- Sermon - Mickey Anders

Text: Acts 2:38

I was born to Thomas and Jane Campbell on September 12, 1788 in Ireland. In my early years, I was home schooled by my father, who was an outstanding preacher of the Gospel and a highly educated man. As a child I memorized large portions of Scripture as well as hymns and choice selections from world literature. I also studied Latin, French, Greek and moral philosophy. I was especially taken by the ideas of John Locke.

My father, Thomas Campbell, was pastor of Ahorey Presbyterian Church in Ireland. To supplement his income he had private schools in our home. At 16 years of age, I began to serve as his assistant, and soon gained a reputation as an excellent teacher. In my late teens, I began to take both life and religion more seriously.

From the time I first began to read the Bible, I believed in Jesus as the Christ, but I did not have the feeling of salvation that I supposed I should. This caused great distress of soul.

Finally, after many strugglings, I was able to put my trust in the Savior, and to feel my reliance on him as the only Savior of sinners. This gave me the peace that I sought.

And I then began to seriously consider my father's desire that I enter the ministry. I started an extensive study of theology and church history. I was immediately disturbed by ignorance, superstition, priest-ridden oppression, and particularly divisions among Christians.

When my father's health grew delicate, his doctor advised a lengthy sea voyage. He decided to sail for America - not only for health's sake, but to search out what might possibly be a home for our family in the New World. While he was gone, I took over the school and continued my private studies, and helped my mother care for the other children in the family.

After fifteen months, my father finally decided there was a future for our family in America, so he sent for us to join him. We left Ireland on the ship named Hibernia on October 1, 1808, about the time I turned 20 years of age. After two days at sea, the ship went aground in a storm, and we were forced to spend almost a year ashore in Scotland. During that time, I attended 300 days of classes at the famous University of Glasgow.

While in Scotland, I was exposed to a variety of religious experiences in nearby churches. I had the opportunity to listen to some Independent preachers including James and Robert Haldane, and especially Greville Ewing. Ewing called for weekly Communion, the Bible to the exclusion of human creeds, congregational autonomy, the rights of lay ministers, the rejection of clerical privilege and the practice of mutual ministry. Many of those ideas were foundation stones for much of my later ministry.

But the thing that bothered me the most was the sectarian bickering and factionalism that I experienced in my own Seceder Presbyterian church. My church was so restrictive on Communion that an exemplary Christian like Greville Ewing would not be allowed to break bread with us.

When it came time for our church's semi-annual Communion service, I went before the elders to be examined as to my worthiness to take part. Of course, I passed their test and received the usual leaden token that would allow me a place at the Communion table. On that fateful Lord's Day in the spring of 1809, I waited in line to enter the Communion room, nursing my doubts about it all. I kept dropping back in line, trying to decide what to do. When at last I was seated at the table, I placed my token in the plate, but let the elements pass without partaking.

This was a pivotal moment for me. It was my private expression of my repudiation of sectarianism, and thereafter I would be resolute in turning in a new direction. I gave no defiant speech, and did not walk out in protest, but I would no longer be sectarian. I was now a free person in Christ.

On August 3, 1809, my family finally sailed for America. We traveled by stagecoach and wagon, finally reuniting with my father after a separation of two years. With great anxiety I shared with my father my highly rebellious ideas about the church and that I had refused Communion. Much to my surprise, I discovered that my father had developed very similar convictions while in America. We felt it was providence that had brought us to one mind in regard to the reformation of the church. We were both convinced of the need of a plea for Christian unity based on the Bible alone.

My father started the Brush Run church in 1811 and wrote his most famous document called "The Declaration and Address," which was a call for Christian unity. Meanwhile, I continued my studies and was ordained to the ministry. I preached my first sermon on July 10, 1810 and went on to give 100 sermons over the next year.

Soon I married Margaret Brown, the 18-year-old daughter of a farmer and carpenter named John Brown. Her father deeded the family home and farm to us as an incentive to remain in Bethany. This was the beginning of a 55 year residency in Bethany.

My first theological crisis came with the birth of my first child. I had to decide if she should be baptized as an infant as all good Presbyterians were. After searching the Greek New Testament and consulting other scholars, I decided against baptism for my daughter and also resolved that I should be baptized by immersion, which I had now decided was the only valid form of baptism. My wife Margaret joined me in this resolution. We asked Baptist minister Matthias Luce to immerse us simply on our confession that Jesus is the Christ. I was nervous about sharing that decision with my father, but when it came time for the baptism, my father and mother not only came along, but brought a change of clothing with them so that they could be baptized by immersion as well.

This was the defining moment that separated us from our Presbyterian heritage once and for all and identified us with the Baptists. In fact, I began making public debates with those favoring infant baptism, and I had such success that the Baptists seemed to think I was a hero. I never officially became a Baptist, but the first two Campbell churches belonged to the Redstone Baptist Associations. We became known as the "Reformed Baptists" and my first journal was named the "Christian Baptist."

In 1816, I preached what is perhaps my most famous sermon entitled "Sermon the Law" before the Redstone Baptist Association. It was another turning point in the story of our movement. Taking my text from Romans 8:3, I argued that the Old Testament and the New Testament reflect different systems and different covenants, and that the Christian is "not under law but under grace." The Christian dispensation is not merely a continuation of the Mosaic law as was commonly taught in Calvinist theology, but a new system of grace.

The pastor of the Cross Creek church quickly rallied opposition and moved against me, insisting that "This is not Baptist doctrine," and that it should be exposed as heresy. It was the beginning of a seven year's war with the Baptists.

I continued to work among the Baptists until the 1820s when my followers began to be forced out by Baptist Associations. I always regretted that our people and the Baptists had to separate.

In 1818, I started a school in my home called the Buffalo Seminary. I used the main floor for classrooms and the upstairs for a dormitory. We had more students that I could handle, but after four years, I decided that this approach was not producing co-workers for the budding reformation, and I closed it.

During this time debating became a new dimension to my ministry. It was not uncommon for Presbyterians to challenge Baptists to debate their differences on baptism. In 1820, I debated John Walker, a Seceder Presbyterian minister in Mt. Pleasant, Ohio, and three years later I debated W.L. Maccalla in Washington, Kentucky. In 1843, I debated another Presbyterian, Nathan L. Rice of Paris, Kentucky, and the published form of that debate ran 913 pages!

I was reluctant to participate in debates, but after the first one, I realized that a debate proved to be an effective means for promoting my ideas. I frequently said that "a week's debating is worth a year's preaching."

Another effective tool for my ministry was publishing. In 1823, I became an editor and pretty much kept publishing for the rest of my life. I soon bought a printing press to make my own magazines. When I became Post Master for Bethany, I enjoyed the privilege of free postage, which greatly enhanced my outreach.

My magazines were hard-hitting publications where I not only told the truth, but also exposed error in doctrine and practice. I was persuaded that the church had seriously departed from the apostolic faith, and was in deep apostasy and that the clergy were largely responsible.

I once wrote a series of articles on "A Restoration of the Ancient Order of Things" in which I sought to correct the deficiencies of the modern church by way of a restoration of primitive Christianity. This restoration idea became a basic motif of my writing and preaching.

In 1826, I published a translation of the New Testament popularly known as The Living Oracles. And a few years later I published a hymnal that enjoyed modest success.

I guess you could say I dabbled a bit in politics because I served as a delegate to the 1829 Virginia Constitutional Convention. There I met two former presidents, James Madison and James Monroe, and other dignitaries. And it gave me the unique opportunity to preach in various churches in the Richmond area.

Perhaps my most famous debate came in 1829, when I debated the famous socialist Robert Owen, who was known for his denunciation of religion and Christianity. I argued that a life without hope is not worth much, and that one cannot be happy in this world without the hope of immortality beyond the grave.

I first met Barton W. Stone in 1824 during one of my visits to Kentucky. It was the beginning of a long and happy friendship. Stone had begun the work for a unity movement during the famous Cane Ridge Revival of 1801. Our movements united into one in 1832 in Lexington.

In 1940, I founded Bethany College on my farm, and became a college president. The college produced some of our movement's most talented leaders.

I brought the Christian Baptist to a close in 1830 and immediately focused my energy on a new publication called the Millennial Harbinger. The title of this new magazine was very important to me because I believe we are on the verge of a new millennium, a great new day for Christianity and the world.

Let me tell you about the new millennium as I anticipate it. Christianity will triumph throughout the world. The only thing keeping Christianity from conquering the other world religious is our ridiculous divisions. As soon as we put an end to denominations and sectarianism, and give a united world witness, Christianity will prevail.

Almost everybody in the world will be Christians; imagine that. Wars will cease, and peace and goodwill will generally prevail. The Jews will turn to Jesus Christ as their Messiah. The weather will be mild. Crimes and punishment will cease. Health will be more vigorous, labor less arduous, lands more fertile. The knowledge of the lord will cover the earth as the waters cover the sea. America will be its epicenter.

Not only is this millennium on the horizon, my friends, but my journal is its harbinger. I am not only announcing its coming, but I am an agent to effect its arrival.

But sects and divisions have to end before there can be a millennium. And they will end only when Christians cease making opinions a test of communion, and unite upon the simple facts of the gospel.

There are Seven Facts that constitute the whole gospel - the birth, life, death, burial, resurrection, ascension, and coronation of Christ. That is the core of the Gospel on which all Christians can unite. These simple facts have a transforming power in human life and point to the proposition that God is love.

The gospel consists of these facts that we accept or reject, while doctrine involves theological opinion over which we can and will differ. "We do not ask (people) to give up their opinions - We ask them not to impose them upon others. Let them hold their opinions; but let them hold them as private property." Christian may differ on opinions and marginal issues and be united on the essentials.

I deem sectarianism as 'the offspring of hell." "I am confident that the church will one day be united again as it was in apostolic times, but only through a restoration of the ancient order of things. This will be a church with a more intimate acquaintance with the holy oracles of both Testaments, a church where we will use Bible names for Bible things, a church with a weekly meeting on the Lord's Day in honor of the risen Lord with the Lord's Supper the most cardinal and essential part, a church with a stricter discipline, a more Christian morality, more piety and devotion, more prayer and praise, more communion with God, and more cooperation among all churches in the work of converting the world. This reformed church will be a united church and the united church will be "the millennial church."

Brothers and sister, I want you to capture the vision of the new millennium and what can happen if we simple put aside our differences and unite in Christ. Some say it will never happen, but let me leave you with my favorite motto: Expect great things, attempt great things, and great things will follow.