Jarrel - Baptist Church Perpetuity - Landmark Baptist

Mr. Orchard:
“I have demonstrated so far as human testimony is allowed to prove any fact
that the Baptist church, as the Church of Christ, has existed from the day of
Pentecost to this privileged period.” f75
John A. Broadus, D.D., LL. D.:
“And it would seem to be entirely possible and very probable that the patient
research of generations to come may gather material for a much nearer
approach to a continuous history of Baptists than is now practicable.”
Many years ago Dr. Benedict, a Baptist historian, wrote:
“The more I study the subject the stronger are my convictions that if all the
facts in the case could be disclosed a very good Succession could be made
out.” f76
Dr. Joseph Belcher:
“It will be seen that Baptists claim the high antiquity of the Christian church.
They can trace a succession of those who believe the same doctrine and
administer the same ordinances directly up to the apostolic age.” f77
The late William Williams, D.D., when Professor of Church History in the
Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, refuting a statement that he taught that
Baptists originated with the Reformation, wrote September 5, 1876:
“I now hasten to reply that it is not the teaching of the Southern Baptist
Theological Seminary, through its Professor of History, that the origin of
Baptists is to be traced to the Church of Rome in the sixteenth century. … The
Baptist churches, in my opinion, are of divine origin, and originated in the
first century under the preaching and founding of the Apostles of our Lord.”
The lamented Charles H. Spurgeon wrote:
“We care very little for the ‘historical argument,’ but if there be anything in it
all, the plea ought not to be filched by the clients of Rome, but should be left
to that community which all along has held ‘by one Lord, one faith and one
baptism.’ … It would not be impossible to show that the first Christians who
dwelt in the land were of the same faith and order as the church now called
Baptist. … The time will arrive when history will be rewritten.”
Geo. C. Lorimer, D.D.:
“There are reasons for believing that the Baptists are the oldest body of
Christians who dissent from the assumption of the Romish church.
Historically they are not Protestants, for while they sympathize with the
protest offered by the reformers at the Diet of Spire, 1529, in which this now
famous name originated, their existence antedates it by many centuries.”