Baptists: From Confusion to Conviction

2 Timothy 1:12 (KJV)

For the which cause I also suffer these things: nevertheless I am not ashamed: for I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day.

We have all of these different denominations of churches around us and for some people that is just about as confusing as they can take.

How can God be in a system where there are:

·   Baptists

·   Catholics

·   Presbyterians

·   Lutherans and

·   Methodists

And that is to say nothing of the

·   Pentecostals

·   Charismatics

·   Calvary Chapels

Let alone the

·   Mormons

·   Jehovah’s Witness and

·   Seventh Day Adventists

·   Some of these churches believe you will go to heaven if you are a member of their church

·   Some of them believe baptism is what does it

·   Some of them think you have to be good enough and

·   Some of them think you are good enough

It seems like a mess!

But that is nothing.

Let’s just focus on Baptists for a little bit. 

Within a 20 mile radius of where we sit right now there are something between 50-100 different Baptist churches.

It would be one thing if we were all the same and there were just that many to make it easy to get to them or to keep them small enough that you could have a sense of belonging.

That’s not the case at all.

Some of those so-called Baptist churches are so far from preaching what we believe the Bible preaches that we would not call them churches at all.

·   Some of them are more like Presbyterians than Baptists[1]

·   Some of them are more like Pentecostals than Baptists[2]

·   Some of them are more like Lutherans than Baptists[3]

Just in the United States there are[a]

1.  Alliance of Baptists

2.  American Baptist Association

3.  American Baptist Churches

4.  Association of Reformed Baptist Churches of America

5.  Association of Welcoming and Affirming Baptists

6.  Baptist Bible Fellowship International

7.  Baptist General Conference

8.  Baptist Missionary Association of America

9.  Central Baptist Association

10.               Christian Unity Baptist Association

11.               Conservative Baptist Association of America

12.               Continental Baptist Churches

13.               Cooperative Baptist Fellowship

14.               Enterprise Association of Regular Baptists

15.               Free Will Baptist

16.               Full Gospel Baptist Church Fellowship

17.               Fundamental Baptist Fellowship Association

18.               Fundamental Baptist Fellowship of America

19.               General Association of Baptists

20.               General Association of General Baptists

21.               General Association of Regular Baptist Churches

22.               General Conference of the Evangelical Baptist Church, Inc.

23.               General Six-Principle Baptists

24.               Independent Baptist Church of America

25.               Independent Baptist Fellowship International

26.               Independent Baptist Fellowship of North America

27.               Indian Bottom Association of Old Regular Baptists

28.               Institutional Missionary Baptist Conference of America

29.               Interstate & Foreign Landmark Missionary Baptist Association

30.               Landmark Baptists

31.               Liberty Baptist Fellowship

32.               Macedonia Baptist World Missions

33.               Mainstream Baptist Network

34.               National Association of Free Will Baptists

35.               National Baptist Convention of America, Inc.

36.               National Baptist Convention, USA, Inc.

37.               National Baptist Evangelical Life and Soul Saving Assembly of the U.S.A.

38.               National Missionary Baptist Convention of America

39.               National Primitive Baptist Convention of the U.S.A.

40.               North American Baptist Conference

41.               Old Regular Baptist

42.               Old Time Missionary Baptist

43.               Original Free Will Baptist Convention

44.               Primitive Baptist Universalists

45.               Primitive Baptists

46.               Progressive National Baptist Convention

47.               Reformed Baptist

48.               Regular Baptist

49.               Roger Williams Fellowship

50.               Separate Baptist

51.               Separate Baptists in Christ

52.               Seventh Day Baptist General Conference

53.               Southern Baptist Convention

54.               Southwide Baptist Fellowship

55.               Sovereign Grace Baptists

56.               Two-Seed-in-the-Spirit Predestinarian Baptists

57.               United American Free Will Baptist Church

58.               United American Free Will Baptist Conference

59.               United Baptists

60.               Unregistered Baptist Fellowship

61.               World Baptist Fellowship

The point I am trying to make is that it can be confusing and I believe the confusion leads to a perpetual state of indifference; 

“Since I can’t tell which one of these churches is true, I will accept that none of them are.”

I want to see if I can’t wade through some of that and maybe come out on the other side with some real conviction.

Biblically, and I think historically there are three doctrines that hold up a true church.

I. THE PRESERVATION OF THE SOUL

2 Timothy 1:12 (KJV)

For the which cause I also suffer these things: nevertheless I am not ashamed: for I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day.

The Apostle Paul claimed with assurance, “…I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded….”

Those are words of conviction.

·   I know

·   I am persuaded

There was no hoping or guessing going on.

Speaking about his own soul and it’s eternal destiny Paul said, “…for I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him…”

Paul spoke word of such assurance in

·   Philippians

·   Ephesians and

·   1 and 2 Thessalonians

to name just a few.

Both Peter[4] and John[5] also spoke of assurance of salvation.

I want you to notice where Paul says his assurance of eternal life rests, 2 Timothy 1:12 (KJV)

“…for I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day.”

His assurance rests:

·   Not in his church

·   Not in his good deeds

· Not in his baptism, catechism or communion

His assurance rests in this one thing; he is persuaded that Jesus Christ is able to keep that which he has committed unto Him.

He had trusted his soul’s safe keeping to Jesus Christ and he was convinced that Jesus was able to perform His salvation to the very end.

Isn’t that exactly what Jesus Christ told his disciples?

John 10:27-29 (KJV)

My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: 

And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. 

My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father's hand. 

Through more than two thousand years of church history, and all of the different kinds of church denominations that have sprung up, there have always been, here and there, often tucked away in some mountain pocket or meeting in a secret sanctuary in the forest, congregations of believers who, with the conviction of Apostle Paul would say, 2 Timothy 1:12 (KJV)

“…for I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day.”

A second leg these churches rested upon is

II. THE PRESERVATION OF THE SCRIPTURES

Psalms 12:6-7[6] (KJV)

The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times.

Thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever.

Among those who claim some sort of Christendom you will discover a number of ideas about the Bible and its role in the Christian faith:

A. There are those[7] who relegate the Bible to a secondary tier of importance.

The Catholics, for example, place church dogma over the Bible.

The teaching of the magisterium supersedes the Bible unless some portion of the Bible has been given an officially dogmatic interpretation.

In most passages of the Bible the Roman Catholic Church has refused to officially teach what they believe the Bible teaches just in case some time in the future they want to change what they believe the Bible teaches.

Liberal and Modernistic Churches[8] prefer philosophy to the Bible.

In some cases they will still refer to the Bible, but they reference it as a book filled with symbols and no solid truth.

B. There are those who believe God has preserved the Bible purely enough that we can be confident in it.

This group – by far the greater number of evangelistic and even fundamental churches – deny that there is such a thing as any Bible that is perfect.

They just insist that there is enough evidence, to demonstrate that the Bible, usually in all of the difference versions, are accurate enough to get the gist of what God wanted us to know.

They often say things like the Bible is perfect and infallible “in the originals” but they fail to tell you that no originals exist.

C. There are a hand full of us that believe God did exactly what He said He would do in Psalms 12:6-7

We believe that God has preserved for us the Word of God, without error perfect, profitable and in the plain language of the English language.

We believe he has done that in the King James Version of the Bible.

If such a version of the Bible exists today, it has to be in the King James Version:

Since only the King James Version is based upon that body of old manuscripts called the Majority Text and

Since every other version has built upon the presupposition that it has errors and therefore must give way, in time, to improvement.[9]

The third leg these churches rested upon is

III. THE PRESERVATION OF THE SANCTUARY

Matthew 16:13-18 (KJV)

When Jesus came into the coasts of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, saying, Whom do men say that I the Son of man am? 

And they said, Some say that thou art John the Baptist: some, Elias; and others, Jeremias, or one of the prophets.

He saith unto them, But whom say ye that I am? 

And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.

And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven. 

And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. 

Throughout the history of Christianity, there have been those churches that were never a part of the Catholic Church, and never had to protest away from her.

·   The preservation of the soul

·   The preservation of the Scriptures and

·   The preservation of the Sanctuary

That makes for a lot of room for differences among those ancient churches:

·   Sometimes in the Swiss Alps

·   Sometimes in the French Piedmont

·   Sometimes in the German Valleys

·   Sometimes in the Russian Steppes

These believers were as diverse as the locations in which they could be found.

Frankly, with the exceptions of the three legs, you and I would have a difficult time finding much of anything similar to what we believe and practice today.

Those three legs and one other.

Every stool has a seat. Nobody sits on the legs of a stool, we all sit on the seat.

The one doctrine that defines a church as Baptist is

IV. INDIVIDUAL SOUL LIBERTY

Acts 23:1 (KJV)

And Paul, earnestly beholding the council, said, Men and brethren, I have lived in all good conscience before God until this day.

Individual soul liberty is the right of every man woman and child to worship God according to the dictates of his or her own conscience.

It is the conviction that.... 
Romans 14:7-8 (KJV)

…none of us liveth to himself, and no man dieth to himself.

For whether we live, we live unto the Lord; and whether we die, we die unto the Lord: whether we live therefore, or die, we are the Lord's.

And that because of this we ought to..... 
Romans 14:5 (KJV)

… Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind.

This is only reasonable.

It is appointed unto man once to die. We all know it. When I die: 

·   I will not stand before my parents and give an account

· I will not stand before a church denomination and give an account

· I will not stand before any king, president or council and give an account

I will stand before God and give an account.

I therefore must be free to live in all good conscience before God.

Baptists have been hunted down and killed for this one truth for nearly 1700 years.

It was this one truth they lobbied for before Jefferson, Madison and others of the founders of the United States.

It is this truth they alone passed down to the world.

They even contended that a person had a right not to believe at all, if they so chose.

With this one caveat: 

No man ought to face eternity blindly.

The Baptists have always held to the responsibility of preaching with passion, boldness and persistence so that, if a soul goes to eternal hell, it isn’t because no one tried to rescue them.

Marvin McKenzie

In the fields

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[1] Calvinists

[2] Contemporary music

[3] Liberal and formalistic

[4] 1 Peter 1:4-5 (KJV)

To an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you,

Who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.

[5] 1 John 5:13 (KJV)

These things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God; that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God.

[6] Though this passage is often attacked by those who deny the preservation of the Word of God, this passage, taken with the scores of other Bible assurances of its preservation, must be maintained as a clear promise that God has preserved His Bible without error.

[7] Like the Catholics and many in the modernistic Lutheran, Presbyterian and American Baptist Churches.

[8] Many of the Lutheran, Presbyterian and American Baptist Churches.

[9] I know the translators of the King James Version did not claim infallibility. But theirs was unique to what we see in the translations that followed. They attempted to translate perfectly. Modern translators work from the presumption that no such perfection is possible. They merely re-work what they have already worked, often so they can re-sell what they have already sold.

[a] I pulled this from Wikipedia.

My Election 2016 Thoughts

The 2016 elections are now just around the corner. It has been my position that I would not take a definitive position, especially concerning the presidential election, until the final hour. I wanted to get as much information as possible and I wanted to give God all of the time there is to move and work. But, as one preacher friend, reminded me just this week, "The ballots are already printed." 

This election has polarized many of my preacher brethren. There are some who imply that a vote for either of the party choices is tantamount to unchristian conduct. Others tell us a vote for anyone other than Trump is a vote for Clinton. I want to give my reasons for voting as I am.

I am going to vote for Trump for the following reasons: 

1. I voted my conscience in the primaries and did not win. 

2. A write in candidate is useless in Washington as the vote will be disqualified unless the name written in is a legally registered presidential candidate. 

3. I have enough issues with all of the “also running” candidates that none of them would be a more conscientious vote for me. 

4. That leaves me with only two choices and I am not voting for Clinton. 

5. To not vote at all would be irresponsible. 

6. A good friend, who has been fervently advocating voting our conscience and not voting for Trump, has repeatedly said he hopes Trump wins. To want him to win and to not vote for him to win is, in my view, hypocritical. 

THEREFORE; I will vote for the most viable candidate who most closely represents my own position.

Marvin McKenzie

In the fields

A Baptist Can Be A Baptist Without Agreeing with Another Baptist

Through the years of my study of church history and especially Baptist history, I have come to identify three doctrines that I see as the three legs that hold up a scriptural church

The preservation of the soul

Salvation is a work of Jesus Christ, which is impossible to lose.

The preservation of the scriptures

The Word of God is infallible and eternal. It has not mistakes and there is in existence a Bible that contains no mistakes. The only version of the Bible that could possibly qualify is the King James Version.

The preservation of the sanctuary

The church that Christ builds and the gates of hell have not prevailed against is neither Protestant nor Catholic. It has to be Anabaptist[1]/Baptist as only they have a claim to a history outside of Catholicism.

That said there are plenty of Baptist people who would disagree with me. That’s all right. If there any is truth that is evident in Baptist history it is that Baptists have not always agreed. Generally I think that has been because of the limitations they had in available portions of the Bible and of opportunity to fellowship with other Baptists for the continuity of faith. Mostly I believe it is because the chief tenant of Baptist faith is the responsibility of each individual to worship God according to the dictates of his or her own conscience.

I liken this to the seat of that three-legged stool. We cannot, must not, force our own conviction upon another. We have an obligation to present our understanding of the Bible to others but they have the obligation and right to search out the matter and come to their own convictions. This essentially leads to differing ideas.

Someone will object, “How can that be if the Holy Spirit of God is guiding and teaching each of us?” The answer is found, I believe, in Isaiah 28:9-13 (KJV)

Whom shall he teach knowledge? and whom shall he make to understand doctrine? them that are weaned from the milk, and drawn from the breasts.

For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little:

For with stammering lips and another tongue will he speak to this people.

To whom he said, This is the rest wherewith ye may cause the weary to rest; and this is the refreshing: yet they would not hear.

But the word of the LORD was unto them precept upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little; that they might go, and fall backward, and be broken, and snared, and taken.

God teaches knowledge to a people with stammering lips and who see through a glass darkly[2].

• ·       Line upon line
• ·       Precept upon precept,
• ·       Here a little and there a little

We learn slowly, gradually and imperfectly. Therefore God teaches us patiently. God isn’t teaching us differently but He is teaching us at our own level. It is a gracious act on the part of God but it means that none of us have either complete or perfect understanding. We are going to have to be gracious and patient with others who haven’t come to see things just as we have. Likely one of the two of us, or both of us, will come to change how we see things as God gives us a little more here and there.

Does this mean that we should ignore differences and even become indifferent and dispassionate about them? Not at all. It is through the:

• ·       Passionate study,
• ·       Preaching,
• ·       Discussion,
• ·       Point and counter point of conversation (even intense debate)

that we polish and perfect those truths we hold so dear.

1 Corinthians 11:19 (KJV)

For there must be also heresies among you, that they which are approved may be made manifest among you.

Heresies motivate passionate study and perfecting of doctrine.

Should believers, who are in passionate disagreement, be forced to unite in the same church body as if there were no differences. I say, “No.”

Amos 3:3 (KJV)

Can two walk together, except they be agreed?

Here is, I think, the genius and the beauty of the independent, local Baptist church. We organize together with members of like faith and practice. We recognize that not every believer sees things exactly the same as we do, and we don’t fault them for it[3] but we do not ignore it and act as if these differences do not exist. In some cases we may choose to have no fellowship with them at all but even then we do not count them as an enemy but as a brother with whom we differ.

2 Thessalonians 3:14-15 (KJV)

And if any man obey not our word by this epistle, note that man, and have no company with him, that he may be ashamed.

Yet count him not as an enemy, but admonish him as a brother.

Perhaps the greatest act of kindness I can do for a brother in the Lord is agree that, because we do not agree, we belong in a different kind of church - even a different kind of independent Baptist church.

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[1] I place groups such as Mennonites, Amish, and Quakers as well as Baptists in this group.

[2] 1 Corinthians 13:12 (KJV)

For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.

[3] Though we might aggressively preach and teach in opposition to what they believe.

Don't Go There!

Isaiah 31:1-3 (KJV)

Woe to them that go down to Egypt for help; and stay on horses, and trust in chariots, because they are many; and in horsemen, because they are very strong; but they look not unto the Holy One of Israel, neither seek the LORD!

Yet he also is wise, and will bring evil, and will not call back his words: but will arise against the house of the evildoers, and against the help of them that work iniquity.

Now the Egyptians are men, and not God; and their horses flesh, and not spirit. When the LORD shall stretch out his hand, both he that helpeth shall fall, and he that is holpen shall fall down, and they all shall fail together.

Nobody in Israel thought Egypt was perfect. Their own history with Egypt attested to that. They knew only too well Egypt's fierce anger.

But at this moment in their history Egypt looked like their best option. On the other side stood Assyria and after her, Babylon. If Egypt was worldliness, Babylon was the devil. They were prone to lean more toward worldliness that Satan.

God said that they should have leaned upon Him.

I find in this a picture of the current state of believers in America. This election appears to be between "the devil" and "the world." 

On the one side we have a candidate who is opposed to almost everything we hold sacred. I have heard that she flatly pronounced that "Christians are just going to have to change."

On the other side we have a man who appears to hold a few more of our more valued principles. He is uplifted by some as the only candidate strong enough to possibly defeat our archenemy. But he is brash, proud, outlandish and unabashedly self promoting.

He is not our preference but many believe he is our only hope.

Not so!

Our only hope is the Lord.

He has always been our only hope.

Woe to them who go down to worldliness for help!

Now, I am not of the opinion that good men cannot vote for the man. Jeremiah objected at first, (I voted my conscience in objection to the current candidate in the primaries) but went down to Egypt and did not compromise in doing so. I, however, do believe that we must be warned not to trust in this man.

Our hope must be in seeking the Lord.

Different Streams of Baptist are Different Kinds of Baptists

I style myself as one of those Baptists with a capital “B” Baptists. Typically what we mean by that is that we hold Baptist baptism as the only form of scriptural baptism since we believe that baptism must be under the authority of a scriptural church and neither any of the Protestants nor the Catholic Church qualify, and that the Lord’s Supper is a memorial to be observed by the members of a particular local church.

Sometimes those of us, who think of ourselves as capital “B” Baptists, think that we are the only Baptists who have any historical claim to the title. I don’t see it as being that simple. It is relatively popular right now to identify four historical “ideas” for the existence of Baptists:

That Baptist churches have existed and reproduced themselves since the first century.

Those who hold to this idea of Baptist origin identify with the Anabaptists.

That the doctrines of modern Baptists are traceable through the centuries and back to Christ.

Those in this camp deny that churches have established churches for these two thousand years, but that various Bible students through the centuries independently came to hold doctrines similar to modern Baptists.

That modern Baptist churches spring from Protestant churches that were influenced by the Anabaptists. 

In this way Baptists claim some link to historical churches but disassociate with some of what they consider to be the less desirable aspects of Anabaptist history.

That Baptists are merely one of the many sub-church groups that protested away from the Protestant Church of England.

This group denies any connection with the Anabaptists and see the Baptist denomination as a brand new church founded by John Smith and his contemporaries.

I am of the first bunch. I see the Baptist church origins as being outside of Protestantism and outside of Catholicism running parallel in time to them all the way back to John the Baptist. I see two possible means to link Baptist churches all the way back to Christ:

First, through the Anabaptists of mainland Europe. There is no question that these believers existed and that they were a growing, vital Christian community all the while Catholicism and later Protestantism existed. They were heavily persecuted by the Catholics and Protestants so most of what we know about them we know from the things their detractors wrote about them, but we do know they existed. We would not agree with everything every Anabaptist held to and we admit that they held to varied positions. But that their basic doctrinal premises were that of Baptists, is not difficult to argue.

Second, through the ancient churches of the British Isles. It is similarly uncomplicated to demonstrate that a Christian presence has existed in the British Isles long before the Catholics arrived there. Many of these churches compromised with Roman Catholicism over the centuries, but some did not. Believers in Wales especially claim a Christian heritage that is more ancient than Catholicism. I contend that Baptists have a right to claim that heritage as our own.

The point I want to make in this writing is that those who hold to these differing ideas of Baptist origins are more than Baptists with differing views; we are different kinds of Baptists. We may identify within the same camps, but we are not the same. Most would agree that Southern Baptists and American Baptists are not the same and that Independent Baptists are not the same as either of them. None of us would want to be thought of as the same as, say, Westboro Baptist. I mean to say that these differences run more personally than this and that we very frequently ignore them. These differing ideas of Baptist origins exist among churches that identify themselves, as I do, as Independent, Fundamental Baptist.

And here we have made a huge mistake, especially in the last fifty to seventy-five years. We have assumed that anyone who was an Independent, Fundamental Baptist was in the same camp as we. Oh, sure, we understood that there were minor differences, mostly we attributed those to personalities, but we viewed all Independent Baptists as “one of us.” The fact is, that is not the case.

• ·       I remember back in the 80’s hearing the head of one Independent Baptist missions agency claim to be the first Independent Baptist back into Ethiopia[1], ignoring that there had been a missionary associated with the Baptist Bible Fellowship there for previous to him.
• ·      I heard an Independent Baptist preacher claim to be the only Gospel preaching Baptist church in his town, but I knew for a fact that there was a church in fellowship with the Baptist Bible Fellowship in the same town[2].

The differences between the various “camps” of Independent Baptists is real. It is more than one of simple personalities. It is a difference

• ·       of philosophy,
• ·       of doctrine,
• ·       of ethics and
• ·       of heritage[3]

It is, in fact, a difference of “kind.” Mixing the “kinds” has been a mistake. It has left the members of Baptist churches confused and doctrinally compromised because of it. The leaders, the guys who wish to assemble a multitude of pastors as their followers[4] would like us to ignore the differences, in fact they wish we would stop having our distinctives and just follow them. But the differences are real. I contend that they are vital and important to preserve. 

Now, I am not suggesting that these others are not Baptists or that they have to agree with my view of heritage, origin and doctrine to be capital “B” Baptists. History will bear out that Baptists, if they are anything, are varied. What I am suggesting is that we become upfront with the differences and that we unite as Baptists with Baptists who are doctrinally, historically and ethically the same as we are and not merely with those who seem to be the most successful and camp under the very broad flag of Independent, Fundamental Baptist. The differences are important.

• ·       They are important to the health of local Baptist churches
• ·       They are important to the vitality of individual believers and
• ·       They are important to the preservation of “faith which was once delivered”  

Marvin McKenzie

In the fields

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[1] Or was it Kenya? I don't remember.

[2] Though I am not aware of any specific instances, I am sure that there were BBF preachers who ignored the presence of the others too.

[3] Unless we wish to claim that heritage only goes back to the 1940’s-1950’s.

[4] And thus have the influence over their congregations.

I Am A Baptist, I Must Be Responsible

I am a Baptist.

I do not belong to any religious denomination.

I have no historical ties to any protestant system of doctrine

I am a Baptist

The historical make-ip of my forefathers is varied. It traces all the way back to John the Baptist, outside of Protestantism and outside of Catholicism. My predecessors have been prosecuted, maligned, mistreated and in many cases exterminated.

I am a Baptist

Though history clearly demonstrates the existence of Baptist believers through the centuries to the first century, their opponents have succeeded in destroying most of the historical documentation and other materials those Baptist believers produced. We are forced to extrapolate what we know about those Baptist believers from the accounts of those who hated them, persecuted them and would have eradicated the world of them.

I am a Baptist

I hold no illusion that the forebears of my faith were perfect men. I do not ask that of them. I hold that their greatest testimony was their conviction to worship God according to the dictates of their conscience as led by their study of the Word of God. 

I am a Baptist

My convictions require that I hold myself responsible to study the Word of God for myself. As a Baptist I am accountable not to a denomination, not to a Bible College, not to a famous preacher or spiritual leader. I am accountable to Jesus Christ, to the particular local church body to which I have been attached and to the doctrines my personal studies have led me to hold.

I am a Baptist.
Therefore I must be responsible for my own convictions.

Marvin McKenzie

In the fields