amity said:
Another name to look up would be that of Lasserre Bradley, Jr. He was the Southern Baptist preacher up in Cincinnati, Ohio, who joined the PB with most of his congregation a few decades ago. Has a radio show called the Baptist Bible Hour that is broadcast through much of the world. I am not aware of details, so may have my facts a little garbled, but I understand that it was this radio show, broadcast in the Philippines, that started the interest there.
There could be some truth to that.
But from what I understand, there was a Filipino pastor, I think it is the first one they ordained, and later found out to be in an adulterous situation, that came upon somebody's web site and read about the doctrines and practices of Primitive Baptists.
This gentleman got in touch with a Primitive Baptist church member here in the States and had asked if they perchance would be planning to go to the Philippines to teach them. The letter got forwarded for some reason to a PB pastor in Virginia, who then got in touch with someone else, who then got in touch with someone else, and finally they had their first "mission" team assembled, and so got over there to my country.
They "ordained" a few elders, constituted a church, had the usual picture takings, and so on, came back to the States praising God for His (?) "mighty and wondrous" works, and then found out that their first boo-boo was they ordained somebody who was living with someone not his lawful wedded wife.
I was at that point in time a new member of a Primitive Baptist church in Maryland (which I later pastored), and was just happy that there were PB's working in the Philippines and teaching my people the Doctrine of Grace as we PB's understand the doctrine.
I had no idea that the PB's were being divided by the issues being brought up, until later. I read both the pros and cons, read the Black Rock address, and decided to stay in the middle because all these things I learned about in the internet, and have yet to hear about them firsthand, or see them up close and personal, and looked forward to vacationing in the Philippines to see for myself.
But then Elder Harter brought some Filipino PB's with him to the States to visit the churches, and that kind of piqued my curiosity further because to me that sounded like, to me, at least, a deputizing mission, a fund-raising mission, if you will. That was when I began to feel uncomfortable, but kept it to myself.
The second time Elder Harter brought in a bunch of Filipino PB's I was already pastor of the church, and had the privilege of speaking to two of my countrymen in private at my house where they stayed overnight.
During that time they gave me hints and indirect statements that all were not that well as things appeared on the surface and that certain doctrines and practices were being compromised. Also that a kind of "papacy" was emerging.
When they got back to the Philippines, one of them started communicating with me, and eventually, broke off from under the Harter "wings" if you will, preferring, as he put it, to rely solely on God for his needs as a family man, and as a minister.
At that point, I decided to publicly, among the PB's, beginning with the church I was pastoring, to disengage from any identification with the modernism and missionism that has crept in among our people.
It didn't sit well with some in the church, especially when I tried, as pastor and undershepherd for the Lord, to steer the flock away from the same identification with the errors, and was accused of trying to stir up foment among sheep and trying to just be identified with a group.
Eventually, I quit the pastorate.
