What Is a Reformed Baptist?: An Overview of Doctrinal Distinctives (Hicks)

Description

A Reformed Baptist is a Christian who believes in the great doctrines recovered by the Protestant Reformation, including the sufficiency of Scripture for the church, salvation by God’s free grace, justification by faith alone, the importance of God’s good law and the gospel of Jesus Christ, the centrality of the church in the life of the believer, and the great doctrine of Christian liberty. This book argues that Reformed Baptists are not particularly unique, but are simply biblical Christians who fall within the theological stream of the historic Reformed faith, and who are also baptistic in their doctrine of the church. This is not a polemical work. Rather, it makes a positive case for the doctrines cherished by Reformed Baptists. May this book benefit motivated laymen, broadly evangelical pastors, Baptist pastors, and Reformed paedobaptist pastors who want to understand what their Reformed Baptist brethren believe.

Contents

Foreword by Thomas K. Ascol
Introduction

• Chapter 1: Historical Roots
• Chapter 2: Confessionalism
• Chapter 3: The Law of God
• Chapter 4: Covenant Theology
• Chapter 5: The Law and the Gospel
• Chapter 6: Calvinism
• Chapter 7: The Church
• Chapter 8: Regulative Principle of Worship
• Chapter 9: Christian Liberty

About the Author

Endorsements

“As Tom Hicks himself says in his introduction, this volume was originally intended as a small book that became a substantially larger book. Such smaller descriptions of Reformed Baptist churches have been written. Dr. Hicks has given us a larger book that is well worthy of consideration. He accomplishes his purpose well. I found many things in it that I appreciate greatly. Here is one particularly good nugget with which I strongly agree: “Reformed Baptists, therefore, are not a species of the genus “Baptist.”  Rather, they are a species of the genus “Reformed.” Reformed Baptists are not a branch of a Baptist tree; rather, they are a branch of the Reformed tree. This is evident in that Reformed Baptists have much in common with other Confessional Reformed churches, but they tend to have many substantial differences with other Baptists. Reformed Baptist identity is catholic first, then confessionally Reformed, and finally Baptist.”
—Sam Waldron, President, Covenant Baptist Theological Seminary

“You hold in your hands a comprehensive and accessible summary of confessional Reformed Baptist theology. By tracing the roots of this movement from the early church to the Reformation and post-Reformation, Tom Hicks shows the significant continuity between the confessional Reformed Baptist movement and the Puritan and Presbyterian traditions—particularly in the areas of soteriology (the doctrines of grace), hermeneutics, covenant theology, the law of God, and the regulative principle of worship. While I respectfully disagree with those areas of doctrine that distinguish Reformed Baptists and Presbyterians (especially the covenantal baptism of infants of believing parents), I appreciate the irenic spirit that permeates this work. As much of this book is a treatment of Reformed theology, much of it reads like an able defense of the broader Reformed tradition of which I am part. I highly recommend this volume for my Reformed Baptist brothers and sisters and for Presbyterians and other Paedobaptists seeking to better understand 1689 confessionalism.”
—Joel R. Beeke, Chancellor and Professor of Homiletics & Systematic Theology Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary 

About the Author

Tom Hicks is the Senior Pastor at First Baptist of Clinton, Louisiana. He and his wife, Joy, have four children. Tom received his MDiv and PhD degrees from The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky. He serves on the board of directors for Covenant Baptist Theological Seminary and teaches for Covenant Baptist Theological Seminary as well as International Reformed Baptist Seminary.