history of the fundamental baptists

I would like to talk about the history of the fundamental baptist movement. I believe that if you took 2000 fundy baptist churches and took them back to their foundations you would eventually come to J Frank Norris. J Frank Norris was a Southern Baptist who felt that Southern Baptists were too liberal. This was in the 19 teens I think!!!! How could someone think that Southern Baptists were too liberal in the early 1900s?!!!! He started his own school called Arlington Baptist College. It was a school that was competing with the southern baptists schools.

 

J Frank Norris was a real thorn in the side of the Southern Baptists. George W. Truett famous pastor of the First Baptist Church Dallas called Norris "that man in Fort Worth." A few years went by, the stock market crashed in 1929 and the horrible great depression came on the United States. There was a Southern Baptist in Dallas who thought that Southern Baptists were too liberal. His name was John R. Rice. This was in 1934. John R. Rice felt that Southern Baptists were too liberal in 1934!!!!!!!! He launched the newspaper known as the Sword of the Lord in 1934.

 

The Sword of the Lord was made up of a lot of former Southern Baptists. Jack Hyles, Bob Gray, Hugh Pyle, Lee Roberson were all former Southern Baptists. An evangelist by the name of Billy Graham came on the scene in 1949. He was on the board of the Sword of the Lord. He was invited to have a crusade in New York in 1957. One group that invited him was the protestant council of New York. The other group was a group of fundies consisting of Bob Jones Sr and John R.Rice. Graham went with the protestant council. That was what started the rift between Graham and the

 

old time fundamentalists. The fundie bapts became increasingly militant and separatist. Bob Jones U came up with "fourth degree separatism." You could not fellowship with someone with was friends with a modernist. The fundy bapts were about soulwinning and building churches. By the 1970's 13 out of the 20 largest churches in the U.S.A. were fundy bapt. Jerry Falwell came on the scene in the 1980s. Boy, is he changing!!!He has started what is known as new image fundamentalism.Turn into his T.V. show Jerry Falwell does not foam at the mouth like Jack

 

Hyles and John R. Rice. Now here we are in the 21st century and the fundamental baptists are dying. Most of the old war horses are dead. John R. Rice is dead. Jack Hyles is dead. Jack Hyles says, "It is very, very, hot down here." Lester Roloff is dead. Curtis Hutson is dead. I think the reason that the fundamental baptist movement is dying is because of the Evangelical Free church down the street patored by swindoll. I am also amazed at what has happened to falwell. I woner what made jerry change? I received a liberty U promotional video the other day. Liberty U is not fundamental baptist any more

 

They have a theater group at Liberty U. The girls are dancing. They have a Chritian rap group called D C talk. Most of the students at liberty are southern baptists. Falwell reads out of the living bible. Graham has spoken at liberty. If John R. Rice came out of the grave and walked on the liberty campus, he would not believe how un-fundy baptist it has become!!!!!! In conclusion, what will the legacy of the fundamental baptists be? Was the fundamental baptist movement a Holy Spirit sent movement or was it a cult? I would like to state what I believe the strengths of the

 

weaknesses of the movement. First, I will deal with the positive aspects of fundamental baptists.They were great at winning people to Jesus Christ. Jack Hyles was a loud mouthed Jerk but a lot of people trusted Christ under his ministry. I also think they were great defenders of inerrancy. Fundamental baptists had less worldly living in their midst because of their high standards. The negative aspects of the movement was that it in many ways it was orthodox Christianity gone cultic. The legalism was crazy. Attacking women for wearing slacks and men for having hair over their ears are just two of many examples. I also think that fundy baptists were not very good at church history and historical theology. This is only natural when your main empahsis is on soulwinning and building churches.

 

I submit that the fundamental baptist movement never needed to exist in the first place. I personally have never met a southern baptist minister who did not believe that hell exists.What were the issues that John R. Rice was protesting in the 1930's?? It was most likely issues such as movies, dancing, etc. If you look at the statement of faith of the SBC, it is identical to most fundamental baptists beliefs. There was one exception, however. It was dispensational premillenialism. J Frank Norris tried to get premillenialism in the SBC statement of faith way back in early part of the 20th century.E Y.Mullins drafted the amillenial state

 

ment that norris did not like. So the only major dotrinal issue was the 1000 year reign of Christ. All the southern baptist seminaries have been pretty solidly conservative for about 150 years!!!!!! Oh, there were instances of a few modernist professors here and there, but there were not very many cases. If there were instances, they were usually quickly fired. The crawford toy case is an example. So the only differnce between Southwestern Baptist Seminary and Norris was the 1000 year reign. B H carroll the founder of the school was a postmillenialist.

 

Southern Seminary in Kentucky was amillenial.So Southern Baptists historically were not dipensationalists. In fact, if you look at the Scofield Reference Bible there are no baptist contributors to it!!!!! So really the only thing that makes fundamental baptists distintive from southern baptists (from a laymens point of view) was legalism and dispensationalism. I do admit, however, that Truett was probably pretty strict by todays standards, I am sure he was against dancing etc. He died in 1944. I also wonder, for instance, when the fundamental baptists attacked

 

Billy Graham, they said that they did want the decision cards at his crudades going to a modernist church. I actually agree with the fundy bapts on this one. However, what was the fundy bapt position on other conservative churches. Lets say an unsaved person goes to a graham crusade. They trust Jesus Christ as Saviour. But the decision card is given to a methodist church. But it is not a united methodist church. Lets say it is a mehodist church pastored by john wesley. It is a methodist church that believes there is a hell with fire and brimstone in it and a heaven with streets of gold.

 

John Wesley baptizes babies by sprinkling and he believes that eternal security is of the devil.John Wesley is not a dispenationalist. He is a postmillenialist. I wonder what Bob Jones Sr. would have to say about that. Bob Jones Sr. was a Southern Methodist. If Bob Jones Sr. was true to the Methodist statement of faith, than Bob Jones Sr. sprinkled babies, believed that eternal security was from the pit, and was a postmillenialist. The founder of Bob Jones U was not a baptist!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

So I think there were some inconsistencies in some of the fundamntal baptist separatism.They attack graham but love ian paisley. I guess that means that it is more important to be separatist than baptist. Ian paisley is a baby sprinkler. Billy Graham is a baptist. I think I am starting to ramble a little bit, so I had better sign off. My summary of all this is that the fundamental baptist movement never needed to exist in the first place. The southern baptists had conservative seminaries and colleges that go back to the civil war.

 

how is my attempt at history lacking?

 

how can you say that fundamental baptists had nothing to do with southern baptists when the FOUNDER of the movement was a former southern baptist. I realize that the GARBC was from a different stream. The GARBC broke off of the old northern baptist convention. However, the GARBC has changed a great deal over the years. Cedarville College their flagship school, is new evangelical now. Jars of Clay a Christian rock group play on their campus. The new evangelical thing I never agreed with any way. Do you want to know why? Fundamental Baptists say that ANYONE who is a Christian but not a fundamental baptist than you are a new evangelical!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

I am not attacking fundamental baptists. I think there are a lot of good things about fundamental baptists. I think agressive soulwinning and leading people to Christ is good. However, I think there were problems with the fundamental baptists (of course you can say that about any group Catholics, Lutherans, charasmatics, methodists etc) from my era 1979. I also realize that fundamental baptist is not monolithic. There are 10,000 fundamental baptist churches in this country and they certainly do not all think alike.I do think, however, that there was a certain mentality that seemed to be part of the churches when I was involved in the movement in 1979. Did dispensationalism have any thing to do with the harsh separatism? For instance,

 

dispensationalism comes from john n. darby and the plymouth brethern. The brethern believed that the organized church was apostate and that they were the only christians. So the plymouth brethern were very separatist just like the fundamental baptists of the 1970's. Fundamental baptists believe tha the 70th week of daniel chapter nine is to be cut off from the other 69 weeks, thus a seven year tributlation period, and a world church and government under the antichrist. Would this belief have something to do with the separtism of schools like bob jones?