Background
He was born on December 25, 1783 in Hudders-field, Yorkshire, England, United Kingdom, son of the Rev. John Sharp, a Baptist minister. The boy grew up under favorable home and community influences.
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He was born on December 25, 1783 in Hudders-field, Yorkshire, England, United Kingdom, son of the Rev. John Sharp, a Baptist minister. The boy grew up under favorable home and community influences.
He studied in Philadelphia under Rev. William Staughton.
Because he was known as a youth of ability and integrity, he was appointed American agent of a Yorkshire mercantile firm, and he became a resident of New York at the age of twenty-two.
His interest in religion associated him with a Baptist church, and he engaged occasionally in lay preaching, revealing personal qualities that led his friends to urge him to enter his father's profession. On May 17, 1809, he was ordained to the ministry in Newark, New Jersey, where he became pastor of the Baptist Church. Three years later, he accepted a call to the Third Baptist Church of Boston, afterward known as the Charles Street Church, and there he remained until his death.
Baptists were not yet on a legal equality with Congregationalists in the old Puritan capital, but Sharp was invited to preach the annual election sermon in 1824 before the governor and legislature, and in 1840 he was asked to preach to the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company. A number of his sermons were printed, and his Recognition of Friends in Heaven (1844) was widely read.
He had executive ability which fitted him for such responsibilities as came to him with the presidency of the American Baptist Foreign Mission Society and of the board of trustees of the Newton Theological Institution. He was elected a fellow of Brown University, and Harvard made him one of its Overseers.
As he approached the age of seventy his constitution weakened and he went South to visit friends and recuperate. He died near Baltimore.
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His first church connection was with the Congregationalists, but he became a Baptist by conviction. Sharp was a leader among the Baptists of his day.
He was always dignified, and rather stern in manner as he was conservative in disposition, but he was gracious in friendliness.
He did not draw the attention of people to himself by any tricks of publicity. He was never sensational in his methods. His preaching was deliberate and impressive. He spoke extemporaneously with vivid gesture and kindling energy. Not only did he gain the regard and support of his own people, he won as well the respect of the community.
Quotes from others about the person
A biographer said of him: "God made him a perpendicular gentleman, of the noblest class, and we never expect to see him voluntarily assume, in any sense, the air and attitude of a curved and sycophantic charlatan" (Knickerbocker, August 1849).
He married Ann (Cauldwell) on January 1, 1818, and nine of his eleven children.