Another in my process into the Reformed Faith or Covenant Theology or Household Baptism (a.k.a. Paedo Baptism). Again, props to a great source on all this; thanks, RubeRad. Previous post related is Rings here at LAH.
I think this is a simple line of logic. Makes clear sense to me, anyway. It’s hard, but faith is built on hard rocks and difficult depths.
There are three positions to take
- All babies and others who cannot respond to the outward preaching of the Gospel will go to heaven.
- Some babies and others who cannot respond to the outward preaching of the Gospel will go to heaven.
- No babies and others who cannot respond to the outward preaching of the Gospel will go to heaven.
I’m going to take option 2 based on demonstrations in history (bible): Some children are/were saved Genesis 7, Hebrews 11, Joshua 2:18, Psalm 103:17, Acts 2:38-39, 16:31, Titus 1:6. Some were not saved: Eli’s sons: 1 Samuel 2:12, Absalom and Esau. Some may argue that there was an age of accountability in these examples. I wonder, since we’re all known before our birth Psalm 139. God doesn’t, in my understanding of Scripture, make decisions based on looking forward to our decisions.
David’s statement about his infant son who has died in 2 Sam 12: “I will go to him, but he won’t return to me.” is not clear, but is used as classic proof for infant salvation.
wcf 10.3 covers Effectual Calling. God is pleased to call to Himself, failing in no way, all people He has chosen. He doesn’t make mistakes, nor is there a “blanket” call to all people amongst whom only a portion respond. There is the call of the Gospel to all people and there is the Effectual Call of God to His elect.
I believe it is very important to think of this calling out of the elect as a lifetime process. Someone who is called to repentance and faith in Christ later in life is to be considered elect. They may not believe but they are elect from the get-go, right? Say they are born and baptised into a believing, churched family yet do not come to the family of God until they are middle-aged. Should not their baptism be of great value? Can they not look back allllll the looooong way back to their baptism and see there, in hindsight the engagement ring and promise that was sealed unto them many years ago and then appreciate all the more God’s promises?
Conversely, a child not baptised but born to a family that is faithful and churched, though coming to saving faith in Christ at middle-age is still saved, baptised when converted. But at what loss? I think, though baptism doesn’t play a part in salvation (it’s not salvific) is it not sad that this person was decidedly different in upbringing from the first? In what I’ve been coming to appreciate about the integral part that baptism and the church play in the family from cradle to grave, it seems a great disservice and a lack of putting perspective on the lost years of God’s promise.
Yes, God’s promise is eternal and yes, it works backward in the life of a man whether baptized in youth or not. Just as a believer who dies never baptized still has the promise. But there’s a richness, a fulness that is lacking. O to look back on the day of my baptism and say here, right here, did God declare that I belong to Him, though it took me twenty eight long years to run to Him in belief and faith. But I don’t have that joy. Do I regret it? Somewhat. It is what it is, of course. But, knowing what I know now, I surely don’t want to lay the foundation for that lack in my own children and for their children. So much would I like to see the better horizon for them and their offspring and if that can be realized, the seal of God on my household, that I would be a fool to avoid it or neglect due attention to it.
But what about those who don’t believe and are still baptized? They still benefit from the common grace that God maintains in His church. They are raised in the moral and spiritual environ of the church and their believing families. They may truly be raised up for God’s judgement, but is not His judgement, His glory and holiness magnified in what He does?
Rather than stew and trouble over this dark side of God’s covenant, is it not better to lay our hopes in Him, to trust our Lord to make all right in the end? He has promised us eternity and salvation. What God does is right, period, and our understanding only comes into play when He wills it to be so. We may not know what will happen or why this side of Christ’s return, so we must go with what we have at this time. God has promised His blessing, however richly full or limited, according to His good pleasure and devices.
So, bottom line, baptize your children. Dedicate them to the good name of our Lord and His promises. He will sort out the rest. And when they are baptized, they must be, by their inclusion, part of the church visible, part of the instruction in righteousness, party to the counsel of God, the discipline of His church and all other things. We owe it to them just as we owe our witness to the Gospel to every pagan around us who has not known God, or His holy things.
Hebrews 8. It’s a covenant. Not just for us but for our children!
Cold Coffee and Flannel 
When you trust in the Lord… in His sovereign election… in His covenant promises… how could you deny your children the sign of God’s covenant with them? I love the post, Rob!
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So are you saying that parents should look to have their children baptized even if they do not have a profession of faith? Any person would be privy to common grace just by the fact that they are alive in a world that still contains God.
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Absolutely, Ben. This is the stuff I’ve been dealing with the last two years. It’s led to a conviction that the church is where we get our bread. And, similar to the child dedication found in Baptist churches, bringing our kids (our meaning children of believers) before God and receiving His promise and declaration on them because they really are different, being in His covenant community (visible body!) is absolutely right.
The difference between the Baptist dedication and covenant sign of Baptism for children is that the former is a corporate promise to God whereas the latter is the Church applying God’s promise to the children. It’s a long way from where I started back in 2003 with you and at Anchor, but I’m convinced of it now. There is a massive difference.
God’s promises are for all His people and our children are His just as Israel’s children were His. I can no longer see how we can exclude our children from what they really are. Especially when they are, regardless of tradition or denomination, commonly treated as different, outside, from the unbelieving peoples.
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There’s plenty more, but this is just a distilled product. I’ll gladly discuss it further. The more I’ve learned here of Covenant Theology, the more it has led me to trust in Christ, to love His church, my family and to take joy in His promises. And more, to take joy in the hardship and trials that seem to keep coming round. It’s deeper, more comprehensive. When I started to grasp what how the New Covenant is administered and what it means to be in the church, things began to fall into place.
In the past, I’ve learnt head knowledge, stuff that made me feel better, understand more, but basically just stuff. Now, it’s life-giving. To seek forgiveness and to receive it, to receive the entirety of Christ’s Church on Sunday, to be wed to these things is amazing.
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Don’t forget Luke 1:39-45, apparently John the Fetus was regenerated in the womb.
Rom 9:11 makes that as clear as it seems possible to make it.
These statements might appear contradictory. I have heard the former, non-Effectual Call, to be called the “General Call”. Whether “blanket” is a good description for that, maybe potato potahto.
Ben, so are you saying that parents should look to have their children cut off from the covenant community even if they do not reject the faith?
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I mean (making my point perhaps a little better), we need to approach the problem with the opposite question; not “when are our children in the covenant?”, but “when did God take children of believers out of his covenant people?”
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William Shishko, as he progresses in his lectures on baptism, more and more frequently raises the question: “If there really is a massive shift in the dispensation, or operation of the covenant regarding households, shouldn’t it be blazingly apparent in the New Testament somewhere?
Christ, Peter and Paul, the writer of Hebrews all could have cleared the air with quick finesse and yet they didn’t. Which ultimately leads me to believe that there wasn’t anything to change. It’s always been group administration. Personal responsibility, corporate dispensing of law, gospel, promise, ordinance, sacrament etc.
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I’ll have another one up tomorrow. I’d really like to continue to hear more from you all. Ben, let me know, for real, what you’re thinking. Nobody’s gonna flame you here.
Also, RubeRad, you turned me toward Josh Brisby’s path to this. I begin to understand the trial it was for him. I see also that I must be thankful in that I don’t think I had half the challenge he did in coming to grips with baptism.
I don’t have a lifetime of indoctrination and in-depth study on credo-baptism to overcome. I’ve had to learn about the details and meaning of both at the same time. Up until 2 years ago, baptism wasn’t on my radar screen.
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Israel and the church are not the same and being a child of God is only through salvation. There is no other way to become a child of God. My child is not a part of the body of Christ because they have not trusted in Christ. If I were to say they were I would be saying there is another way of salvation other then through repentance and faith in Christ’s finished work on the cross. Baptist throughout the new testament is always a outward representation of a inward decision. I believe there might be room to consider being baptized into the body of Christ, i.e. the local church, but that would still not allow for non-professing children to become a part of that body.
Those are my thoughts…
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What gets me most is the potential to be baptized and not believe. It throws a monkey wrench into the entire credo-baptism scheme. You have to believe (profess) to be baptized in the Baptist model.
But you don’t have to believe (really) to be baptized.
And you didn’t have to be regenerate to be baptized in Israel either.
So credo-baptism falls apart if it’s entirely dependent on the regenerate status of the object of baptism.
Baptism, according to all the meanings (identification, purification, discipleship) being something God does to someone, makes it all about Him and not about me.
I’m fairly convinced that the Baptist model has a tendency (not in all cases) to make baptism about me, not the One who has done it all.
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With the new one coming up in just a couple of hours, I’m hoping there will be continued discussion.
Gotta say, this is hard stuff to live with for one big reason. This baptism has drawn me in and opened up these convictions that are powerful and deep. Simply studying baptism has brought me a greater sense of devotion to and dependency on Christ. It’s not just a ceremony like getting a medal or trophy.
So it’s made a great impression on me. Brought some depth to my faith. And I’m convinced of the idea of covenant household baptism. It’s an outworking of a high view of the church and ministers, which I’ve always held. Sadly, my conviction about church has been foiled again and again by churches and elders not holding the same high view. I mean, when you go and you seek to submit, to learn from those in shepherding positions and are ignored, pushed off or told “I’m not here for you”, (for 7 years!) it hurts. Thank God for New Life.
Maybe I just can’t communicate well, or I’m not aware of how I come across, but this stuff is really important. No, a right view of baptism doesn’t add to salvation, but it sure has a massive impact on this one’s life as a Christian. Enough so that I’m willing to come out and make it known.
And if holding my position offends, I’ll repent if I learn that I’m wrong, I’ll repent if I learn that my attitude or approach in communication is wrong. But, like Luther, I’m convinced by Scripture and plain reason, which are required to un-convince me likewise.
All this after a painful ride with my Wonderful Beloved last night. It’s not fun being convinced of something so meaningful and not fully sharing it with her. Same with my brother. Not being of the same mind causes great aches within the conscience –for me, self-doubt and limitation. Going in the direction I believe to be right is hard hard hard when it’s not me alone who is impacted.
But I love them both dearly and just want to finish off by saying it’s not an issue of condemnation or judgement because of different views. I’ll try to convince you but I’ll not let go my high view of my family in the process.
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But they are. All Israel is not Israel, and neither is everybody in the church saved.
Nobody’s saying that anybody is necessarily or even ordinarily regenerated/saved through/at the time of/because of baptism (except Catholics and Lutherans). But you have to make room for God to operate monergistically; otherwise, if you take a hard line on your statement above, then absolutely no dead babies or mental defectives (excuse my frankness) can make it into heaven. But if God can sovereignly impart saving faith and regenerate apart from rational understanding of sin and salvation (see John the Fetal Baptist), that’s a game-changer.
Another way to look at it; you need to get rid of the notion that baptism and true faith are time-synchronized, or must be causally connected. Even apart from the problem of apostasy, what if somebody comes up and says “I realize now that my earlier profession of faith was a sham; I may have had sincere enough intentions, but really I had no idea what Christianity, sin, salvation, atonement, were all about, I was just going along with the flow, trying to meet everybody’s expectations. But NOW, I have TRUE faith.” If you require rebaptism for anybody who was baptized as an infant, on the grounds that they were baptized without faith, wouldn’t you have to rebaptize this guy too? And how many rebaptisms for how many sincere realizations of previous false faith?
There’s a reason we joke about dedications being “dry baptisms”. We’re really getting at the same thing. What you want to accomplish in dedication, is what baptism is for. What you want to accomplish in baptism, is what admission to the Table due to a credible profession of faith is for.
But is your child a member of your church? Are you discipling them? (Does that make them a disciple?) If you don’t have a robust visible/invisible church distinction (see Israel vs. Israel above), then you can’t account for apostasy. John 15: even a dead branch is in some sense truly a part of the vine.
I’m not sure what that could possibly mean in your system. You don’t have room (or want to make room) for a visible church to have some middle status between between unchurched and invisible church.
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There is the rub then. I don’t agree with the initial direction of any of the discussion. That being that Israel and the Church are one and the same. The end times indicates that they cannot be the same. But alas I am sure I won’t change your position so I check out.
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It’s amazing how it’s all connected. Never woulda thunk my being convinced of calvinistics would lead to covenant theology, which lead to the Presbyterian church all the way to this.
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OR, your presuppositions about the separateness of Israel and the Church are determining your view of the end times.
If you like debates, maybe check this out.
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Got one more post coming up and then I think I’ll be done. Alex asked me what I thought the best 3 arguments for paedo-baptism might be. These’ll be my own words, so check me on them.
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