Baptist Church History

By Marvin McKenzie

Baptist Church History
A simple survey for anyone to understand

Learn:
The early history of Christian churches
Trace that history from the first century truth to early heresies
The rise of universal church theology
See the destruction to Christian faith caused by the marriage of government and the church.
The brave stand of faithful believers
Montanist, Donatists, Paulicians and others stood through fiery trials to guarantee we have the pure Word of God today

 

About The Author

Marvin McKenzie was born and raised in the Pacific Northwest and became a believer at the age of eighteen. He has spent his thirty years of ministry planting and pastoring churches in the states of Washington and Oregon, and training others for the work of the ministry in Baptist churches. He has also served for a time as the Executive Vice President of Pacific Coast Baptist Bible College in San Dimas, CA and of Heartland Baptist Bible College in Oklahoma City, OK. He and his wife, Anita, have two sons. Both are Baptist pastors in Washington State.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Marvin McKenzie
• Release date: Oct 15, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201087647

Marvin McKenzie

Pastor Marvin McKenzie was saved at the age of eighteen. He has planted and pastored churches in Washington and Oregon. Involved in planting 10 churches[1] Executive Vice President of Pacific Coast Baptist Bible College, San Dimas, CA[2] and then Heartland Baptist Bible College, OKC OK.  Pastor of Bible Baptist Church in Puyallup, WA 19 years (December 1999-present) Celebrated 35th anniversary of ordination December 29, 2018 Published 65 books relating to Bible Study, Baptist History and Devotionals   Marvin and Anita have two sons; both serve in Baptist churches in Washington State. [1] I was a founding member of two of them, the co-founder of one, founder of one and sent men out of our church to plant the others. [2] I negotiated the sale of the PCBBC campus previous to the college’s move to OKC. I served as the first EVP at Heartland.

Book preview

Thank you for purchasing this book.

I trust it will prove to be helpful and a blessing to you. I have developed my own style of writing for sermon preparation that seems to work well for me to use as I preach from the pulpit. I elected to keep most of that style intact. I trust it will add rather than distract from the effectiveness while you read.

Should you find the book is helpful to you, or if you have questions you would like to ask me, that you feel free to contact me. My e-mail address is [e-mail].

AD 28-150

Matthew 16:18

Robert Sargeant, a well-known contemporary Baptist writer has written that there are three reasons why every Baptist ought to know the basics of church history.

1.  It will strengthen us in the promises of God.  As we see how God has kept what He has promised over the centuries of church history.

2.  It will strengthen our resolve to earnestly contend for their faith.  As we see the cost our forefathers paid to preserve the Bible for us and its true doctrines.

3.  It will strengthen us to have more Baptist Backbone.   As we see and understand from whence our church hails.

As we explore the history of the church, I am reminded of the Old Testament history of Israel.  Many Christians get confused in 1 & 2 Samuel, Kings and Chronicles, because they forget that Israel split into two lines after the death of Solomon.  One line was a splinter group, larger than the other line, but never right with God.  The other line was the true line, although not perfect, the line that God blessed.

Church history has two lines. 

The true line and the splinter false line.  The splinter line has grown to be much larger than the true line, but it hasn't the blessings of God upon it in the same way as the true line.

Of course, I speak of Catholicism and its children (Protestantism) and the Baptist line.

To understand church history, one has to remember that there has always been a line of churches that were not a part of the Catholic system.  They are not Protestants because they never protested out of her.

You also need to keep in mind that most of the information available to use even about the Baptists was written by people who dislike the Baptists and wrote critically of them.  The information we get from them can be helpful, but we must filter through things that are probably not true to find what really happened.  (Nero burnt part of the city of Rome down to build a bigger palace and then blamed the fire on the Christians because they were always preaching that the earth would be destroyed by fire)

Baptists did write and even had Bible colleges, but when they were found, they were hunted down and killed, and their books were destroyed.

Since the bulk of the historical records are about Catholicism and Protestantism, we will use that as the backdrop, and paint the Baptist Picture onto it.

By the way, by referring to Baptist history, I am not saying that the name Baptist can be found on these churches throughout history.

The term Baptist was given to the churches that would not join with Catholicism by the Catholics.  There were also several other names by which they were called.

What we believe is that there has never been a time since the organization of the first New Testament Church that there was no genuine New Testament Church existing.

BASIC OUTLINE OF CHURCH HISTORY beginning with John the Baptist and Jesus Christ (AD 28) and tracing it to the present.

Church History can be divided into three major portions

Primitive Church History

Medieval Church History

Modern Church History[1]

AD 28-AD 150 (approx.)

The beginning of the church JOHN THE BAPTIST in approximately AD 28.

Many Baptists teach that the church did not start at Pentecost, but in fact in the Gospels, with John the Baptist and those he baptized.

On your handout, I have printed for you the Essential elements of a New Testament Church.  All these elements were in existence PRIOR TO THE DAY OF PENTECOST.

It was, however, at Pentecost that the church became empowered to impact the world!  And we begin to see new churches springing out of that church.[2]

Philip left Jerusalem to go and plant a New Church in Samaria.

Others, undoubtedly, did the same thing.

The Patron Saint of Scotland is Apostle Andrew.  Tradition says that he personally went to Scotland to plant churches.  They, of course, would have originally been True, Bible Believing Churches.

The most well-known church planted out of Jerusalem was the church in Antioch.  Paul went out of that church to establish churches throughout Asia.

Paul expressed a desire to travel someday to Spain.[3]  Many believe that he in fact did just that, and for centuries and centuries, the Baptists in Wales have said that Paul traveled to Wales with the Gospel. Pudens, Claudia, and Linus[4] are claimed by the Welsh Baptists to be Welshmen.

Most of the Baptist contingency here in the United States traces its roots through the Welsh Baptists.  If this historical record is true, then we can trace our roots right back to the Apostles.

DEVELOPMENTS OF THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.

J.M. Carroll, the author of the "Trail of Blood," lists the distinguishing marks of the New Testament Churches as they were found in the Bible and in the days of the Apostles as these:

Absolute