THE EMERGENCE OF THE BAPTISTS

The English-speaking peoples advanced late and reluctantly towards the envangelisation of the non-Christian world. In the eighteenth century only one Englishman was sent to India as a missionary; and he, after only one year's service, exchanged the lowly status of missionary for better rewarded employment as a Company's chaplain.

All this was changed by two apparently insignificant but related events which took place in the year 1792.

On 31 May of that year a small group of Baptist ministers assembled at Nottingham for a meeting of their association. The preacher was a young and little-known minister, William Carey. Taking as his text Isaiah 54: 2 and 3 (‘Enlarge the place of thy tent, and let them stretch forth the curtains of thine habitations; spare not, lengthen thy cords, and strengthen thy stakes… thy seed shall inherit the Gentiles’), Carey spoke with prophetic power, laying before his brethren Christ's commission to preach the gospel to all nations. His sermon could be summarised in two short phrases: ‘Expect great things from God. Attempt great things for God.’ All were stirred; yet it appeared that, as so often, emotion would not immediately lead to action.