Beeson Podcast, Episode 353
Nathan Finn
August 15, 2017

Announcer:	Welcome to the Beeson Podcast coming to you from Beeson Divinity School on the campus of Samford University in Birmingham, Alabama. Now your host, Timothy George.

Timothy George:	Welcome to today's Beeson Podcast. This is the year of the Reformation, everybody is celebrating, commemorating, thinking about, investigating the Reformation, what it was, what it means. We're going to hear a lecture today on that subject but with a little different twist, this is a lecture called the Baptist Contribution to the Reformation, and it's presented by Dr. Nathan Finn. He is the Dean of the school of Theology and Missions and professor of Christian Thought and Tradition at Union University in Jackson, Tennessee. Earlier this year, Union hosted a Reformation conference and this particular lecture was given in the Chapel at Union University as a part of their Reformation 500 Festival. Let's listen to Dr. Nathan Finn, the Baptist Contribution to the Reformation. 

Nathan Finn:	My title is reforming the Reformation, the Baptist Mark of the Church, and this is my main argument. There is a long tradition of interpreting the Baptist movement as a Reformation of the Reformation, and a key component of this further Reformation is the Baptist distinctive of a regenerate church membership. 
	As I make this argument, I'm going to hit on three key things, after all it is a preachy lecture so it is a three point lecture, Reforming the Reformation to the Baptist Mark of the Church and then recovering a believers church. So our first thing this morning is reforming the Reformation.
	Now, truth be told, Baptists have always struggled a little bit with what exactly to do with the Reformation. Some of you might be surprised by that admission, others not so much. Some Baptists think that Baptist-ish movements have continued in perpetuity from the time of the New Testament and that these groups weren't really influenced by the Reformation, therefore, modern Baptists shouldn't be considered Protestants, for these folks, the best Baptists, understand that Baptist Christianity is the faith of the New Testament. 150 years ago this view was an unquestioned orthodoxy at Union University. 
	Others think our tradition is informed by the Reformation, but mostly through its radical wing, especially the Anabaptist movements that rejected state churches and infant baptism. For these folks, the best Baptists are sort of like Mennonites who are in the market for capitalism and have made peace with waging war. Still, others argue our tradition isn't just reformational, it's Reformed, and that Baptists are part of the wider Calvinist tradition that emphasizes God's absolute sovereignty and human salvation. For these folks, the best Baptists are sort of like Presbyterians who happen to dump teenagers instead of sprinkling babies.
	Now, I think there is plenty of room on the Baptist playground for all three of these positions, so long as they play nicely together and nobody tries to be a bully. But I confess that none of them really reflects my own understanding of Baptists in the Reformation.
	In the mid-20th century the Swiss theologian, Karl Barth, popularized the Latin phrase, ecclesia semper reformanda est, which could be translated as the church must always be reformed. Now, I'm not much of a Barthian, you can relax President Oliver, but I think Bart's motto captures the best of how the Baptist tradition has seen itself in relation to the Reformation. 
	Listen to James Leo Garett, the Dean of Southern Baptist theologians, "Despite modern denials by certain Baptists that Baptists aren't Protestants, the matrix of the Baptist movement has been powerfully shaped by the Protestant Reformation, and some have even claimed that the Baptists are the truly thoroughgoing reformers." Or, this from the late Bill Hall, a long time Baptist professor and administrator, "While deeply indebted to the Protestant principle, Baptist identity was even more radical for it represented an effort to reform the Reformation. The movement arose, not in protest against the corrupt Catholicism, but in protest against an incomplete Protestantism." Or, this one from David Bebbington, a Scottish Baptist layman and one of the leading evangelical historians in the world today, "Baptists were the people who took Reformation principles to their ultimate conclusion." 
	The most famous voice to make this argument was John Quincy Adams. No, not that John Quincy Adams, the Baptist preacher who was named for that John Quincy Adams. In 1854, Adams wrote a treatise titled Baptists, the only Thorough Religious Reformers, this is one of those books where the title says it all. 
	For my part, I would say it this way, the earliest Baptists were third-generation Protestants who attempted to reform the Reformation in at least two ways, first, by consistently applying the Protestant principle of [inaudible 00:06:21] Scriptures, Scripture alone, to matters of local church order and, second by expanding the traditional Protestant principle of solus Christos, Christ alone, to mean not only the sufficiency of Christ's saving work but also his definitive Lordship over every aspect of every local church. These reforms meant that Baptists rejected traditions that had become uniform by the time of the late medieval era, including an intentionally mixed membership comprised of believers and unbelievers, infant baptism, clerical authority over the laity and what we might call an overly cozy relationship between church and state. The goal was to re-capture as much of New Testament life as possible, which the magisterial reformers had neglected, or some had even rejected, while also owning unashamedly the insights of those same magisterial reformers when it came to the five solas of the Reformation, Scripture alone, grace alone, faith alone, Christ alone, for the glory of God alone.
	For our purposes, this morning I'm going to limit myself to only one aspect of biblical church life recovered by the earliest Baptists, and that is the principle of a regenerate or a born-again church membership. The second thing this morning, the Baptist Mark of the Church.
	In the earliest centuries of Christian history, after the time of the New Testament, theologians emphasized four marks of the church, they confessed the church to be one holy Catholic and apostolic. Most of the reformers affirmed these marks as they applied to the church universal and I think that there's still very valuable indicators of what CS Lewis famously called mere Christianity. Unfortunately, in the high Middle Ages, these four marks increasingly became synonymous in Western and Northern Europe with Roman Catholicism and at first that completely excluded the Christian [inaudible 00:08:49]. Then by the 1500s, the Reformation was dividing Western Catholicism as well, so the discussion shifted to the marks of the church more in the local or regional sense of the term. 
	The Lutherans emphasized that the church is present wherever the gospel is rightly preached and the sacraments are rightly observed. Timothy George, who spoke just a few moments ago, calls this the center of Reformation of ecclesiology. The reformed and Anabaptist agreed with those two marks but over time added to them the right exercise of church discipline as an additional mark of the church. Dr. George calls this the circumference of Reformation ecclesiology. By the time the Baptists came along, the marks of the church language had been expounded in treatises, codified in confessions and debated endlessly by post-Reformation theologians.
	For the Baptists, the principle of regenerate church membership functioned as an essential mark of the church, and one that closely intersected in their view with those other three marks of the church. In fact, theologian John Hammett goes so far as to call regenerate church membership, the Baptist mark of the church. This is the language I used in the title of this lecture.
	Now, to expand on this idea, the earliest Baptists argued the local churches formal membership should be comprised only of those who claim personal faith in Christ, has confessed to that faith publicly through the right of believers baptism and who have covenanted to walk together with other members of that church for the sake of worship and witness. This principle is sometimes also called the believers church since the church is intended to be comprised of believers alone.
	Now, it's a thoroughly reformation of principle, since it bases church membership on evidence that one has experienced justification by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone. The first London confession was written in 1644, it's the earliest trans-congregational confession of faith adopted by a group of Baptist churches. This is how that confession defined a local church, a company of visible Saints called and separated from the world by the word and the spirit of God to the visible profession of the faith of the gospel being baptized into the faith and joined to the Lord and each other by mutual agreement and the practical enjoyment of the ordinances commanded by Christ, their head and King. 
	Now, the Baptists weren't the only group to affirm this approach to membership, it was found earlier among the Continental Anabaptists and later among the English separatists from whom the Baptists began separating themselves around 1609, but the Baptist were different than both of these groups in some important ways. Baptists were more consistently Protestant in their view of salvation and less radical in their critique of culture than the Anabaptists had been and they rejected the infant baptismal practice and, in some cases the consistent Calvinism of the English separatists. In short, Baptists were a new movement that sounded sort of like the magisterial reformers when it came to salvation and sort of like the radical reformers whenever it came to the local church. However, Baptist didn't sound identical to either and their motivation was always conformity to their understanding of Scripture rather than can conformity to these or any other existing church movements.
	Numerous biblical texts informed the Baptist commitment to regenerate church membership. In the interest of time, I'll only highlight a few. See, the Bible, I told you it was a preachy lecture. In the Old Testament, the idea of regenerate community is anticipated in the new covenant prophecies. For example, Jeremiah 31, 31 through 34, "Look, the days are coming, this is the Lord's declaration. When I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, this one will not be like the covenant I made with their ancestors on the day I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke even though I am their master," the Lord's declaration, "instead, this is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after those days. I will put my teaching within them and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people. No longer will one teaches his neighbor or his brother, saying 'no, the Lord,' for they will all know me from the least of the greatest of them. This is the Lord's declaration, for I will forgive their iniquity and never again remember their sin." 
	Or, Ezekiel chapter 26, versus 26 and 27, "I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you. I will remove your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. I will place my spirit within you and cause you to follow my statutes and carefully observe my ordinances." God promised a new covenant that would include a new heart for all those in the community of faith, each of whom will know the Lord and be empowered by the indwelling Holy Spirit to obey God's commands.
	In the New Testament, belief and regeneration are tied closely together, and John three is probably the most famous passage that discusses this. In John chapter three, verse three, "Jesus said to Nicodemus, 'Truly I tell you unless someone is born again and cannot see the kingdom of God'", and when Nicodemus asked how someone can be born a second time, Jesus spoke of how the Holy Spirit mysteriously brings new life, culminating in these familiar words from John 3, 14 through 16, "Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness so the Son of Man must be lifted up so that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life. For God loved the world in this way, he gave his one and only son so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life." To be born again means to have saving faith in Jesus Christ, the result of which is eternal life experienced in the fullness of God's kingdom.
	Moving to the book of acts, the consistent pattern is being born again, baptized as a disciple and then belonging to a visible church. I intentionally obliterated that because it's a preachy lecture. For example, in act's chapter two, Peter concluded his Pentecost sermon with a call to repent and be baptized, and according to acts 241, those who accepted his message were baptized, and that day about 3,000 people were added to them. You know what happened next? These new believers, these born-again followers of Jesus Christ began to gather together for worship, instruction, fellowship and witness. 
	Listen to verses 42 through 47 of acts chapter two, "They devoted themselves to the apostles teaching, to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe and many wonders and signs were being performed through the apostles." Now, all the believers were together and held all things in common, they sold their possessions and property and distributed the proceeds to all, as any had need, every day they devoted themselves to meeting together in the temple and broke bread from house to house, they ate their food with joyful and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people and every day the Lord added to their number those who were being saved. 
	The New Testament epistles were mostly written to individual churches or sometimes to the churches in a particular region and all of them assumed a regenerate membership as normative. This was true even of the messiest church in the New Testament, Corinth community church. In Corinthians one, two, Paul writes to the church at Corinth, "To the Church of God at Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus called as Saints with all those in every place who call on the name of Jesus Christ our Lord both their Lord and ours." Paul says the church is those who are sanctified in Christ and called Saints as is true of all people who call on the name of Jesus Christ for their salvation. The New Testament churches weren't intended to be mixed assemblies of believers and unbelievers, though sometimes unbelievers faked it for a time as indicated even in the Scriptures, rather New Testament churches were meant to be communities of disciples who had been born again and were walking together through this life and into the next life. Since the beginning of the Baptist movement, we have argued that this New Testament understanding of church membership should be our understanding as well. 
	That brings me to the third thing this morning, recovering a believers church. Now, I know we have many denominations represented in the audience, but if you'll forgive me, I want to speak especially to my fellow Baptists in the room. Now, the rest of you are invited to eavesdrop, perhaps you'll hear something that you can apply to your particular context, but I want to talk to the Baptists especially, maybe even especially more so than just the Baptists, some of our Baptist minister friends who are in the room. The principle of regenerate church membership, though still strongly professed, is not as consistently practiced as it once was in Baptist life. We need to recover the believers church. 
	Historically, Baptist churches have employed two practices that aid us in our pursuit of creating churches that are regenerate communities of disciples. The first is the adoption of local church covenants. Until about a century ago, to join a Baptist church meant to voluntarily embrace that church's covenant as a general guide for life and godliness, individually, each member covenanted with a wider body, and corporately the whole body covenanted with Christ as their Lord. Church covenants help to combat on the front end what Dietrich Bonhoeffer once characterized as cheap grace. This is what Bonhoeffer says cheap grace is, "The preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, communion without confession, cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ." Cheap grace.
	While covenants were neglected among Baptists for most of the 20th century, becoming little more than wall art in the fellowship hall's in little country churches spread throughout Baptists, there has been renewed emphasis on covenantal church membership over the last couple of decades. In my own church, the first Baptist Church of Jackson, part of the new member interview process includes affirmation of our church's covenant, which was adopted when the church was originally constituted in 1837, though we are prayerfully considering right now updating some of that original language from the mid-19th century. This renewed attention to church covenants bodes well for the health of local Baptist churches. Church covenants are a valuable tool in recovering regenerate church membership. 
	The second historic practice closely tied the church covenants and, I daresay, more controversial than church covenants, is redemptive church discipline. Church discipline safeguards regenerate church membership by protecting sound doctrine, promoting godly living and pronouncing judgment on cheap grace and its toxic effects. Think about it this way, covenants help to guard the front door of church membership while church discipline stands watch over the back door of the church.
	Now, church discipline is clearly taught in New Testament passages such as Matthew 18, 15 through 20, first Corinthians chapter 5, verses 1 through 13, Galatians chapter 6 verse one, among others, but even though it is something that is self-evidently biblical, the practice has fallen on hard times among many Baptists and, dare I say many other Protestants as well. In part this is because we live in a hyper individualistic culture where we assume our business is our business and it ain't nobody else's business. We also live in a hyper litigious culture. Frankly, many churches are scared of lawsuits if they practice church discipline. Even many relatively healthy churches are skittish about discipline, no doubt in part because they've seen it or heard of it being practiced in un-biblical, sometimes even vindictive ways. Nothing makes people more scared about church discipline than hearing about the church down the road that booted out a whole family for listening to Led Zeppelin or whatever the case might be. It's important to remember that church discipline is never meant to be punitive, but redemptive. 
	When practiced according to biblical procedures and undertaken in the right spirit, discipline is intended to bring about one of two results. Sometimes it brings about conviction and repentance in the life of the offender, whether that means drawling a true believer back to Christ or awakening a false believer to his or her need for the gospel. This is always the outcome that we hope and pray for when we practice church discipline, and I think it happens the vast majority of the time at least just in the case of my experience. But, unfortunately sometimes church discipline helps to expose potentially unregenerate individuals who ignore loving correction from the Scriptures and refuse to repent of sin in their lives. In these cases, we are commanded by Scripture, let me say that again, we are commanded by Scripture to remove the offender from the church's membership according to biblical procedures. Withdrawing membership from unrepentant sinners protects the purity of the congregation and it safeguards the integrity of the church's witness before a watching world. It also clearly communicates to the disciplined individual his or her need to repent and seek reconciliation with Christ and the church. The hope is always to see repentance, not to see the person hardened in their sin and incorrigible. The goal is repentance. 
	About a decade ago, my previous church in North Carolina removed an individual from membership for the first time in a couple of generations. It had been over 50 years since that church had practiced church discipline. She had engaged in a lifestyle of high-handed sin, everyone knew about it, it was scandalous, she was unrepentant when lovingly confronted and eventually she announced she probably didn't want to be a Christian anyway. With saddened hearts and not a few tears, our congregation voted to exclude her from membership and prayed that night that she would repent and return to Christ and his church. One year later to the month, she stood before another meeting of our membership and did exactly that, she publicly repented and we joyfully received her back into our church's membership. The last I know of her, she continues to follow Jesus Christ as our Lord. Repentance is always the outcome we pray for when we practice church discipline, whether it happens early in the process when one or two confront the brother or sister who's fallen into sin or whether it happens long after someone has been excluded from membership, but unfortunately sometimes repentance doesn't happen. I've seen that, too, where it's at least not happened yet. We must resolve to obey Christ's commands and shown neighbor love to unrepentant, hardened sinners by refusing to treat them like everything is awesome when there is significant evidence that all is not well with their soul.
	As with church covenants, I'm heartened that church discipline has begun to be revived in recent years at the 2008 annual meeting of the Southern Baptist Convention, we adopted a resolution titled on regenerate church membership and church member restoration. The resolution urges all Baptist churches to practice redemptive church discipline according to biblical procedures for the spiritual good of those disciplined and for the cultivation of a regenerate church membership. My prayer is that in a generation should Jesus [inaudible 00:29:06] his return will look back on the early years of the 21st century as the era when Southern Baptists recommitted themselves to understanding local churches as communities of disciples who walk together for the sake of worship, witness and service. Local church covenants and redemptive church disciplines are two key practices that will help us in our ongoing recovery of that vision of the believer's church. 
	I am deeply, deeply grateful for the Reformation and its legacy. The Bible alone is our supreme authority for faith and practice, and our hope is built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness, but I'm also grateful that my Baptists fore bearers were willing to reform the Reformation by applying those principles to the life of the church, especially our understanding of church membership. By God's grace, those of us who were Baptists should recommit ourselves to the New Testament principle of regenerate church membership and commend it to our brothers and sisters in other Protestant traditions, though always with open Bibles, soft hearts, a winsome spirit and callous knees. May God grant it by his grace and for his glory.
	Let me close this in prayer. Our heavenly father, we thank you that you are the God of all creation, we thank you that your son is our Lord, the Lord of the church, the Lord of every church. We pray father that you would help us to remember that church is one holy Catholic and apostolic. We pray that you would help us to remember that regional, local, contextual gatherings of that church are marked out by the right preaching of the gospel, the right celebration of the sacraments and the right practice of discipline. Lord, my prayer is that you would help all of us to take seriously the biblical admonition to regenerate church membership. But Lord, what we pray for most of all is that you would grant us healthier churches of every tribe and size and shape and type and location so that we might proclaim to others the good news of Jesus Christ, make them disciples and teach them to observe all things and walk together here, there and everywhere for the sake of your kingdom, which is now and which is coming, world without end. In Jesus name, Amen.

Timothy George:	If you'd like to hear other presentations given at the Reformation 500 Festival at Union University, then visit their website uu.edu. You can find a lot of great information and new resources about the Reformation and its meaning in the life of the church today.

Announcer:	You've been listening to the Beeson Podcast with host, Timothy George. You can subscribe to the Beeson Podcast at our website beesondivinity.com. Beeson Divinity School is an interdenominational, evangelical divinity school training men and women in the service of Jesus Christ. We pray that this podcast will aid in and encourage your work and we hope you will listen to each upcoming edition of the Beeson Podcast.