UCC History: Freedom to Covenant – August 10, 2025

UCC History: Freedom for Covenant

                                          Galatians 5: 1-14

August 10, 2025

          The year is 1579. The place is Cambridge University, England. A young man in his twenties is asked to preach at this prestigious college church. But they said to him, “Of course, you’ll first have to ask permission of the bishop.”

          Robert Browne says, “Why would I need to do that?”

          They said, “It’s the law. The Bishop must give his ecclesiastical approval for anyone to preach in any church in England. And of course, your message must conform to our Anglican theology and the Book of Common Prayer.”

          Browne responds, “But what if I choose not to ask for approval or preach something contrary to the accepted teachings, what will happen to me?”

          “You will be taken to court. I’m sure you’ll be found guilty and fined with a stiff penalty, maybe even be put in jail.”

          Browne comments, “This church is stifling the life out of God’s message of grace and freedom. It is using church law in such an oppressive way. I will come and preach, but I refuse to ask permission of the bishop.”

          A few weeks later Robert Browne’s brother went behind his back and secured for him a license granting preaching privilege from the Archbishop of Canterbury. His brother didn’t want to see him get hurt. But Robert Browne tore up that piece of paper in front of the congregation before he began to preach. As a result, he was forbidden to preach ever again.

          That was the beginning of Congregationalism. It was a movement which started in England in response to the tight grip of the Church of England.

          The year is 50 AD. The place is Galatia. Paul founded the churches in this area a few years before. But after he left, some people from the Jerusalem church came to Galatia. They insisted that all the Jesus followers needed to be circumcised as Jews. They said that it was the Law. All God’s people needed to signify their commitment by becoming circumcised. It was the Jewish Law.

          Paul found out about this and wrote a strongly worded response to the situation. He objected to the tight grip that the Jerusalem church had on his people in Galatia. He especially objected to the insistence on following this aspect of the Jewish law for people who did not grow up in the Jewish faith, who were gentiles. Using the Jewish law in this oppressive way seemed very wrong for Paul.

          Paul writes the letter “we know as Galatians”. The first chapter he says: “I am shocked that you have so quickly turned from God…Some people are causing you trouble and want to make you turn away from the good news about Christ. I pray that God will punish anyone who preaches anything different from our message to you. They should be under a curse.”

          Later in the book he gets to his main point, “Christ has set us free! This means we are really free. Now hold on to your freedom and don’t ever become slaves of the Law again. I, Paul, promise you that Christ won’t do you any good if you get circumcised… But I wish that everyone who is upsetting you would not only get circumcised, but would cut off much more!”

          Paul is so angry and passionate! He feels like God’s grace and their freedom in Christ is at stake here.

           Back to Robert Browne in 1579. He chose not to accept the order from the church to refuse to preach. Instead, he got together with his friend Robert Harrison and started a small church in the town of Norwich. The church members were united by a covenant and agreed that the local congregation would make all decisions, instead of the Church of England.

          The response by the larger church was swift. The bishop of Norwich complained to the Queen of England. Robert Browne was arrested and imprisoned for a short time. He was released with the stipulation that he would leave the country. So, Browne and Harrison and the other church members left and settled in Middleburg, Holland. Here in Holland many of the ideas for Congregationalism were born. Robert Browne wrote them down and published them. 

          This is where my own family comes into the picture. My ancestor about a dozen generations back, Henry Tupper, was one of the church members who went to Holland with Robert Browne.

They were all there for a few years, before returning back to England.

          After returning to England, these people who some called Separatists kept meeting in secret. A group of them eventually moved back to Holland, but then heard about the New World across the ocean where they might worship freely. These Pilgrims arrived in Plymouth, Massachusetts in 1620 on the Mayflower. They started a community that was both religious and political. This Pilgrim community in Plymouth was the birthplace of the Congregational Church which eventually flowed into the UCC denomination.

          Henry Tupper’s son, Thomas Tupper, sailed to America for the first time a year later, in 1621. He also sailed here in 1628 and 1634. The last voyage took him to the Plymouth Colony where he met his wife. They started a family and then were asked to start a new community called Sandwich in 1637. It was the first English community on Cape Cod. Thomas Tupper was given some land and a position in the local government. Thomas soon became one of the charter members of one of the first Congregational churches – the Sandwich Church. This church is still in existence and is now a part of the UCC denomination. My siblings and I visited a worship service there last year.

          Thomas became the Interim Lay Pastor of that church in 1654 at the age of 71. He served as pastor and preached every Sunday for three years and then alternated with another man for the next ten years. Thomas also preached regularly to the indigenous people of the area during these years.

          This was the start of Congregationalism. These Congregational Churches spread throughout New England and then throughout the United States. Our church, the First Congregational UCC of Coloma, was founded in 1853. Thirteen years later in 1865, the Congregational Churches decided to form a denomination they called the National Council of Congregational Churches. They saw themselves more like a federation of churches rather than a tight, hierarchical denomination like the Methodists or Roman Catholic. The denomination focused more on coordinating foreign mission work, while individual local churches were still legally autonomous and independent.

          The United Church of Christ river eventually included three other streams besides Congregational Churches.

          One of those was started by a Pennsylvania school teacher, John Philip Boehm in 1725. He was a layperson who eventually sought ordination in the Reformed Church. His new church was called the German Reformed Church and later the Reformed Church in the United States.

          The early 1800’s found different churches being formed who used the name “Christian” to define themselves. These included some former Methodists from North Carolina and former Presbyterians from Kentucky. These separate groups came together and were known as the Christian Church.

          Many of the immigrants coming to the Midwest in the early 1800’s were from German Lutheran background. The German Evangelical Church Society was formed in 1840 centered around St. Louis. It later was called the Evangelical Synod of North America. I believe this is the group that the St. Paul’s UCC in Watervliet was associated with.

          The middle 1900’s were a time when churches were coming together in unity. As a result, in 1931, the Christian Church denomination joined with the Congregational Church to form the General Council of Congregational Christian Churches. The Evangelical Synod and the Reformed Church in the US combined three years later to form the Evangelical and Reformed Church.

          This was followed over the next 23 years by attempts to bring these two denominations together. This was successfully completed on June 25, 1957 with the formation of the United Church of Christ.

It all started back in 1579 with Robert Browne who wanted freedom from the oppressive tight grip of the Church of England. But he didn’t want freedom for the sake of freedom, but instead freedom for the sake of being able to covenant – covenant with God individually, covenant with other Christians in a church community, and covenant with other like-minded local churches.

This desire for “freedom to covenant” led to the formation of our United Church of Christ.

In our Scripture reading today, Paul does not end with simply a call for freedom. He says, “My friends, you were chosen to be free. So don’t use your freedom as an excuse to do anything you want. Use it as an opportunity to serve each other with love. All that the Law says can be summed up in the command to love others as much as you love yourself.”

God help us do that – to use our freedom to love and covenant.