I Am Still

God said, “Be still, and know that I am God.”

Psalms 46:10 (KJV)

Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth.

Don’t be upset. I know what I am doing. I am simply playing with a word. Allow me to play and, perhaps, as you would watching a child at play, enjoy it.

God said, “Be still, and know that I am God.”

I am still.

Because I know Him to be God, I am still.

I am still a believer in Jesus Christ.

The years of worldly wisdom, exposure to disappointments, and even some disillusionments have not soured my faith in Christ. I came to trust Him as my Saviour at the age of 18. Since that day, I surrendered to preach the gospel, got married, raised my children. My wife and I have forty years of marriage. We’ve seen heartache and hurts. But Jesus has not failed us. I am still a believer in Jesus Christ.

I am still the same kind of Baptist I was when I was baptized.

I was baptized into the membership of an independent fundamental, Bible-believing Baptist Church. I am still a member of the same type of church to this very day. I went off to Bible College. I have served in four churches since then. I am still the same kind of Baptist I was when I was baptized.

I still have the same kind of personal separation.

I still listen to the same type of music. I still wear the same type of clothing. I still read and study a King James Version of the Bible.  I still believe in living soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world. And I still believe those things are defined as I was taught when I began my Christian walk. I still have the same kind of personal separation.

I still hold the same doctrinal Baptist distinctions.

The Lord exposed me to enough types of denominational doctrine that I knew all that was taught in the name of Jesus was not of the Lord. By the time I had found my way into an Independent Fundamental Baptist church, I had been exposed to the Presbyterian church, the Christian Church, the Southern Baptist denomination, the Jehovah’s Witnesses, and the Nazarene Church. I didn’t buy into the Baptist doctrine without some investigation, but when I did buy into it, I bought it lock, stock and barrel. I still hold to the preservation of Jesus’ Church through John the Baptist. I still hold that the only authority to baptize is in a Baptist Church. I still hold that the Lord’s Supper is for the local body alone. I still hold to Biblical authority, autonomy of the local church, priesthood of the believers, two ordinances: baptism and the Lord’s Supper, individual soul liberty, saved, baptized church membership, two offices: pastor and deacon and separation of church and state. I still hold the same doctrinal Baptist distinctions.

God said, “Be still, and know that I am God.”

I am still.

Because I know Him to be God, I am still.

Marvin McKenzie

In the fields

Liberty of Conscience

I guess we all prayed and perhaps expected that, by Fall, this COVID crisis would be a thing of the past. Not so, is it? Some of us are attempting to get on with our lives, but it has been challenging. It seems like the longer the thing stretches on, the more potential for division and disagreement. 

Now is a good time to practice grace! One of the strong doctrinal positions of Baptist churches in history has been that of “individual soul liberty.” It has applied primarily to the subject of worship. A person has a right to worship God according to the dictates of their own conscience. The doctrine leans heavily upon another Baptist distinctive, “separation of church and state.” Historically the Catholic, and then the Protestant churches, married with the state to force people to worship according to the dictates of the state-approved church. The doctrine has applications in this current climate. Every one of us must give every other one of us the liberty to find our own path through the fears this virus has stirred. 

Imagine living 500 years ago. Certain denominations were so sure they were right that they turned in people who disagreed or that didn’t comply. Those who were captured were tortured, sometimes to death, just because they owned a Bible, or refused to have their children baptized as babies, or baptized by immersion rather than sprinkling. England went through a period when the Catholics would gain the throne and kill all the Protestants, and then the Protestants would achieve it and try to kill all the Catholics. It was cruel, senseless, and heartless.

Please. Whatever your personal views of how to navigate this pandemic, let’s rise above pointing fingers at others. Let’s love one another, pray for one another, and give one another liberty of conscience.

Marvin McKenzie

In the fields

(Watch this video of the devastation California's dictates are having on just one of the churches in their state.) Dr Jack Trieber appeals for prayer.

 

The Tale of Two Kingdoms

Matthew 22:15-22

John 19:1-15

 

You will notice that the conflict in each of these texts is between two kingdoms.

 

Several years ago, I listened to a series of lectures on World History by an accomplished professor of history from Columbia University. He told of a student he once had who was from South Korea. This young man said that his goal was to become an accomplished historian and then write the first recognized history, from a pro-Korean bias.

The professor told the story to illustrate that history, all history, is an art.

History is true. But since no one living saw it happen, historians take the clues they find in written documentation, archeological digs and anthropological studies to paint their pictures of history. It is their perception of what happened, not actually what happened.

 

I had not been a Christian very long when I was invited to attend a prayer breakfast where the keynote speaker was a noted Christian anchorman from a Portland News Channel. He made a statement I never forgot but took decades to understand. He said that there is more proof that Jesus rose from the dead than that Alexander the Great ever lived. 

Wow.

Yet the majority of the world would not question the history of Alexander the Great but doubt the resurrection of Christ.

His statement is accurate because, comparatively speaking, there is very little reliable documentation of the life of Alexander the Great and thousands of pieces of documentation on the resurrection. We have written records of Jesus’ resurrection that date back to as close as 100 years after the fact. But all of the documentation concerning Alexander the Great rely on just a hand full of sources

Herodotus

Livy

Thucydides and

Tacitus

There are only a handful of their works surviving, they are all copies of copies hundreds of years after the originals, and even they were not eyewitnesses to the histories they wrote.

In one case the historian was a teacher in a school. Nearing his death, and not wishing his predecessor to have the library of his works, he willed them to family, who simply stored them in a basement. Centuries later someone discovered them and. Realizing their value, set out to publish them again. However, being stored in a negligent way for so long they were severely degraded. Rather than allowing them to remain as they were, this person “filled in the blanks” and unfortunately did not leave indications of what was original and what was his work. When historians study this work today they can only guess at what was the original author’s and what was added.

 

Some years ago, I heard a series of lectures of retired history professor from the University of Oklahoma, Rufus Fears. He said in one of his lectures that historians today debate the actual date of the Declaration of Independence, this despite the fact that both Thomas Jefferson and John Adams died on the 50^th anniversary of the 4^th of July, and acknowledged it as such. If historians can’t agree on something some near to us, and so well documented as that, I suggest that we ought to accept any written history as simply a work of art.

 

The point

Church history happened. But the histories you read are all just works of art the historian's perception of what actually happened. Most Baptist history extant was written by those who hated them. 

A few months ago I was speaking to a well known Baptist pastor about the Anabaptists. He asked me, “Wouldn’t we disagree with most of what the Anabaptists believed?”  My answer, “They were just men and therefore fallible. But I am confident that they were consistently faithful to

The preservation of the Scriptures

The preservation of the soul and

The preservation of the sanctuary

 

Outside of that, the thing that separated the Anabaptists from the rest, and what got them in trouble the most, was the doctrine of separation of church and state.

 

I. THE CATHOLIC CHURCH

Was a marriage of church and state. With the Roman state as the head.

Constantine declared that there was but one universal (catholic) church and he was the head of it.

 

II. WHEN ROME FELL

The Roman Catholic Church did not. The Roman Empire fragmented into the many European kingdoms. It was a marriage of church and state with the church as the head.

Consider the history and you will see that this marriage always resulted in the persecution of those who disagreed.

 

III. WHEN THE MARRIAGE OF CHURCH AND STATE BORE CHILDREN

In the form of the Protestant Churches, they naturally followed suit.

Luther married his church to Germany

Calvin married his church to Geneva

Zwingli married his church to Switzerland

The result in every case was the persecution of those who disagreed.

 

Luther was helped out of Catholicism by the Anabaptists in Germany. He would not unite with them because he believed their premise to be untenable. He did not believe people would 

Attend services

Observe the ordinances and

Support the ministry

If the government did not force them to do it.

 

When King Henry VIII defied the Pope, he called his new church, The Church of England. It was a marriage of church and state.

 

IV. THE PILGRIMS AND PURITANS

Came to the new continent to escape the persecution of the Church of England. But they each married their church with their new state. Early continental history is filled with the persecution of Baptists (and others) by the Pilgrims and the Puritans.

 

When the War for Independence was won, the greatest contribution of the Baptists was to press for no state-sponsored church.

 

Protestants are quick to point out that there is no separation of church and state in the Constitution. Jefferson used the term in a letter to a group of Baptist pastors from Danbury Connecticut.

 

Baptists were the catalyst for the first amendment.

 

The Baptist doctrine that counters universal church is the separation of church and state.

This election season the most Baptist thing we can do is to get on our knees and pray for revival. The answer for America is not the re-election of Donald Trump.[1]

The answer for Washington State is not the election of Loren Culp.[2]

 

The answer for America is revival. And I believe revival is the rebooting of the Baptist doctrine of separation of church and state, “We have no head but Christ.”

 

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[1] Although he is who I will vote for.

[2] That’s who I voted for.

Historic Baptist Churches of Northern Kentucky

My wife and I spent the better part of two days hunting down old Baptist churches. 

Think of it, one of these churches was established while George Washington was still alive. Another was established while Thomas Jefferson and John Adams were still living. 

These churches have different associations than we do, but they are still active and still call themselves Baptist.

Why Aren’t Our Churches Remaining Baptist Long Term?

I have spent a number of days running down old Baptist churches in the northern part of Kentucky. Think about it! One of these churches was established while George Washington was still alive. Another one, while John Adams and Thomas Jefferson were living. They are in different circles than I am, but they are still active, and they are still Baptist in name. Why aren’t more of the Independent Fundamental Baptist Churches remaining Baptist long term?

 

I am sure I don’t have all of the answers but here are some thoughts: 

Most of these churches are either Southern Baptist or Missionary Baptists. 

They might likely say that their longevity is attributed to their organizations. I would not agree with this because their organizations are moving toward being non-Baptist.

 

I would argue that many if not most independent Baptists are not, in fact, Baptists. 

I think they are more immersing old-fashioned Methodists. 

 

I think Independent Baptists have, for many decades, been more pragmatic and growth-oriented rather than doctrinal oriented. 

Almost anything goes in these days so long as we can claim souls being saved and churches growing. 

 

Doctrine is not preached as much as “help” messages. 

Too many preachers try to answer the questions people ask rather than informing people of the questions they should be asking.

 

Marvin McKenzie

In the fields

Perception vs Perspective

“Perception is what you interpret - it is your understanding of a given situation, person, or object. It is the meaning you assign to any given stimulus. Perspective is your point of view - it's the lens you see the world through and determines how you view yourself, others, and everything else around you.”[1]

I’ve been thinking a lot about perceptions d perspective lately. So many of our actions and attitudes derive from one or the other. Perception is most often the result of perspective. We interpret a thing the way we see the thing. 

Pastors today are forced to make decisions whether to open their services illegally, remain totally compliant to government mandates, or attempt some sort of combination. I find that the decisions they make have a great deal to do with perspective and that with perception. 

Recently I spoke with a pastor who says he’s had it with government orders and he’s opening his church to services. He explained to me that “we expect our missionaries to go to foreign fields and break the law for the sake of the gospel. Why should we do less?” Frankly, I didn’t respond. But I did begin to think. In my experience, from my perspective, the last thing anyone has ever expected of our missionaries is that they would break the law. From my perspective missionaries take great pains to obey the laws of the lands they seek to minister. They go to open countries. They get their support from the U.S. so as not to be a drain on the mission field’s economy. They often dress like the culture of the mission field. I have heard of a few missionaries who have been shady in the dealings with governments[2] but, from my perspective, those missionaries are always marginalized by the majority of missionaries. 

I spoke with a pastor just the other day about our Anabaptist forebears, as I consider what I know of them to aide me in my own decisions. His response was, “I don’t mean to be argumentative, but wouldn’t we dismiss the Anabaptists as not good Baptists?” From his perspective, complying with governments as the Protestants and most Baptists in the U.S. do has worked out well. Why would we want to consider the Anabaptist doctrine of separation of church and state? He would like to return to Pre-COVID19 practice because, in his perspective, it’s worked well. My perspective is slightly different. I tend to agree with old B.R. Lakin who, in the 1950’s I think said that churches in America could be successful doing what they are doing without God. Whether he actually said it, I am not sure. I’m taking the word of a preacher from his day. What I am sure of is that nothing in church has improved since then. 

My perspective gives me the perception that this would be a grand time for God to bring revival.

Marvin McKenzie

In the fields (praying)

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[1] A Google search yielded this from onboardonline.com.

[2] Bribing to grease the wheels they want turned.

Why Is Patrick of Ireland So Important?

March 17 is traditionally St Patrick’s Day. As a kid, this quasi-holiday was looked forward to and practiced. We all wanted to wear some green and we all wanted to spot the unsuspecting one who had not adorned in the emerald color so we could give them the playful (and sometimes not so playful) pinch. I suppose most of us knew it to be an Irish tradition but, so far as I knew, no one knew or cared for more information than that.

St Patty’s Day is more than an Irish tradition - it is a Catholic one. 

But then, as a young adult, I became a believer and, in my own pursuit of the church that Jesus built, I came to see that the Baptists are the only Christian people whose faith can be traced outside of Catholicism and back to Jesus Christ. I also learned that Patrick was in fact not a Catholic, nor a Protestant, but a Baptist (in practice - Baptist is not a denomination but a distinct kind of Christianity). 

Every March there appear a number of articles and other materials promoting that Patrick was a Baptist. I saw one article this year by Ken Ham’s organization[1]that promoted that Patrick at least wasn’t a Catholic. 

Someone might ask, “Why is it important?”

Patrick was born in Scotland (some say Wales, on the border of Scotland) in the 4th century. By his own testimony, his father was a deacon and his grandfather a pastor. This is a full 2 centuries before the Catholic Church undertook to evangelize the British Islands and 1200 years before the Protestant Reformation.

His grandfather’s ministry could have easily extended back to the 3rd century. This places Christianity in the British Isles very near to the time of the apostles and supports the claims of Welsh believers that their faith extends back to the apostolic age. 

The significance is this; Baptist’s don’t have to trace an “unbroken chain” through Europe to today. I am convinced that there were Baptists scattered throughout Europe - the Cathari, Paulicians, Waldensians and more. But we don’t have to connect them and find their existence in every place and every century. Patrick is but one evidence that Christianity (remember that Christianity in the U.S. came primarily from the British Isles) has existed in England from the time of the Apostles. 

The world is prone to attack Christianity by shoving in our faces the dark record of the Inquisition, the Crusades and the blotted record of the Lutherans, Zwinglians, and Calvinists. England had its own religious upheaval under the Catholics and Protestants as each vied for power in the monarchy. But there has, all along, been this band of believers in the British Isles who were never a part of Catholicism, never a part of Protestantism and never a part of this dark history of Christianity, so-called.

Patrick is important because he demonstrates that.

Marvin McKenzie

In the fields

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[1]Answers in Genesis

The Difference Between Influence and Power

I recently read a piece written by A.C. Dixon, entitled, “I Kept God From Working.”[1]It read, 

“While I was pastor of the Baptist Church in a university town of North Carolina, I was made to realize that as a preacher I was a dismal failure.

Parents from all over the state wrote and requested me to look after the spiritual welfare of their sons in the university. I prepared sermons with students in mind and was glad to see that they showed their appreciation by attending our Sunday services in great numbers. We also appointed a week of prayer and preaching, with the single purpose of winning them to Christ and they attended the evening meetings.

About the middle of the week, however, their interest seemed to turn into opposition. The spirit of mischief possessed them. One night they tried to put out the lights. As I walked through the grove of trees around the university buildings I sometimes heard an imitation of my voice coming from behind a tree. A bright student had caught a part of my sermon of the night before and he was giving it in thought and tone for the benefit of his fellow students who responded by applause and laughter. As I walked before an open window I heard my voice imitated in prayer floating out. I felt defeated and seriously considered resigning from the pastorate. No one had been saved.

After a restless night I took my Bible and went into a grove of trees and remained there until three o'clock in the afternoon. As I read I asked God to show me what was the matter. The Word of God searched me through and through, giving me a deep sense of sin and helplessness such as I had never had before.

That evening the students listened reverently and at the close of the service, two rows were filled with those who responded to the invitation. The revival continued day after day until more than seventy of the students confessed Christ.

What Did It?

The practical question is, "What did it?" Certainly not I. I fear it was I who kept God from doing it for a long time. Out of that day's experience of waiting on God, there came to me a clear-cut distinction between influence and power.

Influence is made up of many things: intellect, education, money, social position, organization--all of which ought to be used for Christ. Power is God Himself at work unhindered by our unbelief and other sins. The New Testament word power holds the secret. The power from on high was no other than the power of the Holy Ghost touching the soul through the living Word and giving it a birth from above. I had been trusting and testing many other good things, only to fail. The touch of God by His Holy Spirit did what my best efforts could not do.”

After sharing the story, a member of the church asked me to explain a bit more about the power of God. I used the word conviction. Bruce Turner, who was preaching for us at the time, interjected about the difference between being convinced and convicted. A conviction is something from God and cannot be altered. God never changes. Those things that come from Him could therefore never change. 

I am convicted, for instance, that the King James Version of the Bible is without error. 

• Academic proofs won’t change that. 
• More popular versions won’t change that. 
• Pressure from others won’t change that. 

I am also, for instance, convicted that the church Jesus built is a Baptist church. 

I could therefore never go to any other sort. It’s not about convenience, programs, proximity, popularity. It’s not about the personality of the pastor or the friendliness of the congregation. It is about doctrine and authority. I am so convicted of this that I could only attend a Baptist church that is equally convicted. 

My convictions come not from what a man has taught me. That would be mere convincing. My convictions come from personal study of the Word of God, an understanding of church history and the work of the Holy Spirit upon my conscience. 

A conviction comes from God and cannot change. I, however, am a man and can change. If I change from my convictions it is necessary that I rebel against them and will be in rebellion until I return to them. 

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[1]http://www.sermonindex.net/modules/articles/index.php?view=article&aid=28004

Trouble With Baptist History

When the Baptists in England first won the toleration of the government they quickly began to position themselves as mainstream Christians and gain more than toleration. They wanted respect and the approbation of their neighbors. 

Among their efforts to gain this new position were:

A strongly Calvinistic doctrinal statement.

It made them sound like not much more than immersing Presbyterians

A denial of any connection with Anabaptists, especially those of the continent.

English Baptists, along with most of the British Isles, had a distasteful view of the Anabaptists. It seems obvious to me that their view was because of the tainted representation they had received from the Catholics and more recently the continental

Protestants who had long experience with them. Theirs was almost a cultural disgust of the Anabaptists. They had refused to accept the authority of the baptisms of the Catholic and Protestant churches for centuries. That they had always existed was not contested. What was contested was whether they were a unifying factor within all of Christendom. Anabaptists had always been schismatic in their view, insisting on a different sort of church than mainstream Christianity had ever held. Anabaptists had also been noted for their insistence on a different sort of Christianity. They preached a converting kind of faith. They preached that those who were believers were to be born again and that this new birth would result in a growing sanctification and a life of purity. This tenacious distinction between the Anabaptists and the catholic church, whether the Roman version or the Protestant one, had given the world of Christendom a bad taste for the Anabaptists.

Today we still find that this bad taste exists. 

Oftentimes in the writings of those who still dislike them and their history, choosing to believe that they were never a genuine form of Christian faith, frequently by those who would like to know our Baptist roots but find that the Anabaptists were not just like we wished them to be. I find that many modern Baptists, even those who claim to trace their roots back through the Anabaptists have a limited view of who the Anabaptists were. A lot of the reason is because it is a lot of work to read primary and secondary sources to discover as much as is possible about them. Most of us only know what we have read in summary type works like that of Robert Sergeant, Phil Stringer and others like them. 

Books of this nature, while giving us a general outline of Baptist History, don’t allow us to tackle some of the more challenging problems with Anabaptist history. When we do delve into the works of those whose work provides some detail we come face to face with the hard to swallow truth that

One, we are not much like most of them

Two, they were broadly different among themselves

This is readily understandable:

• They had no common way to be trained
• They generally only had portions of the New Testament
• They believed strongly in soul liberty - the right and responsibility of each believer to study the Scriptures and worship God according to the dictates of his or her own conscience

Our true heritage from the ancient Anabaptists is not really a set of doctrinal distinctives, although those distinctives , in a general way exist; what we inherited from our Anabaptist forefathers is

• A conviction that Christ alone saves through faith alone
• A conviction that the Bible is true, without error and profitable in every Word
• A conviction that the gates of hell have not prevailed against the Church Jesus built and
• A conviction that each human being must be given the liberty to know the Scriptures and stand before God as he or she believes the Bible tells them to.

Marvin McKenzie
In the Fields

Baptist History Debunked?

James White has done it again.

Dr. White likes to speak about being gracious and charitable but he only means to Catholics, Mormons and Muslims. To fellow Christians, and especially to fellow Baptists, he can be mean spirited, harsh and sometimes even hateful.

In a recent Dividing Line[1] program entitled “Dogmatic Secularism Rises; the Politics of the Southern Baptist Convention”[2] at about minute 39, White takes off on a message by Dr. Paige Patterson given at a college Chapel service. Patterson was addressing the issue of Calvinism within the Southern Baptist Convention and remarks that it belongs in Presbyterian churches, not Baptist. In his statements, Patterson links Baptists to Anabaptists, the Apostles and John the Baptist. It was at this point that White mockingly says, “You ain’t been reading the Trail of Blood again have you?”[3] From there he says there are many books that debunk the Anabaptist connection to modern Baptists.

Yes, Dr. White, and there are many that affirm it too.

Here’s the thing, on almost any given subject a person can find material to either support or deny any given position. Which material we tend to gravitate to depends largely upon one’s leaning. White confesses his own training was in schools where he was the “token Fundamentalist.” It is obvious that before he finished his education there was very little of Fundamentalism left. The influences in his life, together with his desire to be seen as an academic, has pulled him toward those positions that are the most widely accepted among his chosen group of peers, the Reformed.

Nothing concerning the Anabaptist lineage has been debunked. Writers, who lean toward Protestantism, reference books that keep church history in the Catholic line. Writers who see the error of Catholicism (and thus, Protestantism) reference works (generally much older ones) that maintain the gates of hell never prevailed against God’s churches as they did in Catholicism and then Protestantism.

Marvin McKenzie

In the fields

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[1] A part of his Alpha and Omega Ministries, http://www.aomin.org/

[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mBghEEHPHBM

[3] At about 46 minutes