We have often heard that we are, for example, “Independent, Fundamental, Premillinial, Biscuit eating, sweet tea drinking, pulpit pounding Baptists”. We know, from my previous blog post, why we are Baptists but what does it mean to be a Fundamentalist? Now we today understand that if someone says they are a Fundamental Baptist it pretty much means they are King James only, have dress standards, use conservative music and are not Calvanistic. But what is the history of Fundamentalism? Around 1900, modernism, theological liberalism, German rationalism and textual criticism was showing up in our churches and seminaries. Just like our big battles today are the KJB issue, the contemporary “Christian” music issue and separation in believer’s lives, the big issues that modernism brought about were attacks against the virgin birth of Christ, the deity of Christ, the substitutionary death of Christ, the resurrection of Christ, the second coming of Christ and the verbal inspiration of the scriptures. When all of this hit the fan, Baptists who still believed these truths joined hands with Methodists, Presbyterians, Lutherans, etc who also believed the same way on these choice issues. One of the products of this effort was a series of booklets called “The Fundamentals”. THIS is where the term “Fundamentalist” really came from. Some of the most prominent men behind this movement were R.A. Torrey, A.T. Pierson, C.I. Scofield and B.B. Warfield. Most of these men were postmilleniel, pedobaptist (infant baptism) Protestants and not Baptist. Why was Eternal Security or Baptism by Immersion never mentioned in “The Fundamentals”? These doctrines were under attack as well but many of the aforementioned leaders did not believe in these two doctrines. These booklets of essays on the fundamentals can now be purchased in a hardback, two volume set entitled “The Fundamentals”. So you can see that Fundamentalism was mostly Protestant and definitely non-denominational in its conception. From this same movement we saw Protestant institutions started for the purpose of training preachers such as Bob Jones University, Moody Bible College and Wheaton. Fundamental? Yes, but not Baptist AND para-church ministries. (we’ll save that issue for another blog) The problem is that it almost seems that Fundamentalism has become its own denomination. May I say that I believe in the Fundamentals but to say that I am a Fundamentalist would be a cop-out and a compromise because I am more than a Fundamentalist … I am a Baptist. If you are a Baptist you are already a “Fundamentalist” and then some. You might say, “Well I know Baptists that deny the Fundamentals”. Well, then they really aren’t Baptists. Now we know what we mean when we use the term “Fundamentalist” but the danger is that we begin to accept the theology of others who were “Fundamentalists” in the past. We make heroes out of baby baptizers such as Billy Sunday and murderers such as Savonarola and Martin Luther. When we held hands with the Scofields and Torreys we put our Baptist history on the back shelf and watered down our ecclesiology just to be accepted by the Protestants (those who murdered us in the past and support infant-baptism and a church-run state where there is no religious liberty). A Dr. Feinberg said, “The purpose of The Fundamentals was to unite those who stood squarely on the fundamentals of the faith and to make a powerful statement in face of the inroads of liberalism”. Unity? At what cost? May I say that unity should never be the goal. Obeying God and His Word should be the goal. Anytime we make unity the goal we will compromise to achieve unity among those who we differ with in doctrine. Fundamentalism has watered down our ecclesiology, our eschatology and our Biblical stand on separation of church and state. Curtis Hutson (who was a good man and I love his son’s preaching) wrote in his 1982 Sword of the Lord pamphlet “Who is a Fundamentalist”, “On the other hand, I know some godly Christians who do not call themselves Baptists but believe in the great fundamentals of the Christian Faith and are for soulwinning and revival. I feel free to differ whenever necessary on some lesser matters and to say so, but I am for those who believe in the fundamentals of the Faith and are for Christ and the Bible and soulwinning.” As you can see with the mention of “revival” and “soulwinning” (both of which are Biblical) numerical success and conversion statistics have been made more important then the “lesser matters” such as what you believe about baptism. I mean … baptism is only a picture of the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ! A “lesser matter”? I think not! For this reason, great revivalists such as Billy Sunday and D.L. Moody (who said he didn’t have time for baptism) have become our heroes. Curtis Hutson goes on to say on page 7, “So baptism is not a fundamental, not an essential.” Now I would consider baptism to be a fundamental although it is not essential to salvation. He says on page 6, “Certain doctrines are fundamental to the Christian faith. I believe everything in the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, but everything mentioned in the Bible is not essential to my salvation.” But my question is “how is an understanding of the second coming of Christ essential to my salvation if it is one of these sacred Fundamentals?” When I got saved I didn’t understand the verbal inspiration of the scriptures and that is one of these blessed fundamentals. He later says, “There are things I would die for….. There are other things that I would fight for that I would not die for. I am a Baptist and believe in baptism by immersion. I would fight for that. But a man could go to Heaven without being baptized”. What he is saying is that he would not die for baptism but if he would have studied history a little more he would see that many people did! Get the book and read it. I bought it several years ago and thought it was great but after learning about our Baptist heritage and the doctrine of the local church I almost vomited when I read this booklet again. May I clearly state that if it is in the Bible it is fundamental to what you believe. To say that certain doctrines are not fundamental is to belittle God’s Word. So if Fundamentalism is only holding to a few select doctrines and being a Baptist is submitting to the authority of the entire Word of God, I am going to take the high road and refer to myself as a Baptist and not a compromising, non-denominational Fundamentalist. The “Fundamentals” aren’t even really an issue among Protestants anymore. The line was drawn along time ago as far as who stands where on the “Fundamentals”. What about other issues? Try naming a “Fundamental” Protestant that is King James Only. Fundamentalism was one of the wiles of the devil to attack God’s institution of the local New Testament church because it forced the participating Baptist churches to blur their lines of doctrine. If you look back in history and learn from Baptists, your chances of remaining a Baptist are greater then if you look back and learn from Protestant Fundamentalism. The scary thing is that many Baptists are waving the flag of Fundamentalism and don’t even know its history and negative affects. What can we do about this? First, we can quit calling ourselves Fundamentalists. Secondly, we can quit quoting Fundamentalist Protestants and stop promoting them in our preaching and curriculum. And thirdly, we can throw away our Protestant books and start searching for Baptist books. They are out there. Remember, you are or soon will become what you read. What we often times do not realize is that the old-time Baptists looked at men such as Wesley and Torrey in the same way in which we look at Rick Warren today. Popularity leads to exposure, exposure leads to apathy, apathy leads to acceptance and acceptance leads to practice. I don’t know any ”Fundamental” Baptist who would let Rick Warren preach in their pulpit but I know many “Fundamental” Baptists who would let pedobaptist Protestants such as Wesley, Moody and Sunday preach in their pulpits if it were possible. I hope you can see the danger of “Fundamentalism” and the adequacy of the name ”Baptist”.