‘The Birth of the Restoration’
Excerpt from an Historical Address Delivered at the Clarke Fund Rally, Cincinnati, O., Dec. 11, 1923
March 8, 1924; p. 3
By Ira M. Boswell
THE POSITION OF THE PIONEERS
In the “Declaration and Address,” Thomas Campbell makes the following declaration, which, it seems to me, is the keynote of the entire movement:
Let none imagine that the subjoined propositions are at all intended as an overture towards a new creed or standard for the church, or in anywise designed to be made a term of communion; nothing can be further from our intention. They are merely designed to open up the way, that we may come fairly and firmly to original ground upon clear and certain premises, and take up things just as the apostles left them, that thus, disentangled from the accruing embarrassments of intervening ages, we may stand with evidence upon the same ground which the church stood at the beginning.
Stone says:
Under the name “Springfield Presbytery,” we went forward preaching and constituting churches; but we had not worn our name more than one year before we saw it savored of a party spirit. With man-made creeds, we threw it overboard, and took the name “Christian.” . . . Having divested ourselves of all party creeds and party names, and trusting alone in God and the word of His grace, we became a byword and laughing-stock of the sects around, all prophesying our speedy annihilation. Yet from this period I date the commencement of that reformation which has progressed to this day.
Following the death of the Springfield Presbytery, Stone and his followers published the “Last Will and Testament of the Springfield Presbytery.” Among other things this document says: “We will, that our power of making laws for the government of the church, and executing them by delegated authority, forever cease; that the people may have free course to the Bible, and adopt the laws of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus.” And again: “We will, that the church of Christ resume her native right of internal government.”
In speaking of a sermon he preached before a Separate Baptist Association, Stone says:
I exerted myself with meekness against sectarianism, formularies and creeds, and labored to establish the Scriptural union of Christians and Scriptural names. Till Christians were united in spirit on the Bible, I showed there would be no end to such difficult cases as now agitated them. Having closed my speech, I retired to the worshiping ground. The mind of the association was withdrawn from any further attention to their knotty cases, to the consideration of what I had said. The result was that they agreed to cast away their formularies and creeds, and take the Bible alone for their rule of faith and practice; to throw away their name “Baptist” and take the name “Christian,” and to bury their association, and to become one with us in the great work of Christian union.
In the last sermon preached by Stone at the old Cane Ridge Church, he said “that the object of his life had been to unite the people of God upon Heaven’s own plan, and that he had hoped to die pleading the cause of union upon the Bible.”
And again:
To the word of God’s grace, then, let me commend you. To the Bible, the Bible alone! This is the religion of Protestants. This under God, can make you perfect—perfect in faith, perfect in feeling, in word, in deed, in heart and life, in union and communion with God.
THEIR TROUBLES
Their troubles were many. There were enemies without and within. I shall not have time to notice them all, but will give my attention to those which prevailed before the union between the disciples of Christ and Christians, and, then, only such troubles as have a bearing upon what I intend to say under that part of this address as has to do with the present situation.
ORGANIZATION
Let it not be inferred from what I say that I am opposed to organization; for I am not. I did my part in building up our present organizations.
Their troubles on account of organizations was before they withdrew from those with which they were connected. The most serious trouble with all organizations is that the organization’s conscience becomes the conscience of the people who build it; and, further, the organization becomes the custodian of the liberties of those who constituted it, and the only liberty the people have is the liberty to bow to the authority of the organization and obey its authority.
It is not necessary to emphasize the attitude of the several organizations toward the Campbells and the Stones; but I wish to call special attention to the following: Near the close of the eighteenth century the Baptists of Kentucky were, for the most part, divided into two bodies, the Elkhorn and the South Kentucky Associations. The former were Regular Baptists; the latter, Separate Baptists. A union between these two bodies was consummated on the second Saturday in October, 1801. Article 3 of the constitution reads as follows: “The Association thus formed shall be a council of advice, and not an authoritative body.” The author of the “Life of Smith” says in this connection: “Not long after its organization the North District Association began to exercise, in a very peculiar way, the functions of an advisory council.” He then cites a case where it assumed the rights of an authoritative council. During the entire time Smith was with the Baptists he was in trouble with their organizations.
THE SHAKERS
Some time between 1804 and 1809, three missionary Shakers came into Kentucky, and their visit was for a time a great danger to the cause. Some of the companions of Stone went with them.
Their doctrine was [says Stone] that the Christ appeared first in a male, and through life was preparing the way of salvation, which he could not accomplish until his second appearance in a woman (Ann Lee), who was now the Christ, and had full power to save. They had new revelations, superior to the Scriptures, which they called the old records, which was true, but superseded by the new. When they preached to the world, they used the old record, and preached a pure gospel as a bait to catch the unwary; but in the close of their discourse they artfully introduced their testimony. . . . They misrepresented our views and truth, and they had not that sacred regard for truth-telling which becomes honest Christians. I speak advisedly.
He says that he exerted himself and the broken ranks were once more rallied.
The Shakers now became our bitterest enemies, and united with the sects in their opposition to us. . . . They looked for no other or better heaven than that on earth.
OPEN MEMBERSHIP
Dr. James Fishback was an able Baptist minister. In 1827 he was the minister of the First Baptist Church in Lexington, Ky., or, rather, of a church previously known by that name, but which in that year began to call itself the Church of Christ on Mill Street. The Methodists of Mt. Sterling sent for him to come to Mt. Sterling and expose the inconsistencies of the doctrines and practices of the Reformers, as those Baptists who were in sympathy with Alexander Campbell were called. He spoke to the people on the subject of free and unrestricted communion. His main argument was that sprinkling or pouring is baptism to those who honestly esteem it as baptism; for God, he believed, would accept the honest intention to obey, and pardon the unpresumptuous mistake in the manner of obedience.
About this time [says Stone] the subject of baptism began to arrest the attention of the churches. On this subject I will state what took place while I was a Presbyterian preacher. [This was after the “Last Will and Testament” had been published.] Robert Marshall, one of our company, had become convinced of the truth of the Baptists’ views on this subject, and ceased from the practice of pedobaptism; and it was believed that he was on the eve of uniting with the Baptists. Alarmed lest he should join them, I wrote him a lengthy letter on the subject, laboring to convince him of his error. In reply, he wrote me another, in which he so forcibly argued in favor of believer’s immersion, and against pedobaptism, that my mind was brought to so completely doubt the latter that I ceased the practice entirely. About this time the great excitement commenced, and the subject of baptism was for awhile, strangely, almost forgotten. But after a few years it revived, and many became dissatisfied with infant sprinkling, among whom I was one.
The brethren, elders and deacons came together on this subject, for we had previously agreed with one another to act in concert, and not to adventure on anything new without advice from one another. At this meeting we took the matter up in a brotherly spirit, and concluded that every brother and sister should act freely, and according to their conviction of right, and that we should cultivate the long-neglected grace of forbearance towards each other—that who should be immersed should not despise those who were not, and vice versa. Now, the question arose, Who will baptize us? The Baptists would not, except we unite with them, and there were no elders among us who had been immersed. It was finally concluded among us that, if we were authorized to preach, we were authorized to baptize. The work then commenced; the preachers baptized one another, and crowds came, and were also baptized. My congregation very generally submitted to it, and it soon obtained generally, yet the pulpit was silent on the subject. In Bro. Marshall’s congregation there were many who wished baptism. As Bro. Marshall had not faith in the ordinance, I was called upon to administer. This displeased him and a few others.
The subject of baptism now engaged the attention of the people very generally, and some, with myself, began to conclude that it was ordained for the remission of sins, and ought to be administered in the name of Jesus to all penitents. I remember once about this time we had a great meeting at Concord. Mourners were invited every day to collect before the stand in order for prayers (this being the custom of the times). The brethren were praying daily for the same people, and none seemed to be comforted. I was considering in my mind what could be the cause. The words of Peter at Pentecost rolled through my mind: “Repent and be baptized for the remission of sins, and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.” I thought, were Peter here, he would thus address these mourners. I quickly arose, and addressed them in the same language, and urged them to comply. Into the spirit of the doctrine I was never fully led until it was revived by Brother Alexander Campbell some years later.
In an address, published shortly after the union in 1832, Smith said:
I have also conversed freely with the Christian teachers upon the subject of receiving the unimmersed into the church and communing with them at the Lord’s table. They have said that they had had, and still have, in some degree, their difficulties on this subject. In their first outset, they were all pedobaptist. Having determined to take the word of God alone for their guide, some of them soon became convinced that immersion was the only gospel baptism; and they submitted to it accordingly. They went on teaching others to two likewise; the result has been that all, with very few exceptions, belonging to their congregations in this section of country have submitted to immersion. They have not, for several years past, received any as members of their body without immersion. And, with regard to the propriety of communing at the Lord’s table with the unimmersed, they are determined to say no more about it there, being no apostolic precept nor example to enforce it. But, whatever degree of forbearance they may think proper to exercise towards the unimmersed as best suited to the present state of things, they are determined, by a proper course of teaching and practicing the apostolic gospel, to bring all, as fast as they can, to unite around the cross of Christ, submitting to the one Lord, one faith, one immersion, and thus form one body upon the one foundation, according to the apostolic order of things.
Again, in the same address, he says:
We are pleased with the name “Christian,” and do desire to see it divested of every sectarian idea and everything else, but that which distinguished the primitive Christians from all other people, in faith and practice, as the humble followers of the meek and lowly redeemer. . . . The friends of the Reformation may easily injure their own cause by giving to it a sectarian character, against which we should always be specially guarded. And, in order to avoid this, and all other departures from apostolic order of things, we can not, we will not, knowingly sanction any tradition, speculation, or amalgamation unknown to primitive Christian congregations. On the other hand, we are determined, by the favor of God, to the utmost of our ability, to teach what the primitive disciples taught; and, in admitting persons into the congregation of Christ, we will require what they required, and nothing more. We will urge the practice of all apostolic commands and examples given to the primitive Christians, and thus labor for the unity of disciples of Christ upon this one foundation.
Again, in the same address: “We think that the best of us, either as individuals, or as congregations, are not fully reformed, but reforming.”
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