1842 Circular Letter of the Fishing River Association (Missouri)

ACTS XI. 19—“And they which were scattered abroad upon the persecution that arose about Stephen, traveled as far as Phenice, and Cyprus, and Antioch, preaching the Word,” etc., and some of these were men of Cyprus and Cyrene, which when they came to Antioch spoke unto the heathen, preaching the Lord Jesus. Question—What carried the gospel to the heathen and isles of the sea, money or persecution? You all know it was persecution. Then persecution was the secondary cause why the gospel was carried and preached to the heathen. And this the apostles might have easily known from the directions of Christ, who said, “When they persecute you in one city flee to another.” Now look at the case of Paul and Barnabas in the 13th chapter of Acts. Look at all the apostles, the seventy that Christ sent out, and, indeed, we might refer you to all the preachers for three hundred years after the apostolic age. Look into Ecclesiastical history and see if persecution did not carry the gospel to the greater part of Asia, Europe, Africa, and by the same wing it flew to the United States.…

We ask where was the glorious kingdom of the Redeemer from John the Baptist in the year 30, to Fuller and Cary in 1792? We answer, that if you will consult history you will easily see that it was not in its silvered slippers, but dyed in garments of blood. We do not glory in persecution. Although this is the instrument that God has ever employed to purify his church, but we do glory in the church as being disenthralled from all the inventions of men. The Lord said to Moses, “See, said he, that thou make all things according to the pattern shewed thee in the mount.” He was not permitted to form the architecture or building, according to the fashion of the neighboring nations around, but according to the divine model revealed.