OUR HISTORY SPEAKS TO OUR TIME

It is noteworthy that our Movement, which was launched as an effort “to unite the Christians in all the sects,” found its origin in men’s concern for partyism and division as reflected in sectarian attitudes toward the Lord’s Supper. Both Thomas and Alexander Campbell had experiences with the Lord’s Supper that turned them in a new direction in their quest for truth. It is also remarkable that our Movement at its source, in Cane Ridge, Kentucky, found its origin in a Holy Spirit revival Had it not been for that great revival, where as many as 25,000 gathered for spiritual renewal, Barton W. Stone and his fellow Presbyterian ministers would never have begun their reformatory efforts.

It is this particular history that I now recount, allowing it to speak to our time. It is interesting to most of us that our Movement should emerge out of the drama of the Lord’s Supper, but it appears to be disconcerting for some to realize that we trace our origin to a Holy Spirit revival, especially those who, like those that Paul met at Ephesus, wonder if there be such a thing as the Holy Spirit. Yet it is most appropriate that a Movement devoted to unity and fellowship should trace its beginnings to a concern for the communion of the Lord’s Supper and the communion of the Holy Spirit, for these are the greatest expressions of both the source of unity and the continual sharing of fellowship. Unity is, after all, “the unity of the Spirit,” and it is only as that Holy Guest dwells in our hearts, producing his love, joy and peace, that we are made one. And it is in the Supper that we sit with Jesus and with each other in the most glorious celebration of oneness. “When we bless ‘the cup of blessing’ is it not a means of sharing in the blood of Christ? When we break the bread, is it not a means of sharing in the body of Christ?” (1 Cor. 10:16).

It was providential for Alexander Campbell, and perhaps for us, that a wreck at sea delayed his voyage from Ireland to America to join his father, who had come to the New World to find a home for his family and a freer ministry for himself as a Presbyterian clergyman. The delay made it possible not only for Alexander to spend a year at Glasgow University, which left its mark upon his educational philosophy, but also to become acquainted with such restoration-minded people as Robert and James Haldane and Greville Ewing. These men were disenchanted with the sectarian religion that had brought the lovely isle of Scotland to a very low ebb spiritually. They launched efforts to evangelize the land, in opposition to the clergy. They called for more freedom and individuality in religious thought and a greater reliance upon the scriptures apart from human creeds. They sought to restore the priesthood of all believers through lay-preaching and mutual ministry, and they devoted themselves to reforming the church in doctrine, worship and organization. The high point came when James Haldane informed his congregation, now independent of the Scottish Presbyterian Church, that he could no longer conscientiously baptize children, and was himself immersed.

As a college student Alexander found himself handling the problem of a decadent, sectarian religion somewhat like our youth of today do. He attended his own Anti-Burgher Seceder Presbyterian Church, a strict sect that had broken away from the church that had broken away from the Scottish Presbyterians, on Sunday mornings, but would then steal away to hear Greville Ewing in the evenings, and to sit with him in rap sessions far into the night. In all these experiences the thing that influenced Alexander the most was that the clergy opposed any effort to reform the church. The preachers were content with their sectarian stance, and it was clear that they wanted no one, including the Haldanes and the Ewings, interfering with their ecclesiasticism. This not only caused the youthful Campbell to grow doubtful of authoritarian religious structures, but also to become suspicious of the clergy as a God-ordained system within the church.

It was at about this time, when Alexander Campbell was 21 years old, that the Seceder Presbyterians in Glasgow were to have their annual communion. To qualify for this he had to go before the session and pass an examination, for he had come from Ireland and was not a part of the local fellowship. Passing the examination, he was given a metal token, which everyone wishing to commune had to obtain. It was with an unsettled mind and with serious doubts about his relationship as an exclusive sect that Alexander Campbell, with token in hand, set out to partake of the Lord’s Supper. His doubts were compounded by the fact that he realized that other Christians he had come to love and respect for their spirituality, such as Greville Ewing, would not be allowed to break bread with his people. They would have to have a metal token, such as Alexander clutched in his hand, to prove their acceptance by this particular sect. Young Campbell could see that the Supper, surely intended for all God’s children, was prostituted for the sake of sectarian bigotry.

But loyalty to his parents’ church bore down upon him, as well as his own, desire to conform as much as possible to the practices of his own tradition. So there he stood before the nine tables set up to serve the 800 people that had gathered. Doubts held him back, so he stepped aside and allowed others to file by, waiting for the last table, hoping that by then he could step out with good conscience. But the moment of truth had to come when the usher passed before him with the plate upon which he was to drop his token and then proceed to the table. And at that moment Alexander Campbell made a decision that was not only to change his life, but to ignite the fires of a Movement that would eventually sweep like a prairie fire on the American frontier and to affect the history of Christianity for centuries.

He tossed the token into the plate, and, refusing to partake of the Supper when spread upon the table of sectarian partyism, he walked out as a free man in Jesus Christ. Robert Richardson, his physician and biographer, writing of this watershed in Campbell’s life, says: “It was at this moment that the struggle in his mind was completed, and the ring of the token, falling upon the plate, announced the instant at which he renounced Presbyterianism forever — the leaden voucher becoming thus a token not of communion but of separation.” And we might add that the clink of that coin marks one of the beginnings of what we now know as the Restoration Movement in the United States.

About this same time Thomas Campbell was having a similar experience on the American frontier. Arriving in this country in 1807, he submitted himself for ministerial service to his own sect of Presbyterians, who were already on record for prohibiting “occasional communion” with other Christians, including other Presbyterians. Already weary of the divisions in his own land, Thomas was doomed to disappointment in his hope that conditions would be better in America. He soon learned that in his ministrations along the far-flung frontier of western Pennsylvania that he was to have fellowship only with Anti-Burgher Seceder Presbyterians. There were of course Methodists, Baptists, and other kinds of Presbyterians on his circuit, all of whom he was expected to ignore in favor of his own kind. But he hardly had the heart for this kind of exclusiveness, and so he invited all those who professed faith, not only to his meetings but to the Lord’s Supper as well, and it was this that got him into trouble.

Not unlike our own day, Thomas soon came under the suspicions of his fellow ministers. His soundness in the faith was questioned. They looked askance at his friendship with other believers, insisting that he should be as exclusive as themselves.

On one journey into northwestern Pennsylvania, Thomas was impressed with the large number of other kinds of Presbyterians that attended his meetings, and he was touched by the fact that they seldom had the opportunity to break bread with other Christians. So on this occasion he invited them to the fellowship, bemoaning the fact that divisions have cruelly kept God’s people separated. A fellow minister, traveling with Campbell, was shocked that other Presbyterians would be included and proceeded to report this to the presbytery. The news of his heresy spread rapidly among the Anti-Burghers, and it was not long until other preachers refused to work with him. Charged before the presbytery for holding that confessions of faith were nothing more than human authority, he fell under a judgment that was eventually to separate him from the Presbyterians as much as his son was back in Scotland.

Before leaving the church of his youth, which his sensitive soul could do only with great reluctance, he read a statement to the synod in which he gave expression to some of those principles that inspired the Restoration Movement, something akin to the “Here I Stand” speech of Martin Luther.

“It is therefore because I have no confidence, either in my own infallibility, or in that of others, that I absolutely refuse, as inadmissable and schismatic, the introduction of human opinions and human inventions into the worship and faith of the church.”

As to the accusations made against him, he said: “For what error or immorality ought I to be rejected, except it be that I refuse to acknowledge as obligatory upon myself, or to impose upon others, anything as of Divine Obligation, for which I cannot produce a ‘Thus saith the Lord’?”

He closed his remarks by assuring them that he sincerely desired union with them even though they could not agree with his willingness to share fellowship with those humble Christian brethren who were different from himself. But this was not to be. Tensions forced him to leave and to work independently of any denomination.

Thomas Campbell was now 46 and alone in a new land, his church having rejected him and his family delayed in Europe because of a shipwreck. But God blesses his children who are besieged by angry men with new friends, and they soon discover that they have more brothers and sisters than they realize. Such was the case with Mr. Campbell, for God gave him so many new friends and brethren that he launched an effort “to unite the Christians in all the sects.” His plea became the union of the divided church on the basis of the Bible. Barred from churches, he took his plea to homes and barns, and his summer meetings were held out of doors under the trees. Large numbers came to hear his cry for the oneness of the church and the unity of all believers. He deplored partisan divisions, called for a faith and practice based upon the Bible alone, and encouraged Christians to cooperate with each other.

Interestingly enough, Campbell was not opposing the creeds as such. He himself was still a staunch Calvinist and still believed virtually everything in the Westminster Confession of Faith. Indeed, he once insisted that “I’ll be a Calvinist to my dying day.” It was making a creed the basis of fellowship that he objected to. Any man, or any church, can have its opinions, he granted, and these may be stated in creedal form; but such opinions cannot be imposed upon others or required of them as acceptance into the family of God.

Out of his labors was formed the Christian Association of Washington in 1809, a loose organization that had no intention of becoming a church, the aim of which was to encourage unity and fellowship among all believers. It was in the first gathering of this association that Thomas Campbell made that now famous statement, “Where the scriptures speak, we speak; and where the scriptures are silent, we are silent.” Upon hearing that summary of Mr. Campbell’s views, one brother spoke up and said, “If we adopt that as a basis, then there is an end of infant baptism.” This was followed by animated discussion. Finally Campbell said, “Of course, if infant baptism be not found in scripture, we can have nothing to do with it.” And so the Restoration Movement was off the ground. This association evolved into the Brush Run Church, our first congregation in the Campbell wing of the Movement.

It was during this time that Thomas Campbell wrote the Declaration and Address, which has become our magna charta for Christian liberty. It was here that he zeroed in on the right of private judgment: “It is high time for us not only to think, but also to act, for ourselves; to see with our own eyes, and to take all our measures directly and immediately from the Divine Standard,” and he insisted that we are bound to the scriptures, to them alone, and not to any human interpretation of them.

And he surely spoke for us all when he wrote, “Tired and sick of the bitter jarrings and janglings of a party spirit, we would desire to be at rest; and, were it possible, we would also desire to adopt and recommend such measures as would give rest to our brethren throughout all the churches, as would restore unity, peace, and purity, to the whole church of God.”

We, too, with aching hearts look upon a brotherhood splintered and fissioned by sectarian bigotry and long for that love and forbearance that make men one. We, too, are tired and sick of the whole sordid mess that makes our churches rivals of each other and keeps devoted brothers in Christ separated from each other. Each of us should here and now, in the spirit of Thomas Campbell, resolve that we will henceforth belong to no man’s party, and that we will accept as our brothers all those that God accepts as His children.

In this great document Campbell sets forth some principles that will help us in that resolve.

1. He recognized that divisions are nearly always over matters that the Bible says nothing about: “Our differences, at most, are about the things in which the kingdom of God does not consist, that is, about matters of private opinion, or human invention.”

2. He points to the necessary unity of the church, recognizing that we must honor that oneness despite our differences: “The Church of Christ upon earth is essentially, intentionally, and constitutionally one; consisting of all those in every place that profess their faith in Christ and obedience to him in all things according to the scriptures, and that manifest the same by their tempers and conduct, and of none else, as none else can be truly and properly called Christians.

3. He shows that unity is much more than cooperation, for it involves receiving one another even as Christ has received us: “Although the church of Christ upon earth must necessarily exist in particular and distinct societies locally separate one from another, yet there ought to be no schisms, no uncharitable divisions among them. They ought to receive each other as Christ Jesus hath also received them to the glory of God.” There we have our answer. If we will only receive each other, with all our hangups and foibles, just as Jesus has received us, with all our hangups and foibles. If Jesus receives us even when we are wrong, we ought to receive one another even when we are wrong.

4. He lays down the only possible basis of fellowship in insisting that we can make nothing a condition of acceptance that is not expressly stated in the Word of God: “Nothing can be required as a term of communion but what is expressly taught and enjoined by the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ and his Apostles upon the New Testament church, either in express terms or by approved precedent.”

When Alexander Campbell read this document the principles set forth thrilled his heart, but he had doubts about one point, the phrase just read: either in express terms or approved precedent. To base fellowship upon what is expressly stated in scripture was safe enough, Alexander agreed, but he took exception to the other, for there would always be disagreement as to what is an approved precedent and what is not. And so he saw fellowship based only upon what is clearly stated in the scriptures, and not by what we might like to tag “an approved example”.

And I agree with Alexander Campbell. To make it even clearer, I take the position that unity and fellowship are based only upon what is clearly and distinctly set forth as a command of God. Only commands are binding, not examples. Examples are binding only when they illustrate some command. I repeat: only commands of God can be made tests of fellowship; examples are binding only as they reflect God’s commands.

Several years before all this happened with the Campbells, Barton W. Stone down in Kentucky had started a unity movement all of his own, and we have said that it was born amidst the fires of a Holy Spirit revival. Stone himself writes of this great revival that reaped thousands of converts, including many hardened sinners that he believed could be touched only by God’s grace through the Holy Spirit. And he says, “Many things transpired there, which were so much like miracles, that if they were not, they had the same effects as miracles on infidels and unbelievers; for many of them by these were convinced that Jesus was the Christ, and bowed in submission to him.”

It was this revival spirit that fired the heart of Barton Stone to be a reformer. He and four other Presbyterian ministers resolved to renounce the sectarian spirit and be Christians only, directed solely by the authority of the scriptures. Soon the congregations they served, now separated from Presbyterianism formed a unity effort that began to reach out far and wide. They at first created their own presbytery, but decided that even this did not bespeak the simplicity of the New Testament order, and so resolved “that this body die and be dissolved and sink into union with the Body of Christ at large; for there is but one body, and Spirit, even as we are called in one hope of our calling.” So they wrote in The’ Last Will and Testament of the Springfield Presbytery, another significant document in our great heritage.

These leaders of the Stone movement were still unimmersed, as were the Campbells in the first years of their work. Once convinced by their own study that they should be immersed, they tried to get some Baptist ministers to immerse them, but they would do so only if they would become Baptists. But these men, now calling themselves simply “Christians,” explained that they had already left one sect and that nothing would be gained by joining another. They resolved their problem by immersing one another. And, again in another part of the world, the Restoration Movement was off the ground.

These two movements for unity and reform, one in Virginia under the Campbells and one in Kentucky under Stone (and later Raccoon John Smith and John T. Johnson) did not even know of one another for several years. They finally began to hear of one another and to cross each other’s paths, and came to realize that they had a great deal in common.

By 1829 the Stone group, the oldest of the two, had about 10,000 followers, while the Campbells had some 8,000 that had rallied to their efforts. Through the influence of Stone, Johnson, and Smith, along with John Rogers, these two groups began contacts and conversations that were to lead to their union, which proved to be the first union between two churches in the history of ecumenicity. Our brethren of yesteryear have thus set us an example of what a divided people can do. This union was not based on uniformity of opinion or doctrine, and it cannot ever be so based, for people are going to see things differently as surely as they are different in physical appearance, emotional makeup, and intellectual capacity. At this time they did not even agree on baptism for the Stones still omitted it from their preaching and did not then accept it as being for the remission of sins. Still they effected the union because they were together immersed believers and accepted Jesus as the Lord of their lives and looked only to his Word for their direction.

That was a great day in our history when Barton Stone and Raccoon Smith could stand together before that audience and talk about uniting their forces, “Let us then, my brethren, be no longer Campbellites or Stoneites, New Lights, or Old lights, or any other kind of lights,” Raccoon said to a gathering made up of the likes of Jacob Creath and Philip Fall, men who had suffered much for their faith. But let us come to the Bible and to the Bible alone, as the only book in creation which can give us all the Light we need! Let us stand together united in the Church of Christ as his disciples and as Christians only’” he added.

Shouts of Amen! and Hallelujah! and Praise the Lord! Folk began shaking hands and embracing as brothers. And then someone started that great hymn, and it soon filled the house as if it symbolized the Spirit’s presence.

All hail the power of Jesus’ name

Let angels prostrate fall;

Bring forth the royal diadem

And crown him Lord of all

Raccoon pondered afterward that perhaps the perfect church had been realized, on Jan. 1,1832. His wise wife Nancy reminded him that perfection is mighty hard to come by and that somehow we never quite make it.

But it was the beginning of the beginning.

Let us in our generation not fail the great heritage bequeathed us. Let us make sure that we at least bring our people to the end of the beginning.—presented by the Editor to the First Annual Mid-Gulf Unity Forum, Proctor Street Church of Christ, Port Arthur, Texas, March 31, 1974.