Mr. Campbell himself seems, during the winter of 1812, to have given some consideration to this question of religious fellowship, and as he was then carrying on the correspondence, already spoken of, with his father upon various topics, he took occasion to introduce for discussion the position which believers occupy in relation to unbelievers in social or public religious exercises. Under date of February 26, 1812, he submits to his father the following queries:

      "1. What is prayer, and how many kinds are there? 2. Is it scriptural and lawful for believers and unbelievers formally to join in prayer and praise as acts of religious worship? The matter to be ascertained is," he remarks, "the propriety of social acts of religious worship in promiscuous assemblies or in families where some are unbelievers." After expressing his desire that this matter should be examined impartially, and without paying any respect to such "advantages or disadvantages in a temporal sense as might accrue from this or that practice," he says: "When I survey the religious world and read the New Testament, the more clearly I am convinced that superstition, enthusiasm, formality and will-worship, prevail to the ruin and disgrace of scriptural and ancient Christianity. And as truth can never be injured by being examined, to call all doctrines and religious practices, in this generation, in question, appears an immediate and indispensable duty." After speaking then of the corruptions of Christianity in the perversion of the ordinances of baptism, the Lord's Supper, the Lord's day, preaching, etc., he inquires if it is not probable that the ordinances of prayer and praise have likewise been perverted. "How many disciples of Moses," he exclaims, "are yet to be found in the professed school of Jesus Christ! and how few among the teachers of the New Testament seem to know that Christ's ministers are not able ministers of the Old Testament, but of the New! Do they not, like scholars to their teacher, run to Moses to prove forms of worship, ordinances, discipline, and government in the Christian Church, when asked to account for their practice? On this subject, I think we may rest satisfied, that since the great Prophet has come, whom to refuse or disobey is death, who is a faithful son over his own house, that all worship and forms of worship, ordinances, discipline, and government belonging to the Christian Church, must be learned exclusively from the New Testament. And every appeal made to Moses or the prophets to confirm any form of worship, ordinance, or any part of Christian discipline or government is sending Christ the Son to Moses the servant to be instructed. It is a perverse impeachment of the wisdom, goodness and care of the Church's head."

      Passing, afterward, to the subject of family-worship, he submits to his father the question whether there is scriptural authority for making this observance, as some had done, a term of communion, and whether it is proper in a family composed in part of unbelievers? To these inquiries his father replies at considerable length in two letters, dated the 2d and 12th of March, in which he considers particularly this question of religious fellowship:

      "That Christianity," he remarks, "in the present profession and practice, is greatly corrupted, is a plain matter of fact. Whoever will seriously consider the present state of things in the professing world and compare it with the spirit and tenor of the apostolic writings, and with the state of things there exhibited, will plainly perceive, nay, will sensibly feel, a remarkable and striking difference."

Dwelling then upon the gospel as it was first introduced, and as designed to replace all other religions, he continues:

"As the object of this new religion, if I may so call it, which superseded all others, and made them null and void upon its appearance, was the one God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who was thus distinguished (see 1 Cor. viii. 5, 6), and only rightly worshiped in and through him who was indeed one with him and with the Holy Spirit in Divinity, but distinct from him and Lorded by him as to his relation to humanity, or as the Word made flesh, Acts ii. 36; so with respect to religious fellowship or relationship, the subjects of this new religion had their respects or religious regards entirely turned to and solely confined to each other, considering none but themselves as fellow-subjects of the grace of God, or as brethren in religion. Hence their religious esteem and intercourse in all religious acts and exercises were precisely and necessarily limited to each other, and of course must of necessity still be the same, for there is still but one body, one Spirit, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, and of course but one law of love pervading and uniting all within the manifold limits of this unity and under its manifest influences. Now every pretence to extend [449] communion in the acts and exercises of religion beyond the limits of this special unity, as well as every attempt to set it aside, wheresoever manifest by separating or causing to separate those whom God has thus united in himself by his Son Jesus Christ through the Spirit, in the one baptismal profession of faith and holiness, is no less absurd than anti-scriptural. These, and these alone, constitute the one visible professing body of our Lord Jesus Christ upon earth, and are the special subjects of all-saving grace and of fellowship in all gospel ordinances, in and by which that grace is manifested, maintained and promoted.

      "Now all are, in the first instance, manifested and distinguished by the one faith, of which the one baptism or submersion in water in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, is the proper, instituted and expressive symbol, and also the first formal and comprehensive act of the obedience of faith. But this faith may be manifested without this baptism, and where it is received must always be manifested (I mean by a scriptural and intelligent profession) before it. And now that the world has for a long time been misled about this baptism, and in the way of administering it to children, which are utterly incapable and always unqualified subjects--the one faith, manifested by an intelligent and consistent profession, is the immediate, proper, and formal reason of religious communion in all the instituted ordinances of gospel worship, beyond which it cannot be lawfully or profitably extended; and this instituted worship can be nowhere performed upon the Lord's day, where the Lord's Supper is not administered. Wherever this is neglected, there New Testament Church-worship ceases.     *     *

      "Now as all private and particular meetings of Christians for particular purposes, naturally and properly include only such as are concerned in the proper and specified cause of such meetings, therefore none but they can have any proper or assignable cause of access to such meetings, and as the public meetings of the Church for edification are open to all (see 1 Cor. xiv. 23, 24, 25), there can be, therefore, no [450] prostitution of religious exercises by the accidental presence of unbelievers, seeing they are not intentionally as members, or as the proper and qualified subjects of such exercises, although they may happen to be present, and also to be convinced and converted by the appointed means of public edification. And, as for the Lord's Supper, which only respects disciples, and to which none else have right of access but only such, it belongs so peculiarly to the church and to it alone, that it would appear that none else but disciples had access to the meetings which were held for this particular purpose; so that there was no need for tokens to distinguish church members from strangers who belong not to the church; and, indeed, it would be hard to conceive under what pretence such could be admitted.     *     *     *     *

      "Upon the whole, it appears that the Christians had their public, their special and their private or particular meetings--their public meetings for public edification, their special meetings for special edification, and their more private or particular meetings pro re nata.     *     *     *     *     But all the while, it is as obvious as the light that shines, that professed believers, acknowledged Christians, and none but they, are the proper, intended and specified subjects of all religious communion and fellowship in all the ordinances of gospel worship, nor can they scripturally intend, much less extend, that communion beyond themselves or those of their own number. See 2 Cor. vi. 14-18. Though they may and will consult and intend the conversion and salvation of their perishing fellow-creatures by the means appointed for that purpose in their public meetings. See 1 Cor. xiv. 23-25. Thus far concerns the order, intention and proper subjects of the ordinances of gospel worship, public, special and particular.

      "The next question that occurs upon this interesting and important subject, is like that of the Pharisee of old: 'Who is my neighbor, my brother in religion, the qualified object of my regard, my fellow-Christian?'

      "In attempting to answer this, I would cautiously avoid the Pharisaic self-preferring disposition, and therefore would reply, [451] in the first instance, any fellow-sinner of the human race, how vile soever he may have been, who makes an intelligent profession of the truth as it is in Jesus, as comprehensively specified in the eighth proposition of the overture in our Address; and so long as he continues to manifest the reality of his profession by his temper and conduct, still to consider him in the same light. Than the above, I know no other distinction between mankind with respect to salvation, and this, while I believe the Scriptures, I must believe to be the only and all-sufficient ground for Christian love, and therefore I must heartily acquiesce in what is declared in the ninth proposition. This, however, may be thought at first view to be a very generalizing principle; I could wish with all my heart that it was, that it would embrace the whole Christian--I mean professing--world; but upon a close inspection and strict application, I fear it will be found to embrace but comparatively few--yea, very few--of the great majority of the religious professors. Do they, or can they all, indeed, upon a close examination, manifest a conviction by the word and truth of God that they are originally and actually in the awful, woeful, lost and perishing condition in which the word and truth of God declares them to be? And in connection with this, such a scriptural view of the person and mediation of Jesus Christ as both satisfies God and the convinced conscience, gives rest and peace to the heart from the just apprehension of impending wrath, and disposes the soul to the holy obedience of faith and love? Do they or can they profess such faith, such hope and such love upon the good, assignable scriptural reasons with which a true knowledge and belief of the Divine testimony furnishes every mind that truly understands and believes it? I fear not; and I would say that, without this clearly and scripturally ascertained in connection with a corresponding practice (in so far as practice can be taken into consideration Under the various circumstances in which the various applicants may be found), there is no just scriptural ground of religious fellowship.     *     *     *

      "In order, then, to direct and determine our practice in [452] existing circumstances, when all the world are called Christians, and the great majority seem to persuade themselves that they are so in some sense, and therefore are in a condition with respect to Christ and salvation vastly different from the heathen world, both as to persons and circumstances, we believe, as we have a right to hope, that there are Christians in all the denominations of professors where the great fundamental truths of the gospel are acknowledged, although we have no reason to believe that the majority of professors are such. Therefore, when any number of persons assemble on the Lord's day for the avowed purpose of public worship, there we may reasonably hope that there are some believers, and however this be, the persons thus assembling, in so far avow themselves to be voluntary subjects of the gospel dispensation; nor is it our place to determine, what in many cases we cannot, who of them are or are not Christians, or whether or not they may not be all so, seeing that in the point of view in which they present themselves to our considerations, as also in the course of the service, they manifest themselves to partake with us in the acts of religious worship. There can be no doubt, then, in such a case, but we are to consider and address them as the professed worshipers of the true God through Jesus Christ. I do not say as unfeigned and believing worshipers, for, even in the most perfect Church, we would scarcely be justifiable in considering all as such. This conclusion proceeds upon the supposition that Christ has a people amongst the visible professors of his name, and that these may be expected to be found where the great fundamental truths of the gospel are publicly professed; nay, that wheresoever this is the case, there the professors, if sincere, of course must be his people. But this, as I said above, is scarcely to be expected in the most perfect Church that ever did or shall exist. See the seven Epistles to the seven Asiatic Churches. Moreover, every irregularity, error or mistake does not unpeople a professing people. Therefore I conclude that where we bear an open faithful testimony against the existing evils of a professing people who acknowledge the [453] great fundamental truths of the gospel, we are warranted to join in all public acts of religious worship with such of them as voluntarily attend upon our ministrations, and thus countenance our instructions both by their voluntary attendance and manifest concurrence with us in those religious acts."     *     *     *     *

      Such were the sentiments of Thomas Campbell upon the subject of religious fellowship in March, 1811, and in these his son Alexander substantially agreed. When, about three months after the above correspondence, the church at Brush Run became a body of immersed believers, these views became more clearly and sharply defined, no one being afterward recognized as duly prepared to partake in religious services, except those who had professed to put on Christ in baptism. From his lively sense of the prevalent corruptions of the gospel and its institutions, and his conscientious scruples in regard to yielding to these any countenance or toleration, Mr. Campbell, even down to his later years, would occasionally, amongst private friends, contend strenuously for principles almost as exclusive and rigid as those of Walker. His benevolent feelings, however; his Christian courtesy and his sympathy for those whom he regarded as sincere but mistaken, did not permit him to carry out such principles. Both he and his father had great consideration for the unintentional mistakes and errors in which religious society had become involved, and in this feeling, the members of the church at Brush Run, for the most part, participated. However clear their convictions had become as to the primitive method of confessing Christ, and the primitive faith and order of the Church, they had too fresh a recollection of their own struggles and difficulties in attaining to the views they held, and too deep a [454] sympathy with the pious but priest-ridden members of other communities, to refuse to recognize them as being intentionally at least, followers of Christ. As they could not, however, make any compromise with the corrupt systems and practices of the day, and were prevented by their principles from recognizing fraternally any one who had not publicly complied with the requisitions of the gospel, they were necessarily inhibited from inviting any except the actual members of the church to take a part in religious exercises. This was specially true with regard to the Lord's Supper, which they continued to celebrate weekly, and of which none but baptized believers were invited to partake. It was not, however, the custom of the church, nor has it ever been that of any of the Churches of the Reformation, to "fence the tables," as sectarians express and practice it; or to withhold the symbols from any pious person who might be present and feel disposed to unite in commemorating the death of Christ. [455]

[Memoirs of Alexander Campbell, Vol. I, pp. 447-455.]

      The extracts of Thomas Campbell's letters to his son (1812) were first published in Robert Richardson's Memoirs of Alexander Campbell, Vol. 1 (Philadelphia, PA: J. B. Lippincott, 1871), pp. 447-455.

      Pagination in the electronic version has been represented by placing the page number in brackets following the last complete word on the printed page. The extracts of Thomas Campbell's letters have been set in Century Schoolbook typeface and set off as block quotations. Alexander Campbell's queries and Robert Richardson's narrative have been included to provide historical context and continuity. I have let stand variations and inconsistencies in the author's use of italics, capitalization, punctuation, and spelling in the letter.

      Addenda and corrigenda are earnestly solicited.

Ernie Stefanik
Derry, PA

Created 5 January 1998.
Updated 8 July 2003.