A Glória da Verdadeira Igreja - Uma Introdução à Eclesiologia Baptista

by Benjamin Keach

As páginas aqui contidas apresentarão aos crentes de língua portuguesa duas obras significantes da tradição protestante que, por sua vez, beneficiarão suas vidas e suas igrejas. Curiosamente, ambas foram publicadas na última década do século XVII e associadas ao estimado pastor e teólogo inglês Benjamin Keach. Ao que tudo indica, o primeiro manual de igreja produzido na história batista. Os apêndices, por si só, valeriam pelo livro. Seus conteúdos incluem o mais famoso catecismo empregado por crentes batistas no cultivo da piedade em suas vidas e lares, na evangelização dos mais próximos e no campo missionário mais distantes, bem como na orientação de novos crentes à maturidade cristã. Como as duas obras estão repletas das Escrituras e escritas de maneira simples e organizada, quero encorajar a todos que amam o evangelho de Jesus e sua igreja a extraírem o máximo de suas páginas como um meio de graça, para que sejam “confirmados na fé, tal como fostes instruídos, crescendo em ações de graças” (Cl 2.7). — David Allen Bledsoe, Missionário da IBM – International Mission Board

136 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 2021

About the author

Benjamin Keach (1640-1704) was a Particular Baptist preacher in London whose name was given to Keach’s Catechism.

Originally from Buckinghamshire, Keach worked as a tailor during his early years. He was baptized at the age of 15 and began preaching at 18. He was the minister of the congregation at Winslow before moving in 1668 to the church at Horse-lie-down, Southwark where he remained for 36 years as pastor (1668-1704). This congregation later became the New Park Street Church and then moved to the Metropolitan Tabernacle under the pastorship of Charles Spurgeon. It was as representative of this church that Keach went to the 1689 General Assembly and subscribed the 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith. Keach was one of the seven men who sent out the invitation to the 1689 General Assembly. The signing of the confession was no mute doctrinal assent on the part of the church, for in the same year they entered into a Solemn Covenant which reflected, at the practical and congregational level, some of the doctrines of the confession. There was a secession from Horse-lie-down in 1673 and the Old Kent Road congregation was formed. Spurgeon later republished the 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith for use in the congregation.

Keach wrote 43 works, of which his “Parables and Metaphors of Scripture” may be the best known. He wrote a work entitled “The Child’s Instructor” which immediately brought him under persecution and he was fined and pilloried in 1664. He is attributed with the writing of a catechism commonly known as “Keach’s Catechism”, although it is most likely that the original was compiled by William Collins. (From The Digital Puritan)