Historic Baptist Influence

It depends on what is meant by "offer." (see above). He never offered grace, because in his view grace is given by God alone and not man. He offered the gospel and taught clearly that is the duty of the preacher to call men to repent and believe. High Calvinists (and many Low) affirm that the gospel is its own invitation when preached. It does not, therefore, require what we call an invitation, e.g. an altar call.

 

I didn't use the word "offer." You and Gill did that. :smilewinkgrin:

What I said is that I read that Gill would not preach to sinners (physically speaking) for fear of preaching the Gospel to the unelect. If you will look back in the thread, I am equating hyper-Calvinism with deeds, not doctrine per se (granting that doctrine influences deeds). If Gill indeed did what I just said (granting once again that I can't find where I read it to document it), then in my book he was a hyper-Calvinist, since he directly disobeyed the Great Commission.

You seem well read on Gill. Are there any biographies out on him you can recommend, either in print or the Internet?

 

I'm not Gene , but you can check out what's available at Amazon books . The real John Rippon did a bio on his illustrious predecessor . The resident expert for my money would be George Melvyn Ella ( and money you will need to buy his volume -- it's about $90.00 ) . It's called John Gill and the Cause of God and Truth . ( That's a play on Gill's famous work . ) Tom Nettles has a cheaper book out on the doctor . Then if you want to really invest look up The Life and Thought of John Gill : A Tercentennial Appreciation . The general editor is Michael Haykin ( a wonderful Church historian ) . It is a series of essays and costs around $124.00 .

 

I was thinking more a $10 paperback! I'm not THAT interested in his life, him not being a missionary and all.

 

A bio of Dr. Gill would of necessity be a long one because he led a very rich life and contributed vast amounts of biblical works to the saints of God . A thumbnail sketch is not worthy of that servant of the Lord .

You have to get the timeline down a bit . The missionary movement was in the generation after Gill . But Dr. Gill was a missionary in his own way as was Spurgeon and countless others in church history who did not fit a particular bill of goods set by some of today .

 

Sorry, I don't buy the view that some pastor in the homeland is just as much a missionary as I am.

But I'll bite. In what way do you think Gill was a missionary? What did he do to fulfill the Great Commission?

 

I am surprised Spurgeon is not mentioned in this thread a being a great contributor to the development of Baptist history. His works are still widely read today and his influnce flows beyond Baptist circles.

He, was a biblical sepratist and took a strong stand during the Downgrade Contorversy. A heritage that many a Baptist view fondly.

 

Spurgeon was a great man in many ways, but since he was in essence a follower of Fuller, I put Fuller's influence as greater. For example, the launch of the modern missions movement by Fuller and Carey preceded Spurgeon.

 

Hello J of J, I think I like your definition of hyper-c as simply those that oppose missions, but I wonder if their might be some school of doctrine out there somewhere that might be anti-missions and yet not associated with calvinism in any way.

I've read Phil Johnson's treatise on hypercalvinism and I think he misses the mark on trying to nail down hypercalvinism through theological/doctrinal analysis. HC is a moving target doctrinally speaking, and it may very well be that it can be better understood in its practices rather than its teachings.

I welcome my fellow calvinists to correct me on this as needed.

BTW Phil Johnson is a genius, I just think he's on the wrong track on trying to define HC the way he does.

 

Actually, to tweak the definition here, I would prefer to define HC as a Calvinistic teaching or movement that opposes or disobeys the Great Commission. Thus, in my definition the emphasis is on action, though I don't throw out doctrine completely in it.

 

Perhaps, but I do not think the launch of the modern missions movent is the primary factor for determining influnce as the OP was looking for.

Spurgeon's writings are still largely read and he is perhaps the most quoted figure in Baptist history. His influence continues on today.

Obviously I am a Spurgeon fan, so I suppose I would be a bit biased; I even named my youngest son Haddon!

 

Whew, you certainly are biased!! But Haddon is a good manly name, so....:thumbs:

The OP said, "WHO IN BAPTIST HISTORY DO YOU SEE AS THE GREATEST CONTRIBUTOR TO BAPTIST HISTORY OR DEVELOPMENT?" It didn't limit the contribution to English-speaking countries. The missions movement of Fuller and Carey made the Baptist faith world wide. To this day, the Baptists of many countries in Asia owe their existence to that start: Carey in India, Judson in Burma, Nathan Brown and others in Japan, many in China. I think it is too Euro-centric to ignore this.

 

I think Spurgeon certainly should get the nod for his contribution to not only Baptists , but Christians in general . He is/was/shall be read widely ( though some publications have edited out his Calvinism as much as possible ) . Fuller is not read that much ( far less than John Gill I'd wager ) .

Regarding hyper-Calvinism --- it can't be considered a Calvinistic teaching which disobeys the G.C. Since Calvinists believe in the Great Commission H-C would have to be considered a deformity of Calvinism -- not Calvinism proper . And doctrine has to be the focus of what hyper-Calvinism is , or is not . A JW is not a Christian who denies the diety of Christ , the Trinity and eternality of Hell . ( BTW , I am not putting any H-C's in the category of non-Christians .)

 

Hello Rippon, good to hear from you again - have you heard from Calvibaptist or Me4Him lately? Were they banned or something? I miss Calvi. Anyway, after I had posted that about HC being defined by practice and not doctrine, I repented. With that premise, we would have to label most of the churches in existence as hyper-calvinist, since most churches, regardless of their theology, do not practice the GC. I think you've narrowed it down rightly, that HC has a particular view of the GC - that the GC has been fulfilled during the apostolic age and today the gospel is not to be preached to the world, only the church. Mr. Johnson's definitions of HC make me nervous because I think he overreaches into doctrines, which although may be unorthodox, nevertheless are not necessarily associated with anti-GC. Here is his outline from the gty website:

A hyper-Calvinist is someone who either:

1. Denies that the gospel call applies to all who hear, OR
2. Denies that faith is the duty of every sinner, OR
3. Denies that the gospel makes any "offer" of Christ, salvation, or mercy to the non-elect (or denies that the offer of divine mercy is free and universal), OR
4. Denies that there is such a thing as "common grace," OR
5. Denies that God has any sort of love for the non-elect.

Let's take faith-duty for example. I don't see how one could define hypercalvinism with such a weedy subject. It's over reaching IMO.

Hope this clarifies my position and sorry about hijacking the thread on historic baptist influence and focusing on hypercalvinism instead.

 

I don't think I can answer one greatest contributor to Baptist history and development. But I think one likely to remain unmentioned, and possibly overlooked, whose contributions may be as great as several named in this thread, is Shubal Stearns.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shubal_Stearns
http://www.siteone.com/religion/baptist/baptistpage/Distinctives/church/Stearns.pdf

While on the subject of Baptist history, notice that the new "The Baptist History Collection" CD version 1.0 is available for the retail price of $59.95. One might possibly search around on the internet and find a better price, special offer, etc. Nevertheless, this resource seems like a bargain even at that price, with only one of the many materials being worth the cost.

This CD collection includes Armitage's History of the Baptists; Benedict's General History of the Baptists; Cathcart's Baptist Encyclopedia; Orchard's Concise History of the Baptists; Backus' History of New England Baptists; Taylor's History of the English General Baptists; Griffin's History of the Primitive Baptists in Mississippi; Link's Texas Historical & Biographical Magazine; Asplund's Annual & Universal Register; Baker's Baptist Source Book; The Black Rock Address; Parker's Public Address on Foreign Missions; Underhill's Tracts on Liberty of Conscience; Terrill's Records of a Church meeting in Broadmead; Burkitt and Read's Concise History of the Kehukee Baptist Association; Fristoe's History of the Ketocton Baptist Association; Minutes of the Philadelphia Baptist Association; Purefoy's History of the Sandy Creek Baptist Association; Underhill's Baptist Confessions of Faith & Other Public Documents; Hovey's Life and Times of Isaac Backus; Green's Life and Writings of Elder John Leland; McKibbens' Life and Works of Morgan Edwards....and much more. This collection contains approximately 43,298 pages. It contains the complete text of all the listed materials.
http://standardbearer.org/ContentDetail.asp?ID=21

 

Please define your boundaries

Are you asking who historically, theologically or practically has affected the Baptist's? Do you desire only a corporate impact or can local influence/impact be brought into the conversation?

Do they have to be Baptist?

Many non Baptist’s, if you removed their penchant for affusion, would be classified in every other area as Baptist and many of these men had great influence through their writing and preaching.

If Gill, Fuller, Spurgeon be the only ones considered it will be a short discussion.

:type:

 

I was wondering when someone would mention Stearns. He certainly deserves to be on the short list.

"The Baptist History Collection" CD looks great. "Classic Baptist Books," which I have, is a similar CD with many of the same titles (a total of over 100 books) but overall a different mix. It is a little more pricey, but I'm really glad to have it. It is available at: www.mbbc.edu/rwha
:type:

 

I might consider John Smyth, John the Baptist, Jesus Christ, Paul, or maybe the group of Separatists that came over on the Mayflower.