The 1646 London Baptist Confession of Faith, Article # 41, page 167, William L. Lumpkin, Baptist Confessions of Faith. "The person designed by Christ to dispense baptism, the scripture holds forth to be a disciple; it being nowhere tied to a particular church, officer, or person extraordinarily sent; the commission enjoying the administration, being given to them considered as disciples, being men able to preach the gospel."

J. R. Graves: "Nor do we admit the claims of the "Liberals" upon us, to prove the continuous existence of the church, of which we are a member, or which baptized us, in order to prove our doctrine of church succession, and that we have been scripturally baptized or ordained. As well might the Infidel call upon me to prove every link of my descent from Adam, before I am allowed to claim an interest in the redemptive work of Christ, which was confined to the family of Adam! We point to the Word of God, and, until the Infidel can destroy its authenticity, our hope is unshaken. In like manner, we point the "Liberal" Baptist to the words of Christ, and will he say they are not sufficient?" [J. R. Graves, Old Landmarkism Page 84]

J. T. Christian: "The footsteps of the Baptists of the ages can more easily be traced by blood than by baptism. It is a lineage of suffering rather than a succession of bishops; a martyrdom of principle, rather than a dogmatic decree of councils; a golden chord of love, rather than an iron chain of succession, which, while attempting to rattle its links back to the apostles, has been of more service in chaining some protesting Baptist to the stake than in proclaiming the truth of the New Testament. It is, nevertheless, a right royal succession, that in every age the Baptists have been advocates of liberty for all, and have held that the gospel of the Son of God makes every man a free man in Christ Jesus." [JT Christian, History of the Baptists, p. 22-23]

W. A. Jarrell: "Webster defines perpetuity: "The state or quality of being perpetual... Continued existence or duration."

"The late and lamented scholar, J. R. Graves, LL.D., wrote: "Wherever there are three or more baptized members of a regular Baptist church or churches covenanted together to hold and teach, and are governed by the New Testament," etc., "there is a Church of Christ, even though there was not a presbytery of ministers in a thousand miles of them to organize them into a church. There is not the slightest need of a council of presbyters to organize a Baptist church."

"And the scholarly S. H. Ford, LL. D., says: "Succession among the Baptists is not a linked chain of churches or ministers, uninterrupted and traceable at this distant day... The true and defensible doctrine is, that baptized believers have existed in every age since John baptized in Jordan, and have met as a baptized congregation in covenant and fellowship where an opportunity permitted." To this explanation of Church Succession by Drs. Graves and Ford, all believers in Baptist "Church Succession" fully agree." [W. A. Jarrell Baptist Church Perpetuity, page 1]

W. A. Jarrell: "Every Baptist church being, in organization, a church complete in itself, and, in no way organically connected with any other church, such a thing as one church succeeding another, as the second link of a chain is added to and succeeds the first, or, as one Romish or Episcopal church succeeds another, is utterly foreign to and incompatible with Baptist church polity. Therefore, the talk about every link "jingling in the succession chain from the banks of the Jordan to the present," is ignorance or dust-throwing."

"The only senses in which one Baptist church can succeed another are that the church leads men and women to Christ, then through its missionaries or ministers baptizes them, after which the baptized organize themselves into a Baptist church; or, in lettering off some of its members to organize a new Church; or, in case of the old church has fallen to pieces, for its members to reorganize themselves into a church." [W. A. Jarrell Baptist Church Perpetuity, page 2]

A. H. Strong: "Any number of believers, therefore, may constitute themselves into a Christian Church, by adopting for their rule of faith and practice Christ's law as laid down in the New Testament, and by associating themselves together, in accordance with it, for His worship and service . . . We have no need to prove a Baptist apostolical succession. If we can derive our doctrine and practice from the New Testament, it is all we require."

Thomas Armitage: "Is an unbroken, visible, and historical succession of independent Gospel Churches down from the apostles, essential to the valid existence of Baptist Churches today, as apostolic in every sense of the word? This question suggests another, namely, Of what value could any lineal succession be as compared with present adherence to apostolic truth? From these two questions a third arises: Whether true, lineage from the Apostolic Churches does not rest in present conformity to the apostolic pattern, even though the local church of today be self-organized, from material that never came out of any church, provided that it stands on the apostolicity of the New Testament alone. The simple truth is, that the unity of Christ's kingdom on earth is not found in its visibility, any more than the unity of the solar system is found in that direction, for its largest domain never falls under the inspection of any being but God. So, likewise, the unity of Christianity is not found by any visible tracing through one set of people. It has been enwrapped in all who have followed purely apostolic principles through the ages; and thus the purity of Baptist life is found in the essence of their doctrines and practices by whomsoever enforced. Little perception is required to discover the fallacy of a visible apostolical succession in the ministry, but visible Church succession is precisely as fallacious, and for exactly the same reasons. The Catholic is right in his theory that these two must stand or fall together; hence he assumes, ipso facto, that all who are not in this double succession are excluded from the true apostolic line. And many who are not Catholics think that if they fail to unroll a continuous succession of regularly organized churches, they lose their genealogy by a break in the chain, and so fail to prove that they are legitimate Apostolic Churches. Such evidence cannot be traced by any Church on earth, and would be utterly worthless if it could, because the real legitimacy of Christianity must be found in the New Testament, and nowhere else.

The very attempt to trace an unbroken line of persons duly baptized upon their personal trust in Christ, or of ministers ordained by lineal descent from the apostles, or of churches organized upon these principles, and adhering to the New Testament in all things, is in itself an attempt to erect a bulwark of error." [Armitage, A History of The Baptists, Introductory Chapter.]

Robert Robinson: "Uninterrupted succession is a specious lure, a snare set by sophistry, into which all parties have fallen. And it has happened to spiritual genealogists as it has to others who have traced natural descents, both have woven together twigs of every kind to fill up remote chasms. The doctrine is necessary only to such Churches as regulate their faith and practice by tradition, and for their use it was first invented.. . Protestants, by the most substantial arguments, have blasted the doctrine of papal succession, and these very Protestants have undertaken to make proof of an unbroken series of persons, of their own sentiments, following one another in due order from the apostles to themselves." [Robinson, Ecclesiastical Researches, pp. 475,476]

Jacob Ditzler, debating J. R. Graves in "The Great Carrollton Debate" p. 975, contended that Christian people, baptized or not, could constitute a church [p.944]. J. R. Graves answered: "Now I wish Elder Ditzler to know that there is a world-wide difference between originating an organization different from anything that can be found in the Bible, different from anything the world had ever before seen or heard of, and calling it a Church, and organizing a Christian Church. It is true that two or three baptized individuals can organize a Church, provided they adopt the apostolic model of government, and covenant to be governed by the sole authority of Jesus Christ."

Old-Landmarkism, The Baptist Encyclopedia, William Cathcart, D.D., - The following sketch was written at the editor's request by one of the ablest Baptist ministers in this country. His account of the opinions of all landmarkers is entirely reliable.

The origin of the term old-landmarkism was as follows: about the year 1850, Rev. J.R. Graves, editor of the Tennessee Baptist, published at Nashville, Tenn., began to advocate the position that Baptists cannot consistently recognize Pedobaptist preachers as gospel ministers. For several years he found but few to sympathize with this view. Among the few was Rev. J.M. Pendleton, then of Bowling Green, Ky., who in 1854 was requested by Mr. Graves to write an essay on this question, "Ought Baptists to recognize Pedobaptist preachers as gospel ministers?" The essay was published in four consecutive numbers of the aforesaid paper, and afterwards in the form of a tract. The title given to it by Mr. Graves was "An Old Landmark Reset." The title was considered appropriate, because there had been a time when ministerial recognition and exchange of pulpits between Baptists and Pedobaptists were unknown. This was an old landmark, but in the course of years it had fallen. When it was raised again it was called "an old landmark reset." Hence the term "oldlandmarkism," and of late years, by way of abridgment, "landmarkism."

That the doctrine of landmarkism is not a novelty, as some suppose, is evident, because William Kiffin, of London, one of the noblest of English Baptists, advocated it in 1640, and with those who agreed with him formed a church, of which he was pastor till his death, in 1701, - a very long PASTORATE. These facts are taken from Cramp's "Baptist History," and her refers to Ivimey's "Life of Kiffin."

Benedict, in his "Fifty Years among the Baptists," in referring to the early part of this century, says, "At that time the exchange of pulpits between the advocates and the opponents of infant baptism was a thing of very rare occurrence, except in a few of the more distinguished churches in the Northern States. Indeed, the doctrine of nonintercourse, so far as ministerial services were concerned, almost universally prevailed between Baptists and Pedobaptists." pp. 94, 95.

Truly the old landmark once stood, and having fallen, it was deemed proper to reset it. The doctrine of landmarkism is that baptism and church membership precede the preaching of the gospel, even as they precede communion at the Lord's table. The argument is that Scriptural authority to preach emanates, under God, from a gospel church; that as "a visible church is a congregation of baptized believers," etc., it follows that no Pedobaptist organization is a church in the Scriptural sense of the term, and that therefore Scriptural authority to preach cannot proceed from such an organization. Hence the non-recognition of Pedobaptist ministers, who are not interfered with, but simply let alone.

At the time the "Old Landmark Reset" was written the topic of non-ministerial intercourse was the chief subject of discussion. Inseparable, however, from the landmark view of this matter, is a denial that Pedobaptist societies are Scriptural churches, that Pedobaptist ordinations are valid, and that immersions administered by Pedobaptist ministers can be consistently accepted by any Baptist church. All these things are denied, and the intelligent reader will see why.

William Cathcart, The Baptist Encyclopedia, 1881, p. 286 - Christian history, in the First Century, was strictly and properly Baptist history, although the word "Baptist," as a distinctive appellation was not then known. How could it be? How was it possible to call any Christians Baptist Christians, when all were Baptists?"

From the time the Lord Jesus Christ established his New Testament church during His earthly ministry, until the present time, there have always existed believers and churches apart from both Romanism and Protestantism that have held to the essentials of New Testament (meaning Baptist) truth...

AND ONLY BECAUSE THE LORD HIMSELF PROMISED EXACTLY THAT: Mt 28:18 And Jesus came and spake unto them (HIS Church), saying, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. 19 Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: 20 Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world. Amen.

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