Sorry but no time to read and write now maybe after sunday
On the road Jeff
----- Original Message -----
From: "Aberdeen Wesleyan Church" <abwesleyan@...>
To: "Pastors Forum" <pastorsforum@...>
Subject: [PastorsForum] Article by Jack Hyles
Date: Sat, 22 Oct 2005 16:37:25 -0500 (Central Standard Time)
>
> Hey Gang,
> I was just doing some surfing and came across this article. I've been
> reading through it and don't have time to respond as of yet, though I hope
> to after the weekend.
> I would love to hear other responses, both from those in "group three" (you
> ll have to read the article to find out who I mean :)) and those not in that
> group.
> I am not posting this as a commentary on anything - I simply found it and
> would like to hear responses. I will say this, however. I may disagree
> with some of his positions, but at least in this case, his tone is more
> gracious than many I've seen with his views (present company excepted!).
> Have fun, brothers!
> Brian
>
>
> Where We Are in Fundamentalism
> by Pastor Jack Hyles
>
> The Catholic church had what we call a Reformation. The Reformation was when
> the Protestants (as we call them now) pulled out of Catholicism. The
> Reformation was not a spiritual revival. We have the mistaken idea that when
> Martin Luther pulled out of Catholicism there followed a great spiritual
> awakening and revival. Nothing could be further from the truth. In that day
> the church was associated with the state. Luther and Calvin were both trying
> to start another state church. Martin Luther did not believe in the
> separation of church and state. Neither did John Calvin.
> Consider some facts about the Reformation.
> 1. The Reformation was not a spiritual revival.
> 2. It was not a return to the New Testament church. Basically, it was a
> hatred for Catholicism. It was not started by
> a desire to return to something, but by a desire to leave Catholicism. In
> that day there were other groups besides the reformers. For example, Zwingli
> s position was not the same as Calvin's, and Calvin's was not the same as
> Luther's. In fact, for part of their lives they were bitter enemies and
> never became close friends. They did have a common hatred for the Catholic
> church and wanted to start another state church.
> 3. There was a third group of people in those days called the Anabaptists,
> which means rebaptizers. The Justinian Code from which we get most of the
> framework of our laws had a death penalty for rebaptizing people. That was
> the law of the state because the state and the church were one. The
> Anabaptists were hated by everybody. Zwingli hated them. So did Martin
> Luther and John Calvin. They agreed even with the Catholics in their hatred
> for the Anabaptists. Luther, Calvin and Zwingli all either consented to, or
> encouraged the death and martyrdom of Anabaptists.
> There were three groups of Anabaptists. I will not go into much detail
> except to list and describe them briefly.
> 1. One group of Anabaptists believed in building a local church according to
> the Word of God. The Anabaptists never believed in an invisible, universal
> church. They always believed in the local church. In fact, that is the one
> major thing that separated them, because Luther believed in the invisible
> church as did Calvin, Zwingli, and the Catholics. This group was like our
> Baptists are today. They believed the Word of God was the final authority,
> and built their churches accordingly.
> 2. The second group was called the Pietists. They got their "word" from
> within, in a message from Heaven, or 'a word of knowledge," if you please.
> 3. The third group of Anabaptists was so militant that they wanted to take
> over the government and force everybody to be Anabaptists.
> In every generation we have the same basic alignment of Christian people. I
> want to show you the alignment of Christian people in our day. Why do
> fundamentalists not get along? Why do we not agree on so many things? There
> are different kinds of fundamentalists. The word fundamental means a group
> that returns to the original purpose. practice and doctrine of an
> institution. I am going to take fundamentalism as we know it in America and
> show you why it is divided.
> There are three basic fundamental groups in America. There is an American
> Baptist fundamentalism which came from the American Baptist Convention.
> There is a Protestant fundamentalism which came from the Protestant churches
> or denominations. It could also be called Reformation fundamentalism. Then,
> there is a Southern Baptist fundamentalism of churches which came from the
> Southern Baptist Convention. These are the three groups that form the body
> of what we call fundamentalism today.
> These have basic disagreements which have caused an invisible fence to come
> between them. That invisible fence is becoming more visible all the time.
> Let me show you what I mean.
> I. American Baptist Fundamentalists
> American Baptist fundamentalism comes from the old American Baptist
> denomination which was the original Baptist denomination in America. It was
> originally called the Northern Baptist Convention. There are two basic
> groups of people in American Baptist fundamentalism. First, there is the
> General Association of Regular Baptists, or GARB. They split off of the
> American Baptist Convention and formed a group. Then, the Conservative
> Baptist Association split off of the American Baptist Convention and formed
> another group. Dr. Bob Ketchum was probably the most famous man in the GARB.
> Dr. Myron Cedarholm was probably the best known man in the Conservative
> Baptist Association. Both of these groups are splits from the Northern
> Baptist, or American Baptist Convention. Let me tell you more about these
> groups.
> 1. They were first basically a northern movement.
> You will seldom find a GARB church in the south, and you will seldom find a
> Conservative Baptist church in the south. Basically, these are northern
> groups.
> 2. They pulled out mainly over doctrines. They did not leave many of the
> practices of the American Baptist Convention. They did not change the church
> government of the American Baptist Convention.
> 3. They are also more formal than the Southern Baptist fundamentalists, or
> those who came from the Southern Baptist Convention.
> 4. They are more highly organized than the other fundamentalist groups.
> II. Protestant Fundamentalism
> Protestant fundamentalism is probably the most impressive of all
> fundamentalism. These are the inter-denominational fundamentalists. They are
> Bible churches, or IFCA (Independent Fundamental Churches of America). They
> are not Baptist churches. They are Bible churches or have names like Church
> of the Open Door, Central Church, Fellowship Church or something similar to
> that. These are not bad people. They are good Christian people. They believe
> the Bible, but they came from the Protestant group, so they are Protestant
> fundamentalists. That is why they usually believe in the invisible church.
> That is also why they are not called Baptists. Let me tell you more about
> these Protestant fundamentalists.
> 1. They look like Protestants, in the same way that Protestants look like
> Catholics. If you go to a Lutheran church next Sunday, you will have a hard
> time discerning whether it is Catholic or Lutheran. They are Protestant. If
> you go to an Episcopalian church, you will have a hard time discerning
> whether it is Catholic or Episcopalian. I am not being critical. I am being
> factual. Lutheran preachers wear robes because they came out of Catholicism,
> but did not change everything. Why does a Presbyterian sprinkle babies? When
> they came out of Catholicism, that was not an issue. So they still in some
> ways look like the mother.
> 2. They came from Reformation people.
> 3. From them we get the doctrine of the invisible church.
> 4. Basically, they are the result of the union revivals that were so popular
> many years ago in America. Many churches would go together for a revival
> campaign. From these revivals came people who were genuinely born again, but
> did not know anything about Baptist churches, Baptist polity, Baptist
> programs, or Baptist doctrine. These people started Bible churches, or
> inter-denominational churches. They are good fundamental people. They
> include men like H. A. Ironside, R. A. Torrey, Dwight L. Moody, and Bob
> Jones. D. L. Moody was not a Baptist. He was a Congregationalist. Although
> he was a great preacher, he never belonged to the New Testament church.
> H. A. Ironside did not pastor a New Testament Baptist church. He pastored a
> church that came from Protestantism. These men deserve our admiration. They
> did not know anything else. They wanted something that was not Presbyterian,
> Reformed, Methodist, Episcopalian, or Lutheran. They wanted something that
> believed the Bible, so they came from their Protestant denominations and
> started inter-denominationalism. They had a second Reformation.
> 5. This was largely a northern movement. They are a little more in the south
> than the GARB or the Conservative Baptists, but basically it was a northern
> movement.
> 6. It was also more formal. Individuals who came out of the Presbyterian
> church to start independent churches would obviously be more formal than
> those who came out of Baptist churches to start other Baptist churches.
> 7. These are good people, but they did not build New Testament churches. New
> Testament churches must have pastors and deacons. They must believe in New
> Testament doctrine. Billy Sunday did not belong to the New Testament church
> because he belonged to a church that came from Protestantism. Billy Sunday
> was a Protestant. The same fundamental people who supported Billy Sunday's
> meetings went back to their formal services on Sunday mornings. New
> Testament churches did not come from Catholicism. They came from Jesus when
> He started the New Testament church Himself.
> I am not criticizing these people, but they did not build New Testament
> churches. They promoted the invisible church doctrine in addition to the
> local church doctrine. The only group of people in the history of
> Christianity that has promoted the local church doctrine has been Baptists.
> III. Southern Baptist Fundamentalism
> These are the groups that came out the Southern Baptist Convention. There
> are some great leaders of Southern Baptist fundamentalism. I am talking
> about men like J. Frank Norris, who started what is now the Baptist Bible
> Fellowship; Dr. Lee Roberson, who was basically responsible for the
> Southwide Baptist Fellowship; and Dr. G. B. Vick, who became famous by
> perpetuating the ministry that Dr. Norris started.
> 1. This is where the action has been in fundamentalism. These people are a
> part of the big circle of fundamentalism, but we have some basic
> disagreements. There have been some invisible fences between us that are now
> rising up and becoming more visible. We did not build those fences. They
> started saying that we are shallow and too evangelistic. They started
> accusing us of promoting easy-believism. We have no choice but to say that
> they are wrong They criticize us because of our excitement and our
> informality. The action in fundamentalism in this generation has come from
> Southern Baptist fundamentalists, that is, those who left the Southern
> Baptist Convention and those they have influenced.
> 2. The main issue of difference is on the matter of separation. The GARB and
> the American Baptists divided basically over doctrine. When Dr. J. Frank
> Norris pulled out of the Southern Baptist Convention, most Southern Baptist
> preachers believed that the Bible was the Word of God. The Bible was not
> issue in those days. It was an ecclesiastical issue, a type of worship issue
> and a separation issue. They pulled out over mixed bathing being wrong.
> They pulled out over social drinking being wrong. They pulled out over
> teaching evolution. They pulled out over matters of separation, and matters
> of type worship.
> Consequently, the hottest group in America over the last forty years
> consists of those that pulled out of the Southern Baptist Convention.
> That forms the entire circumference of what we call fundamentalism. If you
> wonder why fundamentalists do not get along, it is because we are not all
> the same type of fundamentalists. When some American Baptist fundamentalists
> visit First Baptist Church in Hammond, they may think that we are too wild.
> That is because they still have some American Baptist left in them. They
> think we should have committees to run everything in the church. They are
> fundamentalists in the sense that they became fed up with what they were in,
> but, they did not come out totally. They rebelled only against the things
> that irritated them.
> * Pastors' School Fundamentalists *
> Today, there is another group of fundamentalists quietly becoming the
> largest group in the nation. I call this group the Pastors' School
> fundamentalists. Without anybody planning or organizing a thing, God raised
> up the Pastors' School at the First Baptist Church of Hammond. Its annual
> meeting is larger than the Baptist Bible Fellowship annual convention. The
> Southwide Baptist Fellowship does not have as many preachers as Pastors'
> School has every year. Preachers from all over this country who want to do
> something for God have come to a Pastors' School and have had their lives
> and ministries transformed.
> In addition to that, the First Baptist Church Youth Conference draws the
> largest group of fundamental young people of any youth conference in the
> nation. Other of these groups have copied and have not attracted a fraction
> of the young people. Without any effort to organize, God has raised up this
> movement.
> Let me make several observations.
> 1. Groups one and two are very much alike. The American Baptist
> Fundamentalists and the Protestant Fundamentalists are very similar to each
> other.
> 2. Group two provides most of the schools. Consider the schools which came
> from group one. Cedarville, Maranatha, and Pillsbury are schools that came
> from the group that came from the American Baptists. Now, consider the
> schools that came from the Protest ant fundamentalists such as Wheaton,
> Moody, Pensacola, and Bob Jones University. That is the group that has been
> educating our Baptist preachers. I have nothing against a plumber, a cabinet
> maker, a lawyer, an accountant, or a doctor being trained by those schools,
> but I think a Baptist preacher ought to go to a Baptist school. That is why
> so many Baptist preachers do not know Baptist doctrines. Group three has
> allowed group two to train their preachers, and group two has trained them
> to believe in the invisible church. Group three is not the same as it used
> to be because we have gone to group two to get our training for our
> preachers.
> I have some very dear friends in groups one and two. I am not criticizing
> them. I am merely giving you the history of the fundamentalist movement.
> Consider the schools in group three. Baptist Bible College was probably the
> best when it started. When Tennessee Temple came along, it was probably the
> best. Today, Hyles-Anderson College is known to be the best school for
> training Baptist preachers. I thank God for the new Baptist colleges which
> are coming on the scene. Dr. Bob Gray has one in Longview, Texas. Dr. Jim
> Vineyard has one in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. I am glad for these other
> Baptist colleges because I believe that group three must train its own.
> 3. Another thing that has hurt group three is that group two has basically
> provided all of the literature. When you provide somebody literature, you
> have a tremendous influence on them. The AWANA Clubs are an example of this.
> These were good clubs which came from group two. They ought to be used in
> group two churches, but we have put them in our group three churches. The
> AWANAS came from churches that were very formal and less evangelistic.
> Most of the Christian school books come from Pensacola and Bob Jones. They
> are good books. There is nothing wrong with them. I am just simply showing
> you that the Protestant fundamentalists have provided most of the literature
> for the Southern Baptist fundamentalists, yet the Southern Baptist
> fundamentalists are the ones that have been red-hot. Why is that the case?
> Because the guy that is red hot does not want to take time to write a
> commentary. Most of the literature being used in the group three churches is
> being provided by the people in group two. We simply are not providing our
> own.
> 4. There has always been an unseen wail that we have not allowed to divide
> us. Those of us in group three have not said much about the more formal
> services of group one and group two. But, in recent days, groups one and two
> have begun attacking group three. As a result, those of us in group three
> are going to need to defend those things which we believe to be important.
> We must defend altar calls. We must defend the old-time religion, because
> groups one and two are basically going back to their origin of formal
> worship services. In order to preserve what we have had through these years
> those of us in group three are going to have to stand for what we have had.
> They are shooting at us, and we have no recourse but to defend our position.
>
> What about the new evangelicals? They are the soft part of each of the three
> groups. They are compromising part of all three groups. The GARB has
> deteriorated some. The deteriorated crowd are new evangelicals. The CBA has
> deteriorated some. The deteriorated portion are the new evangelicals. The
> Southern Baptists fundamentalists have deteriorated some, and they have some
> new evangelicals.
> When a church in group three calls a pastor from group one, there is a
> catastrophe ahead. As long as we stay apart, we can get along. I happen to
> think that we are as smart as they are. We have become such a melting pot
> that the average church does not realize that there is a difference. There
> are some good men in group one, but let them be good in their own group.
> They are in their element. There are some good men in group two, but they
> will teach our people that the local church is one church and the invisible
> church is another. They also will have their formal worship services. I am
> not against group two, but let them stay in group two. Let us continue to be
> group three.
> I am not going to spend my life fighting groups one and two because I admire
> them in some ways. I will keep admiring them as long as they do not try to
> influence group three, because group three is the hope of the nation.
>
>
> What say ye all?
>
> Brian
>
>
> Pastor Brian La Croix
> Aberdeen Wesleyan Church
> 1701 8th Ave NE
> Aberdeen, SD 57401
> (605) 225-2873
> abwesleyan@...
> www.aberdeenwesleyan.org
>
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> "In essential things, unity; in non-essential things, liberty; and
> in all things, charity."
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