Thinking through baptism

The beginning of this year has seen me start reading through some of the issues related to believer’s baptism vs. infant baptism. A few months ago I baptised a couple of young people at church and it sparked the realisation that I’d never investigated “the other side” (infant baptism). In any case, these holidays I’ve taken the time to read two books on the topic thus far and I’ve at least 3-4 to go.

The books I’ve read are:
1. Troubled Waters: Re-thinking the theology of baptism by Ben Witherington.
2. Baptism: Three views ed. by David Wright.

A few initial comments on these books:
- They are both great books on baptism and I’m glad to have chosen these as the first two to read. They’ve covered all the issues that differentiate the baptist and infant views.
- Witherington is rather persuasive in his thoughts about the importance of infants and children. Not convinced this means that they should be baptised so young and without making a decision for themselves but puts the issue on the table well.
- The point above is linked to the very real question of whether children of Christian parents are saved or not. This has practical and theological ramifications and Witherington does well to persuade here.
- The importance of baptism seems to be undermined a little when Witherington questions it’s importance in the NT. This is odd considering he writes a whole book on baptism anyway. Certainly the weight of the NT on baptism is a consideration in whether one should make a larger than life issue out of it.
- Acts seems to be be main book for where the main arguments come from in this book. I did wonder whether it was relied on too heavily or not.
- The three views book is excellent with two particular scholars, B. Ware and S. Ferguson going at each other.
- Ware, a proponent of the baptist view, is more convincing here. Ferguson spends heaps of time explaining the covenants, which is good but isn’t so convincing re baptism and the NT.
- Ware is thorough in his exegetical points whereas the other two aren’t as much. The third view, a middle ground view that includes both views by A. Lane, is interesting but quite inventive and too reliant on historical grounds and not the NT.

Overall, these are two good books to begin with. It’ll be time to crack on with a few more in the coming weeks.

The importance of foreign missions in the early years (5)

Missions has typically been an area that CBC has been good at. From their beginnings to now there have been people in the congregation actively involved in missions, particularly to other parts of the world. There continues to be an emphasis on mission today and it was the same back when this small church began.

In 1891, the first year that this church was planted, the first missionary was sent abroad. Miss Emily Chambers was accepted and sent by the church to work cross-culturally in India with the Baptist Foreign Mission. It was only two years later before the next person was sent too.

By the time the church had reached it’s 50th year anniversary there seems to have been 7 further people who had been or were currently on active service abroad. There were continued strong links with India as well as new work carried out in South Africa.

For a young church, particularly in those early years, it is good to see that the focus was on mission and reaching out to others, wherever that may be. Considering the church had been going through some financial difficulty in these early years we are given the impression of how important members within the congregation thought of the missions task. Despite the church being unable to pay for a permanent pastor the people gave generously to send two young women off to India.

Learning this little part of CBC’s history makes me reflect further on the importance of church’s continuing to raise up people for mission. The task of mission is no way near over, particularly considering that there are still 3000+ unreached people groups yet to hear anything about Jesus. But more than this (and i’m not just thinking of CBC here) the current culture of giving and the thought that we should solidify ”our base” here at home – making sure we have “adequate” staffing for ourselves doesn’t make sense. When we take a step back we see that here are people who were generous with their time, their financial contributions, their prayers, and their willingness to send out good people despite the risk and the loss that this would be for their small congregation. What church these days wants to lose it’s best people? Yet, this is exactly the aim in raising up those for mission – whether foreign or not. We want to raise up good people, we want to raise up remarkable people, who are filled with the Spirit and eager to go and make disciples themselves. The church isn’t a function of culture that keeps people in and locked away, which would be very selfish. The church is a fluid organisation that seeks to make disciples who will make disciples.

Others in this series:

The second pastor – my name sake (4)

The first pastor (3)

Church planting CBC style (2)

A biographical sketch of CBC personified (1)

The second pastor – my name sake (4)

So, I’m not the only pastor with the surname “Coombs” to be at CBC. In the years 1896-1899 the Rev. Henry Coombs was the second pastor of the church. Little is said about his ministry other that it “gathered in the fruits of faithful toil” and I’m not entirely sure what that means.

Considering that the church had been dealing with financial difficulty the ministry of Rev. Coombs made “an effort to establish the finances on a sounder basis”. The church then put into practice something called “planned giving”, which meant that one of the deacons went around to each member of the church asking them to increase their giving and “obtain from them a statement of how much they were in a position to give so that we may be able to know what amount to expect each week.” That’s the same sort of issue many churches face today isn’t it? Not knowing whether the congregation will give or not. Perhaps it’s time more deacons “popped-in” on the people…

In any case, finances and attendance were obviously and issue with the pastor taking the issues to the church meeting. A note from the minutes say,

“The members of the Church were urged (by the Pastor) to endeavor to increase the attendance at our Sunday evening service.”

I could give the same call out today or would that be rather cheeky of me?

Others in this series:

The first pastor (3)

Church planting CBC style (2)

A biographical sketch of CBC personified (1)

Oxygen Programme: Term 4, 2011

The first pastor (3)

The first pastor of Canterbury Baps was a Rev. David Graham who came out from London. He had trained at Spurgeon’s College and even came with a personal recommendation from the Prince of Preacher’s himself.

The guy only lasted from February to December (1892) with the reason for his short tenure being financial difficulty. Basically, the church couldn’t pay him.

It did get me wondering how the history of the church would have been had this guy stuck around. I love the fact that the first pastor of the church was Calvinistic/Reformed theologically which is certainly different to the theological positions of future pastors, some only a decade or two later.

I found two old newspapers that seem to speak of the man. The first is from 30/11/1892 where he seems to give the morning and evening messages at an anniversary of Brunswick Baptist while the minister at Canterbuty. The second is actually a short article detailing his induction as pastor to Brunswick Baps in June 1897. What he did between the end of 1892 and the middle of 1897 i’m not sure.

Others in this series:

Church planting CBC style (2)

A biographical sketch of CBC personified (1)

Church planting CBC style (2)

There are 3 short histories that have been written about CBC. They were published for the 50, 75, and 100 year anniversaries of the church and dovetail each other quite a bit. The other day I picked up the first one and found some interesting things regarding the beginnings of this church.

Basically, there was a small group of men, 8 to be exact, who got together in an office somewhere and decided to plant a Baptist church. Part of the meeting notes describes the beginnings this way:

“It was resolved to commence as a Baptist Mission, first meeting to be held on Thursday evening, February 12th (1891), at 8pm. Mr. Goode to preside and arrange for another speaker.

Resolved to use Sankey’s Hymn Books…To get chairs for seating…The meeting was opened and closed with prayer.”

I found this to be a good reminder that it doesn’t really matter how many of you there are God will do amazing things. Here is 8 men, and no doubt their families as well, who are passionate to see a Baptist church in the blossoming suburb of Canterbury. Today’s thinking would be to organise a team, make sure the leader is the right fit to lead the church plant, make sure associations are supportive, give it a year or so of planning, and make sure everything is in order for the first service. These guys just get together and decide they would like to plant a church then go about the business of making it happen – including Sankey’s Hymns Books.

The other interesting point is that there was no Sunday morning service. In what would surely be a radical move today these guys decided to meet on Thursday and Sunday nights with no morning service. Now, we are told that it was only a couple of months later before the first morning service took place (5th April 1891), but nevertheless, to begin like this stuck me as different.

After the first meeting described above 20 people got together and approved it in some sort of official gathering. The first Sunday morning service had 15 adults attend and by the end of 1891 land had been purchased, a small organ bought for £1, a foundational members meeting totalling 42 people, the first baptismal service where 8 were baptised, and the calling of it’s first pastor – to arrive the following year.

Others in this series:

A biographical sketch of CBC personified (1)

A biographical sketch of CBC personified (1)

In a couple of weeks my church is celebrating their 120th anniversary. In the lead up to this weekend i have been thinking about how to approach the message in the evening service. For many years now we have had an open mic night where people would come to give thanks to God and others – these have been great nights of openness, hearing people’s stories, and having a good laugh and cry about the things that have gone on in the previous twelve months.

This year I thought I’d do something different.

For many years now John Piper has been delivering biographical messages on significant people of the Christian faith. In many of them he encourages the pastors and leaders listening to do the same back at their church. I thought I’d give it a crack in two Sunday’s time.

Now, in no way will it be anything like Piper’s nor will it be on a particular person of the Christian faith. Instead, i will be looking at CBC personified. In other words I will be talking through the history of the church, telling some stories, and bringing out some of the main movements and significant points of its history. I hope it goes well.

In order to prepare for that particular weekend I am reading through three various histories of the church and seeing what took place over the past 120 years. They are very interesting reads with some amazing stories of how God has blessed the place and the people.

Over the coming few posts I will seek to tell a few of these stories that might be useful for the coming week.