The first reason is that many Baptists love to stress that Baptists have long been advocates of Religious Freedom aka Liberty of Conscience.
Baptists have been at the forefront of it right from the beginning of the Baptists as we today understand them with Thomas Helwys and John Smyth. Before them some notion of Religious Toleration has been proposed in the English speaking world by some 16th Century Puritans like Robert Browne, but for them it was just about disagreements within Christianity (or even just within Protestantism), it was these first Baptists who were the first to argue for Religious Liberty for even Jews, Muslims and Atheists.
And this tradition continued with Leonard Busher followed by Richard Overton, the real ideological brain of the Levellers, and then Roger Williams and John Clarke who founded Rhode Island. Then Isaac Backus and John Leland during the era of the American Revolution.
My reason for arguing Universal Salvation should naturally go with belief in Liberty of Conscience is not quite what you’d probably first assume. The relationship between Religious Freedom and Evangelism should be the argument that conversions made under force or coercion simply will not be sincere.
I believe Jesus Christ should be viewed as the model for Human morality, not as a Sovereign who doesn’t hold Himself to the same rules as His subjects. So if it’s morally wrong for us to persecute, torture or kill people for holding the wrong beliefs, it’s an absurd contradiction to then say that is ultimately exactly what Jesus will do when He returns.
For the Scriptural Reasons Universal Salvation is true, start by checking out my Six Points of Universal Salvation, then read others posts with the Universal Salvation tag where I go more in depth.
Now my fellow Universal Salvation believers in Pedobaptist denominations may argue that since Salvation isn't only for a select few; why not just Baptize the babies automatically? Well as an Evangelical Universalist I still see a meaningful distinction between those who are in The Kingdom already and those who aren’t yet. Water Baptism is a ritual performed to symbolize choosing to become a full Citizen of The Kingdom.
But returning to why specifically Baptists should rethink any knee jerk rejection of Universal Salvation is the fact that Baptists who came to that conclusion appeared very early on. And were even important players in getting the ball rolling on modern Universalism entirely.
They start at least with the 17th Century Bell Alley General Baptist Church of Thomas Lambe, Henry Denne and Samuel Oats. And in her book The Reformation of The Heart: Gender and Radical Theology in The English Revolution starting on page 69 Sarah Apetrei highlights the women of that Congregation who were important voices of Universal Salvation like Elizabeth Attaway. They were an influence on Gerrard Winstanley and The Quakers.
The Everlasting Gospel by Georg Klein-Nicolai is a German book on Universal Salvation that seems to have its origin among the Schwarzenau Brethren also called the Dunkers and German Baptists.
The rise of Universal Salvation in the American Colonies in the late 18th Century that led to the foundation of the Universalist Church of America involved several Baptists and people of a Baptist Background. Elhanan Winchester would probably be the most orthodox to modern Baptists, but there’s also Adams Streeter and Hosea Ballou who also each had been Baptist Pastors, Caleb Rich who was born into a Baptist family, and Giles Chapman who married a German Baptist.
James Murray and his mentor James Relly never had actual ties to any Baptist Church, but they came to a view on the Sacraments basically the same as the Quakers and like Gerrard Winstanley and the early Quakers a Baptist perspective on the Pedobaptism vs Credobaptism debate plays a role in how they argue that.
The Universalist Church of America as a denomination never had a uniform policy on Baptism, but they were always consistently Congregationalist.
The main contemporary Baptists who believe in Universal Salvation are the Primitive Baptist Universalists, who are more theologically liberal then other Primitive Baptists on a number of things. I’m hoping writing this can help change that.
The Seventh Day Baptists are partly known for being one of the most allowing of divergent doctrinal views within its denomination. And I do agree that the Sabbath was never changed to Sunday, that’s a misunderstanding of two verses. So it does disappoint me that when I read the Statement of Faith on their official website the only belief of mine that is in potential conflict with any part of it is Universal Salvation.
I also see a logical relationship between Sabbatarianism and Universal Salvation. Believing that Sunday supplanted the Sabbath goes hand in hand with the mainstream Christian view that God permanently divorced Israel to take a new wife. I’m not a Dispensationalist or strictly speaking a Two House Theology advocate. Rather for me God’s determination to restore Israel no matter how far they fall is a specially emphasized part of His refusal to allow any to perish.
And going back to Sarah Apetrei's book, there is documentation of the wife of John Belcher an early Seventh Day Baptist as Pastor of a Church at Belle Lane in the 1660s believing in Universal Salvation.
I know a lot of Baptists are among the most strict KJV Onlists so I should also link to this old post of mine.
And for the Landmarkists who think the Novatians were ancient Baptists, there is evidence they believed in Universal Salvation. It was their critic Cyprian who popularized the idea that there is no Salvation outside The Church.
Novatus, or as he is often called, Novatian, an eminent presbyter of Rome, who contested the bishopric of the church there with Cornelius, advanced something like Universalism. He extolled in the highest, though in general terms, the unbounded goodness of God (De Regula Fidei, cap. ii., prope finem, edit. Jackson, Lond., 1728, pp. 23-25); and maintained that the wrath, indignation, and hatred of the Lord, so called, are not such passions in him as bear the same name in man; but that they are operations in the divine mind which are directed solely to our purification (De Regula Fidei, cap. iv.). In short, he asserted the peculiar principles of Universalism; but whether he pursued them out to their necessary result does not appear.
No comments:
Post a Comment