The Collected Writings of James Leo Garrett Jr., 1950–2015: Volume One: Baptists, Part I

By James Leo Garrett, Jr. and Malcolm B. Yarnell III

James Leo Garrett, Jr. has been called "the last of the gentlemen theologians" and "the dean of Southern Baptist theologians." In The Collected Writings of James Leo Garrett, Jr., 1950-2015, the reader will find a truly dazzling collection of works that clearly evince the meticulous scholarship, the even-handed treatment, the biblical fidelity, the wide historical breadth, and the honest sincerity that have made the work and person of James Leo Garrett, Jr. so esteemed and revered among so many. The first two volumes of the series explore Dr. Garrett's writings on the experience, history, and lives of Baptist Christians, and this inaugural vome specifically considers Baptists, Baptist views of the Bible, and Anabaptists. Spanning sixty-five years and touching on topics from Baptist history, theology, ecclesiology, church history and biography, religious liberty, Roman Catholicism, and the Christian life, The Collected Writings of James Leo Garrett, Jr., 1950-2015 will inform and inspire readers regardless of their religious or denominational affiliations.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Resource Publications
• Release date: Sep 15, 2017
• ISBN: 9781532607301

James Leo Garrett, Jr.

James Leo Garrett Jr. is Distinguished Professor of Theology, Emeritus, at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. He is the author of a major two-volume work, Systematic Theology: Biblical, Historical, and Evangelical (Wipf & Stock, 2014), the monumental Baptist Theology: A Four-Century Study (2009), and numerous other books and articles. He currently lives in Nacogdoches, Texas.

Book preview

9781532607295.kindle.jpg

The Collected Writings of James Leo Garrett Jr. 1950–2015

Volume 1: Baptists, Part I

James Leo Garrett Jr.

Edited by Wyman Lewis Richardson

Foreword by Malcolm B. Yarnell III

2008.Resource_logo.jpg

The Collected Writings of James Leo Garrett Jr.:

1950

–

2015

Volume

1

: Baptists, Part I

Copyright © 2017 James Leo Garrett Jr. All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in critical publications or reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without prior written permission from the publisher. Write: Permissions, Wipf and Stock Publishers, 199 W. 8th Ave., Suite 3, Eugene, OR 97401.

Resource Publications

An Imprint of Wipf and Stock Publishers

199

W.

8

th Ave., Suite

3

Eugene, OR

97401

www.wipfandstock.com

paperback isbn: 978-1-5326-0729-5

hardcover isbn: 978-1-5326-0731-8

ebook isbn: 978-1-5326-0730-1

Manufactured in the U.S.A.

November 21, 2017

Table of Contents

Title Page

Permissions

Foreword

Preface

Acknowledgments

Editor’s Introduction

Part I: Baptists

Chapter 1: History of Baptist Theology (1958)

Chapter 2: Baptists and the Awakenings of Modern History (1959/1960)

Chapter 3: Two Issues and One Trend Considered by British Baptists: A Southern Baptist Visits the Baptist Assembly in London (1969)

Chapter 4: Baptist Theologians (1971)

Chapter 5: Who Are the Baptists? (1985)

Chapter 6: Protect Baptist Distinctives from Extinction (1991)

Chapter 7: Seeking to Understand Baptist Theology (1993)

Chapter 8: Major Emphases in Baptist Theology (1995)

Chapter 9: The Kingdom of God According to Baptist Theology (1998)

Chapter 10: The Baptist World Alliance: A Personal Testimony (2004)

Chapter 11: The Internationalization of the Alliance, 1960–70 (2005)

Chapter 12: My Journey as a Baptist Christian (2009)

Chapter 13: Baptist Theology with James Leo Garrett, Jr.: An Interview and Review (2009)

Part II: Baptists and the Bible

Chapter 14: Biblical Infallibility and Inerrancy According to Baptist Confession (1972)

Chapter 15: Representative Modern Baptist Understandings of Biblical Inspiration (1974)

Chapter 16: Sources of Authority in Baptist Thought (1978)

Chapter 17: Doctrinal Authority, 1925–1975: A Study in Four Representative Baptist Journals (1979)

Chapter 18: Biblical Authority According to Baptist Confessions of Faith (1979)

Chapter 19: The Teaching of Recent Southern Baptist Theologians on the Bible (1987)

Chapter 20: The Authority of the Bible for Baptists (1999)

Part III: Anabaptists

Chapter 21: Anabaptism: A New Look and a New Appeal (1957)

Chapter 22: The Nature of the Church According to the Radical Continental Reformation (1958)

Bibliography

"The first volume of The Collected Writings of James Leo Garrett Jr. is a marvelous gift for a new generation of students as well as all who are interested in Baptist and evangelical history. Wyman Richardson is to be commended and congratulated for his coordination of this valuable project. This collection makes available the most significant writings from the premier Southern Baptist theologian over the second half of the twentieth century. Readers will be introduced to the important themes of Baptist theology and Baptist history that have shaped Garrett’s careful thinking and thoughtful writings through the years."

—David S. Dockery, Trinity International University/Trinity Evangelical Divinity School

Passing by an encyclopedia of church history in my library the other day, I had the thought, ‘There is the mind of James Leo Garrett.’ On the most important matters and in the extent to which he grasped the whole of Baptist and church history, I believe this to be one of the greatest gifts ever given to the Lord’s church. Southwestern Seminary is forever in debt to this gracious Christian.

—Paige Patterson, Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary

Gratefully dedicated

to the memory of

Dr. Walter Thomas Conner

(

1877

–

1952

)

teacher, mentor, and friend

who, together with President E. D. Head

and the Southwestern Seminary trustees,

provided me an opportunity for a

teaching ministry.

Permissions

History of Baptist Theology by James Leo Garrett Jr. used by permission of Broadman Press. Copyright 1958.

The Nature of the Church according to the Radical Continental Reformation by James Leo Garrett Jr. used by permission of The Mennonite Quarterly Review.

Baptists and the Awakenings of Modern History by James Leo Garrett Jr. used by permission of Broadman Press. Copyright 1959.

Baptist Theologians by James Leo Garrett Jr. used by permission of Broadman Press. Copyright 1971.

Protect Baptist Distinctives from Extinction by James Leo Garrett Jr. used by permission of Western Recorder.

Seeking to Understand Baptist Theology by James Leo Garrett Jr. used by permission of Baptist Standard.

Major Emphases in Baptist Theology by James Leo Garrett Jr. used by permission of the Southwestern Journal of Theology.

The Kingdom of God According to Baptist Theology by James Leo Garrett Jr. used by permission of the Southwestern Journal of Theology.

The Internationalization of the Alliance, 1960–70 by James Leo Garrett Jr. used by permission of the Baptist World Alliance.

Baptist Theology with James Leo Garrett, Jr. by Wyman Lewis Richardson used by permission of The Founders Journal.

Sources of Authority in Baptist Thought by James Leo Garrett Jr. used by permission of Baptist History and Heritage.

The Teaching of Recent Southern Baptist Theologians on the Bible by James Leo Garrett Jr. used by permission of Broadman Press. Copyright 1987.

The Authority of the Bible for Baptists by James Leo Garrett Jr. used by permission of Southwestern Journal of Theology.

Anabaptism: A New Look and a New Appeal by James Leo Garrett Jr. used by permission of Arkansas Baptist News.

Foreword

Contributing the foreword to the first volume of The Collected Writings of James Leo Garrett, Jr., 1950 – 2015 is the second greatest academic honor this professor has ever received. Why would this be such a great honor? And, why not the greatest academic honor? One major reason that it is a great academic honor is because James Leo Garrett Jr. may be recognized as the leading academic theologian among Southern Baptists in particular and American Baptists in general during the period spanning the mid-twentieth century through the early twenty-first century. While many others should obviously be mentioned as contributing to the progress of the life of the churches of Jesus Christ, we are speaking of academic theology. In that realm, Garrett has personally taught thousands of pastors, missionaries, and other ministers over fifty years, and contributed important and seminal works to various disciplines, not only in systematic theology, where he is best known, but also in the fields of historical theology, Baptist theology, ecumenical theology, and religious liberty.

While other Baptist academics must be noted as advancing the discipline of systematic theology, Garrett deserves special mention. Garrett’s massive two-volume Systematic Theology: Biblical, Historical, and Evangelical is now in its fourth English-language edition and has been translated into Spanish for that huge and expanding area of evangelicalism. Similarly, when the popular volume of systematic theology, A Theology for the Church, edited by Daniel L. Akin, was originally contracted to provide an introductory text for the next generation, the fifteen authors explicitly agreed to follow Garrett’s theological method in their own writing. His most prolific biographer, Paul A. Basden, therefore rightly asserts, Garrett is recognized by many of his peers as the most knowledgeable Baptist theologian living today.¹

There is also no doubt in the related field of Baptist theology that Garrett’s Baptist Theology: A Four-Century Study will long remain the premier text. There are important volumes written or edited by others, which cover important ideas in Baptist thought about God and his creatures. However, Garrett’s contribution stands out due to its exhaustive yet summative nature. Extending that signal effort, these first two volumes of Garrett’s collected essays, which carry the subtitles of Baptists, Part I and Baptists, Part II, provide considerably more historical depth and theological reflection than was possible in Baptist Theology. The current volumes contain enlightening research only summarily available in the monograph and much else besides.

This series properly begins with two volumes on Baptist theology, which has been perceived as Garrett’s favorite subject in the history of doctrine.² The first volume starts with thirteen presentations on Baptist theology, history, and distinctives. It continues with a valuable set of seven previously published research essays on Baptist views of Scripture, which clarify their ideas of authority and the Bible’s inspiration, infallibility, inerrancy, and interpretation. The first volume finishes with two essays regarding the sixteenth-century Anabaptists. The second volume will be concerned with Southern Baptists and Baptist relations with other Christians. Rounding out the series, volume three will consider Garrett’s various contributions on ecclesiology; four and five, theology and various twentieth-century Christian leaders; and six, Roman Catholicism. Finally, volume seven will take into account church and state and religious liberty; and volume eight, the Christian life. Wyman Lewis Richardson, a lifelong student of Garrett and an accomplished pastor and writer in his own right, is to be lauded for conceiving, planning, and editing this highly beneficial project.

Another major reason for describing this as a great honor is that this series will extend the ministry of a uniquely attractive witness to Christ Jesus. As the reader will soon discover, the churches have been blessed spiritually, for Garrett’s virtuous Christian character inhabits every essay. Garrett is exceptional in that he remains the humble disciple who listens patiently even as he brings a scholar’s critical eye to the subject under examination. Only after attending his interlocutor carefully does Garrett allow himself to offer an opinion. But even then, Garrett speaks judiciously and with a characteristic reserve that grants his chastened conclusions a rare gravitas. In character and in content, it is thus appropriate to describe James Leo Garrett Jr. as the last of the great gentlemen theologians, for he embodies the best aspects while avoiding the worst of that grand tradition within the American theological experiment.³

From a methodological perspective, Garrett may be located in a particular place firmly rooted within classical Christianity. Garrett seeks to be a disciple of Christ through following the supreme authority of Scripture, but humbly so, heeding wisely the church’s expositions of Holy Scripture.⁴ Within the process of historical theology, which follows immediately upon his biblical theological reflection, Garrett respects the broader witness of the church, but not without a particular practice of discernment. Garrett identifies himself as an evangelical with primary reference to the Reformation and within a denominational framework.⁵ Garrett also embraces that branch of the believers’ church tradition⁶ known as the Baptists precisely because he believes their witness to Christ is faithful to identify the Lord’s revealed will even if we have not always carried it well.

The final reason for recognizing this foreword to be a great honor is that those familiar with my own academic work will immediately recognize this student wholeheartedly embraces Garrett’s theological convictions in both description⁷ and practice,⁸ and I am only one among many to do so. Garrett’s personal influence has been so profound that upon his counsel I pursued a graduate degree in Reformation theology at Duke Divinity School with David Steinmetz, wrote a doctoral dissertation at Oxford University on the development of one of Garrett’s most important doctrinal concerns,⁹ and gave my second son the name of Matthew Garrett in order to memorialize the revered family name of my theological mentor.

To cap it off, I returned to Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary to receive Garrett’s mantle as a teaching and writing systematic theologian, painfully yet joyfully trading my own career ambitions in administrative and pastoral leadership for the high calling of transformative popular theological education. Personally standing in a line that began with Walter Thomas Conner, the first leading systematic theologian in the 109-year history of Southwestern Seminary—and that continued with his student, James Leo Garrett Jr., her second great systematic theologian—is, by far, the highest academic honor.

Garrett once described his relationship with Conner, upon whose theology he wrote his first doctoral dissertation, thus: The Lord and W. T. Conner called me to teach theology.¹⁰ Similarly, I can say, with a sense of awesome privilege, The Lord through James Leo Garrett Jr. called me to teach theology. Only for the reason of fulfilling such a God-given vocation for one’s life might one count writing the foreword for Garrett’s collected writings to be the second greatest honor in one’s academic life rather than the greatest honor itself. Standing behind the podium of James Leo Garrett Jr., whom many have esteemed so highly in thought, word, and deed, is the greatest honor I have ever received. Conversely, on the part of himself or herself, the reader will soon conclude that this series, which collects the fruits of half a century of pristine biblical, historical, and evangelical scholarship, is a necessary addition to the library of every pastor and scholar.

Malcolm B. Yarnell III

Research Professor of Systematic Theology

Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary

Fort Worth, Texas

January 10, 2017

1. Basden, James Leo Garrett Jr.,

298

.

2. Basden, "James Leo Garrett Jr. (

1925

–),"

136

.

3. Holifield, The Gentlemen Theologians.

4. For Garrett’s method in theology, see chapter

1

in his two-volume Systematic Theology: Biblical, Historical, and Evangelical, volume

1

. For Garrett’s formula regarding authority in Christianity, encapsulated in his concept of suprema scriptura, see chapter

12

.

5. Garrett, Are Southern Baptists Evangelicals?.

6. Garrett, The Concept of the Believers’ Church.

7. Yarnell, The Formation of Christian Doctrine.

8. Yarnell, God the Trinity.

9. Yarnell, Royal Priesthood in the English Reformation. Garrett has written a number of important essays on the historical development of the priesthood of all believers. He has also described how this particular doctrine and its proper definition brought about a lifelong passion for ministry. Garrett, Recovering My Priesthood.

10. Garrett, Baptist Identity and Christian Unity,

54

. In the same essay, Garrett also lauded his wife, who recently passed away. Of Myrta Ann Latimer, he wrote that she was, my life companion, great encourager, and sacrificial co-participant in the quest for Baptist identity in the context of the wider Christian world. Ibid.

Preface

In my first year of teaching as a young instructor in Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary I requested the faculty to permit me to create and offer an elective course in the history of Baptist theology. The then three Southern Baptist Convention seminaries required of theology students the completion of a course in Baptist history—the grand narrative of the Baptists, sometimes with doctrinal content. A course in the history of Baptist missions had been offered, but seemingly my summer 1950 course was the first offering in the historical theology of the Baptists. Hence I had no model to follow but began with a modest study that combined the Baptist confessions of faith and the teachings of Baptist systematic theologians. This course was offered at Southwestern during the 1950 s, at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary during the 196 0 s and early 1970 s, and again at Southwestern during the 1980 s and 1990 s. Usually a term paper was required of each student. During the last years of my teaching at Southwestern, I offered a PhD seminar on Baptist theologians. After retirement I wrote Baptist Theology: A Four-Century Study . ¹¹ Thus throughout my teaching ministry I have pondered and reflected upon the theology of the Baptists—its commonalities and its differences, its strengths and its weaknesses.

But 1950 provided another influence upon the writings included in this book. My wife Myrta and I attended the quinquennial world congress of the Baptist World Alliance (BWA) in Cleveland, Ohio. Later I was asked to serve on one of the BWA study commissions and then presented a paper at the 1965 world congress in Miami Beach. Through the initiative and instrumentality of Dr. Duke K. McCall, following Vatican Council II, I was appointed chairman of the newly created Study Commission on Cooperative Christianity and served from 1968 to 1975. Other study commission assignments followed. I was privileged to attend eight world congresses between 1950 and 2005 and numerous annual meetings of the Executive Committee and study commissions. I came to know personally Baptist leaders from various continents and to think in terms of the world Baptist family. My students, therefore, were not surprised to find that my Baptist Theology: A Four-Century Study included Africa, Latin America, and Asia.

My most complete treatment of the Christian doctrine of revelation and the Bible is found in the first volume of my Systematic Theology, first published in 1990.¹² But my specific treatment of the nature, inspiration, authority, canon, interpretation, and inerrancy of the Bible began earlier through a series of articles included in this volume. Most of these articles preceded or antedated the intensive Southern Baptist controversy over biblical inerrancy and hence were not directed to the specifics of that controversy.

Anabaptism became a serious concern for me while a student in the PhD seminar on the Radical Reformation offered by Dr. George Huntston Williams at Harvard University. From my student years at Harvard to his death in 2000 I was blessed to have a continuing relationship with Dr. Williams. I have been privileged to know personally four of the five leading twentieth-century American scholars on Anabaptism: Dr. Williams, Dr. John Howard Yoder, Dr. Franklin H. Littell, and Dr. William R. Estep Jr. In addition, the fifth, Dr. Harold S. Bender, published my article in the Mennonite Quarterly Review.¹³ Then I had the opportunity to help to bring together, in collaboration with Dr. Yoder, the modern heirs of Anabaptism through chairing the local committee for the first Conference on the Concept of the Believers’ Church at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky, in 1967. Both in the 1950s and in the 1980s and 1990s I shared with Dr. Estep as a faculty colleague common interests in Anabaptism, though I did not become a technical Anabaptist scholar, as well as interests in religious liberty, ecumenism, and Roman Catholicism.

This series of volumes is designed to be comprehensive with respect to my writings but with noticeable exceptions. Not to be included are the following: Systematic Theology: Biblical, Historical, and Evangelical, 2 vols.¹⁴; Baptist Theology: A Four-Century Study; Living Stones: The Centennial History of Broadway Baptist Church, Fort Worth, Texas, 1882–1982, 2 vols.¹⁵; Thomas Aquinas’ Doctrine of Penance¹⁶; The Theology of Walter Thomas Conner¹⁷; Protestant Writings on Roman Catholicism in the United States between Vatican Council I and Vatican Council II: An Analysis and Critique in View of the Contemporary Protestant Roman Catholic Confrontation¹⁸; and my book notes¹⁹ and book reviews in various journals. Also not to be included are my seven edited and co-edited volumes in their entirety.²⁰

I am deeply and profoundly indebted to Dr. Wyman Lewis Richardson for his willingness and diligence, while serving as pastor of a large urban congregation, to undertake the sizeable task of collecting and editing this series of volumes. No former student could ever bestow upon his onetime professor a greater gift than this, and no such professor can ever repay his debt of gratitude.

James Leo Garrett Jr.

Distinguished Professor of Theology, Emeritus

Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary

Nacogdoches, Texas

December 1, 2016

11. Garrett, Baptist Theology.

12. Garrett, Systematic Theology. For an interpretation and evaluation, see Patterson, James Leo Garrett, Jr. and the Doctrine of Revelation,

25

–

40

.

13. Garrett, The Nature of the Church according to the Radical Continental Reformation,

111

–

27

.

14. Ibid., Systematic Theology.

15. Ibid., Living Stones.

16. Ibid., Thomas Aquinas’ Doctrine of Penance.

17. Ibid., The Theology of Walter Thomas Conner.

18. Ibid., Protestant Writings on Roman Catholicism in the United States between Vatican Council I and Vatican Council II.

19. During the

1950

s, especially in Southwestern News and Baptist Standard.

20. Garrett et al., The Teacher’s Yoke; Garrett, The Concept of the Believers’ Church; Ibid., Baptist Relations with Other Christians; Ibid., John Calvin and the Reformed Tradition; Ibid., Bibliography in Systematic Theology; Ibid., We Baptists; Garrett The Legacy of Southwestern.

Acknowledgments

The editor wishes to acknowledge the frankly Herculean efforts of two ladies in particular: Lisa Kelley and Audra Murray. Lisa and Audra are members of Central Baptist Church and have gone far above and beyond to help get many of these articles typed so that I could begin the editing process. They have worked tirelessly and I simply cannot thank them enough. To say that there is no way this volume would appear before the public when it has without the efforts of Lisa Kelley and Audra Murray is in no way an exaggeration. Thank you Lisa and Audra! You have been a huge help!

I would also like to thank the wonderful staff at Central Baptist Church: Billy Davis, Laurie Milholland, Thomas Sewell, Luci Stephens, Terry Wright, Becky Bird, Rebekah Byrd, Shelley Burris, and Dana McCall for their encouragement, their help, and the amazing patience and grace they have shown me throughout this publication process. They have heard a great deal about virtually every step of this process and I would like to thank them for their kindness in allowing me to talk through and about this wonderful journey as it has developed.

Many others have helped as well and I cannot thank them enough. I wish to acknowledge and thank Central Baptist members Heather Powell, Eric Lancaster, Tara Geelhood, Alex Pritchett, Mandy Warford, James Paul, Rebecca Townsend, and Gerry Allebach for their tremendous help. I would also like to thank Pastor Eugene Curry of Calvary Community Church in Longview, Washington, for his contribution to this project as well as Dave McClung of the Arkansas Baptist State Convention for his.

Dr. Malcolm Yarnell of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary has been a true help to me. I have turned to Dr. Yarnell on numerous occasions for his advice and he has always been most gracious to assist. Dr. Garrett has a worthy successor in Malcolm Yarnell.

My mother, Diane Richardson, greatly helped by proofreading the manuscript. My brother, Condy Richardson, pastor of Fountain Inn Baptist Church in Fountain Inn, South Carolina, assisted in typing as well. I would also like to thank my father, Wade Richardson, and brother, David Richardson, pastor of New Calvary Baptist Church in Sumter, South Carolina, for their encouragement and assistance.

Jill Botticelli, an archivist at the Roberts Library of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, has gone above and beyond on more than a few occasions in helping me track down some of the more obscure selections in this project and has likewise helped me solve a few mysteries that have presented themselves along the way. Along with her, Terry Christian, Wenjuan Durham, and Kristin Vargas of Roberts Library have offered invaluable assistance.

My wife, Roni Richardson, and our daughter, Hannah Richardson, have been drawn into more conversations with me about this project than they possibly could have desired to be drawn into, but I will never know that for certain for they have shown me nothing but encouragement in the unfolding of this work. I love and appreciate them both so very much and wish to thank them publicly.

Finally, the editor wishes to thank Dr. James Leo Garrett Jr. for his willingness to allow this project to move forward, his assistance in helping it move forward, and his encouragement, patience, and trust.

Editor’s Introduction

"M r. Richardson, would you say that Christ died for us or instead of us?"

That question was asked of me twenty years ago as I sat in the front row of Dr. James Leo Garrett Jr.’s Systematic Theology II class at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas. It was the type of question eager young seminarians, naïve and reckless in their theological aplomb, think they want to be asked. However, such was my burgeoning respect for Dr. Garrett, even at that early point, and such was my growing awareness of my own theological inadequacies that I opened my mouth, paused, and then closed it again. I recall finally and briefly saying something about Christ having died, in a sense, both for us and instead of us. I was keenly aware not of a trap (such was not Dr. Garrett’s pedagogical method), but rather of a unique opportunity to hear a first rate scholar with a passion for theological truth and a vibrant relationship with the Lord about whom he was teaching speak to this crucial issue in a way that I desperately needed to hear. He did so, moving on quickly and brilliantly (and mercifully) to a discussion of the idea of the atonement as respresentative and the idea of the atonement as substitutionary. Sometime after this I read William F. Buckley Jr.’s statement, "One wishes, discreetly, that, as one experiences one’s ignorance, pari passu one would lower one’s voice," and was grateful that I said less rather than more that day.²¹

It was a quick moment and a memorable one for me. In my mind it marks the beginning of my relationship with James Leo Garrett Jr. I was keenly aware at the time, as I have been ever since, that here was a scholar before whom one did not wish rashly to speak. This was not because of a lack of approachability or kindness on his part, but rather because Dr. Garrett had spent such long years in the field of theological study, and his character bore such marks of Christian wisdom and charity, that one sensed one had much more to gain by listening than by speaking. In short, James Leo Garrett Jr. is precisely why earnest students of theology want to go to seminary.

Over the last twenty years I have been pleasantly surprised and touched to have joined that expansive and blessed company of people who call Dr. Garrett friend. Over the years I have cherished the phone calls and emails we have exchanged. I have also been honored to interview Dr. Garrett for my own website (www.walkingtogetherministries.com) and once in print (that Founders Journal interview is included in this volume). I have turned to him and to his printed work numerous times as a pastor. I was deeply touched that Dr. Garrett agreed to write the Foreword for my first book, Walking Together: A Congregational Reflection on Biblical Church Discipline.²² His influence is likewise on virtually every page of my second book, On Earth As It Is In Heaven: Reclaiming Regenerate Church Membership.²³

Some years ago I began collecting his earlier writings—essays, articles, lectures, and the like—to use in my own pastoral and theological studies. I soon began to think of organizing these works in binders, purely for myself, so that I might more easily access their contents.

Somewhere along the way I noted an advertisement for Baylor University Press’ The Collected Works of James Wm. McClendon, Jr. That was the moment when the idea for this series came to me. With some degree of nervousness I contacted Dr. Garrett. He was most gracious in his response and now, these many months later, we are able to present to you the first of this eight-volume series. I was struck early on by the fact that Dr. Garrett expressed to me his desire for these volumes to be useful to pastors in particular. I shared with him that this was indeed the original impetus for the entire project and that it began with one pastor’s efforts to collect in one place these critically important works.

The reader will find in these volumes a truly dazzling panoply of study, observation, evaluation, critique, and comment from Dr. Garrett on topics ranging from Baptists, Anabaptists, Southern Baptists, historical theology, biblical theology, Christian biography, religious liberty, Roman Catholicism, ecclesiology, and the Christian life. The volumes are arranged thematically around these categories.

Spending such a long time with these writings has done nothing but cause my estimation of Dr. Garrett’s scholarship and significance to rise ever upward. My personal prayer and hope is that these volumes will help to keep the name and the work of Dr. Garrett before the theological, ministerial, and lay communities that he has served so faithfully over these many years.

Wyman Lewis Richardson

Pastor, Central Baptist Church

North Little Rock, Arkansas

Easter 2017

21. Buckley, Let Us Talk Of Many Things,

229

.

22. Richardson, Walking Together.

23. Richardson, On Earth As It Is In Heaven.

I.

Baptists

1

History of Baptist Theology (1958)

Baptists, whose historical origin as such occurred early in the seventeenth century, have in common cherished principles. Likewise, Baptists share with the majority of the sixteenth-century Anabaptists the tenet of believers’ baptism, the ideal of churches composed solely of the regenerate who are walking in fellowship, and a belief in the separation of church and state. Other Anabaptist teachings—such as an anti-Augustinian theology; a negative attitude toward civil office, oaths, and warfare; and violent chiliasm, such as that practiced at Münster—have not been generally accepted by Baptists.

Baptist theology, like Baptist churches, had a twofold origin in England. General Baptists arose out of English Separatism when John Smyth’s congregation, exiled in Holland, rejected infant baptism and began (1609) de novo believers’ baptism by affusion. General Baptist theology, however, was essentially Arminian on election, free will, and universal atonement. Smyth and Thomas Helwys were pioneer protagonists of religious liberty, contending for it on Christological and theological grounds. After division between Smyth and Helwys, Smyth’s congregation was absorbed by the Waterlander Mennonites, and Helwys’s congregation returned to England to become the mother church of General Baptists. Helwys rejected historical succession and free will. Contact with the Mennonites caused the General Baptists to face the problem of Hoffmannite Christology.

Particular Baptists, so designated because of their doctrine of limited atonement, retained the basic Calvinistic theology of the Separatists, which they regarded as scriptural. A peaceful defection from a London Separatist church on the issue of believers’ baptism resulted in the first Particular Baptist congregation. Richard Blunt obtained immersion (1641) from the Dutch Collegiants, but John Spilsbury insisted that baptizedness is not essential to the administrator. The First London Confession (1644), moderately Calvinistic, was distinctive in prescribing single immersion as baptism. The General Baptists also adopted immersion.

Because of the oppressive measures of the Restoration era, English Dissenters were led to consider beliefs held in common. The Orthodox Creed of General Baptists (1678) mediated between Calvinism and Arminianism. Thomas Grantham defended the General Baptist practice of laying on of hands on new believers and the office of messenger. The Particulars adapted (1677) the Westminster Confession with modifications concerning baptism and church polity, yet retaining its strong Calvinism, even in regard to the Lord’s Supper. The controversy between John Bunyan, an open communionist, and William Kiffin, who held to immersion as prerequisite, opened a recurring and divisive issue among Baptists.

In the eighteenth century General Baptists suffered from deadening Socinianism, while Particular Baptists became hyper-Calvinistic, developing the non-invitation, non-application scheme of John Gill and others. The Evangelical Revival attracted neither the Particulars, who objected to John Wesley’s Arminianism, nor the Generals, who refuted him on baptism. Yet the new evangelicalism did produce the Leicestershire movement, which became immersionist. The resulting New Connexion of General Baptists, formed (1770) under Dan Taylor, taught both universal atonement and universal invitation, while the General Assembly of General Baptists became increasingly Unitarian. Particular Baptist hyper-Calvinism was modified under Andrew Fuller, who, opposing Socinianism and Arminianism, combined limited atonement with universal invitation. William Carey and the missionary movement issued from Fuller’s theology, while William Gadsby’s Strict and Particular Baptists refused to accept it. Calvinistic-Arminian differences diminished so that Particulars and Generals were fused by 1891.

The earliest Baptist churches in America were primarily Calvinistic, but Arminian teaching soon increased. The Philadelphia Confession (1742) was the Second London Confession (1677) with two articles added. The Separate Baptists, a product of the Great Awakening, added a conversion-centered evangelistic fervor to the Baptist stream. Benjamin Randall’s Free Will Baptist movement was Arminian and practiced a connectional polity and open communion. American hyper-Calvinism resulted in the Primitive Baptists, who resisted efforts initiated by Luther Rice to organize Baptists for educational and missionary purposes. In Daniel Parker’s teaching, hyper-Calvinism was joined with dualism. The main body of American Baptists incorporating the Calvinistic, the General, and the Separate sources, became moderately Calvinistic, as may be noted in the New Hampshire Confession (1833).

Alexander Campbell’s identification with the Baptists (1813–30) was marked by increasing tension. Campbell’s Sandemanian and Arminian ideas of faith, doctrine of baptism for the remission of sins, and criticism of Baptist ministers, denominational bodies, and confessions of faith, produced the inevitable separation.

In the 1850s there arose in the South a Baptist high church movement called Landmarkism, led by James Robinson Graves, James Madison Pendleton, and Amos Cooper Dayton. The kingdom of God was said to be visibly composed of the true churches of Christ, identified as local Baptist organizations whose unbroken existence from the Jerusalem church was deduced from the perpetuity of the kingdom and demonstrated as historical. Landmarkers, denying any nonlocal meaning of ecclesia, opposed preaching by paedobaptists in Baptist pulpits, rejected alien immersion, and advocated local church communion. The Landmarkers’ unsuccessful insistence on a local church basis of representation in the Southern Baptist Convention led to their defection (1905). The Convention later adopted this principle.

Baptists were not unaffected by liberal theological trends. The English Downgrade controversy found scientifically trained John Clifford, advocate of biblical criticism, theological reconstruction, and social reform, pitted against Charles Haddon Spurgeon, the defender of Puritan supernaturalism. Augustus Hopkins Strong’s early conservative theology was modified by personal idealism, while William Newton Clarke reflected idealism and Ritschlianism. Walter Rauschenbusch articulated the theology of the social gospel; Shailer Mathews expounded and Harry Emerson Fosdick popularized modernism; and George Burman Foster denied the absoluteness of Christianity. The Northern Baptist Convention declined (1922) to adopt any confession of faith. Fundamentalism, taking its name from The Fundamentals (1910), elicited Baptist support, especially in William Bell Riley, T. T. Shields, and John Franklyn Norris. The challenge of evolution and other issues led the Southern Baptist Convention to modify (1925) the New Hampshire Confession and add eight new articles. Edgar Young Mullins, leading apologist and champion of Baptist soul competency, interpreted conservative theology on the basis of religious experience. Defections from the Northern Convention produced two new bodies, the General Association of Regular Baptists (1933) and the Conservative Baptist Association of America (1947), both of which are premillennial.

The relation of Baptists to Protestantism became a more acute issue with the rise of the ecumenical movement. Although British Baptists declined to accept the Lambeth Appeal (1926), yet from the time of John Howard Shakespeare, they co-operated with the free churches. Henry Wheeler Robinson’s teaching made the term sacrament more acceptable. In the North, open communion and open membership increased. The Northern Baptist Convention, a charter member of the Federal Council of Churches (1908), participated in its program of social action. But the Southern Baptist Convention, influenced by Landmark teachings, fearful of a highly organized world Protestantism, and seeking to safeguard its conservative theology and freedom of missionary activity, refused to participate in the faith and order conferences, the Federal Council, and the World Council of Churches. British, Northern, and certain other Baptists joined the World Council (1948).

From its origin (1905) the Baptist World Alliance has been a forum for the enunciation of Baptist distinctives in the context of world Christianity. After heated debate led by Henry Cook and Monroe Elmon Dodd, the alliance voted (1947) not to affiliate with the World Council.

Efforts have been made to delineate a central Baptist principle such as would imply the other basic Baptist emphases. Among the principles advocated have been the authority of the New Testament, the competency of the individual under God, the doctrine of the church, and the lordship of Christ.¹

1. Barnes, The Southern Baptist Convention,

1845

–

1953

. Cole, The History of Fundamentalism. Graves, Old Landmarkism: What Is It? Littell, The Anabaptist View of the Church. McGlothlin, Baptist Confessions of Faith. Mullins, The Axioms of Religion. Newman, A History of Anti-Pedobaptism. Payne, The Fellowship of Believers. Roberts-Thomson, Baptists and Disciples of Christ (n.d.). Torbet, A History of the Baptists. Underwood, A History of the English Baptists.

2

Baptists and the Awakenings of Modern History (1959/1960)

Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts: the whole earth is full of his glory. . . .

Woe is me! For I am undone, for I am a man of unclean lips . . .

for mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts. . . .

Lo, this hath touched thy lips, and thine iniquity is taken away,

and thy sin forgiven. . . .

Whom Shall I send, and who will go for us? . . .

Here am I; send me. . . .

Go, and tell this people.

Isa 6:3–9 (abridged)

The Baptist movement was born in the matrix of Puritan England. With certain roots in the Anabaptism of Continental Europe and the earlier evangelical bodies, the Baptists entered the drama of Christian history in the second century of the Reformation era. Ninety-two years transpired between Luther’s posting of his Ninety-five Theses on the church door at Wittenberg ( 1517 ) and the adoption of believer’s baptism by John Smyth’s little exiled congregation in Holland ( 1609 ). The General or Arminian Baptists looked across the English Channel to the heritage of the Mennonites, or the Dutch Anabaptists. The Particular or Calvinistic Baptists, on the contrary, were more strictly the offspring of Puritanism itself. Neither group was a mighty popular awakening, but both were absorbed with the twofold task of working out the implications of being churches of the regenerate baptized as believers and of seeking for liberty in a land painfully intolerant of nonconformists. Baptists were numerous in Cromwell’s army, and during the interim between Charles I and Charles II they did not hesitate to sow England with Baptist tracts. Into Scotland they went with the army. A host of new sects—Quakers, Seekers, Levellers, Diggers, and Fifth Monarchy Men—arose as the