Harold T. Commons, a GARBC pastor who was formerly president of Baptist Bible Seminary (Johnson City, N. Y.) and formerly president of the Association of Baptists for World Evangelism, died on July 21. He was 101.
Like many of his peers, he defied the stereotype of an uneducated fundamentalist simpleton. A graduate of Williams College, he was in his second year at Princeton Theological Seminary when eight faculty members left in a dispute against theological liberalism. “These men decided to start a new seminary in Philadelphia,” testified Commons, “and I cast in my lot with them.” The event was a milestone in the growing fundamentalist-modernist dispute, and a hallmark for developing ideas about religious separatism.
His final year at the new Westminster Theological Seminary was eventful. In quick succession he was re-baptized by immersion, joined a Baptist church in Philadelphia, accepted the call to First Baptist Church in Atlantic City, with his new wife, Corinth E. Tracy, applied for ordination at his home church…and then promptly refused to sign a loyalty pledge that professed approval of Northern Baptist Convention mission boards.
Then he further shocked his Baptist friends by inviting a Presbyterian, J.Gresham Machen, to preach his ordination service.
Dr. Commons became the president of Baptist Bible Seminary at age 27 and president of the ABWE mission at 29. Inheriting his role at the height of the Great Depression, he began with an organization of 40 missionaries serving in the Philippine Islands. With the outbreak of World War II, his leadership was further challenged when most of these were captured by the Japanese army and imprisoned at the Los Banõs internment camp on the island of Luzon.
Commons looked back on the difficult years and noted, “there is no greater act of worship than laying down your life in living sacrifice on the altar of service for Jesus Christ. Missions is worth everything you can put into it. When we stand before the judgment seat of Christ, I’m sure the rewards will be worth the effort.”
During his first pastorate he tested an idea that would become his greatest contribution. “My first suggestion,” he explained, “was that the church reduce its missionary giving to the convention and take on the support of a new missionary to the Philippines.” He articulated a deeply-felt conviction that local Baptist churches should chose for themselves which missionaries to send and support, rather than mindlessly sending funds to convention missionaries who preached a liberal and social gospel. Later, when he rose to the leadership of the ABWE mission, Commons proclaimed, “Every missionary and every member of the Executive Committee believes in the whole Bible for the whole world—all the time.”
The powerful idea triumphed, and donations to convention mission boards dried up. In 1936, twenty missionaries were sent by Regular Baptist mission boards while none were commissioned by the larger Northern Baptist Convention.
By the timeHaroldCommonsretired from ABWE in 1971, the organization had grown to more than 300 missionaries in 11 countries.
- Read about Harold Commons’ early days at Princeton.
- Read a Harold Commons letter from the Philippines, printed in the 1936 Baptist Bulletin.
The funeral service will be held on Saturday, July 28 at First Baptist Church in Ticonderoga, N. Y. Memorial gifts may be made to the ABWE South Brazil Ministry account for Dr. Common’s granddaughter, and husband, Rev. and Mrs. Randy Richner.
