Baptists Mark 400th Anniversary, Celebrate Religious Freedom on EthicsDaily.com
August 11, 2009
Posted: Thursday, August 6, 2009 6:19 am
Section: Religion News Service
UTRECHT, Netherlands (RNS/ENI) Four hundred years after the first Baptist congregation was established, followers have been challenged to continue championing religious liberty.
“We as Baptists must continue to defend religious freedom for all peoples and all religions,” said Denton Lotz, the former general secretary of the Baptist World Alliance, at a special service held last Thursday (July 30) in Amsterdam to mark the 400th anniversary of the Baptist movement.
The service was held in a Mennonite church in central Amsterdam, a short distance from the site of what is honored as the first Baptist congregation, founded in 1609 by exiles from Britain who had fled religious persecution in England.
“If we fail to take seriously the 21st century and merely continue to defend religious freedom as though we were living under King James I, then we will have become irrelevant and our defense of freedom irrelevant,” said Lotz, who served as the BWA’s top executive for 19 years until his retirement in 2007.
That first Baptist church was established in an Amsterdam bakery under the leadership of Thomas Helwys and John Smyth, a former Church of England cleric, who sought a self-governing church free from state control.
Happy birthday to us!
We have much in common with other Christians in general and then Protestants and Protestant Evangelicals in particular. The distinctive convictions that make me a Baptist are:
1. Soul freedom, otherwise known as "the priesthood of the believer," and also called "the competency of every believer before God." Churches and clergy can teach sound doctrine from the Bible, but they cannot dictate the conscience of a believer.
2. The necessity for each person to choose their faith, be converted, and be baptized only of their own accord as a testimony to their faith choice in Jesus Christ. Parents can influence their children, but cannot control their faith choices.
3. The local church is autonomous under Christ and determines its own doctrinal statements, affiliation, mission giving, ordination policies, clergy, and internal affairs.
4. The government cannot be controlled by any organized church and the church does not take orders from the government. Christians are called to live out their citizenship responsibilities and influence the moral climate of society as individual followers of Jesus. Religious liberty is a cardinal and vital Baptist conviction.
5. The mission of God is the mission of the church and a church that is not on mission is not a New Testament Church.
6. The Bible is the only creed or authority that is ultimately binding upon the church. Any doctrinal statements churches may affirm are descriptive in nature.
7. The standard by which the Bible is interpreted is Jesus Christ, the Word become flesh.
8. The is only one true sacrament and that is Christ's atoning death on the cross and whatever else we may call ordinances or sacraments are symbols of spiritual realities and high drama witnessing to Jesus' death and resurrection.
These are some of the reasons why I continue to choose to identify myself as a Baptist Evangelical Protestant Christian.