"Minister of the Primitive Baptist Church for 63 years. Enlisted in the southern army in 1863 as a private and came out major of the Seventh Kentucky Reg. of Volunteers."
In the comment section of my article Elder Hassell On Means I had this comment:
"Did T. S. Dalton drop his belief that the elect were ordinarily regenerated under the preaching of the gospel?"
Here is what I said in response:
"Many Hardshells did change their minds but I do not recall whether Dalton did." (see here)
Let me now give some testimony from The Trial and Decision of Mount Carmel Church-Part 1.
Elder J. B. McInturff is questioned and testifies as follows:
Q. Now, Mr. Mclnturff, will you be kind enough to produce those writings to which you referred?
A. I would just like to show that at one time Brother Dalton there (indicating) wrote one of the best articles on the subject of “Means” that I have ever seen. It is just gold. It is just exactly what we believe and a great deal better than I could express it myself. Now I had noted down here a good many places for different things, I didn’t know what you were going to ask me. I was going to show you that old Brother Clarke who was the founder of Zion’s Advocate taught the same, and Dr. Gill, the great commentator, did too."
McInturff was right! Elder Clark believed in means. So did Dalton. It was not till after the death of Clark that the anti means view began to gain momentum.
McInturff continued:
"And that Dr. Purifoy did the same but we have already spoken of him. On page 59 in the first volume of Zion’s Advocate, I have copied an article from it. Well, it is simply an editorial that I wrote. It is the beginning of the third number, March, 1891."
Obviously, many who had formerly held to the gospel means position, the original position, began to change their minds. Why?
McInturff continued:
Purifoy states what was the common accepted view of the Hardshells till the rise of the anti means faction in the late 19th century.
McInturff continued:
"Dr. Purifoy published in Zion’s Advocate in 1879 and here are his exact words taken from it. I can produce the original. Here are his exact words:
“I firmly believe that it is the duty of every gospel minister to preach repentance and remission of sins, in the name of Jesus, to all the unregenerate with whom he comes in contact in his pulpit ministrations. As he does this in the name of Jesus, realizing the utter inability of the sinner to repent until the grace of repentance is given him from on high, he has an assurance from the scriptures, that God’s word will not return unto Him void, but will accomplish that whereunto he sends it, and prosper in the thing he pleases. Thus the gospel ministry is instrumental in God’s hands, through Jesus, in raising dead sinners to newness of life---spiritual life---just as the apostles were instruments in His hands in casting out devils, healing the sick, and raising the dead.”
"Page 153 of The Old Paths for June 1891, the heading of the article is “Elder Dalton on ‘Means’.” This is quoted from Brother Dalton’s paper called The Herald of Truth for May, 1891. Brother Dalton used to publish that paper when he lived in Tennessee. If you will bear with me I will read the introduction to it."
(Reading:)
“In our March number, under the caption, ‘Further Testimony,’ our readers will remember that we quoted from an editorial written by Elder Dalton, and published in his paper of April 15, 1884. In Zion’s Advocate and Herald of Truth for May, 1891, he complains that we did not publish all of his article. We did omit several paragraphs; but with no intention of dealing unfairly with him, or of making him to appear to say what he did not intend to teach. The quotation we made was sufficient for our purpose; and the part omitted was in accord with it, if not positively strengthening to it. Indeed the entire paper is excellent reading, and is a masterly defense of the doctrine as held and taught by us; and if the writer of it still holds the sentiments he then expressed, we are with him heart and soul. In order that our readers may know whether he has just cause to complain, or whether, in omitting several paragraphs, we changed the sense of his article, and made him appear in a false light, we now give the entire paper, verbatim et literatim,---just as he sent it out to the public. The reader will please bear in mind that the article in question was written in reply to an anti-Means letter from one J. R. Hatcher, McEwens Tenn., which letter begins with the words, “If God quickens sinners by the preached gospel, how can it be said that he is an independent God? and if he ever did quicken one through preaching, will some one point out the scripture?”
Here is Elder Dalton’s reply:
“ ‘Oh, that God’s children could see and understand the Bible teaching on the important subject of means and instrumentality, and cease to prescribe boundaries for the Lord. Is God limited? Can he not work when and where, and with whatsoever he pleases? Is he not an absolute sovereign? Who is willing to serve in the capacity of counselor for the Lord, and instruct him when to use an instrument, and when he must not? What are instruments, but so many dormant tools in the hands of the operator, with which he serves his own purpose? What are we, as a people, but so many instruments in the hands of God, by and through which he accomplishes his divine purposes? How came us to have being; was it mere chance, or did God have a purpose in our being? If so, are we not the means to accomplish that purpose? If so, will the purpose be accomplished without the means? Did God ever do anything except what he eternally purposed to do? If God eternally purposed to do a thing, did he not embrace from all eternity the way and means by which he would do it? Will he ever turn aside from the way and means fixed in eternity, and do the work some other way? Did God ever use means and instruments in doing his work? He surely has; could he not have done the work without them? He surely could. Why then did he use them? Because it was so fixed in his eternal counsel. Did not Jesus use clay and spittle when He opened the eyes of the blind man? Surely he did. Could he not have opened them without? He surely could for He had opened the eyes of the blind and used neither clay nor spittle; shall we therefore say, because He opened the eyes of some without either clay or spittle, he must therefore open the eyes of all? Do you not see, brethren, that you prescribe the boundaries of the Lord when you take such positions? If God so fixed in His Divine counsel to open the eyes of one blind man by means of the clay and spittle, and another’s eyes without them, shall we therefore say that God has turned aside from His ordained way, because he did either? Or shall we assume to say that God only ordained, from eternity, to open their eyes without means, and then used means once in a while to try His hand, to see whether he could use them or not? Brethren, can you feed sheep? Study well before you answer. Are you not merely instruments through which God feeds his sheep? Surely you have no food of yourselves to feed sheep; but God only uses you as a means or instrument through which he himself feeds His sheep. Did God ever feed a sheep only through the instrumentality of preaching? He surely has. Shall we therefore say that he must always feed them without? Surely not. Is it not God that feeds the sheep, either with or without the means? Surely it is. Is it not as much the work of God when the sheep are fed through the instrumentality of preaching, as when they are fed without these means? Surely it is. Is it not the spirit of God speaking in the minister that feeds the sheep? Surely it is. Can a man destitute of the spirit of God feed the sheep? Surely not; then it is the spirit that does the work is it not? Surely it is. Is the spirit that feeds the sheep the same spirit that makes them alive; or has God two spirits--- one to make alive, and another to feed them after they are alive? Now, brethren, let me say once for all, that all of the preachers that ever have, or ever will, live on earth cannot quicken one dead sinner into divine life; this is solely the work of the Holy Spirit; but for us to say that the spirit never speaks through the minister, and calls the dead to life is surely assuming too much. But be it remembered, that it is not the preacher that uses the spirit, no more than the rams horns used the children of Israel; but it is the spirit that uses the preacher, and thereby makes his words, God’s words, and God thereby accomplishes his divine purposes through the means which be himself has chosen and ordained, and thereby making the means as sure as the end, and the end as sure as the means. God once caused a dumb ass to speak, to accomplish his purpose. God could have forbid the madness of the prophet as well without the ass, but He chose to speak through the beast, as the means or instrument to that end. Shall we therefore assume that he must always speak through the means of a dumb ass, to rebuke prophets? Surely not. Well; what are we to learn from these scriptures? Why, my brother, we are to learn that God is not limited in his domain---he can, and does work either with or without means or instruments just as he chooses. Could God not have thrown down the walls of Jericho as well without the children of Israel blowing the rams horns as with it? Surely he could. Why then did he not do it? Because it was not his purpose so to do; but this doesn’t argue that rams horns must be blown every time there is a wall to be thrown down, or a city to be destroyed. God destroyed the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah without the rams horns.
Now, brethren, while I frankly confess that there was no one to preach to me, when I was first brought to see my condition, this does not argue that everyone must be surrounded with the same circumstances as myself, in order that God’s spirit quicken them into divine life. Oh, how many children of God, that have proven themselves to be such, can call to mind, that date the beginning of their experience under the sound of some faithful servant of God, as he portrayed the riches of God’s grace in the salvation of poor lost and ruined sinners? Perhaps they will say, the minister said certain words that pierced me into my very soul, and caused me to weep and cry, because I was a guilty sinner before God. Surely in such cases the Lord speaks by his spirit, through the minister, and makes his words God’s words, and thereby sends conviction home to the heart of that poor soul. Brethren these things have been a source of great comfort to me. I can now call to mind many that date the beginning of their conviction under my preaching; and while I have never claimed that it was me that did the work, I have rejoiced in the thought that God has used me as an humble instrument in his hands to accomplish his purposes, and I have received it as one of my strongest evidences, that I was a child of God, and a called minister of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Let us call to mind the case of brother Paul, when the Lord told him that he had appeared to him delivering him from the Gentiles unto whom now I send thee, to open their eyes, and to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God. What for---because they had received the forgiveness of sins, and an inheritance among them that are sanctified? No sir, but, “that they might receive the forgiveness of sins, and an inheritance among them; them that are sanctified, through faith that is in me.”
"Now, my brethren, how are we to understand such language as the above, unless we admit that Paul was the instrument through which God had ordained to accomplish this grand and glorious work? And yet the ax cannot boast itself against him that heweth therewith, nor the saw against him that shaketh it. For they are only dormant instruments in the hands of the operator, and “of themselves can do nothing,” but can do all things Christ strengthening them, so says brother Paul. But perhaps some brother will say, this is all true enough, but it looks like Arminianism. No, my brother, you are mistaken; Arminianism only looks a little like this, for what truth is there in the world that Arminians have not imitated? Shall we cease to proclaim the truth because Arminians will imitate it? Surely not; but we ought to be the more zealous in setting forth the true principles of the doctrine of Jesus Christ, because Arminians do imitate it. Counterfeits always imitate, or resemble, very much the genuine, but is only the stronger evidence of the existence of the genuine. And the Arminians believing that they use God as an instrument to do their bidding, is only the stronger proof that God uses his ministers as instruments in his hands to accomplish his designs; for Arminians always have the cart before the horse. But while this is true, we are sorry to have to say that there are some of our brethren who will not have the cart at all; they are willing to admit that the horse carries the load, but they are not wining for him to carry it in the cart, but must always carry it on his back; but we have some, thank the Lord, that will not prescribe how he shall carry it, but are wining to admit that he carries it, whether in the cart or on his back. ‘A hint to the wise is sufficient.’ Now, my brethren, let us cease to prescribe boundaries for the Lord, for the Bible clearly reveals to us that God sometimes uses instruments and performed his work, and afterwards done the same kind of a deed, and used no instrument; therefore, let us not say that if God used an instrument in one case he must use them in all. This, my brethren, is assuming to be the Lord’s instructor; but let us submit to revealed facts, and cease to strive above words to no profit. Hoping that this may terminate in good to us all, I am ever yours to serve in the cause of truth.”
My modern Hardshell brothers, do you agree with Dalton? Did he not teach the original view of your people?
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