There has been a rather long debate amongst Christians as to the proper meaning, function and administration of the sacrament of Baptism. Rather long, to say the least. In Reformed circles, this debate is between the credobaptists (often Baptists), who advocate for Baptism following a credible profession of faith, and paedobaptists (often Presbyterians) who advocate for children of believing parents also receiving the holy splash.
When it comes to debates on this subject, they have often dealt primarily with the New Testament baptism texts and the Old Testament events that symbolise baptism (e.g. Noah’s Ark). However, this is not primarily a debate about how baptism is conducted by the first Christians, since there is neither an explicit prescription nor prohibition of infant baptism for either side to use. There are many other texts and tangents that often feature, such as the description of ‘holy children’ and ‘raising children in the Lord’. Further, many a breath has been taken and many a drop of ink spilled in determining whether there is a difference between and unrepentant unbeliever and a child of Christian parents (which will be referred to as the Vipers in Diapers fallacy, an excellent name if we have ever heard one).
However, we must see that this debate is ultimately decided by two matters. Firstly, the nature of the New Covenant, and secondly, whether it is proper to let the New Testament interpret the Old, or whether the Old should determine the categories for the New.
The reason that the nature of the New Covenant is essential to baptism is because some say baptism is one’s entrance into the New Covenant (sometimes referred to as ‘membership in the covenant community’). Let us demonstrate by a quick hypothetical logical argument why this is important.
- A regenerate person has been bought by Jesus’ blood in the New Covenant and cannot lose their salvation.
- Baptism enters a person into the New Covenant.
- Therefore, a baptised person cannot lose their salvation.
This author upholds the first proposition, but not the second one, and therefore rejects the conclusion as being logical but untrue.
Many paedobaptist apologists will level the following challenges:
“You credobaptists say that we are wrong to baptise unregenerate persons, however you have baptised many a professing believer who turned out later in life to have not been a Christian at all.”
The credobaptist will usually say “Yes that is true, however we baptised those professors under the impression that they were truly repentant Christians, whereas you baptise infants knowing full well that they have made no such profession of faith at all.”
However, this author thinks that that response is not the most pertinent one.
Let us step through this slowly so that we can hold all the confusing parts together. It seems that paedobaptists want there to be consistency between the outward administration and inward administration of the New Covenant. Inward administration, referring to God’s monergistic work of bringing a spiritually dead and rebellious sinner to salvation and new life in Christ, and outward administration, referring to the sacrament of baptism (again, this author denies that baptism administers New Covenant membership, but it is his most honest attempt to represent the paedobaptist position).
If the New Covenant, or let’s say New Covenant membership, is administered only by the Holy Spirit, then it is a Covenant whose membership will one day number all the elect of God, but at any given point, only contains the elect who have at that point in history come to saving faith. On the other hand, if there is a visual and external aspect to New Covenant membership (e.g. baptism) then it would be no surprise for the New Covenant to contain false professors and baptised children who never express personal interest in loving and following Christ.
However, this has serious theological implications. What is the New Covenant if it can contain people who will one day turn out to not be Christians, but merely ‘covenant breakers’ in the ‘covenant community’?
Here is where we get into the second main element of discussion: how the Old and New Testaments work together to teach us about the New Covenant and baptism. Jeremiah 31 is the prime Old Testament text that promises and pictures the New Covenant.
For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.”
Jeremiah 31:33-34, emphasis mine
From Jeremiah alone, we start to get a clear picture. This is the nature of the New Covenant: all of the New Covenant people will know God, his law will be written on their hearts, all their sins and iniquity will be forgiven. The writer to the Hebrews references that very text from Jeremiah after saying “for by a single offering [Christ] has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified” (10:14). The writer goes on to argue that our very confidence to enter into the holy places and the presence of God is because of Jesus’ blood spilled for us, and because of his perfect and ever-present role as mediating High Priest on our behalf. For one more text, consider Jesus’ words in Matthew 26:28. “For this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.” Jesus links the New Covenant, which has been made in his blood, with the outcome of the forgiveness of sins for many people.
With all of those texts, you may wonder, how could a person suggest that you can enter into the New Covenant community by baptism but never really be a Christian?
See, the Old Covenant community operated differently than the New Covenant community. The Old Covenant was to separate the nation Israel from the surrounding nations, and one entered the Old Covenant community simply by being born to Jewish parents (and if a male, circumcised on the eighth day). Not everyone in the Old Covenant was saved by God, they did not all know God and have their sins forgiven like what was just seen in the New Covenant. If a person takes the Old Covenant as the default for the way God relates to his people through covenant, then we would understand why you could arrive at such challenging perspectives of the New Covenant. Baptising infants would make sense if the New were just like the Old, because the children in the Old received the mark of the Covenant, and so would children in the New.
It must be clear by now that this author, being a Reformed Baptist, defends the credobaptist position, that is, that only believers with a credible profession of faith should be baptised. This is commonly called ‘believer’s baptism’. We must all be prepared to learn and correct our understanding of God’s word, as we are all fallible, and knowing God is a blessing that is refined over years of faithful study of his word.
This New Covenant which we have been looking at is truly remarkable. It’s all God. God is the one who pledged to relate to humanity in this New Covenant, and by it he swore he would save many people, forgiving their sins and opening the eyes of their hearts so that they could truly see and saviour him as their God. We are no more than blessed recipients, we have done nothing to deserve inclusion in this New Covenant. To the dear reader, I implore you to see how great a salvation God has secured for those who draw near to God on the basis of what Jesus has done. Put your trust in him, and you will find him to be a perfect saviour.
Distilled Orthopraxy 