The following excerpt comes from the minutes of a Baptist Church in Huntingdomshire England in the year 1652. It records the exclusion of two church members for five reasons. The fourth reason informs that these people ascribed to a view modern Primitive Baptists would call the “Absolute Predestination of All Things,” or “Absolutism” in short.

The argument has been made by modern Absoluters that our forefathers exclusively held to the concept of Absolutism, ie. that every event on Earth (righteous or wicked) is attributable to the Will of God. Generally, the ambiguous language of the 1689 London Confession is used as proof of this viewpoint. The following short excerpt is proof that our forefathers did not subscribe to the Absolute Predestination of All Things.

A special thanks to Elder Gene Thomas for sharing this quote that he found in his extensive studies of Baptist history.

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Records of Fenstanton Church, Huntingdomshire [England]
Anno Domini, 1652

On the 11th day of the first month, Christopher Linsey and his wife, of Hemingford Gray (being formerly admonished and reproved according to the rules of scripture, Titus iii, 10), were excommunicated for these ensuing reasons, viz.:

First, For forsaking the assembly of the saints.
Secondly, For slighting and despising all the ordinances of God.
Thirdly, For denying to be guided and ruled by the holy scripture.
Fourthy, For affirming that men in all things do the will of God, and that God is the author of all their actions.
Fifthly, For despising and contemning the admonition of the church.

John Denne,
Edmond Maile.

Underhill, Edward B., editor, Records of Baptist Churches at Fenstanton, Warboys and Hexham, 1644-1720, 1854.