Providentially, about this time, while he was most earnestly engaged in studying the Bible, he was thrown into the company of a Mrs. Threadcraft, of Savannah, who informed him that in her city a Mr. S. C. Dunning, who had formerly been a Baptist preacher, but had recently seceded from that body, because he did not believe it taught and practiced as the Word of God required. In this movement he had been accompanied by eight or ten others. This lady further informed him that Mr. Dunning preached the Scriptures as he did, and that at his hands he could obtain baptism upon a simple confession of his faith in Jesus Christ as the Son of God. This information filled him with such great joy that he did not delay in making the journey into Savannah to see Mr. Dunning, who baptized him without further delay. This was during the year 1819.
Immediately after returning to his home he immersed his wife, her sister and her husband. These “continued steadfastly in the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, in the breaking of bread and the prayers,” meeting every Lord’s Day in the house of Mr. Dasher. The little church grew and prospered, being occasionally visited by Mr. Dunning, who assisted in building it up by his teaching and exhortations.
Some time after this, Mr. Dasher, accompanied by a number of the members of the church, moved into Lowndes County, and located where the city of Valdosta now stands. In this new field he continued the work of preaching the word and built up a congregation which met in his own residence. This was the beginning of the work in Valdosta and the region around about. It was many years after the baptism of Mr. Dasher before he knew that there were any others in any place contending for the “truth as is in Jesus,” as he and those associated with him were doing.
CHAPTER IX.
THE CHRISTIANS AND REFORMERS UNITE
A new period has now dawned in the movement for the union of all Christians by the restoration of primitive Christianity. The Baptists had thrust from their fellowship those who had embraced it and they were forced into a separate existence. Every preacher among them was filled with a zeal to plant churches after the primitive order wherever they could get a large enough company together.
The work spread principally from two centers, Ohio and Kentucky. From Ohio it was carried into New York and Pennsylvania; and westward into Michigan, northern Ohio, and Indiana, and Wisconsin. From Kentucky it was carried eastward and southward into Virginia, Maryland, the Carolinas, Tennessee, and Alabama; and westward into Indiana, Illinois and Missouri. The movement spread chiefly in a westward direction from Kentucky and Tennessee along the lines of emigration. Very often a sufficient number of emigrants to establish themselves into a congregation after the primitive order found themselves together in the same neighborhood and began at once to meet together for mutual edification and the spread of the truth.
While it was well known that there were many things received and practiced in common there had been no special effort to bring about a union between them. In 1824, at Georgetown, Ky., Mr. Stone and Mr. Campbell first met. When they compared views, it seemed that there were irreconcilable differences between them. Stone thought Campbell was heterodox on the Holy Spirit, and Campbell suspected Stone’s soundness on the divinity of Christ. But on a more careful investigation, they found these differences more imaginary than real, and they joined hearts and hands and God blessed them with the most important work since the apostolic age. With the kindly feelings towards each other, the work of union between their brethren was well on the way when it was begun. And so, after a number of friendly conferences, it was decided to have a meeting of representative men at Georgetown, Ky., to continue for days, including December 25, 1831. The results of this conference were so satisfactory that another was convened in Lexington, January 1, 1832. In these gatherings the spirit of the Master was supreme.
At the Lexington meeting, at an early hour the house was crowded. Stone, John T. Johnson, Samuel Rogers, G. W. Elley, Jacob Creath, “Raccoon” John Smith, and many other worthy men were there, all guarded in thought and purpose against any compromise of truth, but all filled with the spirit of the Master: “That they may all be one; even as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be in us: that the world may believe that thou didst send me.” It was decided that one man from each party should speak, setting forth clearly the grounds of union, and Smith and Stone were selected as the speakers. After this had been announced, the two brethren went aside, and conferred in private. Neither knew what the other would say in the critical hour which had now come upon the churches; nor did either, in the moment of solemn conference, ask the other to disclose his mind, touching their differences, more fully than he had already done. It was decided between them that Smith should speak first.
The occasion was to Smith the most important and solemn that had occurred in the history of the reformation. “It was now to be seen whether all that had been written and said and done in behalf of the simple gospel of Christ and the union of Christians was really the work of the Lord, or whether the prayers of Stone and Johnson were but the idle longings of pious, yet deluded hearts; whether the toils and sacrifices of Smith were but the schismatic efforts of a bold enthusiast, and whether the teachings of Campbell were only the speculations of a graceless and sensuous philosophy. The denominations around mocked, and declared that a church without a constitution could not stand, and that a union without a creed was but the chimera of a dreamy and infatuated heresy.”
At the appointed hour, Smith, realizing the tremendous importance of the occasion, arose with simple dignity, and stood before the mingling brotherhoods. He felt the weight that rested upon him. Every eye turned upon him, and every ear leaned to catch the slightest tones of his voice. He said: