If you're at all interested in John Bunyan or William Kiffin or would like to understand what the open-membership debate is really about, I direct you to my article . . . Revisiting an Old Debate between John Bunyan and William KiffinBaptists in America have very strong feelings about the conditions for church membership. In this article, I want to focus on one: believer’s baptism by immersion. My current church constitution lists as a requirement for church membership baptism by immersion on repentance of sin and profession of faith. The same qualification appears in both the Philadelphia and New Hampshire confessions of faith, in Pendleton’s Baptist Church Manual, and in the Baptist Faith and Message. Indeed, many Baptists in America consider believer’s baptism by immersion to be a non-negotiable prerequisite for local church membership—but perhaps not as many as did a generation ago. Some significant Baptist churches have begun accepting members without that requirement, and that trend will certainly continue. Indeed, I broached this subject with some colleagues in Britain, and they were confused by my intention because they have nearly unanimously removed that condition from their constitutions. It is no longer a debate for them. This development raises the question: Should this matter simply go by the wayside, another casualty of the inexorable march toward uniformity (or perhaps pastor fatigue)? I know that my pastor has been through several weeks of this discussion with an individual from a Church of Christ background who is presenting herself for membership. Both my wife and I were confronted (blindsided?) with this matter when, as new Christians, we desired to join a Baptist church for the first time. In America, at least, many churches deal with the matter of “rebaptism” on a regular basis.[2] It is a critical matter worthy of continued attention. To remind us of its importance and perhaps refresh our perspective, I would like to call our attention to one of the first times it was debated publicly in its modern sense—the open-communion debate between seventeenth-century English pastors William Kiffin and John Bunyan—and recast it in the context they considered, as a matter of worship. To Kiffin and Bunyan, the crux of the open-communion debate was whether baptism should be considered an act of individual worship or the church’s worship. They revealed baptism to be a critical intersection of ministry, theology, and worship. Their answers to the question could well inform our understanding of this matter and its significance today. Read the rest of this article on the Artistic Theologian website.
0 Comments
One of the most interesting outcomes of this little analysis of two paragraphs written in the late 1640s is how wide-ranging the implications are. Let's start with its three basic assertions:
Profession of Faith Puritanism took a rather oblique stance on salvation. Puritans (and by this I mean the self-identifying Calvinistic party that arose out of the larger movement to purify the Church of England) inherited just enough of Calvin's church/state covenant theology to assume that their church communities would have Christians and nonchristians alike. Throw in enough predestinarianism and they didn't know (or really care) who was who. Because it was God's choice alone who would be saved, all one could do in this life was look for evidence of it. Hence the Puritan approach was to baptize everyone into the church community (preferably as a baby) and let the chips fall where they may. But to give some sort of hope to the community members, Puritans created a very elaborate step-by-step salvation experience (Perkins' "Golden Chain" anyone?) that people could place themselves on. At the end of this set of experiences was repentance/salvation, and if one didn't make it all the way to the end of the chain, he or she was predestined to be damned. I suppose this means I'll have to do a blog entry on the Golden Chain some day. Anyway, Baptists saw through all of that. They never desired to play the role of God in determining salvation because they knew the heart was beyond their vision. They absolutely cared about behavior (moreso as a witness to the lordship of Christ but also as a view to the fruit of salvation); surviving meeting minutes are filled with exercises of church discipline. But their emphasis on proper baptism, proper submission within a church structure, and so on was not about the Puritan test for salvation. It was about proper church order. It was about a church being right with God through its individual members being right with God. Believe it or not, this was a scandalous position to take in that day. {If anyone without a Baptist history background actually reads this blog, I know I need to validate that statement. Take a look at the First London Confession [1644], Article XXXIII for the easiest summary. You can also see Cox, Knollys, and Kiffin, A Declaration Concerning The Publike Dispute, particulary page 20. Kiffin said, "and that being thus baptized upon profession of Faith, they are then added to the Church, 2 Act. 41. and being added to the Church, wee conceive our selves bound to watch over one another, and in case of sinne, to deale faithfully one with another" (A Briefe Remonstrance, 13). They understood that a profession of faith did not mean one had saving faith; one could not verbalize his way into the kingdom of heaven. But they also understood that everyone stood on his own before God in judgment, so they would accept a profession on its face.} We've been looking at a fascinating letter published by John Tombes in answer to a question about baptism. Once Tombes had begun questioning the validity of infant baptism, Westminster and its polemicists blacklisted him and pumped him with the "swarme of sectaries" and in particular the Baptists. Tombes, for his part, took the time to learn the Baptist position, published where he agreed and disagreed, and asked Baptist leaders to clarify some of their wording. The most basic question, and the one that caused the greatest contention with the established church, was the "who" and "why" of baptism. This was the answer Tombes received: That which we require and without which we will not baptize any is a persons manifestation of himself to be a believer in Jesus Christ, and to desire baptisme according to the revealed will of Christ, and in obedience thereunto, we do not baptize any into this or that particular congregation: but only into that one body in general spoken of 1 Cor. 12. 13. As touching joining in communion, we in this case require no more, then a manifest readinesse to hold communion with all the Churches of Christ in the things of Christ, and accordingly to shew a real willingnesse to have communion with any particular Church of Christ according as the hand of God shall give opportunity, and true seasonablenesse of and for the same. Thus we judge and practise accordingly. Benjamen Cox. There are two issues in particular that need to be understood. Early Baptists did not baptize into church membership. But they weren't in complete agreement about this. This matter caused confusion among the early Baptists and still causes confusion today. A lot of Baptist church members today believe that baptism is the act of becoming a church member, in other words that people are baptized "into" church membership. Some Baptist church constitutions actually have it worded this way. (By the way, if you are not a Baptist, you might not have experience with Baptist church autonomy. We believe that Baptist churches have the right to determine this for themselves. I'm just saying the historic position leans a different direction.) I think the confusion is as much cultural as anything (pre- and post-Baptist communities), and that makes it doubly difficult to sort through the disagreements. James Pendleton, in his once very influential Baptist Church Manual, said of candidates for church membership, they are by vote of the church recognized, as candidates for baptism, with the understanding that when baptized they will be entitled to all the rights and privileges of membership. This has been interpreted to mean that baptism is the act of joining the church. But that's not what he said. What he said actually lines up quite well with the beliefs of the early English Baptists. In the next section, we'll look at some specific statements made by the leaders in question, then we'll come full circle and tie everything together at the end. But first, one more point of clarification. "All the Churches of Christ" might not mean what you think it means. Note the definition of a church in the First London Confession: a company of visible Saints, called & separated from the world, by the word and Spirit of God, to the visible profession of the faith of the Gospel, being baptized into that faith, and joyned to the Lord, and each other, by mutuall agreement, in the practical injoyment of the Ordinances, commanded by Christ their head and King. (Article XXXIII) One of my very favorite characters in reading lots of stuff printed in 17C England is a man named John Tombes. He is rather obscure today because he never really fit into any "camp," and so no one really claims him in their heritage. But he was a heavy hitter in his day, a wonderful writer and extremely thoughtful (which is why I like him so much). When I have time *cough* I'll write a book about him one day. Right now, I just want to touch on something very specific. Context In my reading of early Baptists (thank God for Early English Books Online), I came across a fascinating paragraph in one of Tombes's books. To make a long story short, Tombes supported the idea of an established church (for the first 40 years of his life, that meant the Anglicans, and then the Presbyterians when they ascended). But in 1641 he lost a public debate in Bristol with a Baptist, which reinforced the doubts in infant baptism he developed while a student at Oxford. In 1645, he published Two Treatises and an Appendix to Them Concerning Infant-Baptisme which included his formal request to the Westminster Assembly to discuss the subject and his critique of a sermon by Stephen Marshall on the subject. (If you were not aware, Parliament forbade Westminster from responding to any private publications, and Stephen Marshall was widely considered the greatest preacher in England - Tombes was not just being bold, he was being borderline cheeky; I told you I liked the guy.) Well, he earned an immediate blacklisting by Westminster as well as some very angry responses in print, including Thomas Bakewell (A Justification of Two Points, 1645), John Geree (A Vindication of Paedobaptisme, 1645), Nathanael Homes (A Vindication of Baptizing Beleevers Infants, 1645), William Hussey (An Answer to Mr Tombes, 1646), and Stephen Marshall himself (A Defence of Infant-Baptism, 1646). Again, John Tombes was a major player in his day. Tombes responded to most of those books (including a book by John Ley I could not find) in 1646 with An Apology or Plea for the Two Treatises, and Appendix to them. For obvious reasons, the Presbyterians had lumped Tombes in with the Baptists, so in his Apology, Tombes included his thoughts about the recently published (now-called) First London Confession of Faith by the London Particular Baptists. His 1646 Apology sparked even more debate, and in response Tombes went directly to certain London Baptist leaders with questions that had arisen. One of those answers, printed in An Additional to the Apology for the two Treatises concerning Infant-Baptism (1652), is marvelous on many levels and worth lots of discussion.
John Tombes's Answer One of the most common question asked of Tombes was the relationship between baptism and church membership with respect to qualifications for either. The Presbyterians simply did not understand what the Baptists were doing, so they attacked Tombes for agreeing with the Baptists' perceived incoherence. Tombes asked some Baptists what they thought, and this is the reply: |
AuthorIf I ever say something in here that doesn't make sense, please ask me to clarify. It always makes sense in my head, but that doesn't necessary mean anything to you . . . Categories
All
|