Baptist and Anabaptist common grounds

[GreenEyedLady]

I wanted to point out first that there is a common ground here that I think all the churches in this forum would believe in.
Please correct me if I am wrong.
The fundementals of our Christian faith are:
the inerrant inspiration of the Bible
Salvation by grace though faith
the Diety of Christ
the Trinity
the blood atonement
the great commission.
The distinctives of our faith, Baptist, and Anabaptist between other christian groups or denominations would be:
Independent Churches (God is the authority not churches over churches)
Regeneate church membership(Saved people in the church, baptism required for church membership)
Believer's Baptism(only believers have a reason to be baptized)
Baptist by immersion(You know what that means!)
Soul Liberty(individuals reponsibility to turn to Christ)

Please correct me if I am wrong in any of these statements.

My point here is to take our heritage BACK in time, before 1600 by our common 5 traits listed above. Many think that Baptist and Anabaptist were only around since the 1500's however, just because the name Anabaptist and Bapist was not taken earlier in time does not mean our churches did not exist before the protestant movement.
There were many missionary's like our beloved brother Paul who went out preaching the good news and started New Testement churches also. These churchs had these fundemental belifes in them. The name "baptist" or "anabaptist" might not have been around for years, but our churchs have been around since before the protestend movement! I have not figured out yet if we were "labled" Baptist and Anabaptist by the movment or by those who considered us heretics OR some pastor just came up with the name and it stuck with the church though out the years.

I would love to go all the way with this thread with these fundementals of our faith, so long as all on this foum would agree that we alteast have these things listed above in common and some of them seperate us from other christian denominations.

This thread could possibly, get maybe other denominations a little tempted to slip in a few comments as to oppose what our history is because there's and ours don't match. I ask please, just Baptist and Anabaptist posting here on this thread. I turley would like this thread to be a blessing to all who read it.

I think I will wait before proceeding on this thread just to make sure i have the comon ground correct and that most of you would agree that we have these things atleast in common with our churchs.

God Bless this thread!
GEL

 

[Crazy Liz]

I wanted to point out first that there is a common ground here that I think all the churches in this forum would believe in.
Please correct me if I am wrong.
The fundementals of our Christian faith are:

Some Baptists and Anabaptists are not fundamentalists. I'll explain more WRT each point.

the inerrant inspiration of the Bible

"Inerrant" is a word that has come to take on a very technical meaning that not all of us would hold as a common belief. For example, I believe the Bible is our primary authority for faith and practice, infallible in all it teaches. However, I am not necessarily a Young Earth Creationist, which has become, for some, a litmus test of belief in biblical inerrancy.

The primacy and infallibility of the Bible are, I think, common beliefs of Baptists and Anabaptists (though not necessarily Quakers). However, there is some latitude in exactly what inerrancy or infallibility means. If you've noticed my sig line, this point is what it is getting at.

Salvation by grace though faith

I think so, although I'm sure there would be some variation in how each of the key words in this clause are defined.

the Diety of Christ

Yes.

the Trinity

Yes.

the blood atonement

If by this you mean the Anselmian theory of atonement is the only paradigm for salvation we accept, then I would say no. I'm too tired to get into salvation/atonement theology right now, and probably it's not necessary. I will limit myself to saying that the Anselmian theory of substitutionary blood atonement is only one of several biblical metaphors for salvation.

the great commission.

Yes.

The distinctives of our faith, Baptist, and Anabaptist between other christian groups or denominations would be:
Independent Churches (God is the authority not churches over churches)

I don't think so. This is peculiar to Baptist and nondenominational churches.

Regeneate church membership(Saved people in the church, baptism required for church membership)

True of Baptists and Anabaptists, but the part about baptism being required for membership would not be true of Quakers, the Salvation Army, or Evangelical Free churches, which are also traditions that would be included in this forum.

Believer's Baptism(only believers have a reason to be baptized)

Yes. However, not all Free Church Protestants are Baptists or Anabaptists. The Quakers and Salvation Army generally do not practice baptism.

Baptist by immersion(You know what that means!)

No.

Soul Liberty(individuals reponsibility to turn to Christ)

I'm not 100% clear about what this means. Anabaptists do not use this phrase. We probably need to talk about this some more.

I'm not going to reply to the rest of your post tonight. I don't know if I understand it exactly, and I think this is enough for tonight. I'm tired.

 

[GreenEyedLady]

Liz-
Have you done any reseach on the Waldenses or Cathari?
GEL

 

[Crazy Liz]

Liz-
Have you done any reseach on the Waldenses or Cathari?
GEL

No. I thought the Cathari were the people during the Middle Ages who went around doing extreme forms of public penance, but according to the Catholic Encyclopedia, the name has been used to refer to several different (unrelated) groups at different periods of time.

 

[Crazy Liz]

GEL, I think what you are trying to say is that the Baptists didn't make up a new tradition in the 1600s or borrow one the Anabaptists first made up in the 1500s, but recovered a much, much older tradition that the Roman Catholic Church had lost and/or suppressed since the time of Constantine.

This, generally, is what all the Reformers held, especially the Free Church Protestants. (I have heard enough sermons cursing Constantine to last a lifetime!) So I don't see any need for Baptists to distance themselves from the "protestant" label.