Today tiny Lebanon Baptist Church in Crawford County, Georgia, convenes in a business meeting and grapples with war, death and God’s will. Anguished over the loss of a solider member and his father, the congregation issues a statement “in memory of our deceased Brethren O. M. McAfee & A. J. McAfee.” In the midst of…
This month Augustus Hopkins Strong (3 August 1836 – 29 November 1921) is ordained as the pastor of the First Baptist Church of Haverhill, Massachusetts. Fresh from earning his doctorate in theology, Strong begins a ministerial journey that will lead him to a place of national prominence and esteem in Baptist life as the foremost…
President Abraham Lincoln, a former Baptist who now embodies a more mystical view of God and, due to the unparalleled war the nation is now engaged in, is being transformed into the United States’ theologian-in-chief, issues his first proclamation for a national day of fasting: Whereas a joint Committee of both Houses of Congress has…