What Makes a Church Baptist?

Maybe rephrasing the OP question can help us come up with the answers. I would ask, what doctrines and practices, taken together, would cause you to say, "why, that's Baptist"? Conversely, what doctrines and practices would cause you to say about a congregation, "well, they're certainly not Baptist?"

Here's my list of Baptist distinctives, starting with the doctrine of baptism (where we get our name).

Baptism
1. Of believers only
2. By Immersion
3. Symbolic, not sacramental.

Salvation
1. By grace through repentance and faith.
2. Eternal

Jesus
1 Is God
2. Part of the Trinity
3. Pre-Existennt
4. Virgin-born

Ecclesiology:
1. Congregatonal church government
2. Pastor-elder-bishop and deacons
3. Independent and autonomous churches
4. Two ordinances--Baptism and the Lord's Supper, neither sacramental.

Scripture:
1. Inerrant and infallible revelation of God and his son.

Obviously, not an exhaustive list. And one can cite other denominations which hold to a lot of things on the list. To identify a Baptist, we have to take all these things together, not separately.

On the other hand, if you leave some of these things off the list--such as baptism of believers only, salvation by grace through faith--then you ain't Baptist, regardless of the sign on your door.

 

There are so many flavors of Baptists that it's tough to nail down. There is only one thing that all Baptists have in common: the mode and meaning of Baptism. Hence their name . . .

 

What about the Free Will Baptist? They are in agreement with most of this but disagree slightly on Eternal Security and practise 3 ordinances. Are we still baptist under this definition?

Please let me be Baptist... please.. please.. pretty please...puuulllllleeese....

 

Baptists such as yours find it necessary to add a qualifier to signal their difference with historic Baptist distinctives. So we have Free Will Baptists, Seventh-Day Baptists, Two-Seed-in-the-Spirit Predestinarian Baptists, General Baptists, Particular Baptists,

Some add names to identify organizational structure or ecclesiology: Southern Baptist, Independent Baptist, American Baptist, Cooperative Baptist, Landmark Baptist, Regular Baptist, Old Regular Baptist, etc.

If someone says "I'm a Baptist" I'll assume certain things about his doctrine and practice.

If someone says "I'm a Free Will Baptist," I'll assume some different things.

Honest in packaging is good. So I am giving you my official blessing to call yourself Baptist, as long you add Free Will.

I still say that denying salvation by grace and baptism of believers only disqualifies one from calling himself Baptist, and they ought have enough integrity to admit they're not.

 

Thanks Tom,

On a serious note, I do always use the "Free Will" quantifier. For some reason folks in my part of the woods associate some rather negative undertones to just plain "Baptist". I think it has to do with a particularly large "social" church in the area.

 

As a general rule I identify myself as Baptist, but where I think it's necessary, I call myself a Southern Baptist. If I really need to clarify things I call myself a "right-wing redneck deep-water Southern Baptist."

We have a lot of Independent Baptist churches around here, but most of them just call themselves Baptist. A quick question or two about them will quickly determine of which stripe. Truth to tell, there's not a dime's worth of difference doctrinally, and in most cases, not a dime's worth of difference in ecclesiology. In fact, we grant and accept letters with each other.

We have the SBC structure, but even Independent Baptists sometimes have a loose fellowship affiliation.

 

A Christian who believes in baptism by immersion.

 

No one will ever agree on every doctrine. The one thing that all Baptist have in common is baptism. Calling ourselves Baptist is an attempt to tell the world our approximant biblical position, it should act as a compass for the heathen.

 

I'd agree with this, but limit the 4th point. A church can be Baptist even if it doesn't carry it in its name. I know plenty of great baptist churches that don't carry it in the name. They teach Baptistically and have these doctrines but have chosen, for a variety of reasons, not to have in their name.

I might fish around with biblical authority but limit it since there isn't a historical concensus.

This is a good thread. :thumbs:

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Baptists are a diverse set. To be biblical and baptist, one must adhere to many more doctrines, but these are a minimum standard. Note that I included self-identification. I believe this is what separates baptistic churches from baptist churches.[/quote]

 

To-day? The name on the billboard!!!!

I don't know anymore.

Cheers,

Jim

 

Right, as far as it goes. Here's the rest of it.

If you had to strip away everything but the identifying marks which would cover just about every Baptist of every stripe, what would remain is baptism, as follows:

1. Of believers only
2. By immersion
3. Symbolic of the gospel, symbolic of death, burial and resurrection and not sacramental.

It is this view of baptism that angered the Pedo-baptists--which included Catholics and most Protestants. It is this view of baptism that produced persecution and death. It is this view that earned us the name Baptist (Baptizer) from those same people, who hated us because we wouldn't baptize infants, sprinkle adults or attach any saving efficacy to baptism.

When Baptists diversified into several groups, it was not over baptism.

 

Thinking about it I'd also add two ordinances practiced...both symbolic but meaningful.

Baptism and communion.

 

I don't mean that the name "Baptist" must be in the name of the church, only that the church considers itself to be a baptist church.

I think that a "community church" that considers itself to be a baptist church but chooses not to include the title in the church name is a baptist church.

A community church that does not consider itself to be a baptist church may be baptistic, but it is not baptist.

 

We got our name,, Baptists, from those who hated us. We wore it as a badge of courage in the face of persecution.

Today, in the face of hostility to Baptists, or at least to the name, some folks want to avoid it like the plague. Horrors, people hate us. So we'll be baptist, but let's don't tell anybody.

 

I don't know how I missed this one, but I think StefanM might have hit the nail on the head. I can't think of any baptist who do not fall into this and I do not know of any non-baptist denominations that do. Can anyone else?

 

Ben Stratton's comments are on the money. There are not two kinds of baptism. There is only one (Eph 4:5 "One Lord, one faith, one baptism.")

If immersion is scriptural, by definition, sprinkling is not.