Baptist statesman J.L. Dagg finishes his Manual of Church Order with the “duty of Baptists.” Dagg lists 6 duties that all Baptists should uphold and then expounds on each duty.
Regarding the duties of Baptists, Dagg writes:
Although the truth of God does not need human authority, or the patronage of great names, it is nevertheless the Divine pleasure to make it known to the world by human instrumentality; and this instrumentality needs to be adapted to the purpose for which it is employed. If God has commissioned a sect everywhere spoken against, to make known truth which the wise and learned have overlooked, that sect ought to understand the service to which they have been appointed, and ought to fulfil the prescribed duty firmly, faithfully, and in the fear of the Lord. As men designed for a peculiar service, let us, by earnest and constant endeavor, seek to ascertain the will of him to whose supreme authority we yield all our powers, and let us diligently and perseveringly obey that will, whether men revile or praise.
I believe Dagg’s list is helpful for reflection on what God would have us to do and what it means to be a Baptist.
1. It is our duty to maintain the ordinances of Christ, and the church order which he has instituted, in strict and scrupulous conformity to the Holy Scriptures.
2. It is our duty, while rendering punctilious obedience to all the commands of God, to regard the forms and ceremonies of religion as of far less importance than its moral truths and precepts.
3. It is our duty to hold and exhibit the entire system of Christian doctrine in all its just proportions.
4. It is our duty to maintain lives of holy obedience in all things.
5. It is our duty to labor faithfully and perseveringly to bring all men to the knowledge of the truth.
6. It is our duty to promote the spiritual unity of the universal church, by the exercise of brotherly love to all who bear the image of Christ.
Read Dagg’s exposition of each point here.
