The great and inspiring story of how American patriots forged a new nation that enshrined and guaranteed the “inalienable rights” that we have been privileged to inherit and enjoy for more than two centuries is filled with the contributions of extraordinary men, many of whom are not as well known to posterity as they should be.
One such American hero is the Rev. John Leland (1754-1841). Leland, born in Massachusetts, became a Separate Baptist (a new denomination arising out of the First Great Awakening) in 1775 and an evangelist to Virginia in 1776. From then until his return to his native Massachusetts in 1791, Leland became the preeminent Baptist pastor-evangelist in Virginia and North Carolina, probably baptizing approximately 20,000 new converts before his return to Massachusetts.
As a consequence of the ministry of men like Leland, by the end of the Revolutionary War, Baptists had become the most numerous denomination nationally. Leland, like his fellow Baptists, were adamantly opposed to state-sponsored “official” churches at the state level, and were determined that any national or federal government must never have such an “official” church.
Click Here To Read More (Originally Published at the Christian Post)
