Regulars & Separates:Two expressions of the one faith

BAPTIST HISTORYLESSON 22

Great Awakening & George Whitefield

New Lights

Old Lights

1767 formation Warren Association

REGULAR BAPTISTS

More urban

Less accepting of emotionalism

Greater emphasis on education

Shubal Stearns (1706-1773)

1745 converted; joined Separate Congregational Church

1751 rejected infant baptism

1754 moved Opekon, Virginia; joined Baptist Church affiliated w/ Philadelphia Association

November, 1755 moved Sandy Creek area of North Carolina

1758: Sandy Creek Association

Daniel Marshall (1706-1784)

1744 heard Whitefield; saw the promise of ‘later-day-glory’

1754 moved Virginia; married Martha Stearns

1755 moved North Carolina

1726 converted; became deacon in Presbyterian church

Ministry of Daniel Marshall

Abbots Creek, Davidson County, NC

Virginia: preaching tour

South Carolina: Beaver CreekHorse Creek

Georgia: arrested Parish of St. Paul

1770 Kiokee

Nine ‘rites’ practiced in Sandy Creek

BaptismLords SupperLove FeastsLaying on of handsWashing feetAnointing the sickRight hand of fellowshipKiss of charityDevoting children

Women addressed mixed congregations; ‘exhorters’

Sandy Creek Tradition vs. The Charleston Tradition

3. That Adam fell from his original state of purity, and that his sin is imputed to his posterity; that human nature is corrupt, and that man, of his own free will and ability, is impotent to regain the state in which he was primarily placed.

4. We believe in election from eternity, effectual calling by the Holy Spirit, and justification in his sight only by imputation of Christ righteousness. And we believe that they who are thus elected, effectually called, and justified, will persevere through grace to the end, that none of them be lost.

4. We believe in the everlasting love of God to his people, and the eternal election of a definite number of the human race, to grace and glory: And that there was a covenant of Grace or redemption made between the Father and the Son, before the world began, in which salvation is secure, and that they in particular are redeemed.

6. We believe that all those who were chosen in Christ, will be effectually called, regenerated, converted, sanctified, and supported by the spirit and power of God, so that they shall persevere in grace and not one of them be finally lost.

Principles of Faith of The Sandy Creek Association (1816)

Confession of the Georgia Baptist Association (1784)

Holding believers' baptism; laying on of hands; particular election of grace by predestination of God in Christ; effectual calling by the Holy Ghost; free justification through the imputed righteousness of Christ; progressive sanctification through God’s grace and truth; the final perseverance, or continuance of the saints in grace; the resurrection of these bodies after death, at that day which God has appointed to judge the quick and the dead by Jesus Christ, by the power of God, and by the resurrection of Christ; and life everlasting. Amen.

‘The followers of Stearns helped bring into practice the evangelistic convictions of the Regulars; the confessional detail of the Regulars helped give expression to the theological convictions of the Separates’ Thomas Nettles The Baptists, Vol. 2, pg 175

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Sandy Creek church covenant written by Shubal Stearns in 1757; reproduced in covenant of Grassy Creek church

Italics are words George W. Pascal is sure Stearns did/could not write!