May 6, 2012 Puritanism, as a Protestant religious movement, has effected and continues to affect evangelical epistemology and practice positively and negatively in many profound ways. Today’s evangelicals would also profit greatly by accepting Puritan influences in other aspects of their faith and action. Puritanism has positively influenced evangelical views of soteriology, biblical authority, scriptural exegesis, pastoral care, personal discipleship, priesthood of the believer, parental responsibility in the spiritual care of one’s own children, a daily devotional life, the balance between reason and experience in matters of faith, and the scope of religious education. Puritanism has also negatively affected evangelicals in the areas of legalism and partisan intolerance. This article will restrict itself to a brief discussion of only the positive Puritan contributions of biblical authority, and soteriology, pastoral care and discipleship, and the negative influence of legalism. Perhaps evangelicals have profited the most from the Puritan understanding of biblical authority and scriptural exegesis. As a people of the Book, the Puritans and their contemporaries, the separatist’s and non-conformist’s, some of which became the forefathers of modern evangelicals, held high views of scripture as God’s infallible word. The Westminster Confession statement that the “the Old Testament in Hebrew, and the New Testament in Greek, being immediately inspired by God . . . are authentical”1 clarifies the nature of the Scriptures in a more thorough and honest way than has often been the case during the recent past within the Southern Baptist Convention. The clarification that the inerrancy of the biblical autographs is what is being asserted by proponents of biblical inerrancy has increasingly become a casualty of debate in contemporary discussions on biblical authority within the Southern Baptist Convention. When one reads Puritan sermons or commentaries one discovers consistency on the point of upholding biblical authority. The Puritans clearly treated the scripture as a special book when they approached the work of interpretation. Richard Baxter wrote “Before and after you read the Scripture pray earnestly that the Spirit which did indite it, may expound it to you, and lead you into the truth.”2 Evangelicals in general and Southern Baptists in particular would do well to follow the Puritans example of treating the scripture with such care. While elevating scripture above tradition, and finding a proper balance between faith and reason are high points of Puritan contributions to contemporary evangelicals, their reasoned and balanced doctrine of salvation need not be overlooked. Among the many positive facets of Puritan soteriology their emphasis on the necessity of the Holy Spirit in conversion needs to be reiterated by evangelicals. The balance that this aspect of salvation doctrine provides between the orthodoxy of theology and the experience of faith may prove helpful in reaching a postmodern world. First, however, the practice of salvation doctrine needs to be held up to the truth of theology. Persons in too many churches speak of the need for someone to “join the church” or “be baptized” 3 without ever expressing a need for conviction, repentance, regeneration, or conversion. These occurrences are the result of church practices not keeping in step with theological doctrines. The unfortunate result of this doctrinal laxity is that too many have the mistaken impression that knowledge that Jesus Christ is God’s son coupled with walking an aisle and shaking the pastor’s hand are the most critical elements in one’s salvation experience. When this erroneous practice is viewed in the context of the lenience of current church discipline and ineffective discipleship methods the result is a personal tragedy in the lives of countless individuals. These personal tragedies are quickly revealed to be catastrophic eternally for all who come to believe falsely that they have been saved, and temporally for countless others who view the lack of purity and joy in the lives of these so called Christians and then come to view the gospel as lacking the power to transform their lives. This practice of “membership soteriology”4 in which church membership is equated to spiritual conversion through church tradition is insidious and is an area in which evangelicals need to allow the Puritans to inform both their practice and doctrine. The Puritan understanding of the necessity of the Holy Spirit in convicting one of the awfulness of their sin could prove a helpful corrective 5to this cheapening of God’s marvelous grace. One means to correcting this problem would be for evangelicals to reclaim the Puritan Thomas Watson’s premise that there is no such thing as a carnal Christian. He writes, “It is inconsistent with the sanctity of God’s nature to pardon a sinner while he is in the act of rebellion.”6 He suggests that when people half turn from sin “in their judgement but not in their practice,”7 the result is a life that “may be moralized [but] the lust [is] unmortified.”8 Watson draws from scripture as he uses the story of the evil spirit that leaves a man, but then says “I will return to the house I left”9and finding it cleaned and organized brings seven other spirits with him so that the later end is worse than the former, to explain the dangers this failure to truly repent harbors. This concept of the failure of persons to be completely repentant gives a cogent explanation as to why so many church members are powerless in their personal lives and why so many churches are not having greater impact upon their surrounding communities. It is to this strain of thought that contemporary writers like Mark Dever are writing their prescription to help sick churches. In Nine Marks of a Healthy Church, Dever writes that Paul’s use of the term “carnal Christian” is an oxymoron. Dever concludes “If you are a Christian, it is because God, by his own gracious action in your life, has grown a desire in you to live a life that pleases Him more and more. Such growth is a sign of true spiritual life.”10 Another area related to the doctrine of salvation in which evangelicals can profit from the Puritan perspective is the important role pastoral care plays in evangelization and discipleship. Aside from the positive personal impact Baxter’s The Reformed Pastor can have on individual ministers, if his vision of ministry became a model for contemporary ministerial staffs the confusion many church members express regarding their own salvation might be alleviated. His plea to his contemporaries demonstrates the passion which Puritans placed on both evangelism and follow up. If contemporary pastors and churches could similarly reform, perhaps the increasing numbers of “carnal Christians” would diminish. Simple acceptance of That Baxter’s thesis that it is the duty of ministers to personally work toward “catechizing, and instructing individually, all that are committed to their care” 11 would advance the discipleship ministry of most churches seems to be the point George Barna makes in his book, Growing True Disciples. Barna writes that a better evangelism strategy than crusades, advertising would be to “convert the four out of every ten adults and one out of every three teenagers who have asked Jesus Christ to be their Savior into inspired, unmistakable disciples of Jesus.”12 A full acceptance and application of Baxter’s thesis could potentially unleash an army of disciples who are already in the church’s membership. The legalistic depiction of the Puritans which many unfortunately hold has a basis in fact. There numerous rules which are recorded in the legal code they created when the Massachusetts Bay Colony was established which go beyond their desire for order. In Worldly Saints, Leland Ryken, records: In New England, two young lovers were tried ‘for sitting together on the Lord’s Day under an apple tree in Goodman Chapman’s orchard.’ Someone else was publicly reproved ‘for writing a note about common business on the Lord’s Day, at least in the evening somewhat too soon.’ Elizabeth Eddy of Plymouth was fined ‘for wringing and hanging out clothes,’ and a New England soldier for ‘wetting a piece of an old hat to put in his shoe’ to protect his foot.13 Clearly, when the line between law and liberty was crossed, the Puritans favored the law. As seen from Ryken, they enforced their own Christian Sabbath rigidly. One would imagine that after suffering the persecution in England as the Puritans had that they would be more tolerant of those who had different religious beliefs. This was not the case, however, as the classic case of the expulsion of Roger Williams from the Massachusetts Bay Colony for his religious beliefs bears out. It is impossible to explain Puritan intolerance of differing religious viewpoints in the context of today’s different societal mores, but before we become judgmental we need to consider that our own history as a society leaves much to be desired on the same point. We should further acknowledge that were it not for abuses in past administration of our own church discipline, we might find it easier to begin and practice a balanced biblical discipline in our churches. While it is clear from the work of Ryken that abuse occurred, it seems just as clear that today we have erred just as grievously, perhaps more so, in the opposite direction. Today’s evangelicals need to fight past legalistic tendencies, and also find our voice to denounce the numerous occurrences where the cheapening of God’s grace causes some to live as though they have a license to sin. End Notes 1. G. I. Williamson. The Westminster Confession of Faith: For Study Classes (Philadelphia, PA: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1964) 14. 2. Richard Baxter Works, I:478.quoted in J.I. Packer A Quest for Godliness: The Puritan Vision of the Christian Life. (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 1994), 100. 3. These anecdotal comments are based on those commonly heard during the authors twenty-five years of pastoral experience. 4. Thom Rainer, (classroom lecture notes in the hand of the author, 88750 — Contemporary Church Growth, March 21, 2001). 5. See Westminister Confession X. Of Effectual Calling. 6. Thomas Watson, The Doctrine of Repentance, (Carlisle PA: Banner of Truth, 1999), 60. 7. Ibid., 56. 8. Ibid., 67. 9. Luke 11:24. NIV. 10. Mark Dever, Nine Marks of a Healthy Church, (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2000), 203. 11. Richard Baxter, The Reformed Pastor, (Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth, 1999), 42. 12. George Barna, Growing True Disciples, (Ventura, CA: Issachar Resources, 2000), 8. 13. Leland, Ryken. Worldly Saints: The Puritans as They Really Were. (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1990), 191.