Historia ecclesiastica
The Weblog of Dr. Michael A. G. Haykin & friends

By Evan D. Burns

In a sermon entitled, “On an Intimate and Practical Acquaintance with the Word of God,” Andrew Fuller meditated deeply on the piety exemplified in Ezra 7:10—“Ezra had prepared his heart to seek the law of the Lord, and to do it, and to teach in Israel statutes and judgments.”  Fuller made four outstanding observations about Ezra’s character, which Fuller strongly commended for Christian imitation.  Here is what he gleaned so exquisitely from one verse:

1.  SEEK THE LAW, or will, of God
   1. Seek it.
   2. Seek it at the fountain-head.
   3. Seek the will of God in every part of the Bible.
   4. Seek it perseveringly.
2. PREPARE YOUR HEART to seek the law of the Lord
3. KEEP THE LAW.
   1. Dread nothing more than recommending that to your people to which you do not attend yourself.
   2. More is expected from you than from others.
   3. You will attend to practical preaching.
   4. Attend not only to such duties as fall under the eye of man, but walk with God—in your family, and in your closet.
4. TEACH in Israel the statutes and judgments of God.
   1. Let Christ and his apostles be your examples.
   2. Give every part of the truth its due proportion.
   3. Dare to teach unwelcome truths.
   4. Give Scriptural proof of what you teach.
   5. Consider yourself as standing engaged to teach all that hear you—rich and poor, young and old, godly and ungodly.
   6. Teach privately as well as publicly.[1]

One of the most perceptive and potent points Fuller argued from this verse was the preeminence of seeking the will of God in the Bible alone.  Under the first point, Fuller contended:

Seek it at the fountain-head.—You feel, I doubt not, a great esteem for many of your brethren now living, and admire the writings of some who are now no more; and you will read their productions with attention and pleasure. But whatever excellence your brethren possess, it is all borrowed; and it is mingled with error. Learn your religion from the Bible. Let that be your decisive rule. Adopt not a body of sentiments, or even a single sentiment, solely on the authority of any man—however great, however respected. Dare to think for yourself. Human compositions are fallible. But the Scriptures were written by men who wrote as they were inspired by the Holy Spirit. Human writings on religion resemble preaching—they are useful only so far as they illustrate the Scriptures, and induce us to search them for ourselves.^[2]

By Ryan Patrick Hoselton

Christians today have two options: hiding under a rock, or confronting complicated and disturbing moral issues. The past month alone has witnessed an ethical Blitzkrieg on Christian values. From the Gosnell trials to the Marathon Bombing, with two more states on the verge of legalizing homosexual marriage and insecure international relations, believers are overwhelmed with moral conundrums. Thankfully, there are resources from the past that help Christians think through the moral dilemmas of today—nothing is new under the sun. Augustine’s work, The City of God, is an excellent example of such a resource, and while it may not comprehensively address every nuance of our modern ethical crises, it’s a good place to establish a moral framework for working in that direction.

In this work, Augustine (354-430) depicts two realms: the earthly city and the heavenly city. The earthly city is transient and corrupt, and the heavenly city is eternal and glorious. In Book XIX, Augustine explains what differentiates the citizens of these cities: one worships and serves God, and the other serves the self. The worship of God establishes true virtue while self-worship leads to immorality. He expounds this point:

Now in serving God the soul rightly commands the body, and in the soul itself the reason which is subject to its Lord God rightly commands the lusts and the other perverted elements. That being so, when a man does not serve God, what amount of justice are we to suppose to exist in his being? For if a soul does not serve God it cannot with any kind of justice command the body, nor can a man’s reason control the vicious elements in the soul. (XIX.21)

If God is not the master of our actions, then our conduct will serve evil. Service to God subjects the mind, will, and actions to righteousness rather than corruption.

The worship of God grounds not only justice but also true happiness and wisdom. When the saints inhabit the heavenly city, they experience supreme joy because they no longer serve other things. The “present reality without” the future hope of being righteous in God is “a false happiness, in fact, an utter misery” (XIX.20). The things humans serve in the earthly city will not only tend to evil but also to profound disappointment. True wisdom must direct “its just dealings with others” towards “that ultimate state in which God will be all in all, in the assurance of eternity and the perfection of peace” (XIX.20). If believers want to act morally wise in the present age, they must pattern their conduct on the heavenly city rather than the earthly city.

Make no mistake, Augustine warns, for many will exploit the virtues to serve selfish ends rather than serving God. Non-Christians and Christians alike can fall into this insidious trap. Augustine explains, “if the soul and reason do not serve God as God himself has commanded that he should be served, then they do not in any way exercise the right kind of rule over the body and the vicious propensities” (XIX.25). Thus, it is essential for believers to constantly study and cherish God’s commands if they hope to gain moral discernment.

In sum, the foundation of virtue is the worship and love of God. Moral reasoning that is not subject to the service of God is vulnerable to serve all kinds of evils, for “it is not something that comes from man, but something above man, that makes his life blessed” (XIX.25). Augustine grounded his confrontation with the moral issues of his day in this framework, and believers today would do well to imitate him.

St. Augustine. The City of God. Trans. Henry Bettenson. New York: Penguin Books, 1972, 1984.

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Ryan Patrick Hoselton is pursuing a ThM at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. He lives in Louisville, KY with his wife Jaclyn, and they are expecting their first child in August.

By Dustin Bruce

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Baptists are no strangers to soteriological disputes. And while generally Baptist groups have found ways to overcome their differences and cooperate for the sake of evangelism and missions, there are cases where Baptist churches and associations have drawn the line and considered another group outside the bounds of cooperation and fellowship. One example of this occurred near Tuscaloosa, Alabama in the 1830’s and 40’s, when differences arose among churches that would form the Tuscaloosa County Baptist Association and the North River United Baptist Association.

The genesis of the controversy can be traced back to 1832, when pastor David Andrews was narrowly removed from Bethel Church in Tuscaloosa for espousing what many considered “Arminian views.” Andrews, along with a number of members of the congregation, broke off to form a new church, which shortly merged with Salem Baptist Church, also in Tuscaloosa. By 1835, Andrews had convinced enough area churches of his theology, that they were able to form the North River United Baptist Association.

The Tuscaloosa Baptist Association, conceived only a year earlier, did not recognize the legitimacy of the North River Association. The Tuscaloosa Association, whose Abstract of Principles was decidedly of the Strict Baptist persuasion, found the soteriological beliefs of the North River Association, as presented in their Articles of Faith, far too dismissive of God’s sovereignty in salvation. As a result, the Tuscaloosa Association refused to recognize the North River Association as Baptists, because they did not first consider them orthodox.

A number of neighboring Baptist associations attempted to intervene, including the Chickasaw Association from neighboring Mississippi. In response to an inquiry from the Chickasaw Association, the Tuscaloosa Association responded in a letter indicating no difficulty has ever existed between the Tuscaloosa Association and the North River Association, since the events causing the separation occurred before the formation of the Tuscaloosa Association itself. Lest you think such a statement constitutes the acceptance and approval of the North River Association, the letter states that upon organizing, the Tuscaloosa Association reviewed the actions undertaken by the churches involved in the schism, concluding the churches they had accepted into their membership were justified “in the course they had taken, and of condemning the others as disorderly, and as guilty of gross Heterodoxy.”[1] The Tuscaloosa Association felt the Chickasaw Association would be sure they were “fully justified in disowning them (North River) as Baptists” after seeing the minutes of the North River Association for themselves.[2]

In 1848, another nearby association, the Columbia Baptist Association, attempted to intervene. A meeting was organized at Pleasant Grove Baptist in Fayette, Alabama the following year. This time, the well-known Baptist leader and president of the University of Alabama, Basil Manly Sr., would preach a message aimed at reconciliation. Choosing Philippians 2:12-13 as his text, the Baptist statesman preached a moving and compelling sermon entitled “Divine Efficiency Consistent with Human Activity.” In the sermon, Manly gave a majestic defense of the compatibility between God’s sovereignty and human free will in salvation. The sermon was a smashing success. Amazingly, the North River Association incorporated Manly’s theology into a new Abstract of Principles. In response, the Tuscaloosa Association began to associate with them as Baptist brethren, ending a nearly 16-year controversy.

By Nathan A. Finn

In a couple of weeks, I’ll be reading a paper at the annual meeting of the Baptist History and Heritage Society titled “Debating Domestic Slavery: The Wayland-Fuller Correspondence in Context.” My paper will focus on the story behind the book Domestic Slavery Considered as a Scriptural Institution (1845). I’ve long been interested in this important book; my colleague Keith Harper and I co-edited a new edition of Domestic Slavery for Mercer University Press in 2008. It was my first book.

Domestic Slavery is a collection of letters between southerner Richard Fuller and northerner Francis Wayland. Both of these men were devout Christians, Baptist leaders, and moderates within their respective camps in the slavery debate. According to Mark Noll, “This exchange was one of the United States’ last serious one-on-one debates where advocates for and against slavery engaged each other directly, with reasonable restraint, and with evident intent to hear out the opponent to the extent possible.”[1]

In the book, Fuller argues that slavery was not inherently sinful, but concedes that there were many sinful practices associated with chattel slavery in the South. For his part, Wayland argues that slavery was inherently sinful, but concedes that in many instances owning slaves was a moral blind spot among otherwise godly men in the South. Wayland also criticizes the abolition movement for being too radical in its call for immediate emancipation.

Fuller and Wayland make their respective cases in different ways. Fuller, who was an eloquent and widely respected preacher, wrote letters that are saturated with Scripture references defending slavery. That said, most modern readers would agree that many of these citations are taken out of context or otherwise misinterpreted. Fuller’s exegesis is a textbook example of the so-called southern theological defense of slavery.

Wayland’s letters are rhetorically brilliant, but largely absent of Scripture besides references to the golden rule and Paul’s epistle to Philemon. His arguments are based more on common sense and natural law arguments. He had made these sorts of arguments in his earlier books The Elements of Moral Science (1835) and The Limitations of Human Responsibility (1838). The former was the most popular ethics textbook in America in the nineteenth century, though it was banned at most southern schools because of Wayland’s anti-slavery views.

Their respective arguments notwithstanding, Domestic Slavery is a model of Christian civility. Wayland and Fuller continually refer to each other as “my dear friend,” and in this case, they really meant it. Neither engages in ad hominem attacks of the other. Both men are quick to affirm anything they see as right and truthful in the other’s argument. Though Wayland really does believe Fuller is misreading Scripture, and though Fuller really is convinced Wayland is ignoring Scripture, the two men are always cordial and dignified; they never paint the other as sub-Christian or impugn each other’s motives. These two esteemed antebellum Baptists remind us that it is possible to debate even the most controversial issues in a Christ-like manner.

By Michael A.G. Haykin

When Andrew Fuller was serving as the secretary of the BMS he would be away from his pulpit up to three months a year. I have often wondered who supplied his pulpit before he had an unordained assistant by the name of John Keen Hall. In a publication entitled The Preacher; or Sketches of Original Sermons (Philadelphia: J. Whetham & Son, 1842), which contains an essay by Fuller on how to compose a sermon, it is mentioned that “several members of [Fuller’s] church were successfully employed in village preaching, and occasionally supplied destitute congregations in the neighbourhood” (“Preface”, p.iv). These men could have easily supplied Fuller’s pulpit.

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Michael A.G. Haykin is the director of the Andrew Fuller Center for Baptist Studies. He also serves as Professor of Church History and Biblical Spirituality at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. Dr. Haykin and his wife Alison have two grown children, Victoria and Nigel.

By Michael A. G. Haykin

Andrew Fuller passed into the presence of the Lord he had served faithfully for most of his life 198 years ago today. In the months prior to his death he had been preaching through 1 Corinthians and had reached the middle of the fourth chapter before his death. His last sermon, though, was on Isaiah 66:2, preached on April 2, 1815. John Jenkinson (1799–1876), sixteen years old at the time and one of Fuller’s regular hearers—he would later pastor another Baptist work in Kettering, the scene of Fuller’s ministry since 1782—many years later recalled Fuller’s “unequalled expository labours,” as he put it, and heard that final sermon.

He noted that Fuller’s main points were three in number (very Baptist-like!):

“God’s approval of poverty of spirit, or genuine humility: of contrition of spirit, or true repentance: of tenderness of spirit, or a godly shrinking from sin and temptation.”

(In R.L. Greenall, ed., The Autobiography of the Rev. John Jenkinson, Baptist Minister of Kettering and Oakham [Victor Hatley Memorial Series, vol.3; Northampton, Northamptonshire: Northamptonshire Record Society, 2010], 22­–23).

These points are vintage Fuller—and a key reason why we remember his life and witness with thanksgiving to the God who enabled him to do all that he did.

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Michael A.G. Haykin is the director of the Andrew Fuller Center for Baptist Studies. He also serves as Professor of Church History and Biblical Spirituality at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. Dr. Haykin and his wife Alison have two grown children, Victoria and Nigel.

By Ian Hugh Clary

Zwinglianism is the view that the elements of the Lord’s Supper are only a memorial and that Christ is in no sense present—what some have called the “real absence” view, or the memorialist view. The Eucharist was a hotly debated topic during the Reformation that resulted in deep lines drawn between the Reformed, particularly the Swiss, and the Lutherans. Luther could barely bring himself to say that Zwingli was a brother in the Lord because the Zurich theologian refused to believe in consubstantiation. It is often noted that Calvin sought to steer a middle course between the Lutheran and Zwinglian forms by offering a “spiritual presence” view, where the Spirit draws the believer by faith into true communion with Christ in the elements. The so-called memorial view had a continuing influence in subsequent Reformed theology, and even more so in broader evangelicalism. But was Zwingli a Zwinglian?

W. P. Stephens, in his Zwingli: An Introduction to His Thought (Oxford, 2001) puts Zwingli in perspective. The heat of Zwingli’s debate with Luther centred on the words of Christ who said of the bread, “This is my body.” For Zwingli, the word “is” should be understood as “signifies.” For Luther this was anathema. At the Marburg Colloquy (1529), though some headway towards agreement was made, the two Reformers could not agree on this point. However, this did not entail that Zwingli denied any presence of Christ in the supper. After the colloquy, Zwingli expressed his belief in the “real presence” of Christ. Stephens, pointing to Zwingli’s works like An Account of the Faith (1530) and The Letter to the Princes of Germany (1530), says, “Zwingli made it clear that the bread was not mere bread, and he began to affirm terms such as presence, true, and sacramental” (105). In the appendix to his An Exposition of the Faith (1531) Zwingli said, “We believe Christ to be truly present in the Supper, indeed we do not believe that it is the Lord’s Supper unless Christ is present” (Stephens, 105). This change in emphasis came with a greater stress on the bread and the wine, both of which were “divine and sacred” (Stephens, 107).

Stephens does an excellent job tracing out Zwingli’s overall Eucharistic theology. After establishing that Zwingli was not really a “Zwinglian,” as the term has become known, he also makes the important point that Zwingli was consistent in his theology from his early to his later years. While his earlier views were nascent, his later views did not contradict them. In 1523 Zwingli spoke of the soul being fed in the supper. Admittedly he emphasised the “symbolic” understanding of the elements after 1524, yet he held this view when he spoke of feeding on Christ. Stephens summarizes Zwingli’s overall thought saying, “The more positive notes in the later Zwingli do not indicate a real shift in his position, rather a difference of emphasis” (Stephens, 109). The concern for Zwingli, as for other Reformers at this time, was the place of faith in the communicant—he guarded against any gracious effect for the unbeliever who partakes. In this, he appealed to the early Luther who emphasized the need for faith. While issues of Christology and philosophy play into their differences, Zwingli was not as far from Luther as the German Reformer thought. Though he they did not share full agreement, Zwingli was much closer to Calvin, whose view Luther was not so scathingly against.

So, in a sense, Zwingli was against the Zwinglians.

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Ian Hugh Clary is finishing doctoral studies under Adriaan Neele at Universiteit van die Vrystaat (Blomfontein), where he is writing a dissertation on the evangelical historiography of Arnold Dallimore. He has co-authored two local church histories with Michael Haykin and contributed articles to numerous scholarly journals. Ian serves as a pastor of BridgeWay Covenant Church in Toronto where he lives with his wife and two children.

By Dustin W. Benge

David Brainerd (1718–1747) yearned for the salvation of Native Americans scattered along the colonial trails of America and farther west. From 1742 to 1747 he toiled among tribes in New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. Initially he saw little to encourage him and seriously considered abandoning his labors among them altogether. But in time the situation reversed itself, and scores of Native Americans came to know Christ. Brainerd’s poor health, however, eventually forced him to abandon his missionary efforts, and at age twenty-nine he died.

Brainerd spent his last days in the home of his celebrated friend, Jonathan Edwards (1703–1758). Before his death, Brainerd consented to leave his diary with Edwards for publication. That volume has had an untold impact on the lives of others because it reveals Brainerd’s devotion, earnestness, sincerity, and self-denying spirit.

Missionaries such as Henry Martyn (1781–1812), William Carey (1761–1834), and Jim Elliot (1927–1956) have spoken of the great inspiration they received from reading Brainerd’s diary. These are some of the last entries Brainerd made:

This day, I saw clearly that I should never be happy, yea, that God Himself could not make me happy, unless I could be in a capacity to “please and glorify Him forever.” Take away this and admit me into all the fine havens that can be conceived of by men or angels, and I should still be miserable forever. . . . Oh, to love and praise God more, to please Him forever! This my soul panted after and even now pants for while I write. Oh, that God might be glorified in the whole earth! . . . Was still in a sweet and comfortable frame; and was again melted with desires that God might be glorified, and with longings to love and live to Him. . . . And oh, I longed to be with God, to behold His glory and to bow in His presence!

It is clear that Brainerd’s desire was to magnify God’s glory before the world. He also looked forward to his earthly departure because he longed to see the glory of God in heaven. What exactly does the phrase “the glory of God” refer? It is the sum of who God is—the sum of his attributes and divine nature. Throughout history, God has endeavored to show all men and women His glory.

By Evan D. Burns

Andrew Fuller loved to stare long and hard at Scripture in deep meditation and study.  His pastoral methods were marked by providing good food for his flock and by protecting them from contaminated food.  Fuller despised false doctrine, and he was quick to engage those who promoted such error.  One way he protected his flock from confusion and uncertainty was by expounding difficult and seemingly contradictory passages in Scripture.  In a large section in the first volume of his Works called “Passages Apparently Contradictory,” Fuller would take a couple of verses with ostensible contradictions and clarify their coherence having considered each of their historical, literary, and theological contexts.  As he did this for his people, he modeled how ministers today can help their flocks have more confidence in the Word of God and more certainty in its inerrancy, infallibility, and sufficiency.  The Serpent loves to ask, “did God really say….?”  If we, like Fuller, would not rest till we had a satisfactory understanding of how the hard texts fit together, those entrusted to our care would have their eyes opened to wonderful things in God’s law.  “The unfolding of your words gives light; it imparts understanding to the simple” (Ps 119:130).  The first two conflicting texts in his “Passages Apparently Contradictory” are:

“And ye will not come to me, that ye might have life.”—John 5:40.

“No man can come to me except the Father, who hath sent me, draw him….  It is written in the prophets, And they shall be all taught of God. Every man therefore that hath heard, and hath learned of the Father, cometh unto me”

“Jesus knew from the beginning who they were that believed not: and he said, Therefore said I unto you, that no man can come unto me, except it were given unto him of my Father.”—John 6:44, 45, 64, 65.

The following points demonstrate Fuller’s durable cogitation of difficult texts and how he could plainly harmonize without being too complex or too simplistic:

First, There is no way of obtaining eternal life but by Jesus Christ….  Secondly, They that enjoy eternal life must come to Christ for it….  Thirdly, It is the revealed will of Christ that everyone who hears the gospel should come to him for life….  Fourthly, The depravity of human nature is such that no man, of his own accord, will come to Christ for life….  Fifthly, The degree of this depravity is such as that, figuratively speaking, men cannot come to Christ for life….  Sixthly, A conviction of the righteousness of God’s government, of the spirituality and goodness of his law, the evil of sin, our lost condition by nature, and the justice of our condemnation, is necessary in order to our coming to Christ….  Lastly, There is absolute necessity of a special Divine agency in order to our coming to Christ….  Upon the whole, we see from these passages taken together, first, if any man is lost, whom he has to blame for it—himself; secondly, if any man is saved, whom he has to praise for it—God.^[1]

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On June 1, 2013, Dr. Michael A. G. Haykin will be leading a conference on the theme of “Being Baptist: Reflections on a History” at Sovereign Grace Community Church in Sarnia, Ontario.

Conference Schedule:
9:30–10:30am    Where did Baptists come from?
10:50–11:50am  Baptists and the challenge of the age of reason
1:00–2:00pm      Revival and the Baptists in the 18th century
2:20–3:15pm       Samuel Pearce: a Baptist hero

Contact Information:
Sovereign Grace Community Church, Sarnia, ON
Pastor Glenn Tomlinson
365 Talfourd Street, Sarnia, ON N7T 1R1
tel. 519-344-6100 email: glenntomlinson@cogeco.ca