What Is a Reformed Baptist Church?

“Reformed Baptist” is a phrase that says, in two words, a great deal. Tom Hicks, a faithful Reformed Baptist pastor, summarizes it well in his book What Is a Reformed Baptist? (Founders Press): a Reformed Baptist church is one that “holds to the doctrines of grace, the regulative principle of worship, covenant theology, the moral law of God, and the historic Reformed Baptist confessions of faith.” Each of those phrases names something distinct — and together, they mark off a stream of Christian conviction that flows directly from the apostles, through the Reformation, through the Puritans, and into Pray’s Mill Baptist Church today.

What follows is a brief walk through the five marks that make a Reformed Baptist church Reformed and Baptist. None of them is new. All of them are old. We did not invent what we believe; we received it — and we mean to hand it on, unchanged, to our children’s children.

Mark One

The Doctrines of Grace.

Reformed Baptists hold what the Reformers and Puritans called the doctrines of grace — that salvation is, from beginning to end, the work of a sovereign God. The Father chose a people for himself before the foundation of the world (Eph. 1:4). The Son came to lay down his life for that people (John 10:11, 15). The Spirit effectually calls them, regenerates them, gives them faith and repentance, and keeps them to the end (John 6:37; Rom. 8:30). These are not five points of a system; they are five facets of one great truth — “Salvation belongs to the Lord” (Jonah 2:9).

As Hicks puts it: the doctrines of grace are not cold abstractions but the very “warm heart of the gospel” — the assurance that the God who began a good work in his people will complete it.

Mark Two

The Regulative Principle of Worship.

God has not left the worship of his church to our imaginations. He is a holy God who has revealed, in his Word, the way he is to be approached — and what he has commanded, we do; what he has not commanded, we do not impose on his people. This is the Regulative Principle of Worship.

Reformed Baptists, with the broader Reformed tradition, believe this principle sets us apart from churches whose worship has drifted toward entertainment, innovation, and the imaginations of men. The 1689 Confession states it plainly: “The acceptable way of worshipping the true God is instituted by himself, and so limited by his own revealed will, that he may not be worshipped according to the imaginations and devices of men… or any other way not prescribed in the Holy Scriptures” (2LBCF 22.1). We read the Word, sing the Word, pray the Word, preach the Word, and see the Word at the Lord’s Supper. More on how we worship →

Mark Three

Covenant Theology (Reformed Baptist Version).

Reformed Baptists, like our Presbyterian and continental Reformed brethren, read the Bible as one unfolding story of God’s covenants — with Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, David, and finally and fully through Christ in the new covenant. But we differ from them at one crucial point. Following the 1689 Confession (sometimes called “1689 federalism”), we hold that the new covenant is established only with those who have come to faith in Christ — not extended to physical descendants by inheritance.

As Hicks observes, this is the heart of what makes us Reformed Baptist: we share the doctrines of grace with our Presbyterian brethren, but we baptize believers, not infants, by immersion, because we believe the new covenant is a covenant of grace through faith in Christ — not a renewal of the old covenant administration. (1689, chs. 7, 29) See our articles: What is 1689 federalism? and Believer’s baptism vs. infant baptism.

Mark Four

The Moral Law of God.

Reformed Baptists hold that the moral law of God — summarized in the Ten Commandments and ultimately in the two great commandments to love God and neighbor — remains binding on every human being in every age. It is not a way of salvation (Christ alone is that), but it is the rule of life for the justified.

The law shows us our sin and drives us to Christ for forgiveness. And once Christ has saved us, the law shows the redeemed how to walk in love. As Hicks notes, this is one of the great differences between Reformed Baptist churches and the various “free grace” or antinomian movements: we love God’s law because we love God, and we love God because he first loved us (1 John 4:19). (1689, ch. 19)

Mark Five

The Historic Confessions.

To be confessional is not to elevate a human document over Scripture. Scripture alone is the supreme authority over the church. But a confession says, in clear public words, what we are persuaded Scripture teaches — so that anyone who joins this church, sends their children here, or sits under our preaching knows exactly what we believe.

Pray’s Mill subscribes without reservation to the Second London Baptist Confession of Faith (1689). Hicks rightly emphasizes that confessional identity is one of the chief marks of a healthy Reformed Baptist church: it protects the gospel from drift, it grounds the church in the historic stream of orthodox Christianity, and it gives the next generation something solid to inherit. The 1689 is not new theology — it is old theology, faithfully summarized.

Read Further

• What is 1689 federalism?
• Believer’s baptism vs. infant baptism explained
• Plurality of elders — why every church needs more than one
• Why we practice church discipline
• Why we sing hymns and psalms in worship
• What is the Lord’s Day?
• How often should we take the Lord’s Supper?
• What to expect when you visit a Reformed Baptist church