Memorials of the Independent Churches in Northamptonshire Part 6

On June 3rd of the same year we had a day of prayer appointed, and invited several sister Churches in communion with us to join in seeking a blessing upon us as a Church, and upon my poor labours amongst them.

Dr. Doddridge spake to the people, and Mr. Hall, of London, gave me a word of exhortation upon the occasion.

The ministry of Mr. Sanderson was devoted and useful, but short. Only six years after the time of his settlement we find it recorded, "Mr.

Jonathan Sanderson fell sweetly asleep in Christ Jesus, April 18th, 1747."

When he entered on his office, and transcribed the names of those that were then members of the Church, he wrote--"The Lord grant that the Church of Christ at Rowell may increase in numbers, gifts, and graces, and purity, under the pastoral care of their unworthy servant, for Christ's sake, J. S. So be it. Amen." 38 members were added to the Church during his short ministry.

Mr. Sanderson was a native of Bradfield, a village about eight miles from Sheffield, in Yorkshire. He became early devoted to G.o.d, and dedicated himself sincerely to the work of the sanctuary. In the year 1737, when about 19 years of age, he entered a seminary in London, patronized by the Independent Fund, then under the direction of Mr.

Eames, F.R.S., who, in the esteem of his contemporaries, was one of the most learned men of the age. The piety of Mr. Sanderson when at the academy appears to have been of the most decided, humble, evangelical, and experimental character. His preaching was very acceptable and useful, so that opportunities were presented to him to have settled in London, and he was advised by some of the ministers of his acquaintance to do so; but he yielded to the invitation of the people at Rowell, and believed that he saw plainly the finger of G.o.d pointing him there. He was received with much kindness and cordiality, and was greatly encouraged in the prospect of usefulness there presented. He was welcomed into the county by Dr. Doddridge, who addressed to him the following letter, almost immediately after he came to Rowell:--

Permit me, my dear brother and friend--for so, though personally unknown, I will take the liberty to call you; permit me, with the utmost sincerity and pleasure, to a.s.sure you of my thankfulness to the great Shepherd of Israel for bringing you into these parts, to be employed among us, and under him, in the delightful work of feeding his flock, his pleasant flock.

I rejoice to hear by many hands of the acceptance you meet with at Rowell, and of the respect you have of neighbouring brethren and friends, who are so happy as to be at all acquainted with you; respect, which I fully concluded from the manner of your writing (in which I saw at once so much of the gentleman, the scholar, and the Christian) you could not fail to meet with in these parts, where, I bless G.o.d, we are not utterly forsaken of the spirit of serious piety and faithful friendship. Were not my engagements so many as they are, and now increasing by the care of finishing my 'Expositor'

as soon as possible, I would have waited upon you before this. But I send these to beg the favour of you to breakfast with me at Mr.

Saul's, at Kettering, Thursday se'nnight, if G.o.d spare our lives till then; and to contrive your affairs so as to go with me from thence to Wellingborough, where I shall dine that day, if G.o.d permit. By this means I shall have the pleasure of enjoying your company, and also of introducing you to the acquaintance of a friend or two there, with whom, if you do not yet know, it will be agreeable to you to form an acquaintance, or if you do know them, to improve that acquaintance.

I desire you would make my cordial service acceptable to all my dear friends at Rowell, for whom I have an unfeigned and tender regard; and a.s.sure yourself that I have all imaginable propensity to enter into a free, easy, and respectful friendship with you; and that, heartily recommending you to Him in whom, I hope, our friendship does and will centre,

I am, Reverend and dear Sir, Your most affectionate brother and humble servant, P. DODDRIDGE.

_Northampton, March 16th, 1740._

Mr. Sanderson commenced his labours at Rowell with great diligence and zeal; tokens of the divine blessing attended his labours. But his frame appears to have been too feeble to sustain the amount of labour in which he engaged, and it was not very long before symptoms of an unfavourable nature were discovered.

Notwithstanding the great affection manifested towards him at first, and the encouraging prospect opening before him, trials soon arose among his people. There were some whose spirit and conduct had been the occasion of painful trial to his predecessor, Mr. Maurice; and they began, but too quickly, to show a similar spirit towards him: those who denied the Gospel call to sinners as such, and who wanted all the privileges of Christianity without its obligations. Some of them soon withdrew their subscriptions from him, and talked of building a new Meeting. There was a worthy deacon of his Church, who stood firmly by him, and who wrote a very sensible letter, kindly and faithfully expostulating with them on their conduct; in the course of which he observes, "We are not without several sad instances which have fallen under our own cognizance, of Churches who, upon ceasing to contribute to a handsome maintenance of their pastor what was in their power, without injury to their families, have gradually dwindled and come to nothing. The reason of this, we apprehend, is very obvious; for when Churches cease to walk in the path of duty, the blessed G.o.d is pleased to suspend the influence of his grace, and to visit them with his afflictive hand. We are not arguing for a superfluity, for that you are incapable of doing; but only for a proper expression of love and kindness to your pastor," &c.

Mr. Sanderson proved to be consumptive, and gradually grew worse, until he was removed by death in the 29th year of his age.

Dr. Doddridge was amongst the number that visited him in his last illness; and after his visit he wrote a kind letter to the father of Mr.

Sanderson, in which he says, "Greatly have I loved him and esteemed him, as one of the most completely excellent and accomplished persons of his age that I have ever known. Greatly has G.o.d honoured him, as the instrument of usefulness, during these few years of ministerial service."

After the death of Mr. Sanderson, a friend wrote--"Poor Rowell lies in sackcloth. Oh, that she might know in this her day the things that make for her peace! They have my best wishes and earnest prayers that the Lord, the G.o.d of the spirits of all flesh, may find out a man to stand in the gap, and fill up the breach which he has so awfully made, that the congregation of the Lord may not be as sheep which have no shepherd."

In the year 1741 Dr. Doddridge published two sermons, the substance of which had been delivered at Rowell--'The Scripture doctrine of Salvation by Grace through Faith, ill.u.s.trated and improved.' In an address prefixed to these discourses to the Church and congregation of Protestants at Rowell he says,--

I cannot conclude this short address without congratulating you on the abundant goodness of G.o.d to you as a Church, in bringing among you that worthy and excellent person, Mr. Sanderson, under whose pastoral care you are now so happily placed. I know he is a faithful witness to the truths of the Gospel, and rejoice in that rich abundance of gifts and graces which renders him so fit to state and improve them in the most advantageous as well as the most agreeable and delightful manner. I hope and believe that the grace he so humbly owns his dependence upon will add happy success to his labours; and I heartily pray that you and neighbouring Churches may long be happy in him, and that G.o.d, who has by such various and gracious interpositions in your favour expressed his paternal care of you, may still delight to dwell among you.

Shortly after the death of Mr. Sanderson, Mr. Moses Gregson was chosen, with great unanimity, to the pastoral office. His ordination took place April 20th, 1748. Upon this occasion, the service was conducted in the method generally adopted in other Dissenting Churches. Dr. Doddridge asked the usual questions, and took the confession of faith; Mr. King, of London, preached to the people; and Dr. Guyse gave the charge.

Mr. Gregson continued pastor for about forty years. During the course of his ministry 88 members were admitted to the Church. When years increased and infirmities came on, so as to render him incapable of discharging all the duties of his office, Mr. John Wood was invited to become co-pastor with Mr. Gregson; but before Mr. Wood entered on this office, the death of Mr. Gregson took place. In consequence of this change Mr. Wood was invited to become the pastor of the Church, which he accepted, and was set apart to the office in September, 1789; when Mr.

Smith, of Bedford, delivered the introductory discourse; Mr. Wood, of Creaton, offered the ordination prayer; Mr. Horsey, of Northampton, delivered the charge; and Mr. Toller, of Kettering, preached to the people.

No records are preserved of the pastorate of Mr. Wood, though it continued until March 25th, 1811, a period of twenty-one years and six months, when Mr. Wood resigned his office as pastor of the Church at Rowell.

After an interval of two years, Mr. Walter Scott, from Hoxton Academy, was set apart to the pastoral office, on the 20th of May, 1813. On that occasion, Mr. Whitehead, of Creaton, delivered the introductory discourse; ordination prayer, Mr. Toller, of Kettering; charge, Mr.

Gill, of Harborough, from 2 Tim. iv. 22; sermon, by Mr. Richards, from 1 Thess. v. 12, 13. In the evening, Mr. Griffiths, of Long Buckby, preached from Zech. vii. 25.

Mr. Scott's ministry was highly acceptable and useful, distinguished by a great fulness and rich variety of matter, and greatly valued through the county. It continued for twenty years, until the year 1833, during which period about 130 members were added to the Church.

New school-rooms were erected in the front of the front of the Chapel in the year 1826.

With his labours as pastor, Mr. Scott united the duties of tutor. For several years he had under his care a number of young men, most of whom were designed for the ministry, in a course of preparatory training, previous to their entering the Academy at Hoxton, afterwards Highbury.

His labours in this department were considered to be eminently useful, so as ultimately to raise him to a higher sphere as a tutor.

In the year 1833 Mr. Scott received an invitation to become the resident Divinity Tutor of the College at Airedale, near Bradford, Yorkshire, with which he at length considered it his duty to comply.

When it was first presented to him, "he laid it before the Church, desiring their advice and prayer. They unanimously expressed their desire that he would remain with them; and some of them did so in the strongest terms, stating it as their conviction that he ought not by any means to leave. After serious consideration, prayer to the Divine Being, and asking the advice of several ministers, he however came to the conclusion that it was his duty to leave. The Church in general were brought to say, "the will of the Lord be done."

Some idea may be formed of Mr. Scott's habits while at Rowell, from a pa.s.sage in an address delivered to the students at Airedale, and published in the year 1835. Recommending them in one part of it carefully to attend to the preservation of their health, he says,--

I would, in a special manner, recommend to you to take regular, abundant, and systematic exercise. On this subject I can speak with confidence, not only from observation, but from experience of both the most painful and the most pleasant kind. I a.s.sure you, that by neglecting exercise, by untimely late hours, and immoderate study, I injured most seriously my health. By systematic, determined, vigorous exercise, I have banished disease, regained my health, and even increased the vigour of both mind and body. Had it not been for exercise and attention to diet, as the means in the hand of G.o.d, it is my firm persuasion, rather it is with me matter of absolute certainty, that, instead of being able in the possession of good health to address you on this occasion, I should have been the helpless victim of more diseases than one which had begun to invade my frame; or rather, I should have been numbered with the dead. I have observed several running the same course which I had partly run, without having been arrested in it as I was; and the consequence has been, that though they were younger than I was, and at one time quite as healthy, they have years ago been consigned to the tomb.... I am very much disposed to believe, or rather I have no doubt, that, had the history of students and ministers in general been accurately written, the way in which they have neglected their health, entailed diseases on their frame, and shortened their lives, would furnish some of the most striking instances on record in the pages of history, of imprudence in those who ought to be eminent for prudence, and of folly in those whose office it is to teach wisdom to others. I have no doubt that some early and apparently premature removals of eminent ministers from this world, which have been thought to be most mysterious and unaccountable dispensations of divine providence, would be found to be the necessary result of their own conduct, in neglecting some of the most obvious rules of prudence for the preservation of their health. To have prevented that removal, G.o.d must have wrought a miracle.

Mr. Scott is also the author of one of the volumes of Congregational Lectures on 'The Existence and Agency of Evil Spirits.'

After the removal of Mr. Scott, the Church at Rowell was supplied by several ministers, for some time remaining unsettled. On the 5th of October, 1836, Mr. Gallsworthy, a student at Airedale, visited Rowell, and preached for seven Sabbaths, when the Church unanimously agreed to invite him to become their pastor. This invitation he accepted; the ordination service being held October 4th, 1837, when Messrs. Toller, of Kettering, Hobson, of Welford, Scott, late of Rowell, and Green, of Uppingham, were engaged in the princ.i.p.al services of the day. The ministry of Mr. Gallsworthy only continued until December 24th, 1841, when he left Rowell, and became minister to a Church at Pinchbeck, in Lincolnshire. During his ministry 60 members were added to the Church.

Some months after Mr. Gallsworthy had left Rowell, the present minister, the Rev. Richard Jessop, from Oldham, in Lancashire, accepted an invitation to the pastoral office, and commenced his stated labours at Rowell the 9th of October, 1842. Since that time more than 60 members have been added to the Church. A new school has been erected for the Infant Sabbath-school; and at the present time considerable alterations are about to be made in the Meeting House--re-pewing, new roofing, and enlarging--at an expense of from 700 to 800. The number of scholars in the Sabbath-schools is 320. Six villages are supplied with Sabbath evening services by the members of the Church. Present number of communicants is 130.

In reviewing the history of a Church that has been in existence now for nearly 200 years, what abundant reason is there for full satisfaction with the great principles on which it was founded, as agreeable to the word of G.o.d, and the means of sustaining, under G.o.d, the faithful ministry of the word of life, and the administration of the ordinances of the Gospel in their purity! Attached to the same principles, and exhibiting their happy and holy influence, this Church of Christ we trust will still go on and prosper--the great Head of the Church attending it with his constant presence and blessing.

CHAPTER III.

MEMORIALS OF THE INDEPENDENT CHURCH AT KETTERING.

There are some places which present no claim on public notice from anything remarkable in their situation, their population, or their buildings; yet attain celebrity from the character, talents, and services of certain individuals that have been connected with them. This is the case with the town of Kettering. It is a comparatively small town, containing about 5,000 inhabitants, standing about the centre of the northern division of the county of Northampton; but this place has attained to some considerable degree of renown, on account of the religious advantages with which it has been favoured. By some persons it may be thought of with interest, as the birth-place of Dr. Gill and Mr.

Brine, eminent ministers of the Gospel in their day; but it is far more extensively known, as the place where a Toller and a Fuller, though of different denominations, laboured together in the same cause during a s.p.a.ce of more than thirty years. No town probably, for its size, has been so distinguished, by having two ministers, of such a high standing, engaged for so long a period as stated pastors of two societies. Their talents and attainments were of a different order, but though different, equally eminent. Fuller was most extensively known on account of his services to the Baptist Mission, and his able and useful publications, whilst he was highly esteemed as a minister of the Gospel--Toller, as a preacher of original manner, and remarkable interest and power, was greatly valued, and will be long remembered.

But for a considerable period we find the town of Kettering distinguished by the faithful ministration of Gospel truth. The Puritans, in 1591, are said to have held several meetings here and in the neighbourhood. Two hundred years ago, Mr. Thomas Maidwell, an eminent minister of Christ, preached the Gospel here, having become rector of the parish about the year 1650. Mr. Maidwell was a native of Geddington, a village three miles from Kettering. He was educated at Cambridge, became a good scholar, an excellent preacher, and a man of eminent piety. In the year 1662 he was ejected from the living, and ranked among the devoted Nonconformists of the day. After his ejectment he frequently preached in his own house, and in other houses in the town; until at length he opened a Meeting House, which would hold from 300 to 400 hearers. In what year this took place is unknown. He lived for thirty years after his separation from the Church. Like many of his brethren in those days, he was tried by persecution. One H. Sawyer, Esq., a large landed proprietor in the parish, was a bitter enemy to the Nonconformists, and often tried to get Mr. Maidwell into his power. He frequently escaped with difficulty, sometimes in disguise. It is said that he was once cast into prison. He was also banished from his home by the "Five Mile Act," retiring for some time from Kettering, it is supposed to the house of H. Barwell, Esq.,[2] of Marston Trussell, near Market Harborough. From thence he wrote to his people at Kettering three very excellent pastoral letters, which have been preserved. An extract from the first of these will be sufficient to show something of the principles and spirit of this minister of Christ.

MY DEAR FRIENDS: Grace and peace be multiplied.--Since I heard of the great distress you are in on several accounts, it cannot but much affect and afflict me; and the rather, because my present dangers and sufferings add to yours, which makes the burden heavier to us both. But if our G.o.d, who directs, helps us to cast our burden on him, he will sustain it, and us under it, as at present he doth, blessed be his name! for though "we are troubled on every side, yet we are not distressed; though perplexed, yet not in despair; though persecuted, yet not forsaken; though cast down, yet not destroyed."

Though we bear in our outward man "the dying of the Lord Jesus," yet if the life, spirit, and vigour of Christ be exercised in our inward man, we shall live to him eternally hereafter, as spiritually here.

But the want of that divine vigour and true Christian magnanimity fills most souls with despondency, bowels with sighs, and tongues with complaints. Yet we have no reason to murmur against or complain of our G.o.d, who doth all things justly, and wisely, and well, but of ourselves, who neither know, do, nor suffer as we ought; but "in many things we offend all," and therefore all suffer justly. It's true, you will say--what is to be done under our present suffering?

[2] Mr. Edward Barwell was lord of the manor of Marston, when Bridges wrote his 'History of Northamptonshire.'

Then he goes on to give them most suitable and important directions; such as, "Let every one search his and her ways." "Let not self-examination be superficial, but special, thorough, affectionate, heart-melting, soul afflicting, extraordinary, becoming so dark a day."

"Press after a personal, relative, thorough reformation of what is amiss in heart, tongue, and life." "Have a daily vigorous recourse by a lively faith unto Christ." "Let that faith, in the reality and eminence of it, be more and more manifested in our new obedience." He gives them directions as to the purity of their worship--their spirit towards each other--their sitting loose to the world--giving up themselves entirely to G.o.d--giving all diligence in their Christian course--seeking to attain joy and peace in believing--and then closes in these words:--

Thus, my dear hearts, I have answered your desires in your last I received; heartily letting you know, that though I am absent in body from you to my great grief, yet I am present with you in spirit, daily praying for you, longing to see you, which I should have done "once and again had not Satan hindered," which he will do till Christ comes and binds him in chains and removes him out of the way, and gives his people a quiet and full enjoyment of himself in each other. Which, that he may, is the earnest prayer of your unworthy pastor, solicitous for your souls' good.

I am, Sirs, &c., Communicate this to ours. T. M.