At the close of the last article on the Down-Grade Controversy, we found Spurgeon withdrawing from the Baptist Union. Charles Haddon Spurgeon sent a letter (dated October 28, 1887) to Samuel Harris Booth, General Secretary of the Baptist Union to announce his withdrawal. He explains that the reasons for the withdrawal would be laid out in the November issue of The Sword and the Trowel. Spurgeon said, “By this time many of our readers will be weary of the Down-Grade controversy: they cannot be one-tenth so much tired of it, or tried by it, as we are.” The controversy had been all-consuming to him as he weighed whether or not he was going to withdraw from the Union. At last he knew he had to cut his ties with them because he felt that he could not compromise on what was so obviously unbiblical. He saw no reason that anyone who purported to believe in the sufficiency and authority of the Bible should have fellowship with those who doubted it. Since the Union would do nothing to stop those doubters, to continue in concert with them would be joining in with their sin. There was no other course of action available and after seeking God’s direction, he removed himself from the Union.
Spurgeon had not left with haste or without the certainty that he had given all he had to try to bring understanding to the leadership of the Union. He had been writing to the General Secretary for months and had many private conversations with him before he made his decision. He had been sworn to secrecy concerning the letters and conversations, yet urged to use the information to fight the corrupting influence of the modernist thinking.
Eighty men of the one hundred-member Council of the Baptist Union met to discuss Spurgeon’s withdrawal. Most were very upset by Spurgeon‘s accusations of compromise. The General Secretary, in his private letters and conversations to Spurgeon, had urged him to speak out against what he clearly saw as widespread compromise. Yet when he met with the Council, he denied this, saying that he never intended for him to formulate charges with the information. This was not strictly true, since he urged Spurgeon to speak out. The Council accused Spurgeon of misrepresenting the truth and Booth, the General Secretary was among them. Spurgeon never betrayed Booth and bore the false accusations. He told his wife that “God knows all about it, and He will see me righted.” One of his biographers states that he was not righted. He could have furnished Dr. Booth’s letters as proof that he had followed Matthew 18, as the Union accused him of not doing, but he did not break his promise to keep them confidential.
By using Spurgeon’s supposed breach of Jesus’ instruction in Matthew 18, the Council was evading the real issues. He had in fact done things right, but lack of integrity on the part of Dr. Booth led the Council to this conclusion. Spurgeon saw this action by the Union for what it was. It is human nature to cast doubt on the integrity of those with whom you don’t agree; indeed it is a common ploy. Instead of dealing with the heart of the matter, cast doubt on your accuser. This is a very familiar response to a biblical challenge. Paul endured much the same treatment we note as we read the epistles.
Spurgeon had been careful not to mention specific names of those preaching “another gospel”, thinking that this may have been the best way to deal with the fact that the entire Union had been on the Down-Grade.
He did not want to make it seem as though his attacks were of a personal nature, rather than addressing the doctrinal drift of the entire group. But the Council used this against him by saying that his accusations were too vague to deal with. From the human standpoint, he was in a no-win situation. But God would surely count him among His faithful few, who understood and lived the words of a song; “though none go with me, still I will follow…”
A panel of four men was dispatched to meet with Spurgeon to see if they could get him to reconsider his withdrawal. Only three were able to meet with him (one man was ill) and Spurgeon asked them to adopt an evangelical statement of faith, they refused. He would not change his mind either, so nothing was really accomplished at this meeting. However, the full Council met a mere five days later and voted to accept his withdrawal, but also to censure him. They maintained that he did not give them enough evidence to investigate the charges he had made, so they supposed them to be false. The real facts were that he not only had letters proving he had addressed the issues with Dr. Booth, but in the letters between the two, names were in fact named, so that Booth could have (and should have) substantiated the claims Spurgeon had made. Spurgeon could have cited the published articles of some of his fellow Baptists to bring ample proof that he was correct in pointing out the errors.
Why did he not just name the names and bring forth the proof the Council deemed necessary? He did not want the battle to degrade into a personal war and further, he was concerned that the problem needed to be addressed in a different manner, or it was destined to keep happening. The Baptist Union did not have a doctrinal statement, so there was no real mechanism in place for disciplining anyone for false teaching. The only thing they were concerned with was mode of baptism, which leaves a group wide open for heresy. The curtain had fallen, so to speak on this group. They did adopt a creed of sorts, but one that was vague enough to allow the continuation of the Down-Grade. After introducing this weak doctrinal statement, a disclaimer was added that said the Union did not have the authority to enforce any doctrinal standards on its members. So, a wishy-washy statement of faith was rendered completely useless for the purpose of addressing error with this addition.
If it is the desire to have peace at any price, the price will be very dear indeed. The only real peace attainable is from the Prince of Peace and I doubt that He would have voted on such a measure as had the Baptist Union. Spurgeon was not trying to be divisive; he was not in favor of schism. But his conscience that had been informed by the Bible would not allow him to continue in fellowship with a group of men that were unable to discern the enemies of the gospel in their midst. He felt that the best way to promote unity in this case was to leave. “Nothing has ever more largely promoted the union of the true than the break with the false.”
These times tried Spurgeon’s soul. He lost close friends and even some of his students from his Pastor’s College turned against him. Spurgeon never regretted his decision. The Baptist Union was certainly never the same. And evangelicals owe a debt of gratitude to Spurgeon whose actions helped alert the church of the dangers of the Down-Grade and modernism.
It has been and will remain a question in the minds of those who are faced with similar circumstances whether or not to remove themselves from associations that no longer deem adherence to Scripture as necessary. For many, to remain seems like blasphemy and in Spurgeon’s words, “Fellowship with known and vital error is participation in sin.” For others, they may decide to stay to see if they can bring light and correction to the group. It is this writer’s opinion that if the body cannot see the error immediately, it is not likely that they will see it at all…
