Do Baptists go all the way back to the apostles?

rsr;
That is just a little confusing. How could you be the "true church" without being a faithful church. Did you just want to be different or what?

 

I don't know anything about the ESV but I believe that passage is found in Matthew 25.

 

I agree with all of that rsr; I guess I just misunderstood.

 

One does not have to hold that each New Testament church succeeded from another (Baptist succession) to hold to perpetuity. I hold that somewhere, somehow, from Apostolic days through the Dark Ages until today, God has preserved his assembly in some form, known by different names or maybe no name at all. In other words, there has always existed a church which held to the doctrines taught by Christ and the apostles.

My pastor told me once, when you see tracks going into the water, and tracks coming out of the water on the other side, you can safely believe that whatever went in came out, even if you couldn't see it all the time. That's my take on perpetuity.

And yep, the Apostles are our spiritual ancestors, even if we can't always locate great-great grampaw in the lineage.

 

Brother Bob says:

Amen, Brother Bob. If Baptists aren't the closest thing to a NT church, we better bail out and find the ones that are. Political correctness inhibits us from saying other denominations are not true NT churches, but the fact is, if we are, they ain't. And if they are, we ain't.

 

Excellent post.

I don't think modern baptist churches are anything like the NT church. We worship openly without fear of government reprisal. We don't sell our property to help out the poor in our community. We generally don't speak in tongues.

They didn't have constitutions, church budgets or potlucks. They never argued about bible translations or calvinism vs arminianism since these issues didn't exist. They didn't have Sunday School classes or curriculum.

I do think that there is a lot we can learn from the NT church, but they were an imperfect church like every other and mimicking them is never commanded in scripture.

It is Christ we are told to mimic.

 

I agree. Although I would include Catholic and Orthodox assemblies in that line while many baptists would not and have a much more difficult time reconciling their beliefs with historical evidence.

 

Probably the reason that there was no mention of immersion befor that time is that before that time there was no Baptist Statement of Faith. This is my opinion. A good history of the Baptist succession is History of the Baptist by John Christian or The First Baptist by S.E. Anderson. Both are great books. The Trail of Blood is more a history of events that happened to those who opposed the Catholic church and any other religious faction or any government that they felt they could align themselves with. I would not necessarily call it a book about the history of Baptist in so much as a history of Christian dilema.

 

I know what you're saying, and I as a baptist feel like it's the closest representation in so many ways...

...but, I don't see it as such a monolithic thing. "Living as the people of God" is a broad venue. Maybe my church is very New Testament in the area of giving, but we're falling down when it comes to prayer. Maybe we are great in sharing our faith, but we're messing up with who we ask to lead us.

Kind of like the first part of Revelation--the letters to the churches praised some of their strengths, but chastized their weaknesses.

Are we NT church as Baptists? I do feel we're as close as anyone--but there's certainly places we need to improve, and there's probably a few places that other denominations could teach us something about. (a good example--many Baptist churches could have used a lesson from some other denominations (and the book of James) in the 1960's with respect to accepting anyone from any race into our family of faith).

 

We have had all races in our church way before the 60's and still do today. We have black preachers as well as others and we love each other the same.

 

Glad you guys are an exception to what others had going on in the 1960's. I'm sure there were many exceptions...unfortunately, not everyone had a "new testament" view of things then...

 

Amen brother...

This is what I have found to be true also. I have read many early church fathers, and many more history books from all sides that I can find. From the second to the forth century of the Church, I could not find one group that got the doctrine of Baptisim right. NOT One!! I believe the Baptist faith teaches the right doctrine or I would not be Baptist. But no one can link the Baptist to the 1st Century. This is not to say there was not a true church. There was and always has been a true church, but you will not find it in a single group, passing on the truths from one to the other. Sorry..it did not happen.

 

We cut off our nose to smite our face. Again, if we don't go all the way back to the Apostles in some form we are deceiving the people and ourselves.

The Pope couldn't find a better friend than those that say we don't go all the way back to the Apostles in some form.

I will hang to this until I die. Notice it does not say "the". Too many "unknowns" in the Bible for me not to hang on to this. The rest can do as they want.


Luk 7:20When the men were come unto him, they said, John Baptist hath sent us unto thee, saying, Art thou he that should come? or look we for another?

 

One can only go with blind faith on this view above. I do not have a problem with that, if you choose to do so. But I have found no history record to support your view.

It should be noted that I never said there was not a true church. I also never said that the only church was the RCC.

I only stated I have not found record of the FULL Baptist faith going back to the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th century. If you have proof, I would welcome all that you have. It was my semi-goal 15 years ago to prove this fact, that Baptist can be traced back to the 1st church, but after 5 years of study, I could not find it.

I do however feel that the Baptist faith is as close to the NT church that I know of other then the sharing of all things.

 

Bingo! The faith James, the faith.

 

If Baptists are not from the first Apostles, than us Baptists are part of a man made oraganization, not different than the Catholics, Methodists, Lutherans, Prebyterians, Anglicans, etc... We are false.

Well, let me re-word it. If Baptists do not come from Christ and the system of Doctrine He and His Apostles taught, we be false.
We are not just the closest, but we are it. Each doctrine we believe today, is the same as taught 2,000 years ago. What does that make us?

 

USMC671, I like the way you think.

That's the reason Baptists aren't protestants. We were here before they were.

 

Well I like the way you thing too USMC571. I know one thing if I didn't believe our church went all the way to Christ then I would be hunting for it. :jesus: What is my "Proof"? The Scriptures.