September 10, 2019 Show with Kurt M. Smith on “Piety, Passion & Paradox: The Life & Legacy of Basil Manly, Sr.” (Part 2)

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Chris Arnzen. Good afternoon

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Cumberland County Pennsylvania, Lake City Florida, and the rest of humanity living on the planet earth who are listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com.

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This is Chris Arnzen your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio wishing you all a happy Tuesday on this 10th day of September 2019.

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I'm thrilled to have back on the program a returning guest to continue a discussion that we began a couple of weeks ago.

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His name is Kurt M. Smith. He's an author and he is the pastor of Providence Reformed Baptist Church of Pine Mountain Alabama and today we are going to be addressing part two of Piety, Passion, and Paradox the

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Life and Legacy of Basil Manley Jr. and it's my honor and privilege to welcome you back to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

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Pastor Kurt Smith. Thank you Chris, it's great to be back. And once again

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I have to ask you did I screw up the pronunciation of Basil Manley Jr. and I think

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I said Junior didn't I? Yeah you did. And again I did it. I'm looking right at it and it says

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Senior and well that shows you that Basil Manley Jr. is a lot more well known than Basil Manley Jr.

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Yes he is, you're right. Is it Basil or Basil? Basil.

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Okay I screwed up both ways. Well we will be continuing our discussion momentarily about Basil Manley Sr.

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and the specific book that Kurt M. Smith has written, Piety, Passion, and Paradox, which is a biography of Basil Manley Sr.

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But before we do that for our listeners who missed Kurt's first part of this discussion and have not heard him on the program before, why don't you tell us about Providence Reformed Baptist Church of Pine Mountain Alabama.

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Providence Reformed Baptist Church is a Reformed Baptist Church that I've had the privilege of planting and pioneering over the last three years.

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We are located rather 45 minutes northeast of Birmingham, Alabama.

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We are atop Pine Mountain, which is one of the multiple Appalachian foothills that lead down from the northeast into the state.

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But the church, as I said, we're just three years old and as of this year we have seen

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God's blessing and favor with some truly exponential growth numerically, but more importantly the growth spiritually is what we are most excited about because all of the folks who have been drawn to the church over the last six months have all been coming for the same reason and that is the preaching of God's word.

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And so we are very thankful, very grateful to God for this, especially since as a Reformed Baptist Church all we have to offer is

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God's word. And so we are very excited to see this kind of growth because we know that it's real.

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I mean it's not a bait and switch kind of thing and not due to a marketing scheme. So we're very thankful.

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Amen. And for any of our listeners who either live near this area, the

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Pine Mountain Alabama area, or if they have friends, family, and loved ones near there, or if they intend to visit there on vacation or for other reasons, you can look up the website, that's prbc1689 .org.

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prbc1689 .org in the 1689 stands for the 1689 London Baptist Confession, also known as the

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Second London Confession, which is a summary of biblical belief that particular and Reformed Baptist churches have believed for centuries, including such great minds as Charles Haddon Spurgeon and Benjamin Keech and others.

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So look up that church and recommend it to others. It's prbc1689 .org.

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I think it'd be wise for us, since I already proved in the beginning of the program that Basil Manly Sr.

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is not very well known amongst Christians and is lesser known than his son, even amongst

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Reformed Baptists. But if you could, for our listeners who missed the first part of this discussion, why don't you summarize some main facts about Basil Manly Sr.

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that our listeners should know so they understand where we're coming from in our discussion today? Yeah, sure.

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Basil Manly Sr., he lived between the year 1798 to 1868.

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He was born in Pittsburgh, North Carolina, and he would become, in his day, in his time, one of the leading voices of his generation, especially concerning Baptists in the

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South. He pastored three different churches during his years and was the president of the

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University of Alabama for 18 years and spent most of his labors both in Alabama as well as in South Carolina.

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And there in South Carolina, his labors were in pastoring. In fact, the three churches he pastored were all there in South Carolina, one of them being the first Baptist church that was ever planted in the

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South, which was the first Baptist church of Charleston, South Carolina. And then, of course, his labors in Alabama, as just mentioned, 18 years, president of the

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University of Alabama. But then after his tenure as president of the university, later he would serve the

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Alabama Baptist Convention and he would be their state missionary and evangelist, as well, as a matter of fact, even pastoring for just a couple of years, the first Baptist church in Montgomery, Alabama.

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And so that's where he made his mark the most, and of course, he was the spearhead in actually the forming of the

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Southern Baptist Convention in 1845, and he also was the spearhead in bringing about the birth of the

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Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in 1859. Well, praise

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God. And just out of curiosity, since you said it was the first Baptist church ever planted in the

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South, the Southern United States, do you know if the first Baptist church of Charleston still exists, and if it is still reflecting the same theological and doctrinal confessional standards that Basil Manley Sr.

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would have adopted and embraced? Well, the first Baptist church of Charleston, it is still in existence.

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Does it still hold to the same confession that it started with?

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And the answer would be, sadly, no. But its history is very rich.

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Originally, it was organized as a church in Kittery, Maine, up in New England, under the leadership of a man by the name of William Screven, and combined with the aid of the

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First Baptist Church of Boston in the year 1682, that's when it was originally organized.

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But in 1696, Pastor Screven, with 26 congregants, they would uproot from New England and they would head to Charleston to establish the very first Baptist congregation in the

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South. And it is significant and important to recognize in regards to this church that the

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First Baptist Church of Charleston was set forth as a confessional Baptist church, and it did own and subscribe to the

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Second London Baptist Confession of 1689 as its doctrinal standard.

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And so when Basil Manley became the pastor of First Charleston in the 19th century, the church at that time was still holding to the

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Second London Baptist Confession, but it was doing so under the title of the Charleston Confession.

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And the Charleston Confession, it was a reprint of the 1689, but with an addition of one chapter, one extra chapter, that Second London did not have, and that was a chapter on the laying on of hands.

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But it was still, in Basil Manley's era in his day, still very much committed to the

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Reformed faith and the Baptist tradition, particularly the particular Baptist tradition.

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And so for Basil Manley, that should give you some idea quite clearly where he stood theologically, because he held tenaciously to the

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Charleston Confession. But sadly and tragically in the history of First Baptist Church of Charleston, much later years, particularly the 20th century, it would give way to liberalism.

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And so it has departed quite largely from its original confession.

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And from that description, departed from the faith, I'm assuming. Yes, departed from the faith, right.

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Yes, most definitely. Well, who would have thunk that the First Baptist Church in the

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South would have been planted by folks in New England? Most people would never think that the folks up there in the

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North, the Yankees up there, were the ones that brought the Baptist faith to the

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South. Amazing. Yeah, I know. It is rather ironic, isn't it?

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Yes, it is. Yeah, I know. I've thought about that myself. Well, in fact, the first continuing

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Baptist church that was planted in the state of Georgia, my home state, planted by my fifth -grade grandfather,

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Daniel Marshall, in 1772, was planted by a New Englander as well. Daniel Marshall was born and raised in East Windsor, Connecticut.

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Wow. Well, for my listener, there may be some out there who are wondering.

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Now, we can understand you devoting two shows to Charles Adams Spurgeon, to John Bunyan, to George Whitefield, Jonathan Edwards, and some of the more well -known heroes of the faith that have blessed the lives of millions even up to the present day, even crossing denominational and theological boundaries.

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Why are you excavating somebody from the dustbin of history that is hardly known to anyone to highlight them on a program for two parts?

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I don't say that because that's the way I feel, but there are people who obviously may think that this is an odd thing that we're doing today.

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So, why don't you tell us why on earth are we discussing Basil Manley Sr. for the second time? Well, one reason we're discussing him for the second time is because in our first interview we actually only covered just the surface, you know, just the tip of the iceberg as it were in regards to his life and legacy.

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The other thing that I think is really important in discussing him for the second time is this is a figure in church history, in Baptist church history, who we need to wrestle with because in his day, in his time down here in the

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South, while he was a very, as I said, a very strong leading voice and influence of his generation of Baptists in the

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South, he also was a very strong and leading voice in the defense of the institution of slavery in the

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Antebellum South, and he was a slave owner. As you know, and as I know, that whole institution in America's history has really become what many would believe is the unpardonable sin for those of Basil Manley's time who defended it or who were slave owners or both.

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And so, for us as Christians, you know, how do we respond to a figure like this?

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And of course, you know, the same question could be raised in regards to George Whitefield or Jonathan Edwards who were slave owners as well.

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How do we deal with figures like this from church history?

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Because there's a whole movement of those in American evangelicalism who would say we need to write them off the pages of church history altogether.

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They have nothing worth saying. In the recent months, there has been someone, a leading voice among evangelicals who have gone so far as to say that even someone like George Whitefield, there's no way that he could possibly have even been a

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Christian because he owned slaves. And so, you know, that same,

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I can hear and I have heard that same argument being brought against someone like Basil Manley.

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So how then do we answer that? You know, is his life really worth remembering?

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And can we say, based on Hebrews 13 .7, is there something in his faith worth following, worth imitating?

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And of course, I would argue, yes, there are many things in his faith worth imitating, worth following.

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But what we see in the fact that he defended slavery, he owned slaves, is we see a man who was very much flawed, a man who had remaining sin, and that should not be so odd to us because that's true of every

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Christian. And so how we deal with that, how we approach that, is something that I think is important for conversation and discussion, especially at this time and this period, and just in our own history as evangelicals.

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Yes, and even when you consider the broader scope of history and even the broader scope of the sins of mankind, we could even include someone like Martin Luther, the great reformer, who many in our day and age are trying to write off and dismiss and urge us to ignore and perhaps even vilify because of the anti -semitic things that he wrote towards the latter part of his life when he was extremely discouraged that the

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Jews did not, in mass, convert to Christianity after the Reformation began, which was something that Luther was very confident would occur, and when that did not occur, he wrote some very horrible things that unfortunately to some have become his very identity.

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And so we have to remember that we ourselves also do not want to be solely remembered for the worst aspect of our life and legacy.

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But with Basil Manley Sr., why don't you bring up, first of all, some pivotal things about his legacy that you did not mention the first time that would compel us to remember him with great esteem, not as a perfect and spotless hero without blemish, but as a human being and a sinner saved by grace that the

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Lord, in spite of his sin, used mightily? Well, I think one of the first things is regards to his doctrine, his theology, and how he worked that out, how he practiced it, and this comes under one of my chapters, which is called

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The Piety of Experiential Calvinism. For Basil Manley, as I said a moment ago, he held to the

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Charleston Confession, which was a reprint of the 1689 with the addition of one chapter.

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And right there you see that his theology was Reformed, it was

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Evangelical, it was Protestant, it was Orthodox, it was Covenantal, as well as being strongly in principle as a

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Baptist. But the outworking of that faith was experiential versus merely intellectual, merely theoretical.

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One of my dear friends who was actually my mentor in the ministry and formerly one of my pastors for many years ago, he would always say to myself and to other younger men, he would say, do not be an armchair

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Calvinist, but be an experiential Calvinist. And by that, what he was getting at was, you know, the doctrines of grace and the

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Reformed faith as a whole should greatly shape and affect how you live.

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You know, it's not just something you hold to purely intellectually or academically.

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In fact, you know, to talk about someone who's an academic Calvinist is really a misnomer.

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You know, these doctrines are the doctrines of God's Word, and therefore they should greatly affect our lives as a whole.

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And that's what you see in Basil Manley. Basil Manley, in regards to that, at his funeral that was officiated by none other than James Pettigrew Boyce, who was the first president and founder of the

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Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, he spoke to the fact that the doctrines of grace is what fueled

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Manley's fire in, of all things, evangelism. And what

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Boyce brought out about Manley in regards to this was, he said, the holding of these doctrines of grace has been thought by many inconsistent with the preaching of the gospel to all men.

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Certainly, Dr. Manley felt no such inconsistency. On the contrary, no one could preach the gospel more freely than he.

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No one ever urged sinners earnestly and successfully to believe in Christ as their

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Savior. No one felt more than he the duty to give every man a message as sent from God to him.

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And another figure in Alabama Baptist history, a man by the name of Samuel Henderson, who was the president of the

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Alabama Baptist Convention at the time of Manley's death, he mused on Manley's evident piety as an experiential

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Calvinist when he said this, he said, those who are accustomed to urge the trite objection to the doctrines of grace that they paralyze

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Christian activity and lead to licentiousness, we can triumphantly point to the ministerial usefulness and personal piety of him whose memory is so dear to us all for its reputation.

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Profoundly, as he had investigated these high questions, and certainly he was as competent to look into them as any of his brethren, he saw nothing in them but what served to fire his zeal and stimulate the growth of piety in his own soul.

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It was because God had said that his word should not return unto him void, that he was encouraged to preach it.

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It was because God worketh in him to will and to do, that he was encouraged to work out his own salvation.

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It was because the increase was of God that Basil Manley was encouraged to plant and to water the heavenly seed.

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And so by these testimonies, by this example, this is something certainly worthy for us who are either

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Calvinistic or confessionally reformed. It's worthy for us to follow in the faith of Basil Manley.

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He put his faith into action, his faith as a Calvinist was working, and it was working quite demonstrably.

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So he was not some mere academic ivory tower theologian where there was no application whatsoever to what he believed and to what he taught, what he preached.

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And so that to me is very significant and very significant especially in regards to so many today evangelicals who do hold to the reformed faith and especially for those who even just hold to the doctrines of grace.

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Amen. And you know, something I'd want to add to the question as to why would we take time to conduct interviews about more obscure figures or read about them or read what they have written themselves, etc.,

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is because the primary or most renowned heroes of the faith outside of scripture that most

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Christians have come to enjoy and love, or at least they claim to just because these folks are famous, there are a lot of people who claim to love

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Charles Aden Spurgeon and have a theology that seems to be in direct contrast.

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But none of these men, Charles Aden Spurgeon and George Whitefield and Jonathan Edwards and John Bunyan, none of them are completely knowledgeable about every single facet of truth.

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They are men, they are sinners or were, and there is always something new that can be learned.

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And to me, I always find it to be a joy to discover some hidden treasure, like even someone who

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I've been promoting fairly frequently on my show, Spencer Cohn, whose biography

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I absolutely love, The Life and Times of Spencer Cohn. Virtually no one that I've ever spoken with knew who he was until I had told them about the book, the biography.

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So we should not limit ourselves to just those who may be extremely famous, and we can learn a lot from and be blessed by the more unknown and obscure folks.

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Yeah. Yeah. Amen. I mean, that's true. And of course, that's where we as Christians in America have to really be careful and guarded that we don't just focus on what would be called, maybe use the term, but it's the only term

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I think will be called the celebrities, if you will, because there are no celebrities in God's kingdom.

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You know, we're all foot soldiers of the cross, and the Lord has gifted every

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Christian in a unique and significant way. And some Christians are gifted in a way that, you know, we'll never hear about their works until eternity, whereas other

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Christians are so gifted that there are books written about them. They are more well -known.

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But the point is, no matter how well -known or not so well -known they are, we're all saved by the same grace of God, and we all live by the same grace of God.

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And the Lord has uniquely fitted us for our time in His story and in the works of His providence in redemptive history, and that will bear out one day, you know, in eternity when we stand before the

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Lord. And so those are things that as Christians we've got to keep in mind in just really having that eternal perspective.

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Yeah, one other thing to add also about the value of confessions, and as you have already made clear,

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Basil Manley Sr. was a confessional Baptist. The proof is in the pudding of how important these confessions are when we observe what happened, as you just mentioned earlier, to First Baptist Church of Charleston, South Carolina.

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Right. Charleston, South Carolina. And if a church maintains adherence in truth, not just giving it lip service to a confession, obviously it's a litmus test to those around them if they are seeking to join that church, or if they are already in that church and they have to ponder whether or not to leave, they could use that adherence to the very vital biblical truths that are summarized in that confession.

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And obviously a confession is only as good as the biblical truths that it summarizes.

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But you had to come to a point where First Baptist Church in Charleston, South Carolina abandoned that confession, and here we have a church that is apostate today.

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So, I mean, these things are a lot more important than a lot of people may realize.

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Yes, yeah, they really are, and how important it is for a church to have a confession of faith, because that confession works.

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It works in many respects to help guard a local church, protect a local church from people that would enter in and be believing, or for that matter, teaching and spreading doctrine that is contrary to what that church maintains and believes the

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Bible teaches. And for many churches that have no confession, they don't even realize the leadership just clearly doesn't realize how dangerous that is in the door they're opening for all kinds of people to come in, and as Jude would say, to creep in unawares, and teaching or spreading things to other members of the church that are unbiblical.

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And so having a confession of faith, it serves so significantly as what

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Charles Spurgeon described as a banner for the truth. And it lets people know who visit such churches like those who visit our church.

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They wonder, you know, well, what is it that you believe? Well, all we've got to do is hand them the 1689

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Confession and just say, read this. I mean, this is what we believe the

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Bible teaches, because obviously that's really all a confession is. It's just stating that in either small or large compass, what we firmly believe and hold is biblical truth, and what we believe is the teaching of Scripture.

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Amen. Well, we have to go to our first break right now. If anybody would like to join us on the air, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com.

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If you have a question for Kurt Smith about the life and legacy of Basil Manley Sr.

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or any general topic regarding historic Baptist theology and teaching, that's chrisarnson at gmail .com.

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As always, please give us your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside the

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USA, and only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal or private matter. Don't go away. We'll be right back after these messages with more of Kurt and Smith.

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I say more full and biblically sound library. We are now back with our guest today,

41:18

Kurt M. Smith, pastor of Providence Reformed Baptist Church in Pine Mountain, Alabama. We are discussing part two of a discussion that we began a couple of weeks ago.

41:29

This is part two of Piety, Passion, and Paradox, The Life and Legacy of Basil Manley Sr. And our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com,

41:38

chrisarnson at gmail .com. And please, as always, give us your first name, your city and state, your country of residence, if you live outside of the

41:46

USA, and only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter. We do have a question from Ronald in Eastern Suffolk County, Long Island, New York for you,

41:55

Pastor Kurt. He says, from what I hear from those in the woke movement and the social justice warrior movement, they want us to consider anybody that in the 19th century or prior approved of slavery or even owned slaves as someone who is equivalent to a murderer or something even worse.

42:20

They just can't let go of the fact that this is something that would equate anyone professing to be a

42:28

Christian as amongst the most sinister humans that have ever lived, perhaps even on a level of being satanic.

42:36

How do we distinguish these kinds of sins from other more heinous sins that would allow us to maintain as heroes and as folks to be learned from those who were wonderful Brethren in Christ, filled with wisdom and truth and gifts, at the same time those who adhere to things that today we would find abhorrent?

43:05

Well, that is a really good question, and I really appreciate that question being raised.

43:11

In my book on Basil Manley, when I devote a whole chapter to this matter regarding his defense of slavery in the

43:23

Antebellum South, when I get to the application for us, what

43:32

I say very simply is the application needs to first of all be humility. And by that,

43:38

I explain that we need to be humble in our treatment of fellow Christians from another time and generation.

43:47

To state the obvious, none of us grew up in the Antebellum South.

43:53

We therefore cannot say with any authority where we would stand on slavery as Christians in that period of history.

44:00

We can only speak from the time in which we live and the understanding we have in this time as to what the

44:07

Scripture teaches. So while we may see something with greater clarity than Basil Manley, as it pertains to cultural sins of the 19th century, yet how blind could we be to our own cultural sins, which will take another generation of Christians 100 years from now to say was biblically wrong?

44:30

And I would say that first and foremost is where as Christians we need to begin as we look and surmise the lives of these figures in church history from the early part of the 19th century, during the 18th century, and in realizing that, okay, you know what,

44:54

I did not live in their period of time. You know, slavery, the transatlantic slave trade, all of that,

45:04

I mean, that was the norm for a long period of time in that part of history.

45:12

And while it doesn't excuse it in any way, yet we have to realize that that's not a period of history that we're from.

45:30

And like I said, I mean, how we would have treated that particular institution at that time, we can't say with any authority.

45:40

So we need to be very humble in how we treat someone like Basil Manley. On the other hand, we also need to see in Basil Manley Sr.

45:49

something that we should see in all of ourselves as Christians, and that is Basil Manley Sr.

45:57

was a Christian who was redeemed by grace and yet riddled all his

46:04

Christian life before entering glory with remaining sin. And that is true of every single

46:12

Christian on this side of glory. And so where Basil Manley was guilty of sins that would be very obvious and clear to us that he himself was blind to in many respects, what about the sins in our own lives that we're blind to?

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Because we all do have blind spots, and we're all a work in progress. And so, you know,

46:43

I'm saying these things not in any way to excuse what was an institution that was morally flawed at the core, because it was rooted and based in man -stealing.

46:56

But at the same time, you know, I think we need to stress the fact that, okay, but we're not dealing here with perfect men, you know, men who were without sin.

47:09

It's no different when you read the scriptures. And, you know, look at the man whom

47:15

God said was a man after his own heart, King David, okay? How egregious was it of what he did with Bathsheba, what he did with her husband, and, you know, and then of course just his lying to the nation and keeping it under wraps for a year before Nathan the prophet came and confronted him.

47:39

And then on top of that, you know, what about all of his multiple concubines? And, you know, these kind of things,

47:46

I mean, and yet the scripture says he was a man after God's own heart. You know, the

47:54

Holy Spirit did not write King David off as someone that, you know, that we cannot learn from and that we should never hear from.

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And the same holds true for men like this, you know, throughout church history. So anyway,

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I hope that what I'm saying gets, hopefully that gets to the point of at least starting to answer what this brother has asked.

48:21

Well, if you could, before we need to go to our midway break, why don't you give us another aspect of Basil Manley Sr.'s

48:29

life and legacy that we failed to address the last time? Well, one thing would be his passion for spirit anointed preaching.

48:39

Basil Manley Sr., I believe, holds an excellent example of the kind of gospel preacher that every gospel preacher should strive to be.

48:53

And that is one, first of all, who was greatly affected by what he preached and thereby preached with a real, sincere, heartfelt passion.

49:09

And this was something that he himself even recognized. He was very critical of young men who were educated to the point to where they educated themselves right out of being passionate for what

49:27

God's Word taught and therefore passionate in preaching. That was something that as strongly as he advocated and pursued and pushed for Baptist ministers to be educated, yet he believed very firmly that, look, you know, what you're preaching from God's Word should first and foremost affect you, the preacher, and thereby do something that when you are communicating the truth of God to others, they can see demonstrably how this has affected you personally.

50:07

It's just not something that is merely and only theoretical. And on top of that,

50:14

Basil Manley believed very strongly in the ministry of the Holy Spirit in preaching. He would have held very firmly to what the

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Apostle Paul had reported and reminded the Corinthian church about in 1

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Corinthians chapter 2 and verses 4 and 5, where Paul said, you know, when I came to you, my speech and my preaching was not in the persuasive words of human wisdom but in demonstration of the

50:40

Spirit and of His power. Basil Manley firmly believed in the preaching of God's Word being superintended by the demonstration of the

50:52

Holy Spirit's power. He believed in what the older divines like the

50:58

Puritans would have called the unction of the Holy Spirit. And that was something that not only he believed, but God greatly blessed and God greatly favored his labors at that.

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And the evidence of that is very clear when you read the primary sources and those who heard him in the way they described his preaching.

51:20

And so that I would say would be something that is worthy definitely for ministers to follow after and imitate.

51:30

Yeah, because even today, as you probably are fully aware, there is a strain amongst

51:39

Reformed Christians, perhaps even outside of those that are Reformed, but there's a strain among us of pastors and teachers who are opposed.

51:53

It's not even that it is not a part of their makeup as an orator or personality traits or something.

52:02

They actually believe that it is wrong to be passionate in delivering a sermon because they view it as a manipulation of the emotions.

52:14

And they would perhaps even say that this is a contradiction of the doctrines of sovereign grace.

52:25

We are trusting in the truth of the Word to take effect in the person's heart without any added theatrics.

52:36

Now, of course, we who believe in passionate preaching, we are opposed to theatrics too, because there is a manufactured version of passion that is just very artificial, and it's more like a one -man play that you're watching.

52:52

But how do you address those people that would say, I think that a sermon should just be delivered factually, just as a seminary professor might be teaching a course in seminary, and we're just here to provide the facts that the

53:07

Bible itself provides, and we are not to add our own emotion and that kind of a thing to stir up people that may even lead them to make a false profession?

53:21

Well, my answer to that would actually be pulling from Martin Lloyd -Jones, and one of my favorite quotes from Lloyd -Jones,

53:33

Lloyd -Jones gave a lecture back in 1964 at what was called the

53:41

Annual Puritan Studies held at Westminster Chapel in London, England, where Lloyd -Jones was the pastor.

53:47

And this particular lecture was on John Calvin and George Whitefield. And in the course of that message,

53:54

Lloyd -Jones argued very strongly for the power of the Spirit in preaching when he expressed these very memorable words.

54:03

He said, John Calvin always needs George Whitefield. What I mean is this, the danger of those who follow the teachings of Calvin and do so rightly is that they tend to become intellectualists, or they tend to sink into what

54:21

I would describe as ossified orthodoxy. And that is of no value, my friends.

54:30

You need the power of the Spirit upon it. To state the truth is not enough.

54:36

It must be stated in demonstration of the Spirit and the power. And that is what this mighty man so gloriously illustrates, talking about George Whitefield.

54:44

He was orthodox, but the thing that produced the phenomenon was the power of the

54:50

Spirit upon him. Yes, I'm very familiar with those within our

55:00

Reformed circle who are very critical and very opposed to a minister, you know, as you were saying, a minister showing any kind of passion.

55:15

But what's even more disturbing and disconcerting to me is how they're opposed to just this very idea that we need the

55:26

Holy Spirit superintending the preached Word of God. In other words, it is not enough just simply to stand up and preach what you have prepared to preach and then leaving it there, you know.

55:40

But there has to be this supernatural power, this power of the

55:48

Spirit that is clothing the minister, clothing his words, clothing with divine unction, what is being delivered, what is being said.

56:02

Because it takes the supernatural power of God to take the truth of God and translate that into the hearts of the people that you're preaching to.

56:15

You know, it reminds me of what we read in Acts 16, that it was the Holy Spirit who opened the heart of Lydia to take heed to the things spoken to her by Paul.

56:28

Was Paul speaking the truth? Yes, he was. But that was not enough. It took the

56:34

Holy Spirit to open up Lydia's heart to take heed to those things Paul was speaking.

56:40

In fact, we're going to go to our midway break right now, and I want to pick up where we left off there. If you have a question for Kurt M.

56:48

Smith about Basil Manley Sr. or about anything involving historical

56:53

Baptist teaching and doctrine, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com, C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com.

57:02

Please, as always, give us your first name, city and state, and country of residence if you live outside the USA. Please only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal or private matter.

57:10

This is a longer break than normal because Grace Life Radio 90 .1 FM in Lake City, Florida requires of us a longer break in the middle of the show because they have to localize

57:19

Iron Sharpens Iron Radio to Lake City, Florida with their own public service announcement. So please be patient with us. Use this time wisely by writing down information provided by our advertisers so that you can patronize them more successfully and more frequently, which means they'll remain likely our advertisers for a longer period of time, which means that we will remain on the air for a longer period of time.

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But also write down questions for Kurt M. Smith and send them to ChrisArnzen at gmail .com, ChrisArnzen at gmail .com.

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Before I return to my guest, Pastor Curt M. Smith, about the life and legacy of Basil Manley Sr.,

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I just have a couple of announcements to make. On Thursday and Friday, December 19th and 20th, I am going to be heading to New York City to the

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The speakers include Dr. Stephen J. Lawson, Paul Washer, Rev. Jeff Thomas, Rev. Armand Tomasi, and Richard Colwell Jr.,

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and Andrew Quigley. If you'd like to join me there, Thursday and Friday, December 19th and 20th in New York City, go to thefoundationsconference .com,

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If you'd like to advertise with us, we surely could use your advertising dollars. Send us an email to chrisarnsen at gmail .com,

01:18:04

chrisarnsen at gmail .com, but advertising in the subject line. Always remember folks, if you are not a member of a bible believing church, and you're not even prayerfully looking for one, you're living in rebellion against God.

01:18:15

So please rectify that situation if you need help finding a church. I have lists of biblically faithful churches all over the world, and I have helped my listeners find churches in all parts of the globe, either where they have joined and become members, or where they are vacationing, or if they're looking for a church for family, friends, and loved ones who do not have a church.

01:18:35

Send me an email to chrisarnsen at gmail .com, and put I Need a Church in the subject line. That's also the email address where you can send in a question to our guest today,

01:18:44

Pastor Kurt M. Smith, on the subject, The Life and Legacy of Basil Manley Sr.

01:18:51

In fact, the actual complete title of the book that we are addressing is a book by Kurt M.

01:18:56

Smith, Piety, Passion, Paradox, Life and Legacy of Basil Manley Sr. Our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com.

01:19:04

chrisarnsen at gmail .com. Remember, give us your first name, city and state and country of residence if you live outside the USA.

01:19:10

Only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal or private matter. We were talking before about the intellectual academic strain within Calvinism that leans toward an unemotional, impassionate delivery of biblical truths and facts.

01:19:35

They believe this is the most correct way to proclaim truth, because to add emotion and passion into the delivery of these things can be viewed as emotional manipulation.

01:19:50

It can even be viewed as trickery, trying to trick somebody to make a decision that they normally wouldn't even think of.

01:19:57

So, one of the things that occurred to me, that whenever this comes up it occurs to me, is that I think that emotion and passion can be a barometer of how much the person speaking actually believes in what he's saying.

01:20:13

And especially when you're talking about urgent matters that have eternal consequences. This is not just something to add to our knowledge when you hear a sermon.

01:20:24

It's supposed to be changing our lives, and for those that are lost it's supposed to be being used of God to lead men to repentance so that they do not receive eternal condemnation.

01:20:38

And another thing, an example of how if you really believe something that is a very important and urgent matter, that your emotion and passion will be reflected in that.

01:20:53

Can you imagine having a spouse who would actually believe that you truly love this spouse, and would lay down your life for this spouse, and want to remain forever with this spouse, if on a daily basis you were merely to say,

01:21:14

I do love you, dear, and I want you to remain my wife forever and ever, and you're really a wonderful joy to be with.

01:21:27

I mean, that kind of dry, lifeless delivery, to me, it's just a sign that the person is not even truthful.

01:21:39

Yeah, and along those same lines, if I can actually go back to something

01:21:47

I mentioned in the first hour regarding Basil Manly, in a letter that he wrote in 1856, he was troubled over the danger he saw in how educated ministers were given to what he described as this killing tendency to formalism.

01:22:12

And he lamented that, and these are his words, that the spirit of piety is fast oozing out everywhere under the influence of regular -bred theologians.

01:22:30

He was disgusted in what he saw in these dwarf divines, as he called them, who knew full well how to reach the mind, but not the heart, of their hearers.

01:22:45

And that was a letter that he wrote to a friend of his in 1856.

01:22:52

And what is so significant about Basil Manly writing a letter like this is that here's this man who supported so strongly the formal education of Baptist ministers, and yet he did not want their education to be the death kneel of their ministries due to their lack of preaching with an earnestness and passion that would dig deep in the hearts of those they sought to connect with the truth.

01:23:24

And it is a lesson, obviously for us, that having a sound theological education is not enough to fully equip a man to preach effectively.

01:23:37

And, you know, this reminds me of John Owen, English Puritan, 17th century, what

01:23:43

Owen wrote about in regards to preachers and preaching. And John Owen strongly urged that before ministers would ever go into the pulpit to preach, they must be first greatly affected by what they're going to preach.

01:24:07

In other words, this needs to be first dealing with me, dealing with my heart, dealing with my affections, you know, before I relay this to other people.

01:24:20

And that's just huge. So it is not enough to have a well -prepared sermon, a sermon that is accurate and true and faithful to the teaching of the scriptures.

01:24:38

That's not enough. You know, what has this done to me personally?

01:24:45

Am I affected by this? And then, of course, on top of that, as I have been belaboring the point, there has to be the absolute dependence, reliance, and confidence in the ministry of the

01:25:00

Holy Spirit to take what I had prepared and deliver that, deliver that to the hearts of the people who are hearing this message.

01:25:11

And that just goes back to what I had cited from Acts 16, you know, in regards to there is

01:25:19

Paul the Apostle, and he is communicating the truth of the gospel to Lydia.

01:25:25

But Luke tells us in the narrative that, you know, it was the

01:25:30

Holy Spirit who opened the heart of Lydia to take heed to the things that were spoken to her by Paul.

01:25:37

And, you know, I don't understand, honestly, ministers, and especially ministers that are in the

01:25:47

Reformed faith, like myself and him, who just discount that, you know, just lay that aside and think, because I've heard some of them say this, that, you know, all you've got to do, as far as the minister is concerned, you know, just prepare a good exposition of the word, and that's it.

01:26:13

We have B .B. in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, who wants to know, what is specifically the unique contribution to Christendom that can be attributed to Basil Manley Sr.?

01:26:31

The unique contribution. I think more than anything, as far as Basil Manley is concerned, it is the fact that, and this is just connecting with what we've just been talking about, with what we see in him, his contribution is more geared to the minister, and setting before gospel ministers an example of, here's a man who was very highly intellectual, he had a very big brain, and yet he was someone who, as a

01:27:30

Christian, was deeply, deeply affected by the truth of God, and he delivered that in every situation and circumstance that he was in.

01:27:49

He's just, he gives us a good model, and especially as gospel ministers, to see that what we confess needs to be what we also possess in our affections and in how we live, and that,

01:28:10

I would say more than anything, is his contribution to evangelicals, and what we need to gain and glean from him in that.

01:28:27

It just ties back in with what I was saying earlier, and what I belabor in the book, as far as the legacy he leaves, not only the piety of experiential

01:28:39

Calvinism, but the passion for Spirit -Anointed preaching. Those are very, very important lessons that the

01:28:51

Baptist ministers especially, who are Reformed in the faith, need to take away from Manley.

01:29:01

We have John in Bangor, Maine, who says,

01:29:06

In our day and age, most Reformed Baptists and conservative Presbyterians frequently exchange pulpits, share fellowship, read each other's books, and have a lot in common and share great unity.

01:29:22

Was such the case in Basil Manley Sr.'s day, and did he have fellowship outside of Baptist circles?

01:29:31

Yes, Basil Manley did have fellowship outside of Baptist circles.

01:29:36

This was especially true when he was the pastor of the

01:29:42

First Baptist Church of Charleston in Charleston, South Carolina. His tenure there was for 11 years, and while he was a very strong and convinced

01:29:55

Baptist in principle and in doctrine, yet he had a very good relationship with the other ministers who were there in Charleston, those that were

01:30:10

Presbyterian, even Episcopalian, Methodist.

01:30:16

In fact, even when he was in Alabama, one thing that should be noted is that there were many

01:30:23

Methodist churches that even asked Basil Manley to come preach in their pulpits, and Manley did that.

01:30:32

Wherever he could gain an audience to hear the gospel, that's where he was going to be, that's where he was going to go.

01:30:42

Of course, that reminds us a lot of George Whitefield and how Whitefield would preach the gospel anywhere where he was given the opportunity to do so, and it didn't matter whether it was in a

01:30:56

Baptist church, a Congregationalist, or in the

01:31:01

Anglican church. Basil Manley Sr., he was like that as well. We have a somewhat similar question from Susan Margaret in Dauphin County, Pennsylvania.

01:31:13

How strong were the tensions between Armenian and Calvinist Baptists in Basil Manley Sr.'s

01:31:20

day, and did Basil Manley have any uncomfortable conflicts with those outside of the

01:31:28

Calvinistic belief? Well, in Basil Manley Sr.'s,

01:31:34

in his day, and obviously we've got to keep it in the context of Baptists in the

01:31:39

South, the vast, vast majority of Baptists in the

01:31:46

South in Manley's day were confessional Calvinists.

01:31:52

Now, there were a small minority that were Arminian, and they really were, as you would say, the odd man out theologically, doctrinally.

01:32:06

But there's an interesting story in Basil Manley's life that would tie in as an answer to this lady's question, and that is that in 1849, here in Alabama, there was a theological controversy between two different Baptist associations, the

01:32:29

North River Association and the Tuscaloosa Association.

01:32:35

And this controversy had been raging on for 17 years, and during this time,

01:32:41

Basil Manley, he was not a pastor. He was the president of the University of Alabama, but he was the largest

01:32:51

Baptist stalwart among Alabama Baptists, I mean, just because of his reputation, and so forth.

01:32:58

And so a council of ministers from the Tuscaloosa Association, they approached

01:33:04

Basil Manley and asked him, would you please preach a sermon in regards to the subject of divine sovereignty and human responsibility?

01:33:14

And would you please show from the scriptures how that these two doctrines do not contradict, they are not in conflict with each other biblically.

01:33:26

Because the controversy raging between these two associations was a controversy over divine sovereignty and human responsibility, and one of these two associations, the

01:33:40

North River Association, had actually formed under the banner of Arminian teaching.

01:33:49

And so they had completely rejected what was the standard belief and doctrine of Alabama Baptists, which was

01:33:58

Calvinistic. And there were many, many different members of churches of the

01:34:07

Tuscaloosa Association that had been swayed by the Arminian teaching of the churches in the

01:34:12

North River. And so, as I said, a great divide had occurred, and this had gone on for 17 years.

01:34:20

So they go to Basil Manley, will you preach a sermon on this? And Basil Manley did. And the results of that one sermon, where both associations were gathered together to hear it,

01:34:35

Basil Manley wrote in his diary a few days after he preached the sermon that the

01:34:43

North River Association had left their heresy, and that's exactly what he called it, referring to their

01:34:50

Arminianism, and they had come back to the Bible, come back to the old paths of the

01:34:57

Calvinistic faith. And that sermon in particular became the most widely published sermon in Alabama Baptist history.

01:35:08

And that sermon in full is included in my book as an appendix. It's called

01:35:14

Divine Efficiency Consistent with Human Activity. That's the name of the sermon. And so, you know, that was,

01:35:23

I mean, obviously in Basil Manley's day, yes, there was tension with those of the

01:35:30

Arminian persuasion, but they were in the great minority in that day among Baptists in the

01:35:40

South. And Bobby in Hartsdale, New York, has a question that's similar to that one.

01:35:48

What kind of interaction and conflict did Basil Manley Sr. have with hyper -Calvinists?

01:35:53

And if you could briefly define hyper -Calvinism, because as you know, many non -Calvinists think all

01:36:01

Calvinists are hyper -Calvinists. Right. Well, hyper -Calvinism is a definitive system of belief.

01:36:14

It is, of course, what we would call a false Calvinism.

01:36:22

Hyper -Calvinism historically goes back to the latter part of the 17th century.

01:36:28

It was actually started by a Congregationalist minister who denied the

01:36:35

Biblical teaching on the free offer of the Gospel. And so the hyper -Calvinists, how they approach

01:36:42

Scripture, they would look at, say, Romans 9, which, as we know, in verses 6 through 24 is a very, very clear teaching on the sovereign election of God and salvation.

01:36:53

But that's all they would see. They would never go to the next chapter, Romans 10, where we see very clearly that God has ordained the means of the proclamation of the

01:37:05

Gospel to draw in and bring His elect. And so the hyper -Calvinist denies evangelism, they deny missions, they deny the free offer of the

01:37:17

Gospel altogether. And of course, that's just one problem with hyper -Calvinism. There are other problems, one of them being that hyper -Calvinism always seems to lead to antinomianism, that is to lawless, loose living.

01:37:32

Because for the hyper -Calvinists, as I actually heard one hyper -Calvinist say that, you know, since God has ordained this food in front of me, that I don't need to give

01:37:46

God thanks for what He's already ordained. And so, I mean, it really, hyper -Calvinism really leads to that kind of neglect, to say the least, in just basic Christian living.

01:38:01

Now, in Basil Manly, in his day, of course, he countered hyper -Calvinism as strongly as he countered

01:38:12

Arminianism. As I had quoted earlier in the first hour of our talk,

01:38:20

Basil Manly was a very, very strong Gospel evangelist.

01:38:26

He just had this enormous passion for spreading the

01:38:32

Gospel to as many people as he could reach, and therefore he believed very strongly in the free offer of the

01:38:38

Gospel. So he was the very opposite of everything that hyper -Calvinism stood for. And then, in addition to that, when you had the first great divide among Baptists in the 19th century, specifically between 1826 to 1836, what we know today is the anti -missionary movement, which would spawn two different types of Baptist churches, one called

01:39:07

Missionary Baptists and the other called Primitive Baptists. The Primitive Baptists, of course, they would eventually, because of their strong reaction to the

01:39:19

Missionary Baptists in regards to using other means outside of the local church for missions, the

01:39:26

Primitive Baptists would eventually wind up in the quagmire of hyper -Calvinism, because they held so strongly to the sovereignty of God they did so by inadvertently eclipsing everything else the

01:39:40

Bible taught in regards to man's responsibility to believe, to repent, and certainly the church's responsibility to reach man with the

01:39:49

Gospel. Basil Manly, by both his words and especially by his actions, was a staunch advocate for what we would call evangelical

01:40:02

Calvinism, and therefore he stood very strongly against hyper -Calvinism, and he understood very clearly what hyper -Calvinism was.

01:40:12

Okay, we have to go to our final break right now, and if you want to send us an email with a question, do it now or forever hold your peace because we're rapidly running out of time.

01:40:20

ChrisArnson at gmail .com. ChrisArnson at gmail .com. Don't go away, we'll be right back with Kurt M.

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And I have interviewed him right from his hospital bed, and you can hear that interview at ironsharpensironradio .com

01:52:42

and look up Joe Jackowitz in the archive by typing in J -A -C -O -W -I -T -Z,

01:52:49

J -A -C -O -W -I -T -Z, and that will be one of the many interviews

01:52:57

I've conducted with Pastor Joe Jackowitz that come up. In fact, he is preaching right after Iron Sharpens Iron Radio is over.

01:53:03

That is a previously recorded sermon of his. But keep him in prayer, and he thanks all of you from the depths of his heart for your prayers, and keep his family in your prayers as well.

01:53:15

Well, we are back with our final segment with Pastor Kurt M. Smith of Providence Reformed Baptist Church of Pine Mountain, Alabama.

01:53:23

We have been discussing Piety, Passion, and Paradox, the Life and Legacy of Basil Manley Sr. And if you could,

01:53:29

Pastor Kurt, make sure that you address a final important lesson to be learned from Basil Manley Sr.

01:53:37

that we did not address in Part 1 of this discussion. A final lesson.

01:53:49

Well, I think going back to his defense of slavery, something that we certainly can draw from that and learn from that is that Basil Manley Sr.,

01:54:05

of course, first and foremost, he was a Christian. And so he was a sinner redeemed by God's grace in Christ.

01:54:14

And when you look at his life as a whole, that's what stands out the most.

01:54:20

And so his approach to defending slavery in the

01:54:25

Antebellum South was sincerely to Christianize it. He believed that it was regulated by Scripture, and he did everything he could to so regulate it by Scripture.

01:54:38

But, sadly and unfortunately, what he was seeking to Christianize would never have the blessing of God upon it.

01:54:51

That is, the institution of slavery in the Old South.

01:54:56

Because, as I stated in the previous hour, that institution was rooted and grounded in what

01:55:05

God's Word condemns in Exodus 21 -16 as man -stealing. And therefore, that form of slavery would not have the favor of God upon it.

01:55:20

But I think what's interesting and what's important to see in Basil Manley in regards to this is that he takes this institution that was of the world, and he tried to do everything he could to redeem it.

01:55:40

But there was nothing that could be redeemed about the institution itself, because it was already condemned by God, by God's own law.

01:55:53

And I think the lesson for us in that is that we need to be careful that the things of this world, the things of the culture around us that maybe we're trying to redeem or even sanctify, we need to be careful that we're not trying to redeem or sanctify something that is just patently worldly, and thereby of this world, and that will not have the blessing of God upon it.

01:56:30

Now, granted, most of the slaves that Basil Manley preached to, they did come to faith in Christ.

01:56:39

They were converted to Christ. And so, the

01:56:45

Lord used that institution in bringing many

01:56:51

African slaves to Christ, even though the institution itself would not have

01:56:57

God's blessing upon it. But regardless of that, I do think that something that we need to take from that is we just need to be more careful and guarded as Christians that maybe things that we're trying to sanctify, to redeem, that are so much a part of the culture of the world we live in, we just need to be careful that we're not trying to redeem something that just, frankly, cannot be redeemed according to what

01:57:28

Scripture teaches. Now, a lot of people in our day and age especially would be appalled that anyone would dare say that God used the evils of slavery to bring about good things such as the salvation of slaves.

01:57:42

They have to remember, God used the death of his only begotten son, a perfect, sinless man, although he was fully

01:57:50

God and fully man, a very grotesque and torturous death of his own son brought about the salvation of his people.

01:58:02

And although if we were there when Christ was carrying his cross to Golgotha, and as the crowds were cheering on for his execution, we would not join in the cheers that Jesus be executed because of the benefits that we would get from it if we were to understand those benefits at that point.

01:58:23

But at the same time, even though that is the case, even though it was a monstrous and the most evil act committed by sinful men on the planet

01:58:31

Earth in all history, it was still the most glorious event that ever took place. So people have to be very cautious before they start writing off statements like the ones that you just made.

01:58:42

Yeah, amen. Amen. And two, another example in scripture is what

01:58:51

Joseph said to his brothers. You know, what you meant for evil, God meant it, it being the antecedent of evil,

01:59:00

God meant it for good. Amen. Well, I want to make sure that our listeners have the website where they can get this book,

01:59:06

Piety, Passion, Paradox, The Life and Legacy of Basil Manley Sr.

01:59:12

You can go to freegrace .com. I'm sorry, freegracepress .com, freegracepress .com.

01:59:20

And you can also go to cvbbs .com, cvbbs .com. And of course,

01:59:25

Providence Reformed Baptist Church of Pine Mountain, Alabama. You can find their website at prbc1689 .org,

01:59:34

prbc1689 .org. Thank you so much, Pastor Kurt, for being my guest again. I want to thank everybody who listened, especially those who took the time to write in questions.

01:59:42

And I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater Savior than you are a sinner.