|Rev. Henry Clarke|
A Denomination. As the number of Seventh Day Baptists and Seventh Day Baptist churches grew, and new needs and opportunities were recognized, an organizational structure began to appear.
- In 1802 eight of the churches decided to form the Seventh Day Baptist General Conference. The churches surrendered none of their autonomy to the new organization, but saw it as a way to maintain a connection with each other and to promote the doctrinal distinctives of the emerging denomination. In 1833, the first “Expose of Sentiments” was published, described as “as an exhibition of the views generally held by the denomination,” but having no binding effect on churches or members.
- In 1818 the first of several missionary societies was created primarily to send missionaries to the frontier. In 1844, though, it was decided to also send missionaries “to other parts of the world” and the still existing Seventh Day Baptist Missionary Society came into being.
- Seventh Day Baptists promoted religious education in the churches by establishing Sabbath Schools. They also created institutions to promote learning in their communities. Before public schools were generally available churches and groups of churches organized academies for the education of both their own children and those of others in their communities. Institutions of higher education grew out of some of those academies including Alfred University in New York  and Milton College in Wisconsin . The colleges associated with Seventh Day Baptists later included Salem College in West Virginia .
|Milton Academy, Milton, WI|
- The earliest Seventh Day Baptists printed and circulated tracts and books. Now they also began to publish periodicals. There were several short-lived newspapers and then, in 1844, the American Sabbath Tract Society began publishing The Sabbath Recorder – a weekly newspaper during most of the 19th century – which continues as a monthly magazine today.
|George B. Utter|
Source: Don Sanford, A Choosing People: The History of Seventh Day Baptists, 1992
The next in the series: "Seventh Day Baptist History IV - "A Nation cannot long endure..."
This series begins with: "Seventh Day Baptist History I - Seventh Day Baptist Origins"
Links to all of the posts about Seventh Day Baptist History can be found here.