Separatist Church In The Seventeenth Century

Many different Christian churches were founded as a result of breaking away from the main church. People disagreed with how the church had turned into something that they did not believe it should be. Therefore people broke away and created many new Christian churches with their own distinct beliefs and practices. The majority of these Christian faiths are still present and have followers today. One of these Christian churches is the Baptist church which began in the early seventeenth century. In the early seventeenth century, the Separatists were very frustrated with the Puritans. They believed that the Puritans stopped trying to reform the Church, the Church became corrupt and selfish, and the original message of the Puritans was given
The leader of the first General Baptist Church was John Smyth. At first this congregation was solely a “Separatist” congregation in 1606. In 1608, Smyth and Thomas Helwys along with other members of their congregation fled to Amsterdam (Buschart). The members of this church were English refugees who were seeking to escape from the persecution of the Church of England. The goal of this first Church was to develop Puritan and Separatist views, however Smyth failed in this and joined another Separatist congregation in Gainsborough. Then this group in Gainsborough migrated to a city that would free them of religious persecution. It was not until the group moved to Amsterdam that they began practicing the ideals that they are still practicing today
John Spilsbury began the first group of Particular Baptists in 1633. Spilsbury, like Smyth, baptized many of his followers, including one man named William Kiffin. Little did Spilsbury know up Kiffin’s baptism, that Kiffin would become a very important spokesman for the Particular Baptist faith. The major difference between the beliefs of Particular Baptists and General Baptists is that Particular Baptists do not believe in the general view of atonement. Particular Baptists believe in a “...’particular’ view of the atonement, according to which Jesus Christ died only for those who are elect, or chosen, by God” (Buschart). Although the Particular Baptists began after about a generation of the General Baptists, it did grow quite as rapidly as the General Baptists did. The Church of Particular Baptists grew rapidly, and by 1650 they were found all around London