The Missionary to the Tribes: Isaac McCoy's Forgotten Story

This week, we're taking a short break on our early church series, mostly because Taylor put "I get to lead an episode on Baptist missions every once in a while" in his contract when he joined the show :(

Isaac McCoy was a Baptist missionary in the early 19th century who endeavored to bring the Gospel to the American Indians that lived throughout the Midwest. Historically, he's known for attempting to form a westward colony for the Native Americans to relocate to. 

Join the boys as we explore the lasting impact of his evangelistic efforts, and how modern missionaries can learn from our spiritual ancestors. And things miiight have gotten a little heated, but it's all love between brothers on the chumpcast. 

Buy us a coffee: https://buymeacoffee.com/chumphistory

Chapters

• 0:00 Banter Banter Banter
• 2:17 A Haiku for Our New Supporters!
• 10:32 The Good Stuff

Transcript

Juanito (00:00.685)
Hey everybody, welcome to Church History for Trumps. My name is John Simon and I'm here with Taylor Shredway and Thomas Duhuel. How you guys doing?

The Gatekeeper (00:08.096)
no nicknames?

KillaGorilla (00:08.782)
This is pretty NPR. This is like NPR, man.

The Gatekeeper (00:11.991)
Right.

Juanito (00:12.399)
I'm just, straight to the point today boys. We got, we got, we got stuff to do, things to say. There's no room for fluff or goofing off, you know?

The Gatekeeper (00:17.716)
Is that straight to the point our new serious church history podcast. Hi, this is why I got I got your intro. Hi, this is john simon with straight to the point and we're gonna get straight to the point.

Juanito (00:24.29)
gosh.

Juanito (00:31.917)
I like that. That's good. Thomas, let me hear your introduction.

KillaGorilla (00:39.416)
Welcome to Church History for Chumps. Today we are joined with Juanito and the Gatekeeper. Today we will be hearing many, many hot takes about Southern Baptist Church polity from the Gatekeeper.

Juanito (00:59.567)
That was good. Man, gosh dang it. Maybe the reason our podcast works so well, we've all got some great, we've got voices for radio, faces for radio too.

KillaGorilla (01:00.238)
We'll be right back.

KillaGorilla (01:11.256)
Thanks for watching!

The Gatekeeper (01:12.376)
Nice, I just want to say I appreciate Tommy's technical upgrade

Juanito (01:18.211)
Yeah. Is this a new microphone or just a mic holder? Okay.

KillaGorilla (01:21.272)
Same mic, but at least it's stable.

The Gatekeeper (01:23.724)
There's no way it's the same mic. I've listened back to old recordings and Tommy sounds like he's in a tin can, like... See, what I was saying was...

KillaGorilla (01:30.68)
Same mic.

Say, I'm calling in from the 1940s.

Juanito (01:38.465)
I Tommy just gets a little mouthy with it. gets a little close up to the mic sometimes, but you know, yeah. Well boys.

KillaGorilla (01:42.36)
Yep. Yep, yep, that's the problem.

The Gatekeeper (01:46.614)
We have win some haikus.

Juanito (01:49.955)
that's right, yeah. That's right. So we do a haiku for all of our supporters. We love all of you guys, but we only write poetry for people who give us money. And we've got two more people to add to that. So Taylor, take it away.

The Gatekeeper (01:50.974)
or a haiku.

KillaGorilla (01:51.576)
Yeah. Who are we doing a Haiku for today?

The Gatekeeper (02:07.649)
So it's both my parents. Okay, both my parents have generously visited our Buy Us a Coffee page. And so I have written the haiku. Are we ready? Dad taught Sunday school. My mommy loves history. Taylor make podcast.

Juanito (02:10.187)
Right.

Juanito (02:18.383)
Hmm.

Juanito (02:22.905)
Alright, yeah.

Juanito (02:28.431)
Mm.

Juanito (02:35.449)
Good, good. Did you realize when Taylor texted us that about two hours ago and it was not that and it was wrong because Taylor still can't count syllables. This dude is still in, he's in remedial math class.

KillaGorilla (02:36.302)
That was good.

The Gatekeeper (02:38.647)
It

KillaGorilla (02:40.575)
Hahaha!

And it was not that.

The Gatekeeper (02:52.703)
Look, I'm a theology guy, not a mathematician!

Juanito (02:56.591)
It's counting it's counting shouldn't shouldn't a musician

The Gatekeeper (02:59.435)
Yeah, yeah, and my brain's not wired for that.

KillaGorilla (03:01.816)
Were you counting, hold up, you counting loves as two syllables?

The Gatekeeper (03:06.421)
No, I was just straight up. I was just straight up miscounting.

Juanito (03:11.491)
Dude, you play guitar. Can't you count? One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four.

The Gatekeeper (03:13.983)
You think I count? It's art.

Yeah, and you're saying I was I had to get to seven. I've never counted just

KillaGorilla (03:20.95)
and you had to come to Sam Pim

Juanito (03:22.59)
my gosh! You just stop at four?

The Gatekeeper (03:25.755)
I've never counted, well sometimes I count to six, you know, one, two, three, four, five, six. I don't play, I don't play in seven, eight. I'm a peasant.

Juanito (03:31.715)
Yeah. Seven. Yeah.

Maybe Taylor's haikus need to be just three five three.

The Gatekeeper (03:41.217)
What if Taylor just writes a numeric?

KillaGorilla (03:42.19)
All right, and this has been chat with Gateway Seminary staff. We'll talk to you later. Talk to you next time.

Juanito (03:46.457)
Yeah.

The Gatekeeper (03:50.188)
Someone emails the president dear Dr. Groza, it's come to my attention that you employ special I think it's wonderful you employ special needs people

KillaGorilla (03:55.541)
Yeah. Can you please hire people that can at least count to the number eight?

Juanito (03:56.089)
Kiss.

KillaGorilla (04:05.646)
Juanito (04:06.159)
Oh Oh man. But hey, thank you Mr. and Mrs. Treadway. You guys have been very loyal listeners ever since your son joined. But either way, we'll take it. Yeah, I don't care. I don't care.

The Gatekeeper (04:11.861)
Yes.

KillaGorilla (04:13.804)
yeah.

The Gatekeeper (04:17.121)
That's right. Should we talk about my new fan on Spotify?

Juanito (04:25.503)
Yeah, gosh, we got a lot. We got a lot of comments on on the last episode. It's a great great job everybody I'm gonna I'm gonna go through all of our comments real quick As soon as I can pull it up. Yeah, I see here's the thing My fear was that once Taylor came on our viewers were just gonna tank and honestly, that's kind of what I was expecting This is a little bit of like a Hindenburg experience

KillaGorilla (04:26.522)
yeah, you're alt.

KillaGorilla (04:49.324)
like the quality of the viewer.

You

Juanito (04:53.037)
Yeah. Quantity goes up. Quality goes down.

The Gatekeeper (04:53.589)
both numerically.

KillaGorilla (04:57.472)
what was the name? Read the name of this, this,

The Gatekeeper (04:59.509)
Yeah, it's F6MT- I got- no, no, it's F6RT Smeller.

Juanito (05:00.854)
yeah.

Juanito (05:04.729)
fart smeller bro he's just a fashionable fart smeller and he said he said i've been listening to since the first podcast which dude freaking props for that because we've we've dropped some rough stuff back in the day but i will say the show has gotten better since taylor joined and my response to him was is that you taylor which i'm still not convinced is not the case

The Gatekeeper (05:05.973)
No, F6RT. F6RT.

KillaGorilla (05:27.81)
Hahaha

Juanito (05:31.769)
But yeah, we love Taylor and I guess we love this fart smeller guy too. And if you want a haiku, can give us money.

The Gatekeeper (05:38.475)
Happy to be here, happy to be here.

Juanito (05:40.972)
Natalie Lee said that she loves essential Anglicanism, which did we talk about that in the last episode?

The Gatekeeper (05:46.877)
I think I had made a joke about on today's episode of Essential Anglicanism.

KillaGorilla (05:54.11)
Uh, is that a podcast you listen to a lot?

Juanito (05:54.57)
there we go. Well, she likes it. Yeah. Shout out to, shout out to Natalie. Gameboy Nerd too said listening from St. Louis, Missouri. Shout out St. Louis. Shout out the Cardinals. Shout out the Rams. Well, shout out the Rams and their better city. Shout out the penguins. No, no, the blues. That's the hockey team, the St. Louis blues.

KillaGorilla (06:07.95)
Dude, we got like all the...

The Gatekeeper (06:10.753)
You're in LA now.

The Gatekeeper (06:22.401)
Shout out that arch, the arch.

Juanito (06:24.365)
Yeah, big ol' Arch, half the McDonald's.

The Gatekeeper (06:28.323)
I think about that every time I think about st. Louis my brain every single time my brain goes st. Louis arch McDonald's and I'm not

Juanito (06:36.057)
This is why you got gout, bro.

The Gatekeeper (06:42.546)
Juanito (06:44.013)
My gosh, that's the gaudiest thing I've ever heard. My gosh. man. All right. Our boy Jackson, he wrote us a haiku, which I love. He said, a fishmonger finds a brilliant document defending the truth. No, defending the faith. Sorry.

The Gatekeeper (06:47.585)
Get out of my mind!

KillaGorilla (06:50.646)
of my mind.

KillaGorilla (07:05.432)
Wait wait, a brilliant document. A brilliant document.

Juanito (07:08.887)
A brilliant, a brilliant document. Yeah, that's seven.

The Gatekeeper (07:13.847)
brilliant to Document three

KillaGorilla (07:17.794)
I think brilliant is two syllables. Really brilliant. Okay. All right. We'll give it to you Jackson.

Juanito (07:20.055)
No, it's, it's brilliant. Yeah. Yeah. It's kind of. And then our guy LM, Lee Majors, put, he actually answered the question, which shout out to everybody else, but we were looking for people to write their own apologies. And he said, I'll divide my apology into four points, clearing up myths and confusion surrounding Christianity. Love it. The inescapable fact of intelligent design and the existence of God.

love it, the futility and emptiness of other religions and lifestyles and how nature, history, and the body and mind of man point to God and Christ. And he said, but before all this, I would ensure that my conscience was clear before God. It is my personal belief that hypocrisy is the bane of apologetics. And then he called our episode a banger. Thank you, bro. Thank you, bro.

The Gatekeeper (08:07.361)
Mm-hmm.

The Gatekeeper (08:11.339)
Well, we have we need the help again of the dear listeners because we are going to be recording this week another chump talk. It's going to be a Q &A theme. So you can ask anything. You can ask you can ask anything you want and we will answer it.

KillaGorilla (08:11.702)
LM

Juanito (08:25.529)
That's right. Yeah.

Juanito (08:31.267)
Yeah, and honestly, I we've done Q &A's before back before we got you know, little heavier on the cut I didn't mean Really No, it's because I bet like like we got a Like we got a third person. I didn't mean it to be like a chubby joke, which is very Insulted because like you know pot calling the kettle black. I'm not the slim man. I once was

KillaGorilla (08:42.286)
You laughed too fast at that, John. You started cracking a smile before that sentence was even over.

The Gatekeeper (08:48.001)
Taylor has disconnected.

Juanito (09:00.941)
I feel bad, I'm sorry Taylor.

The Gatekeeper (09:03.243)
and you're not even that black.

Juanito (09:05.743)
Fat phobic racist when is When's when CH4C going woke not today not this week you guys We're still we're still on the razor's edge. Good lord. What was I even saying? I said

The Gatekeeper (09:10.964)
white skin.

The Gatekeeper (09:17.397)
Never

We could put that real quick. We could get bad friends to run for their money after that.

Juanito (09:30.553)
Probably, I don't know. I was gonna say, me and Tommy have done Q &A episodes in the past and they're always a lot of fun. And it's always because you guys give us really good questions.

KillaGorilla (09:41.016)
And you can drop those Q &A questions on Instagram. You can drop it on one of our Spotify episodes. Probably the easiest way for us to see it is if you do it on Instagram. We'll probably make a post for Instagram and Facebook that you can comment your questions under.

The Gatekeeper (09:52.883)
That's right. Facebook, Instagram, Spotify.

Juanito (09:54.232)
Yeah, yeah, but also, I mean you guys have been so good about Yes, Facebook too. We don't nobody's on Facebook the only literally the only people that comments on our Facebook posts are your parents bro Which I love which I love but yeah, put them on the put them on the Spotify I know it's easier for you guys. So let's just do that and we'll we'll we'll do some other stuff, too But yeah Q &A we're gonna drop in a couple weeks But if you could put it in today when you hear this then we'll then we'll get it and we'll ask it Let's dive. All right

KillaGorilla (10:01.88)
Taylor's parents

KillaGorilla (10:20.398)
All right, should we dive in?

The Gatekeeper (10:22.367)
time. Well, if you guys remember a few episodes back, I said, Hey, what if I did an episode on a Baptist missionary to the Native Americans? And John Simon said, No. Well, it didn't take much, but he changed his mind.

KillaGorilla (10:23.47)
What are we doing?

Juanito (10:24.313)
Taylor?

Juanito (10:42.737)
you were serious? I thought we were doing the Apostle John. I'm just trolling you, bro. I'm trolling. It's fine. Gosh. He looks so, he looks so hurt.

The Gatekeeper (10:48.309)
I never said we're taking a break. I was so confused. We're taking a break. Dear listeners, just a small, tiny little pit stop on our journey through the apostles. Right now, we're going to actually take a take a time traveling machine to the future. And then we're going to get on a plane and we're going to fly over to America and then we're going to take a time traveling machine back.

Juanito (10:58.734)
Yeah.

The Gatekeeper (11:18.903)
because was easier to take a plane, right? I saved us time, right? Well, I saved us time by going, right. And now we're going back to the beginning of the 19th century. So before his ascension to heaven, Christ gave his followers a final command, go and make disciples of all nations. Christians have practiced mission work from that moment on. And Baptists outside of fringe theological movements have been no exception.

Juanito (11:20.591)
lot of transport here yeah okay yeah

KillaGorilla (11:23.968)
I got you.

The Gatekeeper (11:48.79)
Baptists claim a rich missiological heritage and have been widely supportive of mission work worldwide. They have historically emphasized missions and to some degree they've done so more than other Protestant movements. In the early 19th century, American Baptists sent men like William Carey and Adonarum Judson overseas to preach the gospel message to unreached people groups. So while these

Juanito (12:16.727)
adenarum?

The Gatekeeper (12:18.516)
Ad-adeneerim.

Juanito (12:22.095)
That's how, what was his like nickname?

The Gatekeeper (12:22.097)
Adan- Adaniram Jetson.

The Gatekeeper (12:27.176)
Addy.

Juanito (12:28.489)
that's not bad. Okay.

The Gatekeeper (12:30.231)
I never interrupt your cold opens.

Juanito (12:34.415)
I thought you were finished.

The Gatekeeper (12:36.511)
While these men and their fellow laborers went to the distant lands of the East, a handful of missionaries ventured into the neglected American West. Isaac McCoy and fellow laborers dedicated their lives to evangelizing and serving the American Indian tribes. Their work took place during a difficult time for this new American nation. The conflicts that would eventually lead to the American Civil War were beginning.

The government was at a complete loss on how to handle the Native Americans, and even the Baptists saw denominational friction on whether or not mission work was biblical. This was the political and religious landscape in which Isaac McCoy worked. Resources were scarce on the American frontier. The government was hesitant to provide funding for the missionaries' humanitarian work, and the churches were more interested in supporting the work of Kerry and Judson. This is not to say that the churches at the time did not provide financial support.

But it was meager. In addition to insufficient funding, the frontier missionaries lack proper manpower. In a letter to Isaac McCoy, Charles Kellam writes about his work among the Creek Nation. I was there in July and over 100 have been baptized. The work is general in all parts of the nation and there is no teacher or preacher in the nation.

KillaGorilla (14:00.632)
So was that the end of your cold open?

The Gatekeeper (14:04.257)
Yes.

Juanito (14:05.359)
There's Tim on interrupt again.

KillaGorilla (14:05.806)
So did I catch- So William Carey, Adoniram Judson, and McCoy- What was his first name? Isaac.

The Gatekeeper (14:12.88)
Well, yeah, so we're juxtapose- juxtapose-osing.

Juanito (14:17.999)
juxtaposing.

KillaGorilla (14:18.752)
Right, but these guys are all contemporaries? Okay, and the churches in America were more interested in the foreign missions than the home missions, kind of like they are today?

The Gatekeeper (14:21.889)
Yeah.

The Gatekeeper (14:28.919)
Well, well, dude, Tommy, he's right. So so yeah, you got William Carey in like the in the the jungles of India, right? Like making serious headway. And in fact, I'd be a good chunk of our listeners have probably even heard of William Carey. Like that's how famous he is. And then Judson actually wanted to go to India, but somehow ended up in Burma.

Juanito (14:29.817)
Interesting.

No, not... No, that's a good question.

The Gatekeeper (14:58.001)
And, and he was also doing very exciting things. And so they're writing back, Carrier is writing pamphlets and people just love it. And then in the meantime, you've got the American West, you've got the Native Americans, and they are like woefully neglected. And so this fella, Isaac McCoy, who we're talking about today, from a young age, he felt called to go reach them and serve them.

KillaGorilla (15:28.77)
I've got a question.

The Gatekeeper (15:30.465)
Go ahead.

KillaGorilla (15:32.12)
Do you have any idea if he had engaged with the work of David Brainerd at all?

The Gatekeeper (15:36.681)
I never came across his name in my research.

KillaGorilla (15:42.338)
Well yeah, I don't know.

Juanito (15:43.907)
think they were in different regions.

KillaGorilla (15:46.326)
Right, but they... I mean, this would have been... if this is the beginning of the 19th century, this would have been maybe like somewhere between 50 to 100 years after Brainerd, I think. And so, I don't know... because we did that episode on David Brainerd one time, which if a listener wants to learn more about missions worked to Native American tribes, that episode, we'll talk about that. And I know Jonathan Edwards had taken down his diary and kind of...

Juanito (15:56.783)
Mmm.

KillaGorilla (16:15.746)
rounded out his biography. And I know it's influenced a lot of missionaries, but I don't know when it got into the public consciousness, if you would have had access to it.

The Gatekeeper (16:25.088)
Mm-hmm.

Juanito (16:25.199)
Hmm.

The Gatekeeper (16:28.405)
Well, McCoy was definitely Baptist. I don't, and I mean, he interacted with, Methodists were doing, and Presbyterians were also doing mission work out west. But here's, so here to set the tone for kind of the, the friction that they were facing.

KillaGorilla (16:41.059)
Mm-hmm.

The Gatekeeper (16:52.245)
compared to guys like Carrie, who everyone just thought was a superhero, right? Like every fam, I just imagine like every Baptist family like saying a prayer for William Carrie before bed type thing.

KillaGorilla (17:03.98)
like the kids were kids were pretending to be william carry out in the yard

Juanito (17:04.323)
Hmm.

The Gatekeeper (17:07.519)
Right, right, exactly. this was a McCoy wrote this, but when he was talking about heading out west, we did not believe that they being the board, the board of missions would grant us permission at that time to go west. And we therefore did not ask for it for would have been more painful to go contrary to direct orders than to go without orders.

Juanito (17:32.611)
Hmm.

The Gatekeeper (17:35.192)
So that's kind of the, and you're coming across The Great Awakening. The first thing to really talk about is the cultural landscape here. And let's not get stuck on this too much. no, no, wasn't. And that'd be funny. All right, you little Marxist. So basically,

Juanito (17:50.681)
like that was a shot at me. Let's not get stuck on this too much.

KillaGorilla (17:54.188)
He's like, actually, it was a shot at Thomas.

Juanito (17:59.514)
Carry on, carry on. I don't even know what you're gonna say.

The Gatekeeper (18:05.591)
the whole country had no idea how to handle American Indians. Like, they had no idea what to do. were, there was just, racism is a very modern term, but they were indeed very prejudiced. They thought very low of them. You have to remember, we're coming off the enlightenment, so we're...

like progress, right? Everything is progressing forward. And the way that they see the Native Americans is that they are not progressing. They don't want to integrate. They refuse to progress. And so everybody either outright hates them or it's just kind of this uncomfortable sort of.

Juanito (18:40.111)
Mmm.

The Gatekeeper (18:50.035)
interactions, they're definitely seen as lesser and in a lot of cases, subhuman. And I wonder if that's why it was hard to get support for mission work.

Juanito (19:03.055)
so wild about. Okay, so I'm not gonna dwell because I'm a Marxist. I'm not a Marxist. Freaking, I resent that. No, but like, my understanding is that where prejudice often was deepest, was kind of the civilized versus uncivilized. So they were Europeans, settlers, pioneers.

they were the civilized, the natives were the uncivilized. if you're going thousands of miles away to, like they had to imagine that like the Indians were also uncivilized too, right? So why did the prejudice not transfer? Maybe one was like the evil you know, but I don't know, I'm curious.

The Gatekeeper (19:52.695)
The Gatekeeper (19:56.856)
So this is where the elementary school understanding of how this stuff went down kind of does damage because not saying you have an elementary school understanding, but basically most people were pretty excited to hear about uncivilized people becoming civilized.

KillaGorilla (19:58.734)
That's an interesting question.

Juanito (20:12.656)
from a five-year-old's perspective.

The Gatekeeper (20:22.547)
So like that got people excited and they were happy. The prop, so I think that that's the report of like, the Indians are building schools. They're integrating. They're doing great. They're becoming civilized and they're learning about Jesus in the process. Hooray. The Native American Indians, on the other hand, were fighting back. The integration was not happening.

Juanito (20:44.847)
And they were pushing back when it was,

The Gatekeeper (20:47.247)
in a lot of ways, yes. So I don't know if I have a chance to bring this up later. So I'll just say it now. So Isaac McCoy was definitely guilty of what we would modern day call ethnocentrism. Right? Like, he definitely bought into this. But to see you see his in his writings, his I hate

Juanito (20:49.231)
Okay, yeah.

The Gatekeeper (21:08.583)
anachronizing, think is the word, you know, applying modern stuff to the past. But you see his ethnocentrism play out in a very empathetic way. And it's really.

Juanito (21:11.151)
Mm-hmm.

KillaGorilla (21:23.426)
When you say, when you say he was ethnocentric, like what specifically do you mean?

The Gatekeeper (21:28.759)
Oh, he 100 % thought that like his culture was superior. And so he, yes, he wanted the Native Americans to embrace Western culture because

KillaGorilla (21:34.414)
to the Native Americans.

KillaGorilla (21:40.974)
Is that what ethnocentric means?

The Gatekeeper (21:45.496)
I mean, you can attach a skin color to it, but he wasn't racist in that regard. He like, he wanted them to in Isaac McCoy's ideal world, the Indians would be given a massive amount of land out west, very far removed from whites, so that they could build their own country. He the only thing is he would say, well, we'll give them a white governor.

to oversee and if they don't have the ability to make tools and such, we'll send blacksmiths. But like very few white people would be sent to this new nation. And basically we would give them a chance to like build on their own. That was his sort of political dream for them.

KillaGorilla (22:23.672)
Mm-hmm.

Juanito (22:31.151)
mmm okay okay

KillaGorilla (22:33.432)
That's probably arguably a better idea than a lot of what actually went down in American history.

The Gatekeeper (22:38.891)
So Americans went back and forth on that. I think there was a good bit of people that thought that, yeah, that's great. We'll just send them all out west. they'll get a chance to restart. And we can help them. And then eventually, there'll be great taxpaying people. But we sent them out west. And then 30 years later, we're like, JK, we want this land. Keep moving west.

Juanito (23:01.667)
Wait, so the idea was, so, I'm sorry. was looking up ethnocentrism as you gave that definition. So they were wanting to send them out west to have them settle out there because they didn't want the land yet. And then they would build their own societies and yeah, one day become taxpayers and all that. But at that time, the west was mostly Mexico, right?

KillaGorilla (23:27.278)
depends on what

The Gatekeeper (23:28.223)
We're not, dude, okay, okay. You have to remember that like, West in this sense, like Ohio is West. Michigan is West. So like when they're like Kansas, Kansas is the far West. They're not really even thinking about New Mexico territory era.

Juanito (23:30.039)
I guess like if it's like the plains, like that west.

Juanito (23:39.031)
Okay, okay, yeah, that's a good point.

Juanito (23:47.075)
Sure. Yeah.

Juanito (23:52.176)
And they're probably just sending them off to where all these rival tribes live too, right? Like those territories are already spoken for, just not by the Americans, right?

The Gatekeeper (24:04.597)
Yeah, roughly speaking, I mean, Isaac McCoy, what you will see, and we're gonna see when we read some of this stuff here is like, I would say very much empathetic, very defined by empathy in his. He wrote he wrote a handful of books, but he wrote this sort of pamphlet.

Juanito (24:06.383)
Yeah.

The Gatekeeper (24:23.027)
And it's called the remarks on the practicability of Indian reform, embracing their colonization. And I can't find the quote when I went back to grab it. But in it, he essentially says, imagine with me, if you will, that the Chinese, and he uses the Chinese as an example, which is fascinating because you got to remember they were like the Far East Oriental, they were not Americans did not think of the Chinese back then as we think of the Chinese. So so he's

using this kind of random country. Imagine if the Chinese landed on our soil and said, wow, we love it here. I think we'll build. And they had the technology to not, like we can't stop them. And we're like, well, hold on. My family's been here for 100 years. What's going on? And I go, well, we'll just send you out west. You just keep moving, bud. And so he uses that to sort of like, like get others to empathize with him.

Juanito (25:07.279)
Hmm.

Juanito (25:22.415)
that that was mccoy or carry that is sorry sorry sorry i got carry on the brain that is a wild perspective to take from someone from that era i feel like like in like in a positive way like i'm i'm shocked to hear that

The Gatekeeper (25:24.247)
We're not quoting Carrie here.

The Gatekeeper (25:35.34)
be it's because we've been I know. So either we have been fed a very specific little drip system of the worst of the worst and we're like Andrew Jackson and the Trail of Tears. That's what they meant by displacement and Indian removal.

And yes, that happened. And yes, it was awful. But maybe that was an extreme example. And there was like a million other examples of how people wanted this to go down.

KillaGorilla (26:05.966)
Correct.

The Gatekeeper (26:07.807)
And the Trail of Tears was only one tribe. I'm not trying to diminish what happened. I'm just trying to like, we just want to paint the full picture.

Juanito (26:07.972)
Maybe.

KillaGorilla (26:16.14)
Well, think it's important to note that no matter how you skin the cat of American history, scalp the cat.

The Gatekeeper (26:23.191)
Scalp the cat.

Juanito (26:25.711)
Scalp the cat, gosh, wow.

The Gatekeeper (26:31.991)
I'm sorry. I'm not sorry.

KillaGorilla (26:38.094)
The dominant culture coming from those who had formerly been European was Christian. And so this wasn't like the Mongols came to America and then just instantly, uniformly just kill anybody in their path. You did have, was Western civilization.

majority Christian culture and so I mean the the story of basically the US government and Native American tribes is I would say a Complex one and a long story that's still ongoing But I think you have a lot of a lot to your point Taylor a lot of examples that can be uncovered of More thoughtful Christian approaches both from

The Gatekeeper (27:23.531)
I'm gonna hit you.

KillaGorilla (27:38.294)
like political leaders, but also from missionary agencies, individual Christians, churches, trying to think through how do we approach this.

Juanito (27:47.706)
Well, I mean, if we're going to talk Trail of Tears, like we're talking about the government's interaction with the Native Americans. Like, I'm not super surprised that there were Christians who had good Christian ways of thinking about the Natives, but like, I also don't think that that should suddenly make us rethink if maybe things were as bad as they clearly were.

I'm sure there are mission agencies who are trying to push back on the displacement. mean, like there were, and there were just a myriad of factors, some that were conscious, some that were unconscious that happened even on like a biological level with all the sickness and famine and stuff like that. But yeah, I think there were Christians Christianing, which is great. I don't think that negates what the government did over several hundred years.

The Gatekeeper (28:37.769)
No, I'm not saying it negates it at all. I'll say this. I'll say this. Two things, and then we got to move on to the next point. One, I like to go down YouTube rabbit holes, and I found one, like a guy that was interviewing a bunch of KKK people. I was like, this is interesting. See what they think.

And even like some grand wizard marshal dragon or whatever their stupid titles are of like North Carolina. I remember him distinctly saying like what we did to them, them engines was not right. That was not right. So like even the KKK looks at what happened and goes, this is bad. So like not diminishing the bad, but I'm also saying we need to, it's, it's very dangerous to paint with like thick colors and broad strokes.

Because what happens is when somebody is taught a certain line of thinking and rhetoric, that is, this is the infallible truth, and they find one little piece of evidence that contradicts that, and they go, they'll maybe spend a few minutes verifying it. Now the whole system is in question. So that's all I'm trying to say is I think there was a lot of people at the time that were bothered.

Juanito (29:56.121)
Yeah.

The Gatekeeper (29:56.184)
by what was happening. So it wasn't just this like, the oppressive whites hated the poor, brown, peaceful Indians. Like there was so much more happening in that story. Yeah. Okay, good. Okay. So this will inevitably be its own episode one day, but I think we have to mention the anti-missions Baptists. Have you guys ever heard of anti-missions Baptists?

Juanito (30:06.127)
Mm-hmm.

yeah, yeah, totally.

Juanito (30:22.095)
Mmm.

KillaGorilla (30:25.547)
No.

Juanito (30:25.593)
that that the West Westboro Baptist

The Gatekeeper (30:29.495)
Nope. They're the super, they're the hyper Calvinist Baptist actually. Yeah. Mm hmm. So they have their own theological reasonings for landing where they do and it's worth looking at. But yeah, anti-immissions Baptist was definitely a movement. Their whole thing was

Juanito (30:34.255)
all there we go that's right that's right i've never heard of that before

The Gatekeeper (30:56.661)
we should only be evangelizing the elect. And I think there's just stupid racism involved in some of that, where it's like, and of course, them engines aren't elect, right? But it gets a little more complicated. yeah, so that was part of the denominational friction that Isaac McCoy was facing. He's facing anti-missions Baptists. So his brother wrote him a letter.

And, no, this letter is from McCoy's friend. This is his friend. And he says, religion appears to be perfectly dead in this corner of the Lord's Vineyard. Okay, hold on, on, hold on, hold on. Still we hope that the prayers of the faithful will be heard in due time.

KillaGorilla (31:40.14)
haha

The Gatekeeper (31:49.132)
hoping you will not forget us in your petitions for the great Jehovah to show his stately stepings once more in our neighborhood. Yeah. So, and he's referencing anti-missions rhetoric.

Juanito (31:59.184)
I love that.

The Gatekeeper (32:08.919)
McCoy's brother was a preacher and he preached this roughly around the same time. We have cold times in matters of religion. The churches are generally at peace, but it is not that kind of peace most to be desired. So basically, this is the good old, and keep in mind, Southern Baptists have not been formed yet. We're a couple decades off from that. But I...

KillaGorilla (32:24.226)
Hmm.

The Gatekeeper (32:36.919)
the whole like, let's get out there and live on mission. Like that's what these guys are basically getting at.

KillaGorilla (32:47.022)
It sounds like they feel like the dominant, or maybe not the dominant church culture, although it certainly sounds that way when he says that what religion is dead in this corner of the Lord's Vineyard. It sounds like, I don't know, it just makes me think of Jesus's warnings in Revelation, you know, to a church that's neither hot nor cold. It's like, I'm going to spit you out.

The Gatekeeper (32:58.295)
That's so good.

Juanito (32:59.407)
That's such a good line. That's such a good line.

Juanito (33:13.825)
Mm-hmm. Because their title is almost misleading, right? Because they're not anti-mission. They just don't want to evangelize to non-white people, right?

The Gatekeeper (33:14.101)
Mm-hmm.

The Gatekeeper (33:25.461)
That is exactly well, yes and no, it's it's way more nuanced. But you see, there you go. You just proved my earlier point where I'm like, Yep, see, these guys are anti missions. They hate missions. And then you're like, Well, hold on. There's more to the story. There is anti missions is actually a pretty bad label for them. They just Yeah.

Juanito (33:36.653)
Yeah.

Juanito (33:42.798)
Yeah, but I mean, from a, if you have a good theology of what missions is, and then you look at a missional hermeneutic that says that some people aren't worthy of missions, you could call that anti-missions and not be unbiblical. But from a broad brush perspective, it's not a great definition.

The Gatekeeper (33:56.62)
Right. Right.

The Gatekeeper (34:02.443)
That's right. That's right. And then other people will get labeled as anti mission simply for holding to double predestination, which and so this book that I'm pulling from that's compiled a lot of the stuff on McCoy is from particular Baptist press, which is the Calvinistic branch of Baptists, right? So

Juanito (34:10.708)
okay. That's interesting. Yeah.

Juanito (34:22.723)
Mm-hmm.

Okay.

The Gatekeeper (34:26.963)
And these people definitely, like there's a clear bias in this report and they're like not a fan of Anti-Mission Baptist. yeah. Anyway, I have one more on the Anti-Mission commentary from the time. This is McCoy's nephew.

Juanito (34:34.703)
Mm.

The Gatekeeper (34:42.505)
He says, we have dry times both in regard to religion and temporal prospect. The orthodox part shows too much of a disposition to kill the reformers and the reformers show too much of a willingness to skin the orthodox and let them go alive. Evil surmise, evil surmising and narrow watching each other too much prevail instead of watching themselves.

Juanito (35:07.503)
Hmm. Okay.

The Gatekeeper (35:08.565)
If there's one thing you learn about church history, it's that Baptists have always been fighting.

The Gatekeeper (35:17.431)
just in our denominational blood. So as I... go ahead, go ahead.

Juanito (35:20.769)
Mm-hmm. So the anti-mission Baptists, they, was this just like a subset of, like were these just like dudes who would go to a Baptist church or was this its own thing? Like you would you, was there like an anti-mission Baptist church or were you just an anti-mission Baptist?

The Gatekeeper (35:37.015)
Well, they would never call them. Yeah, you would never like take that label. I don't even think they took that label for themselves because they found it offensive and wrong or whatever.

Juanito (35:46.191)
But they weren't like their own, they were a movement but they weren't specific to their own churches and such,

The Gatekeeper (35:52.96)
Yeah, you might find, don't quote me on this, but you would, I think you would find associations of churches that would be anti-mission. So just like today where you have, know, like, what was it, Tommy?

Juanito (36:04.875)
Mm-hmm. Okay.

KillaGorilla (36:11.342)
This is about to get interesting John. Alright, go ahead.

The Gatekeeper (36:14.613)
Well, Tommy's joke about how like, you you're at the you're you're the 1689 blah, blah, blah, Baptist, and you push them off the bridge. Right. So that that level of division was common. And so you would have church down the street that's part of one association, and then church down the other street is part of another. And they would both be Baptist, but one might be a part of an anti mission association and one

Juanito (36:22.594)
Right.

Juanito (36:40.441)
Gotcha, gotcha, okay that makes sense.

The Gatekeeper (36:40.727)
One would be like, and we're going to pray for William Carey today. Yeah.

KillaGorilla (36:47.118)
So, John, I'm reading that... So there's layers to it. So you had some like anti-mission Baptists or primitive Baptists who basically just didn't like extra societies outside of the church, like a mission board or a tract society or a temperance society. And so to that degree, they might get labeled as anti-mission, but then you also had anti-mission Baptists

who were Baptists who were starting to get into, and actually this was a very, very, very small group it says, I'm reading it says, a miniscule minority of primitive Baptists adhered to the two seed doctrine. So this is the serpent seed doctrine that we've talked about before. Yeah, so that's the whole idea that the serpent mated with Eve and created Cain, and then like, you you follow that down, then some people will say that's where you get black people, and like that sort of thing.

Juanito (37:31.343)
Ayyyy

Juanito (37:43.745)
Exactly. Yeah.

KillaGorilla (37:45.626)
and maybe Indians. So it looks like, just from the cursory glance I just took, that I don't know... Taylor, you might want to... you tell me what you think from your study, but I think labeling the entire anti-mission Baptist movement as like racist or against...

The Gatekeeper (38:10.263)
No, that's not it at all. Yeah.

KillaGorilla (38:13.824)
is like maybe there's a small minority of them who would have been against evangelizing the native tribes for serpent seed reasons, but the majority of the rest of the people in the movement maybe had more like ecclesial concerns of extra-cities and things like that.

The Gatekeeper (38:29.289)
I would say that that is true. think we should do the next time we take a little break from our patristic era, I'll do an episode on Anti-Mission Baptist.

KillaGorilla (38:42.914)
Baptist time with Taylor. That's with the little sub-series.

The Gatekeeper (38:44.983)
It's about this time. You got to remember, so when they're out west, they're on the frontier. There's hardly any rules. Societal expectations break down. This is such a funny letter. This is the full quote from what I quoted in the intro about there's not as many. There's more people that need a pastor than there are pastors. So once again, this is Charles Kellam.

Juanito (38:45.561)
Heh.

The Gatekeeper (39:10.603)
When he says, was there in July and over 100 have been baptized. The work in general is in all parts of the nation. There's no teacher or preacher in the nation. And then he says, two or three very pious Negro boys have done most of the preaching. More than half the additions are from the Indians. Three weeks ago, a brother Tucker was up there and baptized 33. I expect us to visit them with brother Tucker at Christmas and spend two or three weeks.

it's just, it's just so, it's like, that's like the, the like, non malicious racism, right? Like, those wonderful Negro boys, they was out there doing the Lord's work.

Juanito (39:45.743)
Yeah.

Juanito (39:51.087)
Yeah, my gosh. It's like, you know.

KillaGorilla (39:53.762)
I like Taylor's old American accent.

The Gatekeeper (39:56.568)
Mm. Yeah. So I mean, now you've got African-Americans now that are engaging in mission work, which is really cool, right? So anyway, let's jump forward here. We get a little hint, a little taste, to the missiology. That's 10.

Juanito (40:09.263)
Mm-hmm.

KillaGorilla (40:21.71)
That's a ten. Pure vanilla.

The Gatekeeper (40:26.071)
into the missiology of Isaac McCoy. Look, it's pretty rare for somebody to give you quite literally a step-by-step guide, but he does that. He says, this is how to start a church. This is how you start a Baptist church on the frontier. And he like bullet points out step one. Yeah. Step one, assemble the Baptists. So.

KillaGorilla (40:46.99)
I'm locked in. can't wait.

Juanito (40:53.411)
Gosh dang it. All right, you lost me. I'm already out. I'm gonna hit the X button like in America's Got Talent.

The Gatekeeper (40:56.023)
So, so, so, so, so, what.

KillaGorilla (40:56.971)
Assemble the Baptist!

the optimist prime

The Gatekeeper (41:04.139)
This step right here alone implies so much. It implies that people are being baptized without the context of a local church. And then two, they're being baptized as Baptists. So like you're telling your new Native American friend that wants to follow Jesus, like we are baptizing you as a Baptist. And they're like, yes, I'm a Baptist now. step one, assemble all the Baptists. Step two.

Juanito (41:29.881)
Yeah, that makes sense.

The Gatekeeper (41:34.005)
Baptize any who ought to be baptized.

Juanito (41:38.605)
Alright, I'm on board.

The Gatekeeper (41:40.703)
Step three, missionary act as moderator. See, we're already getting to the church business meeting. This is so funny to me. This is.

KillaGorilla (41:49.71)
Starting to sound pretty Presbyterian, he said, moderator.

The Gatekeeper (41:53.046)
This is early 19th century and they're like gearing up. Got a business meeting on our hands. Step four, Baptists present testimonials that they are worthy to become church members. That is cool. Isaac McCoy was definitely known for guarding the door of the church. Anyway, step five, resolve it expedient to constitute a church. Step six, present for consideration or sorry.

KillaGorilla (42:06.606)
Cool. All right.

The Gatekeeper (42:21.813)
Present for consideration a constitution. Step seven. When they have agreed on form of constitution, let them give each other the right hand of fellowship.

KillaGorilla (42:32.462)
They're never gonna get to that step though.

The Gatekeeper (42:34.487)
Right? There's your problem, Isaac McCoy. You want any room of Baptists to agree. Step nine. This is so good. Choose name for the church.

KillaGorilla (42:48.75)
Nice.

The Gatekeeper (42:50.739)
This is our first Baptist Church of Creek Nation. And then they're like, and this is this is first Methodist Church of Creek Nation. And then a few years later, second Baptist Church. OK. Appoint a committee. Gosh, we're just getting there. Appoint a committee to prepare rules of decorum to be presented at next meeting. Step 11, resolve an expedient to order Brother R.D. Potts to the gospel ministry. This should be unanimous. So that was specific to a specific church.

Number 12, missionary question pots on Christian experience, call to ministry, desire to labor in the ministry and views on doctrine, et cetera. That right there. So you have a committee calling their pastor and then grilling their pastor.

KillaGorilla (43:22.69)
They're ordaining their pastors out that was.

KillaGorilla (43:43.896)
But did it say missionary to ask those questions?

The Gatekeeper (43:47.799)
yes, the missionary is asking the questions, but I-

KillaGorilla (43:51.374)
So is this like instructions to a missionary who's acting as like a church planter who then is going to hand the reins over to a pastor? Is that the idea?

The Gatekeeper (44:01.111)
I think this missionary doesn't even necessarily have to know these people. He's coming in to like help oversee... What? Yes. So, and then Pots, the pastor, will kneel, missionary praise, ordaining him.

KillaGorilla (44:06.018)
Okay.

Juanito (44:06.882)
Okay.

KillaGorilla (44:10.69)
businessmen.

KillaGorilla (44:20.588)
Woo, not very Baptist.

The Gatekeeper (44:22.795)
No, this is Super Baptist.

Juanito (44:24.495)
Yeah, ordaining is very Baptist, brother.

KillaGorilla (44:25.44)
I've heard my-

The Gatekeeper (44:28.695)
Mm-hmm.

KillaGorilla (44:30.2)
Not if you ask Mark Dever, but I guess he doesn't speak for all Baptists.

The Gatekeeper (44:33.535)
He does not. That's the great thing about being a Baptist.

Juanito (44:36.505)
Yeah, nobody speaks for them, but them.

KillaGorilla (44:37.932)
I thought you were going say that's the great thing about Mark Dever.

The Gatekeeper (44:42.759)
Okay. Missionary gives Potts advice in exhortation to faithfulness. Missionary gives Potts the right hand of fellowship. Missionary writes out a certificate of ordination. And lastly, administer the Lord's Supper. And that's how you start a Baptist church in Indian territory.

KillaGorilla (44:58.168)
based.

KillaGorilla (45:04.654)
Can you do a combo of an Indian accent and a Roblox accent at the same time?

The Gatekeeper (45:10.41)
What?

Juanito (45:11.275)
I'm gonna nip that one at the bud. think we're gonna leave that one. We're gonna leave that one. Tune in next week for our Watchman-Ni episode where Taylor gets the whole episode, gets the whole show burned down.

KillaGorilla (45:22.926)
you

The Gatekeeper (45:30.027)
Tommy. my gosh. Okay. Okay. To keep this train moving. So we have, we have some examples of McCoy meeting physical needs. So McCoy was constantly asking people to help the Indians constantly. And he was asking the government and he was asking other churches. So this is from his journal, August 23rd, 1831.

Juanito (45:34.063)
Gosh.

The Gatekeeper (45:58.872)
The smallpox is among the, uh, chawanos. Two deaths have occurred. Mr. Likens and the subjugant or subagent, subjugant, I don't know, vaccinated some hundreds of them and hope to arrest the disease. Those Indians are friendly and send compliments to me. So they got the government to give, I think in that situation, it was like $5,000 for vaccinations or something. So, but there was a lot of suffering.

going on. I can't find the exact quote, but I remember roughly around the same time is another little missiology thing. He talked about how him and his wife, they weren't overly concerned with how the Native Americans dressed, which once again shows there's a lot of nuance to ethnocentrism here. He wasn't like, all right, here's your suit and tie. Now, let's go to church and go to work and do things the way

Juanito (46:57.219)
Yeah, cut your hair nice and short.

The Gatekeeper (46:59.443)
Right, he didn't, I don't think he cared about that. He wrote in his journal about like, kind of like, haphazardly remarked that I gave this one guy paint for his face. And then he talked about how him and his wife made some a bunch of poor kids clothes in just in the style of the Native American garb. So he's like, here's your face paint, brother. And then, you know, like, he wasn't really bothered by it.

Juanito (47:18.959)
okay. Yeah.

You

KillaGorilla (47:27.022)
You know, it's interesting. I know that there's probably a lot of difference between different tribes and where they were on the continent, how long they had been engaging with European Americans. But when I think about what I remember from David Brainerd's interactions with the tribes that he

was working with, like the idea of having like a business meeting with them sounds like impossible. The work that he was doing was very, very primitive as far as like what he, like his main goal was like to tell them about Jesus and encourage conversion. And I don't remember what

they were doing with those Christians if they were trying to start churches within the tribes or if they were just inviting them to go to churches that were led by white people. But it seems like 50 to 100 years later, I don't remember the time difference, that there's been some more, I don't know, at least with the tribes that that McCoy's dealing with here, he's got more of an ability to... There's more integration, I guess, in between the groups.

The Gatekeeper (48:44.055)
Yeah, I mean you do have integration happening slowly and sloppily, but it is happening. So this is...

Juanito (48:45.113)
Mm-hmm.

The Gatekeeper (48:56.277)
When you, right here, what we're about to look at, shows, I think, McCoy's empathy. Because when alcohol, as he calls it, ardent spirits, arrive in the Indian territory, this guy, he is spitting mad.

and he like he does not pull the well these sinful wretched creatures can't handle it he's like these poor he says these poor wretched creatures can't handle it no here now i'm gonna read it i'm gonna read it this is in his which one is this in

Juanito (49:21.006)
Mm-hmm.

Juanito (49:25.132)
okay.

The Gatekeeper (49:34.68)
It's in one of his manuscripts, but he says,

So with them is a recklessness of life and its real enjoyments. Like dumb animal in this respect, but little beneath them, they indulge their appetites without restraint. The only sure remedy therefore will be found in the improvement of their minds and manners. Raise them from the degradation, inspire them with the hope of better things, with the doctrines of religion and a love of virtue, and they will be placed under the same restraints that we are indebted to for order among white men.

Don't you feel like 500 different ways about that statement?

Juanito (50:35.011)
Not great. Not great.

i mean i i i definitely get the the empathy i mean yet super weird i mean he's basically saying like all if they get some religion then they'll have they'll have enough order and decency to be like the white people and not be turned into an animal

The Gatekeeper (50:45.431)
That's right, it's weird.

KillaGorilla (50:56.462)
That's not what he said though. He was saying that the alcohol is ruining their race, their line, what was the word that he used? It threatens to destroy their...

KillaGorilla (51:13.838)
They're people or something like that.

The Gatekeeper (51:15.676)
yeah. Well, the Indian race. Yeah, but here's this is why I.

Juanito (51:17.071)
I mean he compares them to dumb animals.

KillaGorilla (51:21.72)
I don't think he's saying, this is where I think something's getting lost in translation and history because so far what we know about him, I don't think that he's saying that they are dumb animals. I think that the...

Juanito (51:33.645)
No, I didn't say that they are dumb animals. He's comparing their faculties to dumb animals.

KillaGorilla (51:39.148)
Yeah, the Bible does that too.

The Gatekeeper (51:40.553)
Yeah, think I think McCoy is more thinking this is like an unregenerate people group that have just been given like, yeah.

KillaGorilla (51:47.042)
Right, and that's the point I wanted to make that I think he's, from what I heard, it sounds like on the right track, where it's like if you have an entire group of people that aren't Christians, it doesn't matter where in history or where in the world they are. If you have people who are not, they don't have the light of God, they don't have God's revelation to them, alcohol is like a bad ingredient to throw in that mix. And so if it got introduced to that group of people,

He's saying there's a hope, there's a cure. Like there's a hope for this and it's the gospel.

Juanito (52:22.723)
Hmm. Yeah, I'm not, I'm not saying that alcohol is not going to, I'm not, I'm not doubting any of that. I'm saying that, I mean, like we, I think we already had established that he's talking about them like they're less than the average person. And yeah, I think that's problematic.

The Gatekeeper (52:42.515)
I... I didn't...

pick up that he is dehumanizing them in any way. I get the vibe that he's just stating factually their state, their spiritual state. And here's a little at the very end, remember how this is how he says, and they will be placed under the same restraints that we are indebted to for order among white men. So in his mind, it's not the color of your skin or whatever, it's the influence of Christian virtue into his culture. And then he uses the word indebted as if

like I owe something. get the vibe that like he knows that without Berthiw, he would be the same.

KillaGorilla (53:20.654)
Like they're not, right, they're not enslaved to alcohol in the same way because they're white. They're not enslaved to alcohol in the same way because they're Christian, is what he's saying.

Juanito (53:34.861)
Yeah, I mean, I don't know, just saying how it struck me.

The Gatekeeper (53:39.884)
That's OK. But yeah, he writes a lot about he hates the alcoholism, like the alcohol on the reservation. Well, it's not a reservation yet. The Indian country. He hates it. So this is Isaac McCoy. This is as we land the plane here. My brothers, I say again, this is a good work and a great work.

which you have undertaken. It is to do good to your people now and to your children and their children forever. Go on now and make all strong and it will be like the fountains or the fountain at which you are refreshed and which will continue to run for the use of all your generations to come. May the great spirit be your guide and your friend. So prayers for your friend and your brother who loves you. Signed Isaac McCoy.

So he was, it's just complicated. If you look up anything from this guy written by modern liberals, they're like, this is everything that he did that was terrible. And they would quote the dumb animal. And you just gotta contextualize everything. Like he.

How many other people were like, hey, I'm living with these guys. I love these guys. And you just gave them a bunch of booze. And you're just letting this stuff flow into the territory to make a quick buck. And it's ruining them. Like, how many people are having that conversation, right? But we're offended by the fact that he said, like, dumb animal. So I don't mean to harp on you for that. I'm just, yeah.

Juanito (55:15.151)
Mm-hmm.

Juanito (55:19.087)
Mm-hmm.

Juanito (55:22.977)
No, dude, I mean, I have no intention of negating the good and clearly like Holy Spirit guided things that he was doing. I... Yeah, I mean, my whole thing is like, and this is the same conversation I had about Brainerd, and I think we have to deal with when we have a lot of these missionary figures throughout this time period. And really anyone who's engaging with what

Hundreds of years of Western culture has said was like an uncivilized kind of subhuman person who for many years They didn't believe had souls like a European did so I'm not trying to like I'm not trying to like sling mud But I'm also really I don't know I I want to find a way to not do what I think we often can do as Christians which is whitewash and just become so

addicted to the, remember the time of their context and forget that the Holy Spirit is kind of about transcending our sinful cultural context to bringing about light. And I'm not saying I didn't happen with this guy. I think it clearly did, but I mean, I don't know. I think I can also feel a little shaky about how he phrases a couple things, you know?

The Gatekeeper (56:41.587)
I agree. I know. I agree. it's just kind of like the age old question of like, what is what you say more important than what you do? And like, like the answer is they're both important. So

Juanito (56:52.815)
Yeah, yeah. Absolutely. I mean, 100%. What?

KillaGorilla (56:59.116)
I think, sorry, go ahead, John.

Juanito (57:02.381)
I get it.

KillaGorilla (57:04.576)
Oftentimes, I think what the under... there's presuppositions that people bring to these historical questions, especially in American church history, but could also look at, mean, in the centuries prior, the Roman Catholic Church did enormous amounts of mission work globally, particularly through the Jesuits. And so it's like, anytime you have...

people from Western civilization going to non-Western civilizations. There's, there's, when people, historians or Church History for Chumps listeners or hosts are looking at these things, sometimes people bring a presupposition that all civilizations are created equal or all cultures are equally valuable. And then others will have a presupposition that cultures are

can be assessed on their adherence to the Word of God, I guess would be one way to look at it. And so I would say probably, just from what we've heard from McCoy, McCoy probably genuinely believed, and I think this is what you were calling ethnocentrism, Taylor, and I don't know if that's what I would call ethnocentrism for the record, but I think McCoy definitely would have said, like,

Western civilization is objectively better than whatever civilization these tribes have. And it's better because the Word of God has salted Western civilization for centuries in good ways. And so He wants them to experience the benefit and the light of God's revelation on their culture and how they're building culture. And that's way different than

Like that's a valid biblical view as opposed to you guys are sub-human. Which I don't think that's what he said.

The Gatekeeper (59:10.367)
No, and remember, I said that ethnocentrism is a modern term that I didn't even really like using. just don't have another use for it. Cultural superiority is, I guess, the same.

Juanito (59:11.107)
Well, I mean, alright, well-

Juanito (59:28.431)
Amen.

KillaGorilla (59:29.102)
Wait wait wait, cultural, ethno... We probably don't have time to get into it.

Juanito (59:35.343)
The difficulty is when you talk about how beautiful and wonderful Western civilization is when you look at what it actually did to Native Americans though, right?

KillaGorilla (59:47.468)
Those are not.

The Gatekeeper (59:47.788)
GOT HIM!

Juanito (59:49.104)
I mean, I don't know. I think Western civilization is good because it was salted by Christianity, but I don't know if the long-term widespread impacts of what happened to natives throughout the past four or 500 years were salted by Christianity. I I think, yeah, I agree. think McCoy

KillaGorilla (01:00:09.006)
That doesn't detract from Western civilization,

Juanito (01:00:13.111)
Absolutely it does. If Western civilization doesn't align with Christianity and then it does damage that degrades someone's humanity, then 100 % it does.

KillaGorilla (01:00:20.942)
The that I was making at the beginning of the episode is that every other civilization in history would have just straight up killed every single Native American from the get-go. so Western civilization certainly isn't perfect. That's not the point that I was making. But it is, Western civilization culturally is a better civilization than Native American culture. It doesn't mean that it should be wiped out. I think people have a difficulty in

The Gatekeeper (01:00:44.127)
Yeah, I think John.

The Gatekeeper (01:00:48.439)
KillaGorilla (01:00:51.48)
Like those-

Juanito (01:00:51.545)
I don't understand the distinction between Western civilization and Christianity because Christianity is what we should be emulating. Western civilization is only valuable where it aligns with Christianity. And I feel like having an overly defensive posture towards Western Civ is problematic because there's a lot of blood on the hands of Western civilization that could have even under certain circumstances been worse than what other civilizations would have done.

The Gatekeeper (01:01:21.431)
I think what John is trying to say is that from the Indians perspective, it's hard to be like, come join our culture. Look how great we are. But you keep doing all this messed up stuff to us.

Juanito (01:01:41.69)
Well, and I'm saying like, like I think something that's valuable about missions is it recognizes that across these human boundaries that we have, there is a kinship that can allow us to walk as brother and sister in Christ, washed by the same blood, regardless of cultural language, nationalistic barriers and things like that. But I think that's something that

Western Civ has to contend with when we look back on missionary work from this time is that they inherited some very heavy prejudices towards people who were outside of their societal views. And I think that those prejudices did negatively impact the impact of their mission work. And that's not to say they didn't do anything good. I would never say that. That's not to say that it wasn't still missions, but

I the whole point of history is being able to look back with hopefully a new understanding and a new wisdom and apply that. And I think that if we ignore the way that prejudice impacted mission work, then what are we learning? Like, you know?

KillaGorilla (01:02:56.878)
No, and I think that the point, I'm not sure I'm being heard, the point that I'm trying to make is not that sinful racial prejudice has never affected missions work. I'm certainly not saying that, and I'm also not saying that because Western civilization was good that all of mission work that came out of it therefore must be good. I'm not saying those things at all. I think the point that I'm making is that

Because we know of mission work and national work that was not good, sometimes it blurs our vision when we look back in history to someone like McCoy, and we may place motives on him that he didn't have. I want to honor my fathers and not ascribe sin to someone who can't defend themselves here. That's my concern.

The Gatekeeper (01:03:53.032)
You know though, you brought up a really good point about like, you know, the one poison skittle ruins the whole bowl. But that happened back then too. I didn't have time to get into it, but in my research, like one missionary would do something sinful, like sleep with some lady or something and get her pregnant. And the missionaries, every missionary in that whole area would have to leave.

So that happened, that happened back then. So that just goes full circle to talk about, know, during the how to establish a Baptist church when the missionary is interviewing the pastor, like he's grilling him to see if he's qualified, because the damage that can be done is so significant.

Juanito (01:04:19.567)
Mm, wow.

Juanito (01:04:39.055)
Mm-hmm.

KillaGorilla (01:04:42.062)
Yeah. Can I make one little final comment about Western civilization to hopefully bring some clarity to what I was trying to say? I believe that grace can and does restore nature. That's the whole point of the gospel. The gospel is not just some intellectual affair, but it actually affects not only our bodies, but the civilizations that we live in. And so Western civilization is

Juanito (01:04:50.297)
Yeah.

The Gatekeeper (01:04:50.549)
You ethnocentrist.

KillaGorilla (01:05:11.022)
Currently, at this point in church history, the civilization that has been exposed to Christianity the longest and been affected the most by it. You have Germanic tribes in Western Europe.

The Gatekeeper (01:05:27.368)
Ethiopia.

Juanito (01:05:29.229)
I was thinking the same thing, yeah. I'm sure he's thinking more widespread, sure.

KillaGorilla (01:05:31.789)
One time.

The Gatekeeper (01:05:33.718)
Right.

KillaGorilla (01:05:35.534)
So you have, you know, got, you know, the basically all throughout Western Europe. mean, you have very, very, very dark pagan civilization that is converted in various ways and then over time builds, you know, the nations that we that we know today. And so when you have a culture that has not they haven't been exposed to special revelation, they've been exposed to general revelation.

that's probably a point that we should make about Native American tribes is they have God's general revelation, but now you have God's special revelation in His Word coming to them. I mean, is... John and I went to the same school for basically missiological degrees, and one of the points that Dr. Goheen would often make is that when Christianity, which I'm not wetting Western civilization Christianity,

like into one thing in my mind or in my statement. But when Christianity encounters a new culture, the job of the Christians is to praise the good in that culture and to call out and reject the idolatry in that culture. And I think anyone who would be unwilling to say that the Native American tribes were not completely riddled and overrun with idolatries is not doing serious historical work.

The Gatekeeper (01:07:00.053)
Yeah, I mean, and I think it's fair to say, because I get your point that like, you know, 2000 years ago, white people were still killing each other with sticks and doing blood eagle. We had blood eagle rituals or whatever. So like, I get it. And I think you don't Google bloody. I think that Isaac McCoy would probably have encountered the Germanic tribes that you referenced and probably spoken as bluntly about them.

KillaGorilla (01:07:10.731)
shipping Odin.

KillaGorilla (01:07:16.184)
Don't Google that.

The Gatekeeper (01:07:28.907)
But all that to say, all that to say, because we've got to land this plane, is it's super fascinating to look back at historic mission work.

that's happening during the Great Awakening, kind of in the little corner of the world that's not seeing any sort of attention given to it by anybody other than this handful of like brave Westerners that are going out living and suffering with the Indian people and then subsequently advocating on their behalf with the government. And I guess it's sad that like he ultimately didn't really succeed him in his.

Juanito (01:08:05.475)
Mm-hmm.

The Gatekeeper (01:08:05.503)
compatriots did not succeed in helping to establish this, this like new Indian nation, right, that could that could become Christianized and prosper, just like the same way the gospel affected the the barbarians of Europe. It just it just never really happened. And now they're relegated to really tiny, bad plots of land, and they're told they can run casinos. So it's it's not good.

Juanito (01:08:30.798)
Yeah.

Juanito (01:08:34.927)
And again, I want to say, I consider the story, I'm encouraged by the story of Isaac McCoy because I definitely see the work of the Holy Spirit and what he was trying to do. And I admire that because I do think he expressed a ton of empathy. yeah, the reason I don't feel bad being kind of harsh when I look back on

certain christians because i believe that the church i think that just as each of us as individuals are being sanctified and growing closer to christ i also believe that that works on a collective like global way as well i think that if if if the church

Capital C is moving in a good direction. We should all be growing and improving at what we're doing. So learning from the mistakes and sins of our ancestors, spiritual ancestors, is the way that we grow and progress as believers. And I don't feel like I'm condemning or damning this guy or any of his compatriots. I just think that, you know, if we as Christians can't critique our own,

then we just let the world do it. And that doesn't seem to be good for anybody. But yeah, love you Tommy. Yeah.

The Gatekeeper (01:09:54.921)
Hmm.

Anyway.

KillaGorilla (01:09:59.34)
I'd agree with you there. I love you too. You and I have been around this merry-go-round a couple times before. No, it's...

Juanito (01:10:05.027)
This is no new topic. Yeah, this is nothing new. All right. Well, should we, should we land the plane?

The Gatekeeper (01:10:10.719)
Yeah, yeah, well, we're not recording a second episode anymore, so we just keep rambling, I guess. What's that? Yes.

Juanito (01:10:16.899)
I have a question for you, Taylor. What do modern Baptist missiologists, like when they look back on American missions, whether it's the dudes who went to little islands or the Native Americans, like Baptists do have a rich

history of mission work. do modern like missiologists look back on that? And is it like, yeah, not even like, that's not a loaded question. I'm just curious.

The Gatekeeper (01:10:58.271)
I mean, dude, missy ologists are like the most fickle bunch in the world. Because if you, if you gather, if you gathered every missy ologist from the Baptist faith and ask them that question, I think you would get a different answer. So you'll have Tommy that's like full blown Christian nationalism. Just kidding, Tommy. I know that's not.

Juanito (01:11:03.597)
Really, really.

Juanito (01:11:16.045)
Okay.

The Gatekeeper (01:11:26.505)
Exactly. I'm making a joke. I was like, don't open that can of words again, Taylor. Yeah. And then you have people that are going to be way more steeped in cultural Marxism that are going to be viewing everything through the oppressor, oppressive lens. And that's probably not helpful. I don't know, man. People.

Juanito (01:11:33.571)
said the word.

Juanito (01:11:52.889)
so you don't feel like there's a general direction that folks are going in.

The Gatekeeper (01:11:56.12)
You asked me about missy ologists, not general, not general Baptist. So missy ologists are the academic branch of missionary work that are like trying to think theologically practical applied theology, right? I will say this. Baptists love mission work so much that you could go overseas and do almost anything.

Juanito (01:11:59.396)
Sure.

The Gatekeeper (01:12:25.239)
that's not directly overtly sinful. And they're going to be like, hooray! Like, like you're just going to get kudos and awards and being sent love letters. So yeah.

Juanito (01:12:39.257)
Taylor have you ever heard... I actually I hesitated because of before I said this because this is like maybe one of the meanest things I've heard someone say. Have you ever heard of the phrase LBH?

The Gatekeeper (01:12:50.992)
LVH now.

Juanito (01:12:52.269)
Yeah. So I had a, I've got a good, good friend whose wife was, was an MK. So missionary kid down in South America spent probably the first 16 or 17 years working with a missions agency down in South America. And they had a phrase for certain people called LBH, which stands for loser back home. And the, and the premise, the premise is basically like,

KillaGorilla (01:13:17.838)
Ooooo

The Gatekeeper (01:13:17.85)
I have heard of this.

Juanito (01:13:21.837)
you identify a missionary who, I don't know, maybe because of their personality, because of their just personal ethics or whatever, you just kind of think, you're a missionary because this was the only way you could feel like important, but you're like, you're the loser back home, which is very, very mean. But I think that kind of aligns with, we're a little too eager to throw people into other countries sometimes.

The Gatekeeper (01:13:39.169)
Yeah.

The Gatekeeper (01:13:49.872)
well, first off, Baptists have a big problem with somebody that all they have to say is, have a call. this echoes in Evangelical fish worlds too, where it's like, well, God doesn't call the equipped, he equips the called. And that is just wrong. It's biblically wrong. It's not true. And then people are like, what about Moses? And I'm like, well, what happened to Moses is not prescriptive of Christian pastors and missionaries.

Juanito (01:14:07.492)
Yeah.

Juanito (01:14:18.047)
I'm... but I'm Moses.

The Gatekeeper (01:14:19.287)
Right, but I'm David killing Goliath. No, you're not You're Craig from Newark, Pennsylvania, right?

Juanito (01:14:25.272)
Yeah.

KillaGorilla (01:14:29.752)
Well, one thing I've tried to pay attention to with people who tell me that they are interested in missions work or people who are trying to raise money so that they can go across overseas or even people who are already there who I have some sort of relationship with. The big thing that I want to know is do like what is your perspective of your own culture? I'm not saying you have to like

You have to super love American culture or Americans or like or not be able to critique it or anything like that. But like, are you willing to love the place that you're from? And if you're just going to some across the seas because you hate your brothers, man, that's not a healthy place to be in. And it's like dodging a problem that's just going to crop up in a different way probably.

The Gatekeeper (01:15:16.46)
Yeah.

The Gatekeeper (01:15:23.159)
Well, because you're going to get disillusioned when you get over there and you encounter whatever the new thing you're going to hate. The way sin manifests in another place, you're going to hate that. So yeah, I mean, there's about 100 different ways to approach mission work. I think the IMB is trying to figure out the best way to, they're always trying to adapt and change to what's going to be the most effective. So, you know, what I did in Ethiopia, in my opinion, made the most sense for an educated person to do. You go over, you train the people that

Juanito (01:15:23.471)
Hmm.

Juanito (01:15:31.169)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

The Gatekeeper (01:15:53.066)
that are gonna go out, you train the people that are already committed Christians, you give them as much theological wisdom and training as you possibly can, and then they're the ones going out and connecting with the lost. And so like that is 100 % could be accused of being like a white savior complex. And I'm just like, I don't know, dude, like I had the fortune of, know, I,

Juanito (01:16:04.815)
Mm-hmm.

Juanito (01:16:16.601)
being white. Just kidding. No, but I actually, I wouldn't even agree with that because like, I feel like the white savior model is when you try to copy and paste first Southern Baptist Church of Nashville, Tennessee into Ethiopia. then, it doesn't make sense. You're not, you're not allowing the culture to breathe. like, like Tommy, like you said earlier, allowing to affirm the beauty of the culture while also allowing the gospel to.

KillaGorilla (01:16:20.344)
Well, you're-

Juanito (01:16:46.425)
to correct it. So yeah, I think the white savior is when self-important dudes are planting themselves as the head honcho in an unreached area rather than supporting the church that are already there.

The Gatekeeper (01:17:00.759)
So that and that is the difference between the, like thinking through something philosophically and theologically and just coming to a conclusion of what's best and what feels better. Because it doesn't appear to be white savior to be like me and Brandy are just packing up and we're gonna go start a church in Japan. Like, okay bud, that comes across as self-sacrificing, doesn't it?

Juanito (01:17:13.455)
Mm-hmm.

The Gatekeeper (01:17:28.375)
That comes across as like, rather than I'm going to go to Japan and try to connect with the Christians that exist there, and I want to learn how to interact with their culture from them, and I'm going to give them as much as I possibly can.

Juanito (01:17:28.397)
Yeah, yeah.

Juanito (01:17:43.15)
Yeah.

KillaGorilla (01:17:43.907)
think about like in my own presbytery we've got a couple churches that we just seeded last year that are in the Philippines and they so these guys these Filipino pastors shout out to Leo and Salso these guys are they they operate like on a like on an administrative

or like a presbytery kind of brotherly pastoral level. They operate as complete peers with us. They'll travel here probably one day. We'll actually travel to them for one of our presbytery meetings. We'll probably have one in the Philippines. But like, I could say objectively, none of the other pastors in our presbytery would be nearly as good candidates to go actually pastor the churches in the Philippines.

The general structure and function of our churches and the gospel is of course the same. But the nitty-gritty cultural stuff, I think this is a nice trend in Mission's work that we're seeing, that you're talking about, Taylor, is understanding that people who are native to the place that they're from have a huge leg up over foreigners. It stops kind of the white savior complex.

The Gatekeeper (01:19:04.075)
Mm-hmm.

KillaGorilla (01:19:09.358)
from happening but then it also... there's no one's better suited than the people who know the language especially the language barrier thing is of course massive in most places.

Juanito (01:19:20.131)
Yeah, I think it kills the idea that Christianity is inherently like an American export. you know, I think Christianity should and must exist within its own cultural context. And if everywhere you go, every church is led by Josh with the backwards hat, then it's like, well, you're just inevitably teaching that.

that yeah, it's that Christianity is intrinsic to American culture, which again, we thank God that American culture has been blessed in sometimes teeny tiny ways by Christianity. But like, if it doesn't transcend that, then it's not the real gospel.

KillaGorilla (01:20:03.918)
I was reading, I can't remember if I talked about this on a podcast, it would have been over six months ago, but I was reading somebody who was commenting on the fact that, I mean it's true that kind of the locus of global Christianity is moving out of the West and moving out of North America, and a lot of the biggest church growth, but also a lot of the probably the most prominent church scholarship is going to be coming out of

Juanito (01:20:22.351)
Mm-hmm.

KillaGorilla (01:20:33.198)
the global south and the global east, South America big time, Africa, China big time. And somebody was making the point that like, hey, like we need to be careful as American Christians now to like, we do have a rich theological heritage here in America. And if we basically like

dump on our theological heritage, what good does that serve our brothers and sisters globally who should be able to tap into that heritage and then carry the ball, you know, the next 10 yards down the field, essentially. So I think that there, I don't have an issue at all with like the sort of thing that Taylor was helping with. Like, that's not, that's not presumptuous for us to go, hey, man, we have, we have some amazing resources here in America, both

from like scholarly resources, but also financial resources and how can we wisely resource these in and out of America and into places that need them? That's cool work.

The Gatekeeper (01:21:43.549)
Yeah, no, that's exactly right. But we've gone very long.

Juanito (01:21:43.631)
Mm-hmm.

Juanito (01:21:51.086)
Alright special episode. Yeah, this is a little interesting one. We broke the early church mold Honestly guys, I'm kind of sick of the early church actually as I say that I'm literally getting ready to start something brand new and it's gonna take at least four weeks so We're gonna be in the early church for a little bit longer, but

The Gatekeeper (01:21:53.057)
It is a special episode.

The Gatekeeper (01:21:59.682)
We did.

Wow.

The Gatekeeper (01:22:11.211)
Yep.

KillaGorilla (01:22:11.446)
You're doing, like you're gonna do like a four week long, like you've got four episodes worth of content.

Juanito (01:22:15.183)
Kind of sort of, yeah. I've got a little, kind of like what Taylor has with the apostles, but it's different, but it's going to keep us for a little bit longer. Yeah.

The Gatekeeper (01:22:17.985)
I feel like...

The Gatekeeper (01:22:22.583)
I feel like we will finally progress to post fall of Rome Like by the end by winter like Thanksgiving time right we should be there Yeah

Juanito (01:22:35.695)
that be nice? Yeah, I think so. I think so. Well, we should probably log off.

KillaGorilla (01:22:40.536)
We should do a epic Unix and church history mini series.

Juanito (01:22:46.735)
Let's just start with Origin.

KillaGorilla (01:22:48.542)
origin some guy named second is match handler i'm just joking i just he wore that pink sweater one time and and you know never look up match handler pink sweater

The Gatekeeper (01:22:48.946)
No!

Juanito (01:22:55.033)
mean.

The Gatekeeper (01:22:55.799)
How dare you. He's one of our bishops. He had brain cancer.

Juanito (01:22:59.68)
my gosh, man.

Tommy loves everything about Western culture until a guy wears pink and then all of sudden, and then it's out, and then it's over.

KillaGorilla (01:23:08.758)
Until Madshaylor.

The Gatekeeper (01:23:10.001)
I know. Hey guys, we need to not dump on our theological heritage. Anyway, Matt Chandler

KillaGorilla (01:23:15.586)
He's alive! Matt Chandler's alive! I can tell him not to wear a pink knit sweater.

Juanito (01:23:16.783)
Yeah.

The Gatekeeper (01:23:20.439)
Gosh. Okay. All right. Well...

Juanito (01:23:21.226)
my gosh. man.

KillaGorilla (01:23:24.194)
This is what keeps the people coming back.

The Gatekeeper (01:23:26.581)
Guys, if you made it this far, God bless you. Please look for the post on Instagram and Facebook. That'll be, leave questions. We'll put the post up on Tuesday, right? So that if they're listening to this, yeah, yeah. OK.

Juanito (01:23:26.935)
I guess.

Juanito (01:23:33.687)
And just leave us questions in the comments, honestly. Yeah, we'll answer all of them. Yeah, probably. One time somebody actually responded with a question the day after we recorded it, and I had to tell them that we couldn't answer it. And I he died a couple days later, so I don't know. Yeah, that's not true. Yeah, all right, well.

KillaGorilla (01:23:53.486)
Whoa.

The Gatekeeper (01:23:59.244)
The outro music's playing right now, isn't it? It's so good. Bye bye.

Juanito (01:24:02.542)
Yeah, all right, let's end it. All right. Peace. Peace, family.

KillaGorilla (01:24:04.184)
God bless you.