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Whether you are privy to this or not, the issue of the first Baptist church inAmericahas resurfaced once again and has been challenged by those within our own independent Baptist ranks.  Without going into much detail and avoiding the possibility of seeming inflammatory, let me just say that, sadly but proven, financial profit was the human reason for this most recent attack on historical truth.

 The Issue

                Is the currentFirstBaptistChurchatProvidence,Rhode Islandor the current United Baptist Church of Newport, Rhode Island the firstBaptistChurchinAmerica?  Was the first Baptist church inAmericastarted by Roger Williams or John Clarke?  Those who have launched this most recent perversion of historical carelessness say that Williams started theProvidencechurch in 1638 and that Clarke started theNewportchurch in 1644. 

There are basically only two reasons why the Providence-before-Newport theory exists: (1) the self-proclaimed beginning date of the Providence church being 1639, and (2) the abundance of histories that have been written about this issue based primarily on the great (but not infallible) historical works of Isaac Backus when he said that the Newport church was started “about the year 1644” (A History of New England Baptists, Vol. I, pg 125).  While nothing  more than  mere  tradition supports  theProvidence- before-Newport theory, more pertinent evidence proves otherwise.  However, the pride of consistency won’t always allow the evidence to be accepted and there are demonic reasons as to why that is.  So, before you deem this as unnecessary or minimal in importance, you should consider why this is such an issue and why there is so much noise about it from both sides.

 The Facts

                While there is much necessary information that proves theNewportchurch was the first Baptist church inAmerica, there are basically four categories of facts that need to be proposed to help understand the issue.

 (1) While the Providence church claims the beginning date of 1639 and others have said that the Newport church was started “about the year 1644” the church at Newport was actually started in 1638 thus making it at least one year older than the Providence church.  Although Backus is considered the first (by mere popularity) Baptist historian in America, there was actually an historian before him who was closer in time to the issue at hand.  That historian was John Comer.  James W. Willmarth, in his notes in John Comer’s published diary says, “The organization of the First Church was effected probably early in 1638, the year of the settlement of the colony.  Mr. Clarke began his ministry as soon as the colonists arrived.  John Winthrop, the governor of Massachusetts, assures us of this fact in a written statement made that very year; in 1638 he affirmed that Mr. Clarke was ‘preacher to those of the Island’”.  Another less-known historian and sixth pastor of the Newport church, John Callender said in his Historical Discourse on the Civil and Religious Affairs of Rhode Island, “Mr. John Clarke, who was a Man of Letters, carried on publick [old spelling] Worship at the first coming. [to Rhode Island]”  The Warren Association (of Baptist churches) of Rhode Island, when confronting the resurfaced controversy in the 1840’s, appointed a committee who, in 1849, reported that the Newport church “was formed certainly before the 1^st of May, 1639, and probably on the 7^th of March, 1638.”  Comer also said in 1730, “This (speaking of theNewport church) is theFirstBaptistChurch inRhode Island, and the first inAmerica”.

 Both Roger Williams and John Clarke were religious leaders, statesmen and friends of religious liberty.  They both led several people who had fled religious tyranny from elsewhere in the new land, purchased theislandofRhode Islandcollectively from the Indians but then went their separate ways (mostly for reasons explained in fact #4).  Williams led a group of people to what would becomeProvidencein 1639.  Clarke led a group of people to what would becomePortsmouthand on March 7, 1638, they formed a civil government inPortsmouthby making a civil compact called the Portsmouth Compact.  It wasn’t until 1639 that Clarke and several others moved and foundedNewportbut do you think that a Baptist preacher and a group of people who fled religious tyranny (sounds like Baptist people to me) would wait over a year before they organized into some kind of church, let alone waiting until 1644?  Would the group that originally organized inPortsmouthin 1638 wait until they moved toNewportto start a church?  With knowing that a church is a people and not a building, we must understand that the current church inNewportwas actually started inPortsmouth. 

John T. Christian, in his A History of the Baptists, said on page 43 of Volume II, “Dr. John Clarke…was a Baptist minister before he came to America”.  Clarke was a Baptist preacher who, according to Winthrop, was a “preacher to those of the Island” and according to Callender, “carried on publick Worship at the first coming”.  But let the marble etched and weather beaten tomb stone of Clarke speak for the truth when it says, “To the memory of Doctor John Clarke, One of the original purchasers and proprietors of this island and one of the founders of the First Baptist Church of Newport, its first pastor and munificent benefactor; He was a native of Bedfordshire, England, and a practitioner of physic in London.  He, with his associates, came to this island from Mass., in March, 1638, O.S., and on the 24^th of the same month obtained a deed thereof from the Indians.  He shortly after gathered the church aforesaid and became its pastor…” (underlined emphasis added and last half of epitaph left out for sake of pertinence). 

 It is no coincidence that the Warren Association said that the church was “probably” started in March of 1638, the same time that the same group compacted together in a civil fashion.  In his Historical Discourse, Callender says on page 212, “March 7^th, 1638 – The persons thus associated, eighteen in number, having obtained a place for their purpose, on the Island of Aquiday, signed their names to a church covenant, which also embodied in itself a civil compact.”  TheNewport church before settling inNewport had actually organized atPortsmouth under the leadership of the Baptist preacher, John Clarke.  As James Beller recently said about this issue in an open letter to the attackers of truth, “What we have is an assumption by Isaac Backus, with Benedict, Armitage, etc., following suit.  The testimony of those closest to the situation: John Winthrop, John Comer, John Callender and the Warren Association should take precedence.”

(2) While it is said that the Providence church is the oldest because it was started in 1639, it is a proven fact that this proposed date cannot be proved and is only speculative.  There is a lack of historical evidence to accurately secure the Providence church’s beginning date as 1639.  Backus, speaking of the Providence church, says in his History of New England Baptists, “no regular records before 1770 can now be found”.  Dr. Caldwell, once a pastor at the Providence church said, “No records before the coming of Manning (12^th pastor from 1771-1791), in fact, prior to 1775, have been preserved… One hundred and fifty years of the story now told has had to be taken wherever it could be found, and not from any records preserved and authenticated by the church itself.”  So what records were used to authenticate the historical chronology of the Providence church?  Many years later, Dr. Manning, speaking of the pastor who came after him, said, “During the brief period of his stay here Reverend John Stanford (who pastored Providence in 1788 and 1789) gathered such facts as he could find, and his account was inserted in the Book of Records.  It has been quoted by Benedict (author of A General History of the Baptist Denomination in 1813) and other writers, as if it had the authority of original records.  But it contains many errors.”  So we see that Stanford compiled and injected notes into the church record books 150 years after the alleged beginning date, to authenticate the claim. 

The above claim by Manning was made in 1817.  Benedict’s work was originally published in 1813 but when J.R. Graves visited Benedict in the 1850’s with the accurate historical evidence on the issue,Graves said of Benedict’s reaction, “it was his rule not to go behind the records of the churches.  His verdict was in accordance with the records of theProvidence church.  If he had erred he had been misled by those records, and with no intention to disparage the claims of theNewport church.  He admitted the growing perplexities that had for years confused and unsettled his mind as to the correctness of Mr. Stanford’s history of theProvidence church, compiled without any church record, and a full century after its origin. It would not be strange, but indeed probable, that errors, and not a few, would occur”.  Before Benedict died, he said about this issue, “The more I study on this subject, the more I am unsettled and confused”.  Dr. Caldwell said in April of 1889, “We (speaking as a friend and former pastor of theProvidence church) celebrate, after all, an unknown day.  There is no record of the exact date of our beginnings.”

(3) While it is claimed that the church in Providence is the first and oldest Baptist church in America, the truth is that the current First Baptist Church in Providence is actually not the same church which was started by Roger Williams and neither does that original church still exist.  The current First Baptist Church of Providence is the result of a classic church split  which occurred in 1652 and now we have historical confusion because the seceding church wants to claim the original church’s heritage of 1639 (which is easier to do when the original church no longer exists to contend for the chronological claim).  The split caused there to be two churches inProvidence.  The original congregation was then led by a man named Olney (Williams having already “deserted” the church for reasons given in fact #4) while the seceding group was led by Wickenden, Brown and Dexter.  The original church ceased to exist in the early 1700’s but the seceding congregation exists to this day as the First Baptist Church of Providence and therefore, because the split occurred in 1652, the current First Baptist Church of Providence started in 1652 (which, by the way, is after 1638, 1639 and 1644). 

Strangely, Comer’s works were utilized by Backus (obviously not completely) but historian Edward Peterson, who also viewed Comer’s works said, “The First Baptist Church in Providence has assumed two points which she is unable to maintain: First, her existence being prior to that of the church at Newport; secondly, that the church was founded by Roger Williams…. he [Comer] says in one place that it [the church at Newport] is the first of the Baptist denomination [in America]”.  Callender also said in his Historical Discourse of 1738 that, “The most ancient inhabitants now alive, some of them above eighty years old, who personally knew Mr. Williams, and were well acquainted with many of the original Settlers, never heard that Mr. Williams formed the Baptist Church there…”  That is because the time period when those testimonials were given was prior to when Stanford had changed the records and the existingProvidence church was not claiming theProvidence-before-Newport theory yet.  That proves that the currentProvidence congregation did not always claim the title of “first” and that the church that WAS started by Williams had already ceased to exist by the time those testimonials were given in the early 1700’s.  Even if the church atNewport would have started as late as 1644 it would still have been older than the current congregation represented and known as the First Baptist Church of Providence (a title of blatant dishonesty).  No wonder David Benedict was “confused” about this issue!

(4) While it is said that Roger Williams started the first Baptist church in America, his baptism was not legitimate and he therefore did not have the Biblical authority to start a church.  Roger Williams was a great thinker, writer and statesman but he was not a Baptist as we have so often been told.  Williams was an Episcopalian minister who, before coming toAmerica, had been intrigued by Baptist principles and the concept of religious liberty thru the writings and sufferings of the Baptists.  After coming toAmerica and leaving the established church, Williams and other like-minded men settled inProvidence and decided to organize a church on Baptist principles.  The event is commonly recorded in various Baptist histories how the church was started.  One of the men in the group, one Ezekiel Holliman, baptized Williams who in turn  baptized  Holliman and ten others.  It is a principle ofNewTestamentChurch doctrine that the person who is baptizing must be baptized (the exception being the initial baptismal ministry of John the Baptist).  Can you become a Baptist by asking just anyone off the street to baptize you? 

Remember, as John T. Christian explained, “Dr. John Clarke…was a Baptist minister before he came to America” and had the authority to baptize and organize a church but Williams, according to Graves, “did not believe that there was a church on earth scripturally authorized to administer the ordinances, and under the influence of an imagined inspiration from Heaven, he felt authorized to originate one, but in a few weeks he saw his folly, repudiated his act, deserted his ill-gathered company, and ‘in four months it came to nothing,’ says Cotton Mather.”  If anyone took baptismal authority and successional authenticity to an extreme it was Williams, because He did not disagree that a church needed to be “scripturally authorized” but believed that no church at that time had that authority.  AsGraves put it, “He (Williams) was never a Baptist one hour in his life”. 

 The Importance

                (1) Integrity for Historical Correctness – History and Facts are important and we shouldn’t be afraid of the facts just because they might upset the proverbial cart of popular historical teaching.  Once we start changing history we change who we are, where we came from and where we are going.  Maybe Stanford did what he did in 1788 or 1789 to coincide with Backus’ work which was published in 1777.  Just think – notable historians such as Cathcart, Benedict and Armitage along with more contemporary and liberal historians such as Vedder and Torbet might have had different conclusions about this issue if their most trusted sources for this subject (the works of Backus and the injected notes of Stanford) would have been correct (interestingly, the venerable John T. Christian was right on this issue in his works published in 1922).  Oh how we need to be careful with preserving our history and not be careless and presuming like Stanford by twisting the facts to paint an untrue depiction.

(2) Proper Examples of Doctrinal Soundness – How sad it is that the supposed firstBaptistChurch inAmerica was not even started with Biblical baptism.  Some might say that the only authority one needs for baptism is the Word of God, which is true, but the Word of God authoritatively gives that authority to the church – the pillar and ground of the truth and the sole recipient and instituted executor of the three-fold great commission.  You can’t have a church without baptism (correct baptism that is), yet for years, we have held up this example of one who tried to do so.  This poor veneration can only lead to the belittling and eventually the abandonment of Baptist principles – particularly the ordinances – our identifiers!  It can probably be proven that it already has on many fronts.

(3) Regard for our Baptist Heritage – Up until the late 1800’s it was almost impossible to find a Baptist who believed that Baptists were Protestants but now the theory is prevalent among all kinds of Baptists.  This is mainly because of the efforts of a compromising Baptist preacher by the name of William Whitsitt, who, in the late 1800’s promoted the idea that Baptists are a fairly new sect that started sometime in the mid 1600’s.  The idea of Roger Williams starting a Baptist church on principles only and without any Biblical church authority or Baptist background would support (by mere influence) the Whitsitt theory, especially with having the prominent distinction of being the first in the nation. 

The long-term legacy of the Newportchurch is also important because, unlike the Providencechurch, it truly is the ancestor of most Baptists in America.  The Newport church was a church planting church and out of the churches started in Connecticut thru their efforts, was birthed what would become known as the Separate Baptist Revival – the greatest revival in American history.  (for more information read Baptist Foundations in the South by William Lumpkin and America in Crimson Red by James Beller) Many independent Baptists can theoretically trace our heritage thru the Separate Baptist revival and eventually back to John Clarke.  What a glorious heritage to be claimed and one that cannot be claimed by the Providence church (it had very little fruit from whatever time it started until its disbandment in the early 1700’s).

 (4) Historic Influence on American Principles – The Separate Baptist revival and its immediate and amazing church planting result in the south prior to a Constitutional America, created such a stir for the cause of religious liberty in a natural reply by our framers to our persecution under the state church, that the result was eventually our first amendment to the Bill or Rights (read the aforementioned book by Lumpkin for more detail).  Religious liberty and separation of church and state (properly defined) is the Baptist contribution to our constitutional republic.  That being said, it should be no shock to us that “evangelical” Protestants can’t understand why one of our distinctives is separation of church and state, because you can’t truly understand American history until you understand Baptist history (which is why THIS particular part of Baptist history is so vital for us to understand).

Not only is the Newport church amazing because of the Separate Baptist revival that was birthed out of her church planting efforts but the efforts of John Clarke and the Baptists of Newport for the cause of liberty are amazing in and of themselves.  It was Clarke that labored for twelve years to obtain a charter from the king ofEnglandthat would establish religious liberty inRhode Islandfor over a century prior to the federal Bill of Rights.  It was the second pastor of theNewportchurch, Obadiah Holmes, who was publicly whipped inBostonfor his Baptist views.  To embrace and honor a church like Providence as the first and most significant is not only historically incorrect but dangerous to our liberty because if “we the people” venerate Providence as a model, we will repeat what our model did do and didn’t do – start churches with no authority, have very little impact on civil government and die absolutely with almost no fruit (because of little church planting).  Without true churches, (the pillar and ground of the truth) in each community, liberty and freedom will cease to exist.  In an essence, if Baptists die out, our principles die out as well and our nation will suffer because it was Baptist principles that led our country to be the bastion of liberty it is today.  It was not churches likeProvidencethat had great impact on our nation’s founding principles and more churches likeProvidencetoday will do no more.

 In Conclusion

                As Pastor and Historian Dolton Robertson recently said while commenting on this issue in the Ancient Baptist Journal, “This concern goes far beyond a disagreement over matters of historical indifference” and later said, “It is not a squabble over meaningless historical data.”  I believe the regurgitation of this issue is one of Satan’s great attempts to not only detach us from our Baptist heritage but also from our ecclesiastical views and principles of civil government.  For more information on this issue, read the time tested book entitled The First Baptist Church in America – not founded by Roger Williams by Graves and Adlam, 1887.  This book can be obtained from Bogard Press inTexarkana,AR or from Local Church Bible Publishers/Calvary Publishing inLansing,MI.

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