First Church of Boston - Charles Chauncey

1 Boston Pl

It’s called that because it’s the first Church established in Boston in 1630 and built on this plot, about in front of where Tatte is, in 1632. It was a form of Protestant in Reformed Calvinist Tradition known as Puritan. The building is long gone, and the group has grown and is settled in the Back Bay at corner of Berkeley and Public Alley 423.

Charles Chauncey was a Puritan Pastor here. During the American Revolution, he supported the Patriot cause through sermons and pamphlets. One in particular staunchly opposed the stamp act. Chauncy resolutely believed God was on America’s side. His sermon title at the ‘Old Brick’ Church on Election Day morning was, ‘Trust in God, the duty of a People in a Day of Trouble.’ His scriptural justification was in Psalm 22: ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Our fathers trusted in thee: they trusted, and thou didst deliver them.’ Chauncy fought his battles from the pulpit.

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Chauncey went to Boston Latin School and Harvard and received a master’s degree in theology. He was also a charter member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Despite his Puritan heritage, Chauncy opposed Calvinism and its doctrine of total depravity. He held liberal Arminian views on free will and was an opponent of the First Great Awakening. According to religious studies scholars Norman and Lee Gibbs, Chauncy deserves the title "theologian of the American Revolution".

‘Old Brick’ Chauncy was as sturdy and resolute a man as the ‘Old Brick’ Church was a building. No wonder ‘The Boston Ministers,’ a popular ballad, had this verse about him:

And Charles ‘Old Brick,’ if well or sick, Will cry for Liberty.
At young & old he’ll rave & scold, He deals in things of State.
A zealous whig than Wilkes more big, In church a tyrant great.
And Charles ‘Old Brick’, if well or sick, Will cry for Liberty.

Whig was another name for Patriot. They were also called Revolutionaries, Continentals, or Rebels.

What fruitage did these spiritual leaders produce? Mt 7:15-20. Consider John 17:16 vs Acts 20:29, 30. What would Jesus have said seeing this?

-Source Links-

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Church_in_Boston

https://www.digitalcommonwealth.org/search/commonwealth:8k71p274z

http://www.firstchurchbostonhistory.org/charleschauncy.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Chauncy

https://www.hmdb.org/map.asp?markers=215034