This Month in Our History...with Fred Anderson

2007 Article Archives:

December 2007
November 2007
October 2007
September 2007
August 2007
July 2007
June 2007
May 2007
April 2007
March 2007
February 2007
January 2007

December 2007 Edition

Each one of us has a favorite Christmas story.  As you might expect, mine come out of the pages of Virginia Baptist history.  Robert Healy Pitt was the dean of religious newspaper editors in America when he died in 1937.  For some 50 years he had been associated with the Religious Herald, which he served as senior editor from 1906 until his death.  His writings often included glimpses into earlier periods of life in the Commonwealth of Virginia.  Below are his Christmas memories as shared in the Herald in December 1926.  The article is included in a collection entitled Christmas among the Baptists of Virginia, which has been published by the Virginia Baptist Historical Society.

“The Christmas season has passed in the case of this writer through three quite distinct seasons.  First, the Christmas of childhood days.  Many years have passed, years filled with duties, responsibilities, joys, griefs, all manner and all variety of human experiences.  Nonetheless, those [childhood] days come back in memory with a clearness of detail almost startling.”

“The scenes that are recalled were laid in a quiet and remote country section [known as Middlesex County, Virginia].  They date in the middle 1860s, during a part of which Virginia was engulfed in the great war of ’61-65.  Notwithstanding all the horrors of war and of the collapse which followed, the Christmas scene was joyous for the little ones.”

“To be sure, its joys were simple.  Expenditures for the celebration of the season were very limited, but the traditional stocking was hung at Christmas Eve.  And the eager boy or girl was glad to find in it, bright and early Christmas morning, something like these:  a big red apple, an orange, a bunch of raisins, a little striped peppermint candy, a few homemade cakes, and in the war years a handful of chestnuts, which became a little later a handful of almonds, pecans, and palm nuts.  This would about conclude the list of presents for the youngsters…but the zest with which the children of that day enjoyed these simple things is fully equal to that with which the more sophisticated boy of [today] welcomes his more elaborate and costly gifts.”

“The Christmas table was well laden.  The inevitable turkey was at hand, the country ham was on deck, oysters were in abundance…The tide of youthful blood ran high in our veins, and the simple winter sports of the countryside were keenly relished.  Alas, how far away and yet how neat it all seems!”

“A later stage of the Christmas season came when the boy had grown…and had his own children around him.  Then the season brought a new pleasure…in seeing the little faces glow and in hearing the little voices cry out with delight.  It is good to have one season in the year when we are thinking more of the comfort and happiness of others than our own.”

“Now the third stage has come.  The children are all grown and married.  They come back for a brief season and their coming is in itself a Christmas joy beyond computation.  They bring with them the third generation and everybody knows that the chief folk in that large family circle will be the little folk.  And so the grandchildren take charge.  Now they must have more costly, elaborate novelties.  Yet the childish laugh will ring out and the joy of the childish hearts will be just as merry and just as contagious as ever.”

“What a blessed Savior He was who brought into a world of gloom and darkness so much light and gladness.  Nowhere, save where the spirit of the Lord Jesus Christ reigns, is there a season of the year when the vast majority of our people are thinking of how to give pleasure to others rather than themselves.  [Let’s] take the spirit of Christmastide into all the rest of the year.”

And so we should, even in our time of Christmas 2007.  Merry Christmas!

November 2007 Edition

Last month this column told about a man – Henry Keeling Ellyson, the long-time executive leader of Virginia Baptists in the 19th century – and his vision: the planting of new church starts wherever the railroads placed depots.  No matter how expansive and bold a vision, it can do little without money.  Just as the old locomotives needed to be stoked with coal, the Virginia Baptist enginery needed to be fueled.

Charles Hill Ryland, a Virginia Baptist leader of the period and treasurer of “the Baptist school,” Richmond College, realized better than most folks that the General Association would never move forward without a great push.  In 1881 on the floor of the BGAV annual meeting held at Grace St. Church, Richmond, Ryland presented a motion “that a committee of 22 (one from each District Association, if practicable) be appointed to inquire and report what plans, if any, should be devised for securing a more active cooperation between this body and the churches and District Associations of the State.”

For the most part, the district associations were weak, and many of the churches unresponsive to the great challenges which were before Virginia Baptists; most of the churches had no plan for systematic giving to the state association, and the various Boards (Education, Sunday School, and Bible) were competing for funds.  As for the latter problem, Ellyson once remarked:  “We do not complain that too much was given to the other Boards, but too little to this [one for state missions].”

The State Mission Board had 34 missionaries scattered across Virginia.  They performed Herculean work.  In one year alone, they had organized 4 new churches, begun construction on 15 houses of worship, preached 3,251 sermons, and were instrumental in the conversion of over 1,200 persons. 

The Mission Board seldom had sufficient funds to meet in a timely fashion the salaries of their missionaries.  At the same 1881 meeting, Ellyson reported that the treasurer had a balance in hand of $963.50 and the Board needed $5,272.80 just to pay the back salaries.  Multiply those figures many times over to get some idea of what they mean in today’s dollars.

In short, the churches were not giving to meet the very programs which their representatives had approved.  Ellyson pleaded to the messengers:  “You touch now only the tips of the fingers of many of the 532 churches which are among your givers.  You must get near enough to take hold of them with so warm a fraternal grip that they shall all feel through you the heart-beatings of the whole Baptist brotherhood and be drawn into closer union and more active service.”

Ryland’s Committee on Cooperation was a giant leap forward.  Baptist leadership across the state began to discuss the problem of adequate financing in light of mammoth needs. 

In 1882, the General Association met at the Warrenton Baptist Church.  Ryland delivered the annual sermon and he used the opportunity to match vision with resources.  The sermon was immediately recognized for its impact and importance.  The Religious Herald published it in full. 

Charles Ryland minced no words.  He told his listeners that out of the 700 churches only 200 were responsible for most of the missions dollars.  He called nongiving churches “parasites” living off the generosity of others. 

“As long as the association can feed and clothe them,” he said, “they are willing to stand by.  This association is no mint for the coinage of money.  We are only the dispensers of what our people voluntarily contribute.  Let us seek churches who give nothing and teach them that it is more blessed to give than receive… [and] train and develop our churches that are not now doing their duty.”  One-third of the churches had absolutely no plan for collecting missions offerings!

Ryland’s sermon text was Ecclesiastes 8:5:  “A wise man’s heart discerneth both time and judgment.”  He knew the time was right, and there was sufficient wisdom among Virginia Baptists for the task.

He pleaded:  “Oh! Let us not persist in dragging the weak, impracticable, ineffectual methods of the past behind the car of progress.  They have served their day.  Praise them and let them go.”

As for giving money to the separate Boards and not to the State Mission Board, Ryland urged:  “Let the Association calmly consider whether there is not a demand for a separate department, an additional department, a board of collection… whose sole duty it shall be to cultivate the field of resources, to educate the churches, to increase your means.”

An immediate result of Ryland’s sermon was the continuing of the Committee on Cooperation.  Over the years it cultivated an awareness and a willingness to cooperate.

It was not that Virginia Baptists were small and without means.  At the time six Virginia Baptist churches were among the eleven largest churches in the entire SBC.  There just had been no plan for giving.  Charles Ryland and the Committee on Cooperation supplied that plan and the work of Virginia Baptists took giant leaps forward.

October 2007 Edition

Henry Keeling Ellyson became possessed with a vision.  It is the mark of any effective leader that a vision is forthcoming and that it is articulated.  Ellyson was the executive leader of Virginia Baptists.  His actual title was corresponding secretary.  It was a humble title which really did not consider the magnitude of the responsibilities.  If he were serving today, he would be known as the executive director, the CEO of the Mission Board and the General Association.

Ellyson was a young man when he was elected to the position in 1848.  He was a month shy of his 25th birthday.  He was granted a salary, but he never claimed it.  In the nearly 45 years that Henry Keeling Ellyson served Virginia Baptists as a leader, he never received any financial compensation.  But circumstances never required it.  He earned his livelihood as editor of the Richmond Dispatch, a newspaper which he developed into a statewide respected source of news and opinion.

Ellyson had been in the leadership post of Virginia Baptists for over 25 years when he began to articulate a new vision.  He needed others to catch his vision.  And so he began to present it over and over again.  In short, his vision was that the Baptists should climb aboard the Iron Horse and develop new churches at every railroad depot.  He realized that the railroads were taming the vast western landscape of Virginia and he envisioned a continuous string of Baptist churches from Winchester to Bristol.

In 1875 the Mission Board and the General Association promoted a motto: “Virginia for Jesus – in every neighborhood a Baptist church.”  Ellyson reminded the messengers to an annual meeting of the BGAV that “verily the Lord is with us, and bids us go up and possess the land in his name.”

In 1879 he appealed:  “There are at the present time most potent reasons why the Valley and Appalachian divisions should receive a large share of our labors… great lines of railway already in operation and others soon to be built, open to it the markets of the world, and furnish an easy highway for the incoming thousands of our own… to enter.”

In 1881 he stated:  “In a few months 500 miles will be added to our railroads… factories, farmhouses, villages, and towns will follow.  Missionaries of Christ should go close after the track-layers to plant mission stations for the thousands who will come into our midst upon these highways of trade.  If Baptists would keep pace with the growth of Virginia, they must give this Board ample means to occupy every position opened to Christian laborers.”

But how could the Mission Board and the General Association “possess the land” with little money to fund such a bold vision?  The State Mission Board was operating with declining receipts.  Ellyson maintained:  “This reduction in our income is not due to any lack of effort on our part to keep the churches advised of the needs of this work.  The Board has had direct communication with nearly every pastor… through their clerks, deacons, and thousands of their members, so that they cannot plead want of information for their waning interest in State Missions.  We do not complain that too much was given to other Boards, but too little to this.”

“If it would impracticable to increase their annual gifts to the churches, which we are far from believing, it may be well to consider whether you are not seriously weakening the right arm of your strength by withdrawing so large a part of your offerings from State Missions.”

“You have stationed us as sentinels on the watch towers of our Virginia Zion, and we would be faithless if we did not warm you of the threatened dangers.”

Only a few churches were carrying the financial load for the many.  In an age before the development of the Cooperative Program and the expectation of systematic giving, the major portion of income had to come from dramatic appeals which were made over and over again.  After Ellyson delivered the annual report on state missions at a BGAV meeting, someone would move that subscriptions and pledges and offerings be taken to pay the salaries of the state missionaries.  A better way had to be developed.  A Committee on Cooperation was formed, and the committee studied the overall situation of financing the work of state missions.  The Committee began to recommend and the BGAV adopted measures which encouraged financial participation by all the member churches.  The vision could be given a sound foundation.

By 1882 there were 2,398 miles of railroads and more to be constructed.  New villages and towns were being created.  With adequate financial assistance, the General Association was planting new churches and/or erecting new church buildings from Winchester to Harrisonburg to Clifton Forge, a town where the C&O and the Richmond & Alleghany had a junction, to Central in Montgomery County which was on the Norfolk & Western line.  Even in the East, the new or improved work was at the railroad depots – Newport News, the eastern terminus of the C & O, West Point, and the eastern terminus of the Richmond & Danville Railroad.  By 1885 the State Mission Board had 71 state missionaries occupying fields across the state. 

At last, the motto “Virginia for Jesus” was becoming a statement of fact. 

September 2007 Edition

A century ago, this month in our history, the men in many Baptist churches were being approached about missions.  Earlier in the spring in Richmond, on the day before the opening of the annual meeting of the Southern Baptist Convention, men from across the South had gathered for a meeting of possible significance.  They had come to the Calvary Baptist Church in downtown Richmond.  They had sensed the enthusiasm around organizing men for missions.

It is likely that every one of those men had a wife or mother or sister or aunt or grandmother who was a member of a women’s missionary society.  After all, women had embraced missions support some 90 years before these men gathered in Richmond.  There had been a few early men’s missionary societies, but they never caught the fervor of the societies organized by and for women.  There had been numerous men supportive of missions, but they had no central and organized group.

All of that was about to change.  The meeting in 1907 would rally the Baptist men of the South.  The program had been well planned by Joshua Levering, a layman from Baltimore and a powerhouse in political circles as well as the SBC, and W.J. Northen, a former governor of Georgia.  Before the meeting was over, the Laymen’s Missionary Movement had begun.

Virginia Baptists immediately embraced the Movement.  Two key laymen in Virginia – Lewis Bosher of Richmond and Livius Lankford of Norfolk – were effective organizers within the state.  They visited churches and kept repeating the motto adopted at the founding meeting of 1907:  “The Evangelization of the World in this Generation.”
They asserted that if the laymen of all the leading denominations in the USA would tithe their income, the amount would fund “all home benevolence and evangelize the heathen world in this generation.”  The lay leaders maintained that regular systematic tithing and giving would eliminate “the present pitiful begging system of [church and missions] financing.”

“We are God’s stewards,” said the Virginia laymen, “and it behooves us to be just and honest.  We should give the tenth (some should give more), of our income: first, because it is God’s direct command over and over again and endorsed by Jesus Christ; second, because we thereby promote our spiritual and temporal interests.  Brethren, read and pray over God’s challenge.”

Within three years, the Virginia laymen had a representative to promote the Movement within each of the district associations.  These local chairmen were charged with encouraging laymen to give regularly to missions, to practice tithing, to hold missionary rallies, and to “urge men to pray more.”

By 1913 the Movement had grown to the point of requiring “a field secretary” to coordinate the work.  John Thompson Henderson, president of Virginia Intermont College in Bristol, a Virginia Baptist school, was elected; and for the next 30 years, in addition to his work in higher education, he gave leadership to the Movement.  Henderson was known to the Baptists of Virginia especially for his service as president of the BGAV.

In 1926 the Laymen’s Missionary Movement became known as the Brotherhood.  By mid-century, any Southern Baptist church big enough to have a signboard out front also had an active Brotherhood.  In the late 1950s, the Brotherhood also assumed responsibility for the missions education of boys through directing the Royal Ambassadors or “RAs,” which previously had been directed by Woman’s Missionary Union. 

Beginning in the mid-fifties, Virginia Baptists were led in their men’s missionary work by staff members at the Virginia Baptist Board.  Across the years, a succession of capable men led the program, including George Euting, James Meade, Gene Williams, and Lloyd Jackson.  In time, the Brotherhood’s men’s work became known as Baptist Men.  With the restructuring of the SBC in the 1990s, the Brotherhood Commission was dismantled and the assignment for missions emphasis for men was placed in the domain of the North American Mission Board, SBC.  Today NAMB has a program called Baptist Men on Mission (or BMEN for short).  Besides missions education, the BMEN program encourages the overall spiritual development of men as churchmen, husbands, and fathers.

A century of organized men’s missions emphasis, by whatever name and under whatever denominational entity, has accomplished great things for Kingdom work.  Men have gathered, met “real live” missionaries, learned about needs at home and abroad, considered their participation, and acted. 

Today, a scan of the annual of the BGAV in the section which reports church statistics reveals many “zeros” when it comes to reporting organized missions work for men and boys.  It does not mean that there is absolutely no missions activity for and by males.  There are men active in partnership missions, on construction teams, in disaster relief, in toolbox ministries, in visiting sick and shut-in members, and engaged in personal missions activities.  Whether they know it or not, the year of 2007 is something of an anniversary for all the men of the Baptist churches.  The movement which began a century ago yet remains alive.

August 2007 Edition

In August 1707, a great experiment was just underway.  Only a few days earlier in July, five churches had formed the Philadelphia Baptist Association.  It was the first Baptist association in the United States, and it was patterned after Baptist associations in England.

“The Philadelphia,” as it became known, gave rise to the organization of others which proved influential within their spheres:  Charleston in South Carolina, formed in 1751; Kehukee in North Carolina (and for a while spilling over into southern Virginia); Ketocton in Virginia, 1766; and Warren in Rhode Island, 1767.  Another very influential early association was Sandy Creek, which was established in 1756 in North Carolina.  Sandy Creek had a direct influence especially across the southern tier of Virginia.  Walter B. Shurden, the highly regarded dean of Baptist historians, developed an entire thesis about the influence of “the Charleston tradition” and “the Sandy Creek tradition.”

The movement to establish local “district” associations among Baptists was a stroke of genius.  Otherwise, these independent, autonomous congregations had no cohesive form, no means of communication, no interchange of ideas.  The concept of freely cooperating through associations was at the root of denominationalism.  It brought the several into one, while preserving the uniqueness of each church. 

For Baptists, there never would be “the Church” but many churches.  And it was more than mere semantics.  Theron Price explained:  “Early Baptists had a high doctrine of the local congregation precisely because they took with radical seriousness the reality of the church of God.  A local church was important just because it was meant to be, in its own time and place, the embodiment of the whole church.  Each church was independent.  But all churches were interdependent.  They were congregations expressing a common faith, walking together in a common calling, and sharing a common experience.  Their interdependence was expressed in the principles of association and cooperation.”

It was in the annual meetings of the associations that wider community was built.  The Baptist people from one hollow met their cousins from the next hollow.  The Baptist people from over the mountain glimpsed another perspective by crossing over, sharing in a great meeting, and breaking bread together.  They heard some of the choice preachers of their day.  When the missions movement took hold, they personally encountered missionaries at the ‘ssociation meetings.  When churches had doctrinal questions, they sent queries to sound out their fellow baptized believers.  In time, the associations became great training grounds for the churches and allowed local leadership to develop.

In the 1700s, some Virginia churches and associations sent delegates to the Philadelphia Association’s meetings.  It, therefore, had an influence upon the early Virginia Baptists; but it also had a far wider influence.  Directly or indirectly, the Philadelphia touched all of Baptist life in America.  Its Confession of Faith became the basis of much of the doctrinal thought of the Baptists.

Cathcart’s Encyclopedia (1881) said it best:  “The influence of the Philadelphia Association has been greater in shaping Baptist modes of thinking and working than any other body in existence.  It has been the warm friend of missions at home and abroad, its ministers making missionary tours all over our country.  It has always been the friend of Sunday schools.  It was a tower of strength to our persecuted brethren in other colonies in times when they suffered great legal oppression.  It gave them financial aid and good counsel, and lent the weight of its great influence in seeking a redress of grievances from men in power, and it has ever demanded liberty for all men to worship God according to the dictates of their consciences.”

The Philadelphia led the way in support of Baptist seminaries and schools of higher learning.  They supported what became Brown University.  They set a noble example; and the Virginia Baptists as early as the 1780s were hoping to emulate in the areas of education.  The bold plan was to establish not one but two seminaries of learning on either side of the James River.  The plan never materialized, but the seed of the idea had been planted.  In 1830, the Virginia Baptist Education Society was formed, and it supported private academies of learning for ministers.  In short order, the Virginia Baptist Seminary was created, which evolved into Richmond College or today’s University of Richmond.  Other schools followed.  In our time in history, we have witnessed the creation of two seminaries in Virginia.  Baptist Theological Seminary at Richmond and the John Leland Center for Theological Studies might be considered the ultimate fulfillment of the early vision of Virginia Baptists.

The Philadelphia undergirded missions; and once the movement spread, Virginia associations were quick to join the chorus for missionary promotion and support.  At least one “district” association, the Goshen, even had its own missionary-sending board in the 19th century.  Several of the Virginia associations in urban areas developed local missions, especially in the form of “goodwill centers.”  In time, the larger associations added staff for community missions and developed the concept of associational missions in even greater ways.  The Philadelphia supported Sunday schools; and the Virginia associations became champions of the Sunday schools, as well as all other forms of religious education.  Often the district associations would sponsor special “schools” on various topics.

In the essentials, we have not wavered much from the same concept of associationalism of 300 years ago.  We have not surrendered one whit of our independence on the local church or local association levels while embracing other Baptists and enlarging our tent.  We have not ceased in our understanding that we can do more together than separately.  We have not abandoned an appreciation for the educated mind nor lessened our enthusiasm for the practical value of Sunday schools and church training.  We have embraced creative new ways to “do missions.”  The experiment is still working!

July 2007 Edition

Every Fourth of July the flags fly from front porches and the bunting drapes many a public building.  The afternoons may be devoted to backyard cookouts or family picnics, but the evening in a town or city worth its salt is ablaze with fireworks.  It is a time of national pride, harkening all the way back to the patriots who secured independence in the American Revolution.

Where were the Virginia Baptists in that time of struggle and triumph?  As individuals, many of the Baptist persuasion were engaged as soldiers in the war.  As a people, they were organized and campaigning for full religious liberty.  When the dust settled and a new order emerged, the Virginia Baptists wanted the old system of a state church to be gone, replaced by complete freedom of conscience.  They wanted to be free of any connection between the government and an established church.

In the meantime, they did what they could.  The Separate Baptists’ General Association petitioned the General Assembly to permit them to supply preachers for the Colonial troops, and the offer was accepted.  Jeremiah Walker and John Williams, two powerful preachers, “went and preached to the soldiers when encamped in the lower parts of Virginia.”  George Washington himself knew his Baptist neighbors and declared that they were “uniformly and almost unanimously the firm friends of civil liberty.” 

The war captured much of the attention of the preachers and people.  Great hopes were placed upon the success of the endeavor.  The growth and expansion of the Baptists almost took a second seat to the first priority of securing independence from Great Britain and all the tyrannical laws which had been imposed.  Some of the key leaders among the Baptists fell away, and there was general spiritual decline among the Baptist people.

Robert Baylor Semple’s history of 1810 pictured the situation:  “Perhaps we may add, that many did not rightly estimate the true source of liberty, nor ascribe its attainment to the proper arm.  In consequence of which, God sent them liberty, and with it, leanness of soul.”  The cause of spiritual life languished.  And once peace and independence were won, Semple pinpointed another enemy:  the pursuit of economic opportunity and wealth.  Some of the best and brightest of the Virginia Baptist clergy removed themselves (and many within their congregations) to the new western territory of Kentucky. 

“The love of many waxed cold.  Some of the watchmen fell, others stumbled, and many slumbered at their posts.  Iniquity greatly abounded.  Associations were but thinly attended, and the business badly conducted.  The long and great [decline] induced many to fear that the times of refreshing would never come, but that God had wholly forsaken them.”

Where was the zeal which had persisted so long, especially during the time of persecution?  Some mocked the Virginia Baptists:  “Their enemies often reproached them.”  It seemed that the great movement of Baptist growth and development had halted.  Some of the most loyal of Virginia Baptists wondered aloud about their downfall.  Semple worded it in biblical language:  “Oh! That it were with us as in days past, when the candle of the Lord shined upon us.”

And then the Lord of the harvest did His work.  In 1785, along the James River, revival fires began to ignite.  “It spread, as fire among stubble.  Continuing for several years, in different parts:  very few churches were without the blessing:  How great the change!”

The general revival of the 1780s was emotional in its display.  “It was not unusual to have a large portion of the congregation prostrate on the floor; and in some instances, they have lost the use of their limbs.  Screams, cries, groans, songs, shouts, and hosannas, notes of grief and notes of joy, all heard at the same time, made a heavenly confusion, a sort of indescribable concert.  Even the wicked and unenlightened were astonished and said, ‘The Lord hath done great things for this people.’”

The great revival continued from 1785 to at least 1792:  seven years of remarkable spiritual experiences.  Thousands were converted and the effect was seen not only among Virginia Baptists, but also among those of other denominations. 

As in almost anything, there were positive and negative results even to the great revival.  There surprisingly was a decline in the number of young persons expressing a call to the ministry.  John Leland wondered if it was because “the old preachers stand in their way.”    The Baptists gained a degree of social recognition and even respectability which carried as much negative as positive results.  Something of the beauty in “simplicity and plainness” vanished as the Baptists began to formalize their worship and adopt the ways of more socially acceptable religious societies.  “Party spirit and even vanity” began to divide Baptists, especially among the ministers. 

All in all, the Baptists came out the better because of the great revival.  More souls were added into the Kingdom.  With religious liberty secured, energy could be directed to evangelism and eventually to practical missions.  New churches were planted.  Crude wooden meetinghouses gave way to brick and stone.  The Virginia Baptists were on the rise once again!

In July, Baptists can enjoy patriotic fervor as well as anyone.  They can fire off the crackers and rockets.  They also might give some thought to what comes after celebration of temporal victories.  The spiritual side of mankind also needs victories.  The post-Revolution revival provided something truly worth celebrating.

June 2007 Edition

June is always celebrated for the emancipation of the slaves in the United States.  On June 19, 1865, the slaves in Galveston, Texas, heard a reading of the Emancipation Proclamation; and forever after, “Juneteenth” has been celebrated around the world.  The full legal steps also were taken in June 1865, following the Civil War, when the Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was passed, thereby abolishing slavery. 

Prior to the Civil War and to the constitutional change, there were some Virginia Baptists who freed their slaves.  Thaddeus Herndon and Traverse Herndon, two brothers from Fauquier County, Virginia, were among the progressive Baptists who sent their slaves to Liberia.

Thaddeus Herndon was born in Fauquier County, Virginia, in May 1807.  He was the first son of the family; but there would be three other sons, all destined for the Baptist ministry!   The Herndons became a family of note among the Baptists of Northern Virginia. 

Thaddeus was baptized in 1828 into the fellowship of the Long Branch Church.  He had come under the good influences of William F. Broaddus, one of the most prominent Virginia Baptist leaders of the period.

Almost from the beginning of his religious conversion, Thaddeus Herndon became known as “as sweet singer and gifted in prayer.”  The pastor had enough confidence in the young man that he turned over the prayer meetings to him.  It was from those experiences that the desire to enter the Gospel ministry was born.

Thaddeus was licensed and ordained and set apart as an evangelist or local missionary, laboring in the several counties of Northern Virginia.  He traveled considerable distances by horseback to visit those who needed to hear the joyous news of the Savior.  When he finally accepted two settled pastorates in Prince William and Loudoun, he still had to commute – again, by horseback – and do this week after week for a total of 40 years.  Someone estimated that he would cover a thousand miles by horseback each year just to visit his flocks.

It is no wonder that Thaddeus was described as a “stalwart, courageous, self-sacrificing, faithful country preacher, of the saddlebags type.”  Those bags would be loaded with supplies, religious tracts, Bibles, and testaments.

He was “gifted in prayer.”  Every day in the Herndon home, at morning and night, the family, servants, and guests were gathered for family devotionals.  One former overnight guest once admitted that he had been “convicted of sin and led to Christ” because of his host’s prayers for him.  The guest later became a minister!

But the full measure of Thaddeus Herndon and of his wife, Mary Fannie Gibson Herndon, was revealed when they freed their slaves.  The Herndons – Thaddeus and his brother Traverse – reached the conclusion that slavery was morally wrong.  They also realized that there was a solution to their dilemma.

In 1821 a group of freed slaves emigrated to Africa and settled in Liberia.  Among the group were Baptists from Richmond including Lott Cary and Colin Teague and their families.

Several years earlier, in 1815, the Richmond African Baptist Missionary Society had been organized with Lott Cary as the secretary and Robert Baylor Semple, one of the leading figures in American Baptist life, as president.  Their purpose was to raise funds for African missions.  The American Colonization Society also fostered the concept of sending freed slaves to Africa.

The Herndons discovered that there was a way to reconcile their moral dilemma.  They could send their slaves to Liberia.  It was no small sacrifice to follow their convictions.  Their slave property was valued in antebellum dollars at $30,000.  They also knew that they would be breaking a close relationship.  Thaddeus himself said:  “We have lived together.  We have grown up together.”

The Herndons provided the necessities of life for their departing servants.  They purchased clothing, bedding, tools, equipment, and books including a family Bible for each family.  They even gave the former slaves a journal in which they had recorded the vital information of births and deaths and notes recorded by the Mistress of the farm, Mary Fannie Herndon.  They asked that the departing friends maintain the journal.

Thaddeus accompanied the servants to the ship.  An account survives of the parting scene.  It was said that the old Master began to address the servants and at times became “so choked for utterance” that he could scarcely continue.

He reminded the group that some had been “appointed by the church to watch over” the others, and he offered a special word for their benefit:  “You are chosen to admonish, guide and counsel the others, not to lord it over them, but gently and kindly to watch over their souls.”

In the hold of the sailing ship, Herndon held a prayer meeting.  Remember that he was “gifted in prayer.”  Everyone knelt and prayers were offered for safety and for a future filled with promise.  An eyewitness to the scene told of the “bursts of grief and sobs from men, women, and children.”

The years have flowed and the relationship between Liberians and Virginia Baptists has continued and strengthened.  Imagine this if you will:  the spiritual descendants of the Herndons and the spiritual descendants of those servants have – as equal brothers and sisters beneath the throne of the Father – joined hearts and hands in missions partnerships.  Today there remain opportunities for the Baptists of Virginia to assist the people of Liberia.  The Glocal Missions and Evangelism Team of the Virginia Baptist Mission Board can supply information on how individuals and churches can be of assistance.

May 2007 Edition      

In May 2007 our minds and hearts continue to be absorbed with the tragedy at Virginia Tech, which captured the world’s headlines on April 16.  It set into motion a response by Virginia Baptists – individuals, churches, collegiate ministries, Virginia Baptist Mission Board staff – which illustrated once again Christ-like compassion. 

For many of us, it brought to mind another time of crisis.  On Tuesday September 11, 2001, the day began as one of those magnificent fall days.  The sky was brilliant blue.  The air was refreshing.  And, like April 16, 2007, an unthinkable tragedy occurred in the morning and the beauty of the day could not overcome it.

This writer was working at the Virginia Baptist Historical Society, mounting a new exhibit.  A telephone call alerted us to turn on the one little television set in the building.  At first, we thought it was an accident caused by a plane that went astray.  It soon was revealed that it was no accident and that a deliberate attack was unfolding before the eyes of the nation.

The next day I brought in the newspaper accounts and asked our research assistant to begin what likely would become a growing file.  For want of a subject heading, I asked her to label the file:  September 11.  Nothing else would be needed to describe its contents.

The file did grow and now is about two inches thick.  It contains the stories, especially the stories of the Virginia Baptist response to the tragedy.  There were two fronts available for ministry:  New York City and the Northern Virginia and District of Columbia area affected by the attack on the Pentagon.

The executive committee of the Virginia Baptist Mission Board arrived at the Resource Center that fateful Tuesday morning for their regular meeting.  The committee immediately turned to prayer.  The main item of business that day was the introduction of John Upton, who was to be recommended at the BGAV meeting to succeed Reginald M. McDonough as executive director.

The staff of the Virginia Baptist Mission Board experienced a double blow that week.  On September 12, Nat Kellum, the beloved treasurer of the General Association and its Board, died from a heart attack.  On September 14, the staff gathered on the front steps of the Resource Center and held a prayer meeting.  A month later, the Mission Board held its regular October meeting and adopted a statement of affirmation of the many ways in which ministry was offered to those so directly affected by the attacks.

All Virginia Baptists were proud to know that their disaster relief’s feeding unit would be sent to New York City.  From September 14 – 28, some 75 volunteers from Virginia Baptist churches provided 55,567 meals for relief workers clearing the debris from the site of the World Trade Center.  The North American Mission Board reported that the various disaster relief teams working with NAMB had served over 238,000 meals.  Jim George, Dean Miller, and Terry Raines of the Virginia Baptist Mission Board staff coordinated the disaster relief response for Virginia Baptists.  Churches were encouraged to send disaster relief donations through the treasurer’s office of the Virginia Baptist Mission Board. 

Churches also found their individual ways of expression.  The ancient bell of First Baptist Church, Richmond called people to prayer.  And the people responded in Richmond and beyond.  Churches across the Commonwealth experienced an increased attendance at worship services, prayer vigils, and other times for gatherings.

When the world turned upside down on Tuesday, every pastor in the land had to change the sermon for Sunday.  The Center for Baptist Heritage & Studies, a Virginia Baptist ministry partner, called for the pastors to send their sermons for inclusion in a book.  The collection was entitled For the Living of These Days…Responses to Terrorism.  Compiled by William H. Duke, the book became a source of reflection upon the power of Christian hope in the midst of tragedy.  All the proceeds from sale of the books went to the Virginia Baptist disaster relief ministry and enabled the purchase of additional feeding equipment.

Beyond the feeding ministry, Virginia Baptists also sent numerous volunteers to clean apartments near Ground Zero in New York City.  In relatively short order, they had cleaned over 300 residences.  Bill Latham, a member of West Side Baptist Church in Harrisonburg, shared his impressions of the relief effort in an article to the Religious Herald.  In part, he wrote:  “One day the firemen and the police will organize this area into a memorial or shrine that people from all over can come and view and get close to the story.  This is a new chapter in American history.  In the fine print will be a small kudos for the work of the Baptists.  There is a church seed-planting team in the area now.  They are trying to work out the logistics where a small church can be located.  It will start out as a mission and there will be enough good will and seeds planted that they can nurture.”

Following September 11 – and now following April 16 – Virginia Baptists have been planting good will and seeds of compassion, love, tenderness, and mercy.  Such seeds always seem to survive and bring forth good fruit in due season.

April 2007 Edition

In April 1797 – 210 years ago – a male child was born who must have screamed louder than any other newborn. He certainly had healthy lungs! In time, he became a noted Baptist preacher who was said to have possessed a “voice like a trumpet.”

Cumberland George made an impact upon Central Virginia – the then rural counties of Fauquier, Stafford, Culpeper, Rappahannock, and Orange – which was felt long after his passing. He held protracted revival meetings which brought an untold number of souls into the Kingdom. Only the Lamb’s Book of Life can adequately tell the story of Cumberland George’s influence. One – and only one – of those individuals was John A. Broadus, who was baptized as a youth by Cumberland George and who in full adulthood became the prince of preachers.

George was only a teenager when he became a believer, acknowledging Jesus Christ “as the Saviour of sinners.” The power of Christ continued to dwell upon his heart and mind; and in 1819, at age 21, he was set apart for the Gospel ministry in an ordination service at the Fredericksburg Baptist Church. No less a person that Robert Baylor Semple – “Mister American Baptist” – laid hands upon the young candidate.

Cumberland George was one of those “weeping” preachers. Absorbed in the subject of Christ and Him Crucified, acquainted with the cancerous sores of sin yet the balm of Gilead, fraught with the emotion and the fervor so expected in his time, Cumberland George sometimes scarcely could complete his sermons without giving way to tears. Unlike some others of his generation of preachers, he also could evoke those same emotions in his hearers. No one ever went to sleep during Cumberland George’s preaching!

Well, that is not exactly true. History reveals that during one of his sermons, Caleb Burnley, the schoolmaster for the village of Jeffersonton, nodded off. When he suddenly awoke, the schoolmaster called out: “Go on and finish conjugating that verb.”

The “pride of the Piedmont Baptists” also took great pride in the office which was bestowed upon him. It was a forgivable pride mixed with humility. He explained it best with the following pledge: “Let me never dishonor Thee nor the ministerial office in heart or life.” He knew that ordination alone would not shield him from any dishonor. He realized that he would have to constantly watch his own conduct and measure his own conscience.

The trumpet sounded. In the first 25 years of his ministry, by his own estimate, he preached “over 4,000 sermons.” In 1845, writing in Culpeper, he admitted that he had saved but few sermon notes. “I am sorry I did not enter a sketch of every sermon I ever preached. They might at least tend to humble me and make me more studious and prayerful.”

Cumberland George was active in the life of the General Association and an early advocate of missions. He delivered at least one of his sermons before a BGAV annual meeting. Probably the church most associated with his pastoral duties was the Culpeper Baptist Church, and there were others: Alum Spring, Jeffersonton, Mt. Salem, Reynolds Memorial, and Woodville churches.

In 1863 the trumpet was silenced. The burial spot with its modest stone marker may have been in the countryside, but in time the ever-encroaching suburbs of Culpeper enveloped the little graveyard. Today modern homes surround it, and one of the neighbors sometimes can be counted upon to keep it mowed.

Sermons never written and saved. Voices shouting into the open air. Churches embracing new generations. Sometimes it seems that all was for naught. The other side of the coin reveals sermons that touched sinners, voices that could not be recorded except in memories which fade, and churches which continue their ministry.

Cumberland George once declared: “In my ministrations may I be ever endued with power from on high, that, with all boldness and enlargeness of heart and of views, I may be enabled fluently to declare the whole counsel of God.” His words of benediction are every bit as valuable as all those 4,000 sermons!

March 2007 Edition

In March 1877 – 130 years ago – a dedicated Baptist layman named Milton Thomas Fristoe died at his home in Front Royal, Virginia.  He was only 49 years old, and yet he had already accomplished an outstanding record as a civic and church leader.  He also made a momentous personal decision which cast him into the role of a philanthropist.  With his death, a noble cause ultimately would benefit.  But I am ahead of my story.

Milton Thomas Fristoe was a man of modest circumstances.  The son of a Shenandoah farmer and his wife, Fristoe never had the opportunity of higher education.  He plunged into the business world, opening a general merchandise store and a hotel in the growing community of Front Royal. 

He served a variety of civil positions in the town.  At one time or another, he was sheriff, a justice of the peace, and a town supervisor.  When the famous William F. Broaddus held a revival meeting in the town, Fristoe was among his converts.  He became an active deacon and took a lead in the construction of a church building.  Front Royal Baptist Church was his second love.

Milton Thomas Fristoe’s first love was Sarah Eliza Stinson, also of the same neighborhood.  The couple had no children. 

In 1873 the Baptist General Association of Virginia held its “Semi-Centennial” meeting (or 50th anniversary) in Richmond on the campus of “the Baptist school,” Richmond College.  A great temporary tabernacle was erected to hold the crowd which attended.  Some say that as many as 5,000 – maybe even 10,000 – attended the great public meeting.  It was the largest religious meeting to date ever held in the Commonwealth of Virginia.  Baptist ministers and laypersons from all across Virginia, and even from outside the state, descended upon Richmond for the meeting. 

It was a time of great celebration for several reasons.  First, it was a time of rejoicing for all the ways in which Almighty God had led the Baptists of Virginia, including the deliverance of His people from the bondage of a state religion and the ensuing persecution of colonial Baptists.  Second, it was a time for celebrating the accomplishments of the General Association, which had come a long way from its humble beginnings in 1823.  Third, it was a time to show to the world that the American South had risen from the ashes of the War Between the States. 

The Baptists of Virginia had suffered from the War.  Much of the military action had occurred on Virginia soil.  Church buildings had been destroyed.  Richmond College – again, the crown jewel of Virginia Baptists – virtually had ceased.  Its buildings had been used as army hospitals and were damaged.  Its students had scattered.  Its library had been hauled away by the invaders.  Its endowment was in Confederate bonds and now was worthless.  

A great campaign was mounted by the General Association to celebrate their anniversary by endowing their school.  Several prominent pastors were released by their churches to serve as fundraising agents.  Appeals were made that a memorial would be raised on the college campus to the Baptists who struggled to secure religious liberty, a subject dear to the hearts and still in the memory banks of Virginia Baptists. 

Virginia Baptists gave out their impoverished post-war finances.  They gave cents and dollars.  Many of them came to be a part of the festivities.

There were several well-known and outstanding speakers at the great meeting.  Jeremiah Bell Jeter – one of the original state missionaries known as “the Bedford Plowboys” – was fresh from his tour of duty as a commissioner of the Foreign Mission Board in Italy.  He stood before the crowd and made a large personal gift to the endowment campaign.  The main speaker of the day was J.L.M. Curry – one of the most prominent orators of the age – and he told the story of the struggle for religious liberty.  He held aloft the ancient lock and key from the Culpeper jail where Baptists had been imprisoned for their faith. And then he lifted the offering for the endowment. 

We are told that grown men and women wept after the appeal was made.  They remembered what their own grandparents had told them about the time of persecution and the movement to secure full freedom of conscience.  They opened their purses and wallets and gave cash.  They gave items of cherished jewelry including watches.

Among those in the crowd that day was the businessman from Front Royal.  Fristoe was a member of one of those old Virginia Baptist families which had members who were persecuted for their faith.  The story which Curry told resonated with him.  And he felt moved to give to the college, even though he had never attended a school of higher learning.  He appreciated what such a school could mean to generations unborn and glimpsed a vision of how he might share in such an accomplishment.

When he returned to Front Royal, he talked with Sarah about the noble cause.  Since they had no children of their own, they decided to make the college boys their sons.  He began to give and to give.  He made provisions in his will.  Finally, Sarah laid down the law.  She said that everything from their estates could go to the college; but one thing she had to retain as her very own:  the sewing machine! 

In the 1870s Fristoe established a charitable remainder trust!  He left his lands and buildings and other property to his wife for her lifetime.  After Sarah’s death, everything was to go to Richmond College and its endowment fund.  But for her lifetime, Sarah held on to that new-fangled sewing machine and to one other possession – her piano.  She wanted to keep her fingers busy.

The Fristoes became philanthropists for a cause bigger than themselves.  They saw a need, a worthy enterprise, and a lasting contribution.  Across the long years, numerous individual Virginia Baptists have been philanthropists – large and small – with gifts to worthy Baptist-related causes, including the several educational institutions identified with the General Association and the different benevolences such as the Virginia Baptist Children’s Home and the Virginia Baptist Homes for retired persons. 

The couple from Front Royal pioneered in Baptist philanthropy.  Today there are numerous good and worthy causes – Baptist causes – including the Baptist General Association of Virginia – which could use the generous support of someone like the Fristoes.

February 2007 Edition

February is always a good month for a love story, since St. Valentine’s Day comes smack dab in the middle of the most maligned and generally miserable month of the year.  And so here is a love story with a Baptist history and heritage lesson to boot.

The story begins in Texas and concludes in Virginia.  In the 1890s a shy young woman named Minnie Lou Kennedy was teaching first grade in Rockport, Texas, and one fall a new principal was hired.  He was a recent graduate of Richmond College, a Baptist school in faraway Virginia.  He was a tall, handsome native Texan and he quickly took a romantic interest in the first grade teacher. 

The principal was thoroughly Baptist.  His parents had given him a good Baptist name, calling him William Carey after the first English Baptist missionary.  His last name was James.

Minnie Lou Kennedy was a staunch Episcopalian; and when they were married in June 1894, each respected and loved the other and each kept their own denominational affiliation.

William Carey James began struggling with God’s call to the ministry and his wife accepted his decision.  He made the decision to enroll at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville.

When the time came to leave Texas for Kentucky, Minnie James was pregnant and had to remain behind for the birth of the baby, a girl they named Margaret Estelle.  Once together in Louisville, the little family must have been happy sharing in the dream of a new life in gospel ministry.  He must have been daydreaming about his future life as a pastor and probably was weaving sermon outlines in his head.  She accepted the traditional view of a pastor’s wife and her dreams must have been of the support she would play in the church.

In 1896 W.C. James graduated magna cum laude with a doctorate.  He began to fill pulpits and his Episcopalian wife dutifully, probably proudly, sat in the Baptist congregations, listening to every word.

Blanche Sydnor White, the history-minded executive of Virginia Woman’s Missionary Union, worked closely with Minnie James and was privy to the following information:  “When Mrs. James told her preacher-husband that she was willing to change her denominational affiliation, she was surprised by his statement that he wanted no ‘Baptist by convenience’ in his church.  Unless she became a Baptist by conviction, he would not accept her membership!”

“One Sunday morning, Dr. James extended the usual invitation for church membership.  His wife left her pew, came forward, and asked for baptism.  Without further consultation with her husband, she had become a Baptist by conviction through a re-study of God’s Word.”  The couple had been married four years before Minnie became a Baptist.  She was twenty-four when she was immersed.

In 1907 W.C. James became pastor of Grove Avenue Baptist Church in Richmond.  For thirteen years, 1907-1920, the couple enjoyed a loving relationship with the church.  Someone once observed that “every woman in Grove Avenue Church loves Mrs. James.”

Before long, it could have been said that every Southern Baptist woman loved her!  Soon after their arrival in Virginia, she was elected to the executive board of Virginia WMU.  After only two years of service, she was elected president.  It was a glorious time of high achievements, including the beginning of a mountain mission school, a goodwill center, and a “Standard of Excellence” which long guided the local societies.

Virginia WMU had “an unwritten law” that a president should serve only two years; and so Mrs. James stepped aside only to return later for another term.  During her second presidency, the women adopted “the circle plan,” which proved a boon to enlistment and organization.  Many “missionary ladies” remember the days of “the circles.”

In 1912 Minnie James led the committee to plan the Jubilate Anniversary for WMU, SBC; and her leadership caught the attention of national leaders.  It was Fannie E. S. Heck herself who suggested that Minnie James be tapped as “Southern Union” president.

From 1916-1925, she gave superior leadership, developing study courses, moving the headquarters to Birmingham, and enhancing young people’s work.  But perhaps the single greatest achievement, and certainly the most far-reaching, was her participation on the committee that recommended a new plan known as the Cooperative Program.  The very words became almost an icon.  The concept bordered on sheer genius.  For decades it proved the pipeline of financial support for denominational enterprises.  On the local level, it gave the people in the pews the opportunity to feel a part of the larger work.

In 1923 Minnie James – the Episcopalian turned Baptist – presided over the women’s meeting of the Baptist World Alliance.  Meanwhile, W.C. James’ career soared – four years as head of SBC education work, another four as president of Bethel College in Kentucky and, finally, a return to Virginia as pastor of the Williamsburg Baptist Church and Bethlehem Baptist Church in Chesterfield. 

January 2007 Edition

January is always a month of new beginnings.  We post the new year’s calendar which we received as a gift over the holidays.  We begin a new appointment and social calendar.  We clear out the old and embrace the new.  The artist depicts the old year as an old person and the new year as a baby.

New Year’s Day itself should be a national holiday for Baptists! It’s made for them. With all its traditional and natural emphasis on new beginnings and resolutions, why it’s designed for Baptists.

One of the chief Baptist distinctives is the doctrine of regeneration. In theory, at least, it means that each believer is a changed, born-again, regenerated creature. Baptists have held that a collection of those changed folks, gathered together, are the rightful people that constitute a Baptist church. It is a powerful thought.

Jeremiah Bell Jeter, the preeminent Virginia Baptist leader of the nineteenth century, articulated the time-honored Baptist distinctives in his landmark Baptist Principles Reset. He wrote: “A spiritual, or regenerate, church membership lies at the foundation of all Baptist peculiarities. Repentance, faith, regeneration were conditions of admission to their fellowship.”

John A. Broadus, a great Baptist seminary leader, stated: “We hold that a Christian church ought to consist only of persons making a credible profession of conversion, of faith in Christ. Maintaining that none should be received as church members unless they give credible evidence of conversion, we also hold in theory that none should be retained in membership who do not lead a godly life.”

Broadus’ last statement seems foreign to contemporary Baptists, but in the old days Baptist churches routinely and regularly disciplined the flock for all manners of transgressions. The concept of church discipline offered the church community opportunities to deal openly and constructively with the paradox of sin within a regenerated people. It also solved many a dispute without resort to civil court.
And, more importantly, it offered redemption. The old church records may report the exclusion of a member for some infraction, and yet on the next page the records may tell that the guilty party confessed, asked forgiveness, and was reconciled – redemption and grace.
 
Old-time Baptists also welcomed the Holy Spirit to move among them in seasons of revival. The impact of the Great Awakening in New England was felt among some of the Baptists who adopted the name of “New Lights” or “Separates.” As historian Garnett Ryland explained: “[They] insisted on vital faith as a prerequisite to church membership.”
 
Two powerful preachers among the Separate Baptists were Shubal Stearns and Daniel Marshall.  They brought revival fires to Virginia. Lives were challenged and changed; churches were planted and prospered. In yet a later revival, the two diverse groups of Baptists in Virginia – the Separates and the Regulars – came together and formed a union.
 
Revival became a part of Baptist tradition. Many a church set aside one or two weeks each year as invitations for revival to break forth within the community.  Often it did, and with mighty results. Many an old-time Baptist church left the revival open-ended and hoped its “protracted meeting” would kindle a flame of religious zeal which would burn brightly till the next meeting.

Rededication offered another avenue for Baptists. And usually instead of an avenue it was an aisle – a church aisle and a waiting hand from a welcoming minister – that provided the means for a renewal of those within the community of believers.

Charles Spurgeon, the English evangelist, put it this way: “You must have a new heart and a right spirit and baptism cannot give you these. You must turn from your sins and follow after Christ; you must have such a faith as shall make your life holy and your speech devout.”

Francis Wayland, the American Baptist leader, stated: “The change of heart is called, in the Scriptures, regeneration, and hence our belief is that the church of Christ is made up wholly of regenerated persons.”

Walter Rauschenbusch, the “Social Gospel” figure, said: “Now consider how great a thing it is for a church body to assert that a man may and must come into direct personal relations with God and to adapt all its church life to create such direct spiritual experiences in men. I have met people in other churches who not only have no such experience themselves, but they doubt if anybody can have it. It seems presumption to them for a man to assert that he knows he has received pardon from God and is living in conscious fellowship with him. Yet what’s all the apparatus of church life good for if it does not help men to that experience?”

Any day is a good day to be made anew in Jesus. But somehow New Year’s Day and the first month of a new calendar year offer Baptists a special opportunity. The New Year traditions of resolutions and renewals seem downright Baptistic!