Traces P B Historian Elder Sylvester Hassell

According to the entire tenor of the New Testament Scriptures, what we are to look for is, not such outward succession, but a spiritual succession of principles, of inward, vital, heartfelt religion. Names are nothing, principles are everything, in the true kingdom of God. In all ages and countries, that people who, in all spiritual matters, acknowledge Christ as their only Head and King, form a part of the true church of God. They have mostly been dissenters from "state churches" and political religions- Christ having declared that His kingdom is not of this world; and, like the prophets and Apostles and Christ Himself, and as he predicted, they have been hated, slandered and persecuted to the death by worldly religionists, not only by heathens and Mohammedans, but even far more numerously by professed Christians, both Papists and Protestants (Matt. v. 10-12; xxiii. 34; Mark x. 30; Luke xxi. 12; John v. 16; xv. 18-21; xvi. 33; Acts vii. 52; viii. 1; ix. 5; xiv. 22; Gal. iv. 29; 2Cor. iv. 9; 2Tim. iii. 11,12; Heb. xi. 35-38; Rev. vii. 14; xii. 13; xiii. 7,15,17; xvii. 6; xx.4); and, instead of persecuting their enemies in return, they have returned good for evil and prayed for them.-Matt. v. 44-48; Luke xxiii. 34; Acts vii. 60; Rom. xii. 14,18-21; 1Cor. iv. 12; xiii. 4-8; 1Pet. ii. 23; iii. 9. So the inoffensive lamb and dove and sheep, used in the Scriptures to represent the Son and the Spirit and the people of God, are slain and devoured by predaceous animals and birds. These persecuted people of God have had, since the first century, a variety of names, generally given them by their enemies, and derived from their location, or from some of their leading ministers, or from some doctrine or practice of theirs which distinguished them from worldly religionists. Until the Protestant Reformation in the sixteenth century, they were known as Montanists, Tertullianists, Novatians, Donatists, Paulicians, Petrobrusians, Henricians, Arnoldists, Waldenses, Albigenses, United Brethren of Bohemia, and Lollards; many of these were called by the general name of Ana-Baptists (or Re-Baptizers), because they did not acknowledge the scripturalness or validity of infant baptism, and therefore baptized (Paedobaptists said they baptized again) those who joined them on a profession of faith. While these various classes of people differed in minor particulars, and while some of them were in much darkness and error on certain points of truth, they yet held substantially to the same general doctrine and practice- insisting, above all, upon the spirituality of the church of God and her heavenly obligation to walk in humble and loving obedience to all His holy commandments, both in an individual and a church capacity, and not in obedience to the unscriptural traditions and commandments of men. For the last 365 years (since A.D. 1520) they have been called Baptists (for about the first 100 years of this period, also Ana-Baptists), because they baptized (that is, immersed in water, in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost) all who, upon a credible profession of their repentance towards God and faith in Christ, desired to unite with them in a church capacity. The cardinal tenets of Bible Baptists, being also those held by the apostolic churches, as set forth in the New Testament, and those held, in the main, by the people of God in former times, are:

· The exclusive and supreme authority of the Holy Scriptures;

· The exclusive headship of Christ over His church;

· The three-oneness of God as Father, Son and Spirit; the total depravity of all mankind since the fall of Adam;

· The special and effectual electing love of God the Father, redeeming love of God the Son, and regenerating love of God the Spirit, manifested, in due time, to all the vessels of mercy;

· The baptism of believers, and the partaking of the Lord’s supper by those properly baptized and in gospel order;

· Salvation by grace and faith alone;

· A regenerated and orderly-walking church membership;

· The universal priesthood and brotherhood of believers;

· The divine call and divine qualification and equality of the ministry, who feed and care for the flock of God among them, not for filthy lucre, but of a ready mind, not as being lords over God’s heritage, but as ensamples to the flock;

· The independence and yet cordial brotherly association of gospel churches;

· The separation of the church from the world,

· The non-alliance of the former with the latter in any kinds of religious institutions; such corrupting associations being pointedly forbidden in both the Old and New Testament Scriptures (Exod. xii. 38 with Num. xi. 4-6; Exod. xxxiv. 12-16; Deut. vii. 1-11; 2Chron. xviii. 1-3 with xix. 2; Ezra ix. 1-15; Neh. xiii. 1-3, 23-31; Psalm xxvi. 4,5; lvi. 35-43; Isa. viii. 12; Acts viii. 20,21; 2Cor. vi. 14-18); the separation of church and state;

· The liberty of every human being, so far as other people are concerned, to worship God according to the dictates of his own conscience;

· The resurrection of the bodies both of the just and the unjust;

· The final and general judgment of the world by the Lord Jesus Christ;

· The everlasting blessedness of the righteous, and the everlasting punishment of the wicked.

In giving the history of the church since the birth of Christ I have divided the periods into centuries, the oldest, simplest, and clearest method. All methods of division are more or less arbitrary, artificial and mechanical. The modern German periodologies are endlessly diversified, inconsistent, and confused, and almost destroy any profitable comparison with each other.

As portrayed by the Scriptures of infallible truth, how unspeakably solemn is the condition of man, as he stands upon these mortal shores, before launching upon the great ocean of Eternity! As testified by the Inspired Word, he has entered upon an everlasting career, either of happiness or of misery. Beyond the portals of natural death, into which he may at any moment be ushered, his estate will be unchangeable. "What shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul? Or what shall he give in exchange for his soul?" is the momentous inquiry of God manifest in the flesh. May the Lord Jesus, by His blessed Spirit of grace, seal this most solemn question upon our hearts and upon those of our fellow-men; give us to realize the vanity of earthly things, and the supreme and transcendent importance of our spiritual and eternal interests; lead us, under a deep sense of our sinfulness, with weeping and supplication, to the throne of His mercy; enable us to count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus our Lord, and to behold Him, by an eye of faith, as pierced and dying for our sins and rising for our justification; may He shed abroad His renewing and transforming love in our hearts, and elevate our thoughts and affections above the corrupting and fading shadows of this world to the pure and enduring realities of heaven; may He create within us a desire to identify ourselves with His afflicted, lowly, despised, and persecuted church and people; enable us to adorn the doctrine of God our Savior by loving obedience to all His holy commandments, and thus prepare us for a blissful and eternal communion with Himself in the General Assembly and Church of the First-Born, who are written in heaven... This is just a portion of Church History by Elder Sylvester Hassell and his father C.B. The complete book is online at www.primitivebaptist.org ... You brethren please excuse the length of the article but I felt you would be interested in what this fellow elder and historian had to say... Brother Glen

[ February 24, 2002, 05:25 PM: Message edited by: rlvaughn ]