Prior to this month, the only African American Baptist churches in the state of Missouri are located in St. Louis, Hannibal, St. Joseph, Jefferson City and (possibly) Lexington. Now, a new church joins this short list: the First Colored Baptist Church of Warrensburg. Many other black Baptist congregations are also birthed this month, including the…
As the Confederacy’s largest city — New Orleans — is surrounded by the Union Navy, to the East the annual meeting of the Georgia Baptist Convention convenes at the First Baptist Church of LaGrange. The travails of the war are evident from the opening session, as both the appointed preacher, and the alternative, for the…
Before a packed sanctuary at the First Baptist Church of Macon, Georgia, Ebenezer W. Warren, pastor of the Macon congregation, delivers a sermon defending black slavery as biblical. (The Macon Telegraph printed the sermon in its February 7, 1861 edition.) Warren ties slavery explicitly to the Bible and the will of God, arguing that biblical…