On this day in 1774, Benjamin Cole became the second, full-time pastor of the Hopewell Baptist Church in western New Jersey. Its earliest preachers were all itinerant visitors, but God blessed, souls were saved and a church was established. In fact, Hopewell was one of the earliest churches in the colony. By the time of Brother Cole, she had been blessed with the ministry of Isaac Eaton and the sending out from her membership such men as John Gano, James Ewing and James Manning. Then under Brother Cole’s ministry, during the next two years, more than a hundred people were added to the membership through salvation and baptism.
Pastor Cole was the leader of the church through the tumultuous days of the Revolutionary War, which at times was fought in the church’s own backyard or just down the road, and with General Washington and his staff having at least one war meeting within its very walls.
Somewhat earlier, the congregation was in worship one Lord’s Day when news arrived of the skirmishes at Concord and Lexington. While listening to his pastor, Colonel Joab Houghton, was handed a note by a soldier who had reverently come in to find him. The Colonel patiently listened to the conclusion of the message and then quickly went out to stand on a stone block in front of the meeting house. As the members exited the building, he called to them and explained the message he had received. Then he said, “Men of New Jersey, the red coats are murdering our brethren of New England. Who follows me to Boston?” It is said that every man in that congregation that day stepped out into a line and answered, “I do.”