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By Lloyd Mackey
IT WAS 100 years ago, in February 1910, that James Bavis Rowell sensed his call
to be a minister of the gospel. Less than two decades later, he began to live
out much of that call at Victoria’s Central Baptist Church.
J.B. Rowell had been converted to Christ in 1907 in a little chapel, through
some straightforward biblical preaching. He was a baker at the time, in Bournemouth, England.
Soon after, Rowell enrolled in Kensit Memorial College, the training school for
the Protestant Truth Society – at the height of the ‘Anglo-Catholic’ controversy.
This intellectual battle related to concerns among some Baptists and others
committed to ‘free grace’ and ‘free church’ theology, over what they believed was the drift of the dominant Anglican church
into Catholic practice – such as the use of images and icons.
That controversy helped to shape Rowell’s ministry. He became a major authority on Catholic theology and practice,
observed from a strong Protestant perspective.
In his later years, he was believed to have one of the largest libraries on
Catholicism outside of official Vatican and Catholic institutions.
Rowell headed for Canada in 1913, entering Brandon College for theological
studies. Before arriving in Victoria, he was already a part of what eventually
became the theologically conservative Fellowship of Evangelical Baptists.
One of his three children, Grace Eno, recalls that in Victoria, Rowell was known
in Central Baptist as a warm-hearted and compassionate pastor – and a skilled, intelligent preacher who bolstered his biblical expositions with
verbal illustrations and charts designed to make his points relevant.
Under his leadership of the Canadian Protestant League’s Victoria chapter, he often packed Central on weeknights for lectures comparing
Protestantism and Catholicism.
Often, those Rowell won to Christ were people who were first attracted to his ‘free grace’ message, through the influence of such biblical texts as: “Not by works of righteousness that we have done, but according to his mercy, he
saved us.”
In coming to Canada, he had left behind a young woman named Lucy. When he was in
Brandon, they exchanged correspondence in shorthand.
In 1916, Rowell left Brandon to enlist in the British Medical Corps. The open
trenches of World War I left him in ill health – with conditions that returned to trouble him periodically throughout his life.
His ill health, however, brought a reuniting with his beloved Lucy in England. They were married in April, 1917, and settled in Canada the following year.
Rowell held pastorates in Vernon and Prince Rupert – both successful, but cut short by recurrences of ill health. In Kamloops he
worked with a small group to re-energize a dying congregation. By the time
seven years had passed, that church was flourishing.
In 1927, he responded to a call from Victoria to establish what was to become
Central Baptist Church. It was part of the ‘Regular Baptist’ stream that had grown out of a fissure in the denomination.
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As pastor Rowell wrote, he realized the magnitude of what he was taking on:
“Passing the Parliament Buildings, and crossing over in front of the Empress
Hotel, we experienced an overwhelming sense of the responsibility of such a
venture. Spontaneously the prayer was offered, ‘Oh Lord, I don’t want to come here unless it is positively Thy will’; and like a flash the reply came, ‘Behold I set before thee an open door.’
“The following day, contemplating what it would mean to leave Kamloops where we
had been for seven years, and come to a city where we were not known; begin a
work without a church or a church member, or any equipment, there welled up the
prayer, ‘O Lord, give me an assurance that it is Thy will for me to come here.’
“Immediately, the Lord gave His word, ‘My Presence shall go with thee.’ And on these two promises our pastorate in Kamloops, filled with many evidences
of the Lord’s blessing, was terminated, and another, with an unknown future, begun.”
Today, Central Baptist is a congregation of several hundred, whose edifice takes
up most of one block.
The original building, today incorporated into the larger structure, was
completed in 1929. Grace Eno says crowds were good from the start, both for
church and for the Protestant rallies. During World War II and after, dozens of
young soldiers attended the church and became part of its burgeoning youth group. Many of them
came to Christ through Rowell’s preaching; and he was known to have solemnized marriages between sailors and
Central girls.
After World War II, Rowell was active in the founding of what became Northwest
Baptist Seminary, now a part of the ACTS seminary consortium at Trinity Western
University.
He would leave on the midnight CPR boat Sunday nights, to teach classes at the
school during the week at the school’s Port Coquitlam campus.
A recurrence of health problems forced him to cut back on the teaching and focus
on his pastoral activities, such as encouraging church plants.
Later, he earned a doctorate of theology from Los Angeles Baptist Theological Seminary; and he taught there periodically,
after becoming Central’s minister emeritus, in his mid-60s.
Rowell was a great believer in the use of print to augment his ministry. His
gospel tracts and explanations of the Protestant take on Catholicism were
widely distributed.
After ‘retirement,’ Rowell remained active in guest preaching and teaching assignments. In his 80s,
he embarked on a ‘dial-a-thought’ ministry, making use of cutting edge telephone recording technology to provide
words of inspiration to callers.
Rowell died June 24, 1973, active to the end in “telling the triumphs of the King.”
This article was based on archival materials supplied by Grace Eno to Aaron
Dunlop, minister of Victoria Free Presbyterian Church.
July 2010
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