Landmark Baptists

@Alan Gross

I don't know your location, but if you are near Nashville you can read Grave's hand written journals.

I did my thesis on Landmarkism and the debate between Graves and RBC Howell. Spent a lot of time in the archives reading Graves' and Howell's letters and journals.

Just thought you might find it interesting, if it's not too far.

Alan Gross said:

I am quite the critic. I said, "really?"
….
Sorry, nothing of that nature was intended and it won't happen in a way you could misunderstand, again, I hope.

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I misunderstood nothing. You completely dismissed my work’s credibility with a rhetorical “BaptistBasics.org really?” followed by a list of alternative resources. You then deceptively presented the information in my article as incorrect even while agreeing with it. You sought to discredit my website instead of directly confronting your real issues with the person who shared a link to it. I misunderstood nothing.

Matthew Gage said:

You completely dismissed my work’s credibility with a rhetorical “BaptistBasics.org really?”

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Being Commissioned by the Creator God of the Universe has more power than I thought. Maybe, God trigged you.

Because there are alternative resources more knowledgeable for gaining an understanding of God's position on Landmark Baptists.

Rather than one with cardinal errors, such as defining Landmark Baptists as believing The Kingdom (Basileia) of God and the Lord's churches (Ekklesia) are synonymous when they are nowhere near it and, thereby, negating the entire premise of Landmarkism.

A local church is the only kind of ekklesia/church/congregation that Jesus or The Bible knows anything about and what He Originated and Commissioned.

Local church congregations perpetuate themselves through the Supernaturally Overseen execution of the Great Commission, organically, using real visible people. They do the business of God on earth, as a lighthouse and witness where God's people gather together to worship God, periodically.

The kingdom of God is all saved people on earth at any given time. No Divine Organization involved, no Commission, no authority in baptism, or any need to promise it perpetuity.

We may be some of the few called to distinguish these distinctive characteristics, from the Bible, and myriad are those commissioned to intentionally sabotage our teaching on it.

Matthew Gage said:

followed by a list of alternative resources.

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I have more.

Heavy duty.

Not for the uninitiated (that need to be blessed with an understanding of the difference between Basileia and Ekklesia, to start with.)

This one is brilliant, by a man whose mind was blessed by God;
https://www.pbcofdecaturalabama.org/pdf/TheGreatCommissionCredentials.pdf

Matthew Gage said:

You then deceptively presented the information in my article as incorrect even while agreeing with it.

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Why didn't you give an example of this?

Do you mean this?

""It is not that they held any new or revolutionary position.

"They were responding to an attack on their own identity as an upstart group emerged to claim to be the one true church with the only true doctrines.

"Conflicts and debates between Landmark Baptists and the Church of Christ (or “Campbellites” as Landmarkers liked to call them) were very common."

You said before that, "These quotes are deceptively pulled from a paragraph where I explain my theory of what caused the rise of the Landmark Movement."

I don't get the 'deceptively' part. On this or the other words, you defended yourself with.

Are you being counseled or advised by a significant other or other?

Let me talk to them.

Matthew Gage said:

You sought to discredit my website instead of directly confronting your real issues with the person who shared a link to it.

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I placed the same, 'Really?', comment on the other two website links.

I am anxiously awaiting God to trigger them, too.

Matthew Gage said:

I misunderstood nothing.

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BaptistBasics.org, BaptistBasics.org, BaptistBasics.org.

Looks like your blog is the contact information you have, for correspondence, if I took exception to some of your article's content and didn't care to see it repeated in one of your books some day?

Salty said:

You say tow-mato
I say TA-mato

"Majoring on the minors"

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I would like to request that I not be named as an authority to use these expressions concerning the Lord's local church congregation He Originated, at The Judgment Seat of Christ.

It won't fly.

Piper said:

We can briefly point to the testimony of the Separate Baptists in the United States. Shubal Stearns and Daniel Marshall were converts under Whitefield’s ministry during the Great Awakening. Though they were brothers-in-law, they came to Baptist convictions independent of each other, through reading the Scriptures. They had a good ministry in Virginia and later removed to North Carolina where a great revival ensued.

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This is from my home church's history at our website;
Our History – Bryan Station Baptist Church

Our church was organized by the authority obtained from "Elders Shubeal Sterns and Daniel Marshall who, once they were saved, sought out Baptist Baptism".

Provided, "they came to Baptist convictions", by reading the Bible, the authority in the succession of baptism is a subsequent event where these two actually had, "sought out Baptist Baptism".

We were organized with authority in the succession of baptism, in 1786, which was 65 years prior to the popularization of the term, "Landmarkism", by J.R. Graves.

"Bryan Station Baptist Church is a local, visible, called-out assembly of scripturally baptized believers, covenanted together according to the Biblical pattern of a “one member, one vote,” spirit-led democracy; whose purpose is the carrying out of the Great Commission of Matthew 28:16-20. The Bible teaches that only such a church as this is authorized and constructed to be able to do so.

"Our authority came, according to the Biblical doctrine of “church succession,” through particular New England “separate” Baptists who had sought out existing Baptist churches for this arm of authority. Such were Elders Shubeal Sterns and Daniel Marshall who, once they were saved, sought out Baptist Baptism; Shubeal Sterns at the Baptist Church at Toland, Connecticut on May 20, 1751; and Daniel Marshall from Winsor, Connecticut, saved and burdened to preach, came to Winchester, Virginia where he became convinced of the soundness of Baptist doctrine and was immersed at the age of forty-eight.

"After a few years each under sound ministry, and after becoming licensed to preach by their respective churches, they were found laboring in Virginia, North and South Carolina and Georgia. They remained in Virginia only a short while “but the power of God was effectual in the conversion of Samuel Harris, a man of great distinction…” who at length became greatly used of the Lord.

“Sometime in 1766… Elijah Craig and two others came to this same Mr. Harris’s home in order to procure his services in Orange County, Va. and adjacent parts; to preach and baptize and organize new converts. They found to their surprise that he himself at that time had not yet been ordained; but being more perfectly instructed in the way of the Lord he carried them about 60 miles into North Carolina to get James Read (who was ordained) (Robert B. Semple, “A History of the Rise and Progress of the Baptists in Virginia.”) and (John T. Christian, “A History of the Baptists,” pg. 215, vol. 2), even as Jesus traveled at least as far to receive baptism at the hands of a Baptists preacher (Mark 1:9-14).

"From this beginning churches were established and ordination by them was begun (John T. Christian, pg. 216, vol.2), and a church was soon found at Spotsylvania, Va. – the Spotsylvania Baptist Church, pastored by Elder Lewis Craig. And it is from this church, when it became the famous “Traveling Church” in September of 1781, when Lewis Craig led the whole church over the Cumberland Gap to settle in the bluegrass region of Central Kentucky, that the authority for our Bryan Station Baptist Church came, organized in 1786.

Piper said:

Johann Gerhard Oncken was a German who was saved in England. Later, in Hamburg he became convicted of the truth of believer’s baptism. After waiting for someone to immerse him, he, his wife, and five others were baptized by Barnas Sears under cover of darkness. God used him to establish a Baptist testimony in Germany, and he was the driving force of missionary outreach into Russia, Hungary, and several of the Scandinavian countries.

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from: Distinguished Men Among Early Delaware Baptists
By Richard B. Cook, 1880

On point, Barnas Sears had authority in Baptist baptism by succession, when he baptized Johann Gerhard Oncken;


Rev. John G. Oncken, D. D.

"It is, however, chiefly of his connection with the conversion to Baptist views of the great German apostle, Rev. John G. Oncken, D. D., that I wish to speak. This matter was first brought to the attention of the writer by Miss Anne Semple of Wilmington, Delaware, who knew him well and played with his children. Miss Semple says: "Captain Tubbs commanded a vessel sailing between Philadelphia and Hamburg, belonging to the late John Welsh, Esq., of Philadelphia, whose wife was a member of Sansom Street Baptist Church, and who was the father of the ex-Minister to England. One winter his vessel was providentially ice-bound at Hamburg, and he boarded in the city. In the same house was a young man, a colporteur from London, named J. G. Oncken, a Pedobaptist. They became intimate, and among other religious subjects discussed interchanged their views on the ordinance of Baptism. Mr. Oncken, being convinced that
the captain had the Bible on his side, and consequently that he was not baptized, requested that on his return home he would make his case known to some Baptist minister going to Europe, and ask him to visit Hamburg and baptize him."

In Lehmann's History of the Baptist Churches in Germany, etc., translated by G. Anderson, D. D. (p. 5), we read: "Finally, after many years, Dr. Barnas Sears of America, who now occupies a high position in the United States, came to Hamburg, entered into intimate relations with Oncken, and was thus prepared to administer baptism to him and to the few believers who found themselves in fellowship with Oncken, and shared his convictions in respect to the ordinances. It was on the 22d of April, 1834, that the above-mentioned solemn baptism was administered to him and to six others, and thus was laid the foundation of the first Baptist Church in Hamburg and in Germany. The event caused a great sensation wherever Oncken's name was known. On account of his meetings and preaching he had already suffered persecution, which now rose to an unusual height."

Baptist baptism by authority "laid the foundation of the first Baptist Church in Hamburg and in Germany."

The following letter should explain itself;

From Rev. Barnas Sears, D. D., LL.D.
STAUNTON, Va., April 29, 1880.

REV. R. B. COOK.
DEAR BROTHER:
I often heard Mr. Oncken speak of Captain Tubbs, who was, I think, at different times at Hamburg, and with whom Mr. Oncken corresponded. He always spoke of him with the greatest Christian affection. My impression is that Mr. Oncken got his Baptist views first from him; that is, that he first talked with him on the subject of Baptism. His own doubts may have preceded that time. As Secretary of the Lower Saxony Tract Society he expressed his doubts in a letter to Dr. Maclay, and Dr. Maclay asked me to seek him out in Hamburg, which I did, and I found his views settled on the subject. He wished me to converse with his wife and four or five others, who were then much troubled with doubts; all of whom were baptized afterward. Yours truly,
B. SEARS.

Baptized by authority.

Piper said:

Gustavas Schroeder was a Swedish sea captain who was saved in a Methodist revival meeting in New Orleans. He came to Baptist convictions by reading the Bible and was used of God to plant churches in the United States (including Hamilton Square Baptist Church, San Francisco) and in Scandinavia.

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Again, from: Gustavus Schroeder - Swedish Baptists


Are you saved? If you were a Swedish immigrant to America in the 1850s and 1860s and stood near a Swedish Baptist, chances are you would be asked that question. The curious thing about it was that the Swedes came out of the Lutheran tradition rather than the Baptist. Baptist views were not even introduced into Sweden until 1847, and that was by a sailor named Gustavus Schroeder. There was something curious about that fact, too: Schroeder was converted in a Methodist Church in the U.S.! However, before returning home, he encountered a group of Baptists, was convinced by their teaching and baptized by them. He shared his testimony with fellow Swedes.

About the same time, another Swedish sailor, Frederick Olaus Nilsson, became frightened in a storm and vowed to turn his life over to God. In New Orleans, he jumped ship and worked his way across America handing out tracts. Back in Sweden, he met Schroeder who explained Baptist views to him. Nilsson could find no one to baptize him in Sweden, so he traveled to Hamburg, Germany. He found a Baptist pastor there who returned with him and baptized his family and a few others one night; persecution was severe so secrecy was needed.

Christian History Institute.

Gustavus Schroeder encountered a group of Baptists, was convinced by their teaching and baptized by them, by Baptist authority in succession.

Frederick Olaus Nilsson couldn't find a Baptist to baptize him, by authority of succession, until he found a Baptist preacher in Hamburg Germany.

Piper said:

These stories can be repeated countless times.

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Yes, they can be repeated countless times, only the way I have them presented and sourced them, not Fred Moritz.

Piper said:

The Landmark Baptists face the horns of a dilemma when deciding if these godly leaders, and others like them, are true Baptists.

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No, we're not. We simply research the facts from history.

It is interesting that this hit piece uses the language, "the horns of a dilema", when J.R. Graves famously has a book entitled, "Trilemma".

The trilemma by J. R. Graves | Open Library

And the contents of the book?

Protestants made their own study of the authority they may or may not have had, for conducting THE BUSINESS of GOD, in so many words. They sought out history.

The Protestants found themselves on "the horns of a dilemma" when they discovered that since they came from Roman Catholicism and claimed that they didn't have any authority from God, then their Protestant religion couldn't claim authority from God and if Roman Catholicism did have authority from God, what were the Protestants doing away from them?

The Protestants found themselves on "the horns of a dilemma".

So, what is a "Trilemma" J.R. Graves is talking about in his book?

That is when you are on "the horns of a dilemma", finding yourself between a rock and a hard place, AND THEN IN ADDITION TO THAT, something is pushing on you and applying pressure.

That is a "Trilemma".

How did that come about?

After the Protestants discovered that they could establish no credible claim to operate by the authority of God, they looked over and saw that The Baptist and Baptist-like believers had the authority to conduct the business of God.

Hummm.

So, what did they do?

Well, they shut down their study.

What do you think they did?

And to this day, both Roman Catholicism and Protestantism and 'Baptist-Protestants', and other 'Baptists', in name only have actively endeavored to oppose true Historical Baptists and Baptist-like churches and especially to put out false hit-pieces like this one, by Fred Moritz, to disparage 'Landmarkism', because it makes them look like they are doing just what they are doing.

"Fishing without a license".

Piper said:

How does their coming to biblical convictions apart from any influence but Scripture “square” with the Landmark theory of historical succession?

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Those that come to the Biblical convictions of the truths of Baptist Doctrine are COMMANDED to "be baptized" and that BY AUTHORITY, as they read all about in The Book of Acts.

Piper said:

Scripture nowhere teaches such a succession.

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Sure it does. Provided God considers it someone's business.

Piper said:

The validity of a church and its authority is determined by its conformity to Scripture.

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What about that?

So, why the 'universal invisible' monstrosity of nothingness that doesn't differentiate The Kingdom of God, from The Lord's church He founded, Personally?

Piper said:

The strongest, and indeed the only valid argument for the Baptist position, is the following. If suddenly today all religious traditions were somehow to vanish from the earth and all that were left was a New Testament, tomorrow there would be Baptists.

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You got that right. The Bible mass-produces those with Baptist convictions, by default. Those folks would still be Commanded to be baptized by The Authority of God given to a man sent from God to baptize, whose name was John the Baptist.

How would they accomplish that? That would be up to the originator of the initial fictional hypothesis.

God hasn't left the world without His witnesses that assemble by HIS AUTHORITY, just as they did by His Command in the Old Testament.

It is pertinent to know that the Greek version of the Old Testament uses the word, "ekklesia", or a "called-out (of the world) assembly, 66 times.

God's meeting places with His people that had The Shekinah Glory* in their midst, were "assemblies" exactly like those that God Commands to assemble (churches/ekklesias) in The New Testament, only organized differently (just like the Temple and Tabernacle were both assemblies of God's people with The Shekinah Glory, only organized differently).

*The Lord's New Testament church Organization/ Organism that was fully operational and up and running prior to The Day of Pentecost was publically inaugurated when Jesus fulfilled prophecy, by baptizing her (figuratively speaking immersing her) with the Holy Spirit, once and for all time.

See Danuel 9:24; "Seventy weeks are determined upon thy people and upon thy holy city, to finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most Holy."

The Shekinah Glory indwelling The Lord's churches Superintends and Divinely Administrates over her continual existence on earth, as God's witnesses and lighthouses to bring Him Glory and conduct HIS BUSINESS.

Piper said:

Succession of New Testament doctrine is the only true apostolic succession

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Who do you think God has called to perpetuate New Testament Doctrine? Those that still hold to it, today? Those that know enough to not claim 'Apostolic Succession', or at least know what it means, not to bring it up.

Piper said:

The claim of succession is similar to Roman Catholic teaching. Rome depends upon apostolic succession; Landmarkism depends upon a historical succession. Both are in error.

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Nope. Roman Catholicism falls all over herself in an attempt to claim 'apostolic succession, at which they are sadly mistaken and have and will always fail.

The Lord's churches/ Landmarkism depend on The Bible 100% to teach succession and all the overwhelming and ancient historical evidence is just additional icing on the cake. We believe there is a historical succession, by faith, based on The Word of God, but we are not dependent on or capricious enough to suggest such a historical record exists. The records needed just do not exist. That doesn't debunk a nickles worth of our claim to succession by The Authority of God in Baptism, because here we are.

Piper said:

This issue is important because it affects our approach to Baptist history and because the Landmark theory has not disappeared.

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Yep. Landmark History is Baptist History and The True History of True New Testament Christianity. And we won't disappear, because God says we can't, even if The Beast, The Great Whore, and her Harlot Daughters mass the power of the government over centuries, to mercilessly pillage, rape, torture, and murder 10s of millions of us, she (the Lord's churches) just fled into the wilderness (a statement of documentable historical fact).

"And the woman fled into the wilderness, where she hath a place prepared of God, that they should feed her there a thousand two hundred and threescore days (the entirety of The New Testament Church Age until Jesus comes again. Revelation 12:6

Piper said:

We must understand that these presuppositions cannot be established from Scripture. Neither can the succession premise be proven from history.

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I'd like to see it disproved rather than just swiped at.

Piper said:

We specifically reject the Landmark Baptist position that holds that there is a visible, unbroken, historical line of succession between the New Testament believers of previous centuries and Bible-believing Baptists today.

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No one has claimed "a visible, unbroken, historical line of succession" that can be demonstrated, (and if they did or do they need to be corrected, just like a seemingly well-intentioned 'Ruckmanite' needs to be corrected) because all the records necessary (WE require) simply have not been preserved, in the Providence of God, as has The Bible, for example. That is God's call.

A "visible, unbroken, historical line of succession" is not a prerequisite to being taught by The Spirit of God what a church is in The Bible and believing the Biblical Record that Jesus promised His churches a continual existence until He comes again.

Piper said:

People who held Baptist convictions have lived in every period of church history

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Very good point.

Piper said:

but to prove a line of succession between them is impossible.

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Yes, it is, until we stand before God and He is pleased to reveal it.

No one is or needs to claim, historically, a line of succession.

It is beside the point of God promising His ekklesias perpetuity.

Piper said:

the authority of the Word of God that gave our Baptist forebears their convictions.

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The "authority of the Word of God that gave our Baptist forebears their convictions", in Baptist-like Doctrine, also led them by the Supernatural Guidance of The Holy Spirit to seek out authority in baptism by succession, as we have seen some examples of.

Piper said:

That Word is also the source of our Baptist convictions.

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Right.

The Bible gives true historical Landmark Baptists a Homecourt Advantage, as I have mentioned previously, to the Glory of God.

Someone was wondering about the Early Church Fathers and their beliefs about Redemption and various related positions.

These folks below begin on pg.617.

The Cause of God and Truth In Four Parts
With a Vindication of Part IV., by John Gill, D.D.

Part IV, Chapter 2 - Of Redemption, pg.617
-Introduction
-Clemens Romanus. A.D. 69.
-Barnabas. A.D. 70.
-Ignatius. A.D. 110.
-Justin. A.D. 150.
-Ecclesia Smyrnensis. A.D. 169.
-Irenaeus. A.D. 180.
-Tertullian. A.D. 200.
-Origines Alexandrinus. A.D. 230.
-Cyprian. A.D. 250.
-Lactantius. A.D. 320.
-Paulinus Tyrius. A.D. 325.
-Eusebius Pamphilus Caesariensis. A.D. 330.
-Julius Firmicus. A.D. 350.
-Anthanasius. A.D. 350.
-Macarius Aegyptius. A.D. 350.
-Hilarius Pictaviensis. A.D. 363.
-Basilius Caesariensis. A.D. 370.
-Optatus Milevitanus. A.D. 370.
-Victorious. A.D. 365.
-Marcus Eremita. A.D. 390.
-Faustinus. A.D. 390.
-Cyrillus Hierosolymitanus. A.D. 370.
-Gregorius Nazianenus. A.D. 370.
-Didumus Alexandrinus. A.D. 370.
-Gregorius Nyssenus. A.D. 380.
-Pacianus Barcinonensis. A.D. 380.
-Hilarius Diaconus. A.D. 380.
-Ambrosius Mediolanensis. A.D. 380.
-Epiphanius. A.D. 390.
-Gaudentius Brixiensis. A.D. 390.
-Joannes Chrysostomus. A.D. 390.
-Ruffinus Aquileiensis. A.D. 390.
-Hieronymus. A.D. 390.