DIFFERENCES BETWEEN OLD & NEW SCHOOL BAPTISTS 6/6

 Beebe concludes his series of articles with the subject of predestination - ed.

On the subject of predestination. As on other points embraced in the gospel. The New Order of Baptists differ very widely among themselves. And it would give us pleasure to be able to say that the Old School were perfectly harmonious. Unhappily, there is some discrepancy in the views entertained even by them, or at least in their manner of expressing their views on this branch of the Christian doctrine. With some exceptions, the Old School Baptists believed that the whole government of God is administered, and all the works of God and creation, Providence, and grace are executed in strict accordance with the determinate council and predestination of God. One of the oldest of our sect, affirmed by inspiration that "God works all things after the counsel of His own will," and all consistent Old School Baptists subscribed to and rejoice in the affirmation. It is hard for them to conceive of how God could declare the end of all things from the beginning, and that if he did not know from the beginning what the end of all things would be, or how he could know from the beginning what the end of all things would be, or how he could know from the beginning the history and the result of all things if he did not possess that knowledge independently of himself. Or how that knowledge could be independent and of himself if it did not rest upon his own sovereign decision. If all the events in history and the destiny of this world were naked and open to the omniscient eye of God before all time, it could not at the same time be an undecided question with him whether such events should or should not transpire, and if it depended on the decision of God whether the world would with all of its contents, causes, effects, should exist. That decision by which it was made sure that they should exist in all their order, variety, connection, and circumstances, is what we call predestination. In the absence of such predestination, the existence of the world and all the events of time are but the things of chance, and the government of God, so far as relates to them, is but a name for nothing. There can be no medium between skepticism and unbelief in the predestination of all things. The skeptic renounces divine revelation and denies a supernatural or divine government over the events of time. 

All events with him are fortuitous and result from chance, and to the same conclusion, all must be driven who deny the absolute government of the Supreme God over all things and all events and all worlds. If the falling to the ground of one hair of our head could result from chance. Then so might the fall of a Sparrow worth half a Farthing and as so precisely the same of an empire or a world. But God has informed us that his government extends to the flight of sparrows and to the numbering and preservation and destiny of every hair of our heads. While Old School Baptists as a general thing believe what God has revealed in His Word on the subject, the New School has generally reviled him as Hyper-Calvinists. Antinomians. Fatalists. And charged him with making God the author of sin.

Some of the New School will admit that God has predestinated some things, while many others of the same school denied that doctrine altogether. Those among them who profess to believe the doctrine, so define their views as virtually denying it. For example, they say that all things which are in themselves good, and all good actions of men were predetermined or predestinated by God, but none of the wicked deeds of men or devils were provided for in the predetermination of God. The case of Joseph and his brethren is in point. According to their theory, God predestinated that Joseph should go down to Egypt. But not that his brethren should sell him to the Ishmaelites; that he should have had a home in Potiphar's home but not that he should encounter the wickedness of his mistress; that he should interpret the dreams of his fellow prisoners but not that he should be thrown into prison; that there should be seven years of plenty, but not that there should be seven years of famine, Because, they say if God has of the same lump of clay, made "some vessels to honor and others to dishonor," "if some were before of old ordained to this condemnation," "if before Jacob and Esau were born or had done. neither having done good or evil, God loved the one and hated the other; if some of the human family, as brute beasts, were made to be taken and destroyed, while others were from the beginning chosen the salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth, then God is the author of sin, and men are mere machines not to blame for their wicked actions. 

That God spared not his holy Son, but delivered him up to die for the redemption of sinners according to an eternal predetermination. They will admit. But that there should certainly be sinners to be saved, they deny. But he cannot believe that Pilate and Herod, the men of Israel and the Gentiles, came together to do what God's hand in counsel had before determined should be done. Not that he was delivered up by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God to be put to death with wicked hands. Predestination according to their creed. May have provided a great fish to Fairy Jonah to the shore. But the necessity for such a miraculous conveyance was accidental. That God created the Smith that blows the coals but not the water to destroy. There are others of the new school who admit that predestination is truly a Bible doctrine. They say that it ought not to be preached; that it is calculated to reflect on the divine character, conflict with the efforts of men for the salvation of sinners, and paralyze the arms of such as would steady the ark of the Lord. So great is the difference between the two parties on the subject, that it is as impossible to be a New School Baptist and a consistent Bible predestinarian simultaneously as it is to be a regular Old School Baptist and not love and feed upon the doctrine.

Predestination has been a rock of offense and a stone of stumbling to the enemies of God and truth. From the mourning of the creation, from the days of cane to the present day, men and devils have maintained an incessant war against it. But they have not prevailed. Nor can they prevail. But why did a heathen rage? Why did the enemies of truth imagine vain things against it? Truth or against a God of truth? Is it not because they hate the government of God? And chose to hold the government in their own hands. 

In what we have written on this subject We do not hold all whom we recognize this old school Baptist brethren responsible. As we have hinted, there is not as perfect unanimity among us on this subject as could be desired. But all so far, as our knowledge of them extends, which is very extensive glory in the doctrine so far, and is as it has been, opened to their understanding by the Spirit of Truth, whom the world cannot receive because it sees him not, neither knows him. We have not labored to bring a doctrine down to the comprehension of Armenians, of the Baptist, or of any other order. Nor to so modify or remove from the offense of the cross as to make carnal men love it. We certainly should never have rejoiced. In the understanding of it, if God had not by His power subdued the native enmity of our heart and shed His love abroad in us. We, therefore, are not permitted to rejoice that it subjects devils to us through our Redeemer's name. But rather that it has inscribed our names in heaven.

Elder Gilbert Beebe

Middletown, NY

April 1, 1848