Obadiah Holmes

Obadiah Holmes was born in Lancashire, England in 1606-7. (His exact date of birth is currently unknown.) His parents names were Robert and Katherine (Johnson) Holmes. When he was around two years of age he was "baptized" for his family was a part of the Congregational Church. Obadiah married Katherine Hyde on November 20, 1630 and they had eight children.
Obadiah Holmes came to America in 1639 and remained a part of the Congregational Church, but soon he became tired of its defficiencies, and so his great search for a True Church began. When his family moved to Rhode Island he met John Clarke, the pastor of the first Baptist Church in America. The church met in the woods there, away from the persecuting eyes of the Congragational Church. Very soon after Obadiah Holmes met John Clarke he was Scriptuarlly Baptized.

In July of 1651 Obadiah Holmes, John Clarke, and John (or some call him James) Crandall travelled to Lynn, Massachusetts to visit the home of William Witter, who because of his health could not travel to the Baptist Church. While holding services in Mr. Witter's home Holmes, Clarke, and Crandall were arrested and kept in prison over night, after being forced to attend services at the Congregational Church. While in the service they refused to remove there hats. After a few minutes the constable forced them to remove their hats. After spending the night in prison they returned to Bro. Witter's home and had the Lord's Supper together. When the magistrate found out they were once again thrown in prison. In order to teach them a lesson the magistrate charged them a fine, five pounds for John Crandall, 20 pounds for John Clarke, and 30 pounds for Obadiah Holmes. If they refused to pay the fine they were to be whipped. A friend payed the fine for Crandall and Clarke. They also offered to pay the fine for Holmes, but Obadiah refused to sign the papers that accepted the fine as payed.

Obadiah Holmes remained in prison from July to September of the same year. This is how his sentence read, "Forasmuch as you, Obadiah Holmes, being come into this jurisdiction about the 21st of the fifth month, did meet at one William Witter's house, at Lynn, and did here privately (and at other times), being an excommunicated person, did take upon you to preach and baptize upon the Lord's Day, or other days, and being taken then by the constable, and coming afterward to the assembly at Lynn, did, in disrespect to the ordinance of God and his worship, keep on your hat, the pastor being in prayer, insomuch as you would not give reverence in vailing your hat, till it was forced off your head, to the disturbance of the congregation, and professing against the institution of the church, as not being according to the gospel of Jesus Christ; and that you, the said Obadiah Holmes, did, upon the day following, meet again at the said William Witter's, in contempt to authority, you being then in the custody of the law, and did there receive the sacrament, being excommunicate, and that you did baptize such as were baptized before, and thereby did necessarily deny the baptism before administered to be baptism, the churches no churches, and also other ordinances and ministers, as if all was a nullity; and did also deny the lawfulness of baptizing of infants; and all this tends to the dishonor of God, the despising the ordinances of God among us, the peace of the churches, and seducing the subjects of this commonwealth from the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ, and perverting the straight ways of the Lord; the court doth fine you thirty pounds, to be paid, or sufficient sureties that the said sum shall be paid by the first day of the next Court of Assistants, or else to be well whipt; and that you shall remain in prison till it be paid, or security given in for it:
"By the Court,".

And so on that fateful day in September Obadiah Holmes was taken out and was publicly whipped. Thirty lashes is what he received. It has been described as a "brutal beating". But the Lord was with Obadiah Holmes that day! For as his friends walked him past the magistrate he stood tall and cheerfully said, "The Lord has made it easy for me. You have whipped me as with roses." So bad were his wounds that for months he could only sleep by supporting himself on his elbows and knees, and still with great pain!

The story of Obadiah Holmes is one of the most stirring stories in Baptist History! A man who believed so strongly in The Lord Jesus Christ and the one True Church, the Baptist Church, that he was willing to suffer so terrible a beating! Obadiah Holmes would later become the second pastor of the first Baptist Church in America!