FIRST LIGHT

A NEWSLETTER OF FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH
110 SYDENHAM STREET KINGSTON , ON K7L 3H5

(613) 548-7116
fbckgstn@kingston.net
September 2005

Let me say at the outset how delighted I am to have Josh Mutter on board as our Next Generation Pastor. Josh’s responsibilities are varied. He is planning to be involved in Kids’ Club, Young Peoples’, and College age ministries. He plays base guitar and will be involved in the worship team on Sunday night as well as speaking at our contemporary service known as Taste & See. He will also participate in the Sunday morning services. This is a very broad job description. But with a church of our size we need someone with diverse skills and interests. I believe the Lord has provided a very special person for us.

I am currently reading from B. R. White’s The English Baptists of the Seventeenth Century. (London: The Baptist Historical Society, 1983). B. R. White was principal of Regent’s Park College, Oxford University at the time of this publication. White gives us some insights into what Baptists are. He writes of early Baptists:

Basically, it was assumed that the Bible was not only the final authority on earth for matters such as Christology and the atonement but also that it provided the final and authoritative teaching for all necessary matters concerned with the true nature and constitution of the Church. On this assumption a number of others were built: it was assumed that in the apostolic age the Church was organized and constituted according to one pattern only and that the New Testament provided enough evidence of that pattern to enable those who came after to reconstruct it. But this was not merely an academic matter: with it there went the assumption that the one pattern could be and must be reconstituted by any later generation of Christians even in a situation of total apostasy. The one pattern, as the Anabaptists had believed in the age of the Reformation and as the English Separatists were to believe during the age of Elizabeth I, demanded that the church comprise not everyone in the parish but a committed, convinced and converted group of believing men and women. When they saw this truth the group had the right and duty to form themselves into a church under the guidance of the Risen Christ. . .

This concern for the reconstitution of the apostolic model explains why, in so many Baptist documents, the argument was not considered complete without Scripture references. In all their arguments, debates, struggles, they were trying to discover what was the will of God and then to bring their practice, whether about baptism, church membership, the laying on of hands, the payment of tithes, the ministry, their duty to the state or anything else into conformity with that will.

So, while they were prepared to allow that they had not yet perfectly seen, nor perfectly obeyed every detail of the divine pattern they naturally required that their critics should give clear and adequate evidence from Scripture for their position before expecting the Baptists to move from the ground they already occupied. A certain humility because of their sense that the Lord had yet more light and truth to break forth out of his written Word is embodied in a classic form in the 1646 edition of the London Particular Baptist Confession:

Also we confess that we now know but in part and that we are ignorant of many things which we desire and seek to know: and if any shall do us that friendly part to show us from the Word of God that we see not, we shall have cause to be thankful to God and to them. (White, p10-12).

The Baptists of the seventeenth century sought to be knowledgeable about the Scriptures. Obviously, they believed that the New Testament was the guide for a true church of Jesus Christ. By the same token, they felt that the church should not be conformed to society but take its cues from Scripture. How about you today?

FOR THOSE WHO LIKE TO READ

I have had the privilege of reading a number of books over the summer. For those who enjoy history, I recommend E. Glenn Hinson The Early Church: Origins to the Dawn of the Middle Ages (Nashville: Abingdon Press: 1996). Hinson taught for decades at Southern Baptist Seminary in Louisville before leaving there about 15 years ago. At the time of writing, he was Professor of Spirituality and John Loftis Professor of Church History at Baptist Theological Seminary, Richmond, Virginia. Now he is teaching at the new Baptist Seminary in Lexington, Kentucky. Hinson would be an ecumenical theological moderate who would no longer be at home in the Southern Baptist Convention as it is today. One troubling point about this book is that there is no index. Especially for a historical book, that is essential. Secondly, there are a couple of puzzling Scriptural interpretations. But aside from those two issues this is a wonderful book which will help you to reflect on how the church developed.

A second book I would recommend is entitled Holiness by John Webster. It was published in 2003 by William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company of Grand Rapids, Michigan and is based on lectures he gave here in North America in various places. Webster taught Tim Vickery of St. James Anglican Church when both were at Wycliffe College in Toronto. Tim speaks very highly of him. From there he became the Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity at the University of Oxford. More recently, he has moved away from the heavy demands of administration at Oxford to teach systematic theology at Aberdeen University in Scotland, one of the great old universities there. He is a prolific writer. (Holiness is not a book written for Keswick. Instead, what he is successfully attempting to do is to write a Trinitarian dogmatics of holiness. I appreciated the novel approach he has taken.)

A third book for people to consider is Marva J. Dawn’s Is It a Lost Cause: Having the Heart of God for the Church’s Children? ( Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans’ Publishing Company, 1997. Dawn is a prolific Lutheran theological writer and hymnist. She completed her Ph.D. in theology at Notre Dame. The back cover of the book addresses her concern:

How can we help the church’s children not to make the same choices as the children of the dominant culture around them concerning their sexuality, their use of money and time, their attitudes toward work and life? Is it still possible in our post-Christian, post-modern society to raise children with Christian faith and moral character? In this sensitive and astute work, Marva Dawn insists that forming genuinely Christian children is not a lost cause if congregations, pastors, and parents wake up to the present crisis of a society at odds with the gospel and to the crucial need for deliberate formative efforts and intensive discipleship in both home and Church.

FOR THOSE WHO LIKE TO LISTEN

Two local Christian stations are available among the many excellent radio stations locally. At 94.7 FM is the Mars Hill Network which is an American broadcaster with minimal Canadian content. There are a number of Christian radio preachers as well as traditional Christian music.

However, I find myself listening more to UCB 102.3 FM, a Canadian Christian broadcaster coming from Belleville with a more contemporary flavour of music. If you like Southern Gospel, it is featured on Saturday night. Again there are a number of Christian radio preachers on there.

COMING EVENTS

Seniors mark down September 30 th for the Corny Event out at Jack Friendship’s cottage. It starts at 11am and involves a corn boil.

One of our partners in mission, Tim Bannister, will be speaking at both the morning and evening services on Sunday, October 16 th while Pastor Kevin will be away speaking at the 100 th anniversary of one of his former churches, Boon Avenue Baptist Church.

The Rev Dr Mark Parent, a former pastor at First Baptist Church, Kingston will be speaking at our 165 th anniversary service on Sunday morning at 10 am. The previous evening, Saturday, October 29 th, there will be a church supper along with an address by Dr Parent. Mark is currently an MLA in the Nova Scotia legislature and does occasional preaching there.

It is not too late to get involved in Fire and Reign, a look at Acts 1-7. Josh is speaking on this theme on most Sunday nights. During the week, we will reflect on the video series and discuss issues that come up in a group.