unhealthy expressions of congregationalism. Some have lived through combative church conferences where the congregation showed little love for Christ or for one another. Others have witnessed (or endured) mean-spirited votes of “no confidence” in a pastor or other staff members, often for unbiblical reasons. Still others have seen ineffective congregationalism where the whole church had a voice in even the most mundane decisions.
We are troubled by unhealthy versions of congregationalism, but we do not believe the answer is to abandon congregational polity. We are convinced congregationalism comes down to trust. The membership selects and holds accountable its pastors (also called elders), so in a sense the members have authority over their pastors. But it is also true that the members select pastors to lead them—pastors are not mere employees but are leaders who are called upon to “shepherd the flock of God,” “oversee” the church, and “rule well” (see Acts 20:28; 1 Tim 5:17–19; 1 Pet 5:1–2). So in a sense, pastors also have authority over their members. The congregation trusts the pastor or pastors who lead them, and the pastors trust the members not to act in an unbiblical manner toward their leaders. A culture of trust, in the context of a regenerate membership, will help ensure that congregationalism is expressed in healthy ways that focus on kingdom priorities rather than pet agendas. To that end we suggest the following “organizational scheme” as embodying a healthy, Christ-centered congregationalism: each local church should be ruled by Jesus Christ, governed by its members, led by its pastors/elders, and served by its deacons.
Local Church Autonomy
Local church autonomy is a hallmark of the wider free church tradition and has been championed by Baptists since the inception of their movement. Local church autonomy is the idea that every church is free to determine its own agenda apart from any external ecclesiastical coercion. Baptists believe autonomy reflects the biblical pattern. As Stan Norman notes, “The Bible makes no reference to any entity exerting authority above or beyond the local church.” Positively stated, churches have the freedom to follow the Lord’s leading in their worship and witness. Put more negatively, no denomination or convention or association can force a church to do something it does not wish to do. Local church autonomy is closely related to the aforementioned Baptist distinctives: the whole congregation of regenerate saints takes ownership of the church’s ministry with the understanding that Christ alone is Lord of the church and his will is the standard by which the church’s faithfulness is measured.
Some Baptists, especially in North America, have argued that local church autonomy means every church is independent of other churches and that any ecclesial relationships beyond the local church are undertaken for purely pragmatic purposes. For example, one often hears Southern Baptists argue something like this: “The local church is primary, but we ought to cooperate in associations or state conventions or the Southern Baptist Convention because we can accomplish more for the kingdom when we work together than when we go it alone.” We are not convinced this is the best way to think about autonomy. Historically, both General and Particular Baptists in England embraced a view of autonomy that valued congregational freedom but also affirmed a robust doctrine of the church universal and interchurch cooperation. The Second London Confession says of autonomy, “To each of these churches thus gathered, according to [Christ’s] mind declared in his word, he hath given all that power and authority, which is in any way needful for their carrying on that order in worship and discipline, which he hath instituted for them to observe; with commands and rules for the due and right exerting, and executing of that power.” This is a strong statement of the freedom of local churches to determine their own spiritual agendas.
However, the same confession also claims the following concerning cooperation:
As each church, and all the members of it, are bound to pray continually for the good and prosperity of all the churches of Christ, in all places, and upon all occasions to further every one within the bounds of their places and callings, in the exercise of their gifts and graces, so the churches, when planted by the providence of God, so as they may enjoy opportunity and advantage for it, ought to hold communion among themselves, for their peace, increase of love, and mutual edification.
The Baptists who adopted this confession affirmed the necessity of associational arrangements, not only based on pragmatic considerations but because cooperation is healthy and embodies the type of unity that will one day characterize Christ’s church when it assembles at the marriage supper of the Lamb (Rev 19:6–10). Associational cooperation is as much about ecclesiology and eschatology as it is mission and fellowship. This view of ecclesiology carried over into colonial North America, especially New England and the Middle Colonies. The churches of the Philadelphia Association adopted a lightly amended version of the Second London Confession, including its affirmations of both autonomy and associationalism.
Many British Baptists continue to affirm the historic justification for associations, but during the nineteenth century a majority of American Baptists moved in a more independent direction, especially in the South and Southwest. This happened for many reasons. The American emphasis on freedom and individualism certainly played a role; these themes were frequently applied to both congregationalism and local church autonomy. Landmark sectarianism played a role as well, especially its frequent denial of the universal church. Both liberalism and fundamentalism contributed to the trend. While these movements differed greatly on doctrinal matters, both were thoroughly “modern” in that they prized individual and congregational freedom, albeit unto different ends. The tendency among Southern Baptists to equate cooperation with financial support of joint missions and ministry since the advent of the Cooperative Program in 1925 has furthered an overemphasis on independence and a mostly pragmatic understanding of cooperation.
Churches can and should cooperate with like-minded congregations so they can do more together than any one church can do alone, but this is not the only reason individual congregations should cooperate with one another. Local churches do not exist in isolation. In most places they are part of the wider body of Christ in a county, town, or city. Churches need one another, especially when they are of like faith and practice. We sharpen one another theologically. We come alongside one another when hurting churches have needs that can be met by sister congregations. We need to be humble enough to ask for help, selfless enough to serve sister churches, and biblical enough to heed the sound counsel of sister churches who lovingly point out errors and faults in our theology or methodology.
Historically most Baptists have agreed that autonomy must be balanced with accountability. Baptist associations and conventions have often chosen to cease cooperation with churches that embrace doctrines or practices that the majority judges aberrant. For example, in 1992 the Southern Baptist Convention withdrew fellowship from two churches in North Carolina because one voted to bless the union of two homosexual males and the other voted to license a homosexual to the gospel ministry. Those churches were free to embrace that position, but they were also held accountable by sister congregations who determined their views to be unbiblical. Ultimately, of course, and most importantly, every church is accountable to Christ; he reveals his will for us in Scripture. He is the One to whom we will all one day give an account.
We believe autonomy is a means not to mere independence but to greater gospel freedom. Autonomy guarantees the freedom of individual churches to proclaim the gospel in whatever ways they believe the Lord is leading them. When Baptists are at our best, associations, state conventions, and national conventions help us cultivate this sort of gospel-centered cooperative autonomy. Autonomy should spur churches to greater faithfulness rather than tempting churches to strike out in their own directions—a move that too often leads to unbiblical compromise.
Religious Freedom
Baptists have always championed liberty of conscience for all people. Liberty of conscience is the belief that every person is free to follow his conscience in religious matters without any human coercion. The Abstract of Principles (1858) offers a good summary of this conviction: “God alone is Lord of the conscience; and He hath left it free from the doctrines and commandments of men, which are in anything contrary to His word, or not contained in it. Civil magistrates being ordained of God, subjection in all lawful things commanded by them ought to be yielded by us in the Lord, not only for wrath, but also for conscience sake.” Baptists have sometimes called this principle by other names such as “religious freedom,” “religious liberty,” “soul competency,” “soul freedom,” and “soul liberty”; these terms are more or less synonymous. Liberty of conscience is not taught explicitly in a specific biblical passage but inferred from several biblical principles. As Stan Norman argues, religious freedom is among the “doctrinal corollaries” of “our convictions about and commitment to biblical authority, the lordship of Christ, and the nature and practice of a New Testament church.”
Liberty of conscience functions on the personal level much like local-church autonomy functions on the corporate level. As such, it can be distorted into an overemphasis on freedom—in this case individual freedom. Some Baptists, especially E. Y. Mullins, have been accused of reading American individualism into the historic Baptist commitment to soul competency, resulting in a view of freedom that is at least potentially untethered from accountability. While it is debatable whether Mullins was too individualistic in his views—he was also a champion of congregational accountability—many Baptists have, without doubt, claimed his mantle in advancing highly personalized views of liberty of conscience. We believe liberty of conscience does not justify aberrant theology but rather provides the freedom for individual Christians to follow Christ’s will as it is revealed in Scripture, remembering that one day we will each stand before him to give an account for our faith and practice.
John Leland Defends Liberty of Conscience
Government has no more to do with the religious opinions of men than it has with the principles of mathematics. Let every man speak freely without fear—maintain the principles that he believes—worship according to his own faith, either one God, three Gods, no God, or twenty Gods; and let government protect him in so doing, i.e., see that he meets with no personal abuse or loss of property for his religious opinions. Instead of discouraging him with proscriptions, fines, confiscation or death, let him be encouraged, as a free man, to bring forth his arguments and maintain his points with all boldness; then if his doctrine is false it will be confuted, and if it is true (though ever so novel) let others credit it.
Historically Baptists have argued that the best way to preserve liberty of conscience is to promote a formal separation between church and state. Though many Baptists have lived in contexts where there was no church-state separation, Baptists have traditionally defended religious liberty for all people and advocated a free church in a free state. In fact, over the past four centuries, no other group of Christians has so consistently advocated religious liberty as a basic human right. This principle has been championed by Baptists all over the world and, alongside evangelism, is central to a distinctively Baptist approach to missions. As this book has made clear, numerous Baptists have defended religious freedom and church-state separation in treatises, tracts, sermons, and confessional statements. Thousands of Baptists have been fined, jailed, tortured, and even killed for their commitment to this principle. As the Baptist Faith and Message (2000) says, “A free church in a free state is the Christian ideal, and this implies the right of free and unhindered access to God on the part of all men, and the right to form and propagate opinions in the sphere of religion without interference by the civil power.”
In the past 200 years, and especially since the mid-twentieth century, many of the world’s nations have come to embrace religious freedom as a fundamental human right. Often nations affirm a formal separation of church and state based on nonreligious theories of natural rights or broader pragmatic considerations. Historically, while Baptists have been willing to make cause with all people who defend religious freedom, we have argued for a free church in a free state for spiritual reasons. As Russell Moore argues, religious liberty is ultimately about the Great Commission. Church-state separation protects the freedom of Christians to proclaim Christ to non-Christians and make disciples from people of all nations.
As the West has become increasingly secularized, some have cited the separation of church and state to justify what Richard John Neuhaus calls a “naked public square” that is devoid of religious voices. This is not what Baptists advocate. Though not all Baptists apply the principle of church-state separation the same way, all Baptists agree that Christians have an obligation to be “salt” and “light” as we bear witness to the broader culture (Matt 5:13–16). For this reason most Baptists challenge secularist visions of church and state that seek to silence the voices of Christians or any other people of faith. Church-state separation is not an end in itself but is a strategy for allowing people of all faiths and no faith to live out their convictions without fear of coercion and persecution. As the previous chapter argued, Baptists have been willing to cooperate with other groups that value religious liberty and to defend the rights of all people to follow their consciences in spiritual matters.
Conclusion
We can think of no better place to end this chapter and this book. As we hope our narrative has made clear, the entire Baptist story consistently comes back to three key interrelated themes: promoting liberty of conscience, following Christ’s will in our individual lives and churches, and proclaiming the gospel everywhere. Baptists have not always lived up to these ideals, but when we have been at our best, we have embodied them. As historians we appreciate these themes and the way they have been lived out by Baptists. As Baptist followers of Jesus Christ, we sincerely pray these three priorities will continue to be at the center of the Baptist vision in anticipation of that day when the Lord says to Baptists and all followers of Jesus Christ, “Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master” (Matt 25:23 ESV).
For Further Study
Allison, Gregg R. Sojourners and Strangers: The Doctrine of the Church. Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2012.
Carroll, B. H. Baptists and Their Doctrines, The Library of Baptist Classics. Edited by Timothy George and Denise George. Nashville, TN: B&H, 1995.
Dever, Mark E. The Church: The Gospel Made Visible. Nashville, TN: B&H, 2012.
———. Polity: Biblical Arguments on How to Conduct Church Life. Washington, DC: Nine Marks Ministries, 2001.
Dockery, David S., ed. Southern Baptist Identity: An Evangelical Denomination Faces the Future. Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2009.
George, Timothy. “The Priesthood of All Believers and the Quest for Theological Integrity.” Criswell Theological Review (Spring 1989): 283–94.
George, Timothy, and Denise George, eds. Baptist Confessions, Covenants, and Catechisms, The Library of Baptist Classics. Nashville, TN: B&H, 1996.
Hammett, John H. Biblical Foundations for Baptist Churches: A Contemporary Ecclesiology. Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Academic, 2005.
Harper, Keith, ed. Through a Glass Darkly: Contested Notions of Baptist Identity. Tuscaloosa, AL: University of Alabama Press, 2012.
Jewett, Paul K. Infant Baptism and the Covenant of Grace. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1978.
Norman, R. Stanton. The Baptist Way: Distinctives of a Baptist Church. Nashville, TN: B&H Academic, 2005.
———. More Than Just a Name: Preserving Our Baptist Identity. Nashville, TN: B&H Academic, 2001.
Schreiner, Thomas R., and Shawn D. Wright, eds. Believer’s Baptism: Sign of the New Covenant in Christ. Nashville, TN: B&H Academic, 2007.
White, Thomas, Jason G. Duesing, and Malcolm B. Yarnell III, eds. First Freedom: The Baptist Perspective on Religious Liberty. Nashville, TN: B&H Academic, 2007.
———, eds. Restoring Integrity in Baptist Churches. Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Academic, 2007.
———, eds. Upon This Rock: The Baptist View of the Church. Nashville, TN: B&H Academic, 2010.
1. Describe the three approaches to Baptist identity. If you are a Baptist, which of these approaches best describes you? If you are not a Baptist, can you think of similar levels of belonging with respect to other religious traditions?
2. What are the three most important sources for studying Baptist identity? Has your church ever adopted a church covenant? If so, which one? What emphasis is placed on it, if any? Which items, if any, in J. Newton Brown’s church covenant do you find helpful for church members? Which items, if any, in Brown’s church covenant do you find unnecessary?
3. What biblical passages do Baptists point to in order to justify their understanding of regenerate church membership? In what ways is church membership affirmed in your church? Evaluate the statement, “You must believe before you can belong,” as it relates to children of non-Christian parents.
4. On what basis do Baptists practice church discipline? Do you believe church discipline can have a redemptive purpose? Explain your answer.
5. Compare and contrast the credobaptist position on baptism with the pedobaptist position. Which of these two positions seems most convincing? Explain your answer. If you were baptized as a believer, describe the experience. If you have not been baptized, have you ever witnessed a baptismal service? What do you remember most about it?
6. What is congregational polity? How does it differ from presbyterian and episcopal polity? In what way is congregational polity different from a mere democracy? What solutions are presented in this section with regard to unhealthy congregationalism? Can you think of more solutions? Explain your answer.
7. What do Baptists believe about local church autonomy? How did General and Particular Baptists affirm local church autonomy while promoting a form of connectionalism? Do you believe churches should be autonomous, independent, or have regulatory oversight by larger church bodies? Explain your answer.
8. Explain the difference between liberty of conscience and personal religious autonomy. Provide an example of each from earlier chapters in the textbook. Do you agree or disagree with the statement that “religious liberty is ultimately about the Great Commission”? Explain your answer.
9. Can you think of areas where Baptists might partner with non-Baptists in promoting religious liberty? What lines should be drawn and what limits should be observed when cooperating on a common cause with people from different denominational perspectives? Explain your answer.