How Barton Stone
Relates to the
Heresy of Decisional Regeneration

Barton Stone (1772-1844)

Barton W. Stone (1772-1844) was the first Restorationist minister. He was educated by David Caldwell. Caldwll did NOT teach Stone Scottish Common Sense Realism, because Caldwell attended the College of New Jersey before the arrival of John Witherspoon in 1768.

Stone became a Presbyterian minister and starting in 1796, pastored the Concord and Cane Ridge churches in Kentucky. Stone and fellow Presbyterian James McGready shared a growing concern about the need for religious renewal on the frontier. In 1800 Stone attended a Presbyterian Sacramental Meeting at Gasper River, Kentucky and was impressed by the large number of conversions. Soon after, he began planning his own Meeting.

On August 6, 1801, thousands of people from Kentucky, Tennessee, and Ohio appeared at Cane Ridge and participated in the largest Presbyterian Communion service in American history. In the intensity of the service, people cried, jerked, and above all, fell to the ground. By 1803, the Presbyterian Church had accused two of Stone’s closest colleagues of Arminianism. In 1804 Stone and six other ministers resigned from the Kentucky synod and within a year adopted the name “Christians” and took the Bible as their only guide.

Rejecting the Presbyterian Confession, they contended that salvation was open to all believers and that each congregation should govern its own church. Stone spent the years from 1804 to 1832 preaching and writing in Kentucky and Tennessee. In 1832, Stone joined with Alexander Campbell.