BHC Plenary Session - 4

Profile: Shubal Stearns (John Sparks) – great presentation, costume and singing.
Sandy Creek Tradition for NC Baptists and vital in CT Baptists as well
God uses men like Pastor Stearns to change many lives along the way and to pave the way for many Baptists today. Neat how just 6 years ago I was sitting in Binkley listening to Voddie Baucham during Sandy Creek Revival Week – all because of God using this man and others to come to NC, preach the gospel, and lead the Baptists.

Profile: R H Boyd (David Groves) – Boyd Publishing Co, Nashville, TN
Three biblical reasons to study him:
1. He was a man of purpose – A slave born 2 decades before the War, he overcame and became a Baptist preacher. He found his work to accomplish. Family man and organized associations, pastor of churches in TX, superintendent of NBC TX.
2. He was a religious pioneer. Leading former slaves was a tedious task. Writings out of their experiences were to be more helpful to them both spiritually and economically.
3. He developed partnerships. J M Frost – of the SBC. Publishing relationships, developed own materials, used own writers. National Baptist Publishing Board came out from that partnership and is still in existence.

Birth of Gospel Music – Lucie Campbell and Thomas Dorsey – Charles Walker (got to eat lunch with him yesterday)
Dorsey – “Georgia Tom – blues nickname) his Dad was an itinerate preacher and his mom was a pianist (great mix). Was involved in worldly music early on and had a varied childhood – he sang in a Billy Sunday crusade, but also sang in clubs and bars. Writer of “There Will Be Peace in the Valley” and “Precious Lord, Take My Hand” – two well recorded hymns. This latter song came out of a trial of losing his wife while he was away singing at a revival.
Lucie Campbell – smart educator in the early 20th Century. She was the composer of many songs in the early to mid 1900s; she didn’t have any contact with worldly music, unlike Dorsey. She didn’t quite to courtship to her husband like would be biblical – but it made for a great story. “Something Within”

Bill Carlson – Theological/Social/Economic Response in the 19th Century
Economic: He read Salvation in the Slums early on, and that shaped some of his thinking. There should be some reach with the gospel – salvation – to the poor of our society.
Social - The Great Reversal ­ - What happened to those who championed these issues in the late 19th century who abandoned it after the turn of the century? Baptist history isn’t solely an Anglo-history. Christianity is global.
5 Baptist individuals who addressed three essential questions:
1. How should Baptists assist African Americans and society as a whole after the CW?
2. How should Baptists assist America on the issue of gender (women’s right to vote)?
3. How should Baptists respond to capitalism and financial stress in America?
1. Nanny Burroughs and Sutton Griggs – How do we integrate ourselves and our traditions into a new society (post CW)? How do we deal with reconstruction? (new denomination, new publishing co and educational units, post-south re-segregation and lynching, integrate into culture). The Leopard’s Spots was written by Briggs in response to some of these questions as well as The Imperial.
3. Helen Montgomery – Women’s Suffrage movement. The only way to move from an alcohol-ridden society was to allow women to vote and preach. She spent most of her life in NY and was significant in doing: published a translation of the NT to counter the KJV, a major player in attempt to reconcile the NBC, and developed a friendship with Susan B Anthony (and argued Suffrage).
4. Walter Rauschenbusch – Christianity and a Social Gospel - the Bible for the social gospel, written in 1907 (100 years ago).
5. Russell Conwell – moderately supportive of the Success Theology.
They all were attempting to know how the church should respond to culture – the same question applies to the social issues facing our society even today.

Application for today:
1. Love all different kinds of music. Variation does the ears good!
2. Know your culture. The gospel resounds to hurting people. Jesus loves them.