Covenant Baptism:
"To Your and to Your Children"

It cannot be denied, however, that the overwhelmingly majority position in Christianity through the ages has been that of infant baptism. All Christians who confess belief in "the communion of the saints" and "the holy catholic church" as they recite the Apostle's Creed week after week must, at least, give it a hearing. They must, if for no other reason, because those from a former age whom they admire and hold in high regard firmly held that the ordinance was handed down from the apostles. 

As in the case of adult baptism, so too in infant baptism there are three possible stances. The medieval practice was to baptize as many children as could possibly be baptized, for to omit the ordinance, they argued, was to jeopardize the child's position in eternity. Since infant baptism took away original sin (the sin inherited or imputed from one's ancestors) it was incumbent upon the church to baptize the greatest number of infants possible. 

The anabaptists of the reformation period were the left wing of the reformation movement who agreed neither with the papal church, the Lutherans or the reformed on the issue of baptism. Baptism of a subject before the moment of faith in Christ is no baptism at all, they said. Their detractors called them ana(again)-baptists but they saw themselves as true baptists, for they thought that those who were baptized in infancy had not been baptized at all. 

The consequences of this view with regard to, say, the fifteen hundred years of Christian history before their own century is a historical disaster. Their view virtually proposed that almost none of the supposed Christians of those long ages were even really baptized! Neither Wycliffe, nor Huss, nor Peter Waldo, nor Bernard of Clairvaux, nor Theodulph of Orleans, nor Francis of Assisi were baptized Christians. Nor were Luther, Zwingli, Calvin, Wesley and a large group of godly men who have lived since their time. Needless to say, if one holds a high view of baptism which calls into question the very faith of those who have not received the ordinance, it is indeed a shocking and intimidating view. 

The third view is that, in an analogous way to adult baptism, the performing of the ordinance of infant baptism does not do anything in and of itself. Rather, it is an instrument given by God to be united with faith in his promises. The faith, in this case, is on the part of the Christian parents who are accepting God's promises to save the children of believers and who are promising to obediently follow the Lord in the rearing of the child. This is the view presented in this chapter. 

The ultimate question which Christians have regarding infant baptism is, naturally, "Was it practiced in the first century by the apostles?" This is a legitimate question, indeed. It is not likely that we could institute such a radical deviation from exclusive believer's baptism and be blameless. The practice or non-practice of the ordinance by the apostles must be considered normative. 

There is substantial evidence for infant baptism in the New Testament. The fact that Luther, Zwingli, Calvin and the people of their century were rejecting the confessional, the mass, purgatory, indulgences, popes, cardinals and bishops but never wavered on infant baptism, shows how strong they thought the evidence for the practice was. Recently a study very favorable to the anabaptists has argued that even the anabaptists were not, at the first, opposing the baptism of infants of believers but any baptism performed by a corrupt church. (Verduin, The Reformers and Their Step Children, 1980, p.189-220) On the other hand, the evidence is not incontrovertible. For if the New Testament gave the kind of evidence for its practice as it does, for example, for the practice of communion or prayer for the sick, there would be no controversy and the believing church in all ages would be unanimous in its practice of infant baptism. 

We must answer our question in the affirmative, however. While there may not be incontrovertible evidence, there are strong implications that the New Testament Christians baptized their children. The lack of an unambiguous statement that they did will be discussed later. Suffice it to note here that some of the most significant doctrines of Christianity are proved only by inference and comparative texts rather than by a single proof text appearing in the New Testament. 

The several family baptisms in the New Testament (Acts 16: 15; 16: 33; 18: 8; I Corinthians 1: 16) might, on the surface, seem to be unimpressive as proof. However, we note that these are a surprisingly large number in the comparatively few references to individual baptisms in the New Testament. They, of course, do not prove that these families had infants in their number. However, they seem to suggest that people joined God's visible church by families. Peter implies just that when, in the context of baptism he tells the pentecostal multitude: The promise is to you and to your children." (Acts 2: 39) 

This idea seems more plausible when one remembers that the very first Christians were exclusively either Jews or Gentile proselytes in the former religious profession and had always performed the initial rite of religion, circumcision, on their children. The idea of family membership in the kingdom was not new to them. What would have been novel to them would have been the absence of an ordinance for their children. The New Testament, as a matter of fact, associates the ordinance of baptism and that of circumcision in such a way as to suggest that baptism is Christian circumcision.(Colosians 2: 11-12) As in ancient Israel, so in the new Israel the church, at the first and at other times of vigorous evangelism, many adults received the ordinance. Once the religion had become established, however, the overwhelming number of people who received the initial ordinance received it as babies of faithful parents. 

Those who would object to the idea because it implies two kinds of baptism (i.e. infant and adult) and is therefore improbable, must be reminded that in the Old Testament there were two forms of circumcision; one dramatizing the personal commitment of an adult in behalf of himself and the other dramatizing the commitment of a baby by its believing parent. 

We are not especially surprised when we find no historical statement in the New Testament which says in an unambiguous fashion that a baby was baptized. There is no statement of the baptism of one who was a slave, yet we do not think that the omission amounts to a prohibition of the baptism of slaves. Inasmuch as the writings were addressed to people who were so steeped in the Old Testament religion and its inclusion of children in the covenant, we would expect a negative statement that they were not to baptize their children. If religion were so radically changed, certainly we would find some passage, or at least a verse among all the large body of material dealing with the adjustment of New Testament practice with Old Testament practice which would explain why there was no longer any ordinance for the children of believers as they had formerly been blessed with. Furthermore, one would imagine that if Christians did not baptize their children as Israel circumcised theirs, God would have given some other ceremony such as infant dedication to make up for the short comings of the new form of revealed religion to make it at least as adequate as the old. 

An interesting confirmation of this mentality in the people of New Testament times is found in the religious situation of the first century B.C. Baptism was used by John the Baptist and before him by the Essenes. Their practice of baptism continued long after his death. Before the Essenes, the main body of Judaism had practiced baptism as an ordinance to incorporate Gentiles into the Jewish religion. This baptism was performed in addition to the circumcision of all the male proselytes and was an ordinance for both males and females. What is especially significant here is that when a family became proselytes they baptized their infants as well as the older members of the family. By the time of the Christian use of the rite, baptism had long been associated with infants and whole families. The historical question must not detain us because of the scope of this book. However, a few words are appropriate. The practice of infant baptism is an almost universal practice going back as far as the eye of the historian can see. We have good historical evidence of its practice back to the very threshold of the apostolic period. 

One early person to speak against infant baptism was Tertullian who lived around the end of the second century. He speaks about it in his work On Baptism (18). Tertullian was later to go into the bizarre, if not heretical, sect of Montanism. He is hardly a model witness. It is clear that his objections stem from inadequate theology since he reasons that baptism should be postponed until all the indiscretions of youth are past so that one is not likely to sin after his baptism. But what is more important is his opinion that infant baptism was an ancient and established custom which ought to be stopped. 

Origen of Alexandria, a few years later discusses baptism and assumes that it was the ancient practice of the church. The Apostolic Tradition, probably written by Hippolytus around the same time, refers to infant baptism. It should be stressed that the intervening years between these Christians and the apostles have produced a comparatively small body of literature and there is no treatise on baptism from that period which has survived. In the light of this evidence the strong New Testament inferences are not weakened but, rather, strengthened as we discern a strong historical remembrance of the practice from the days of the apostles. 

It is obvious from the explanation of adult baptism which has gone before, that infant baptism must have a slightly different significance than adult baptism. Presumably, an infant cannot make a covenant with God and consciously receive God's assurances as an adult does in adult baptism. It is the same act of covenant making, however. 

The treaty-maker in infant baptism is not the infant but the parent. In precisely the same way as the adult covenants with God with regard to himself in adult baptism, so too the parent covenants with God with regard to his child when the child is baptized. 

Baptism of one's child is an act of faith and promise of parental obedience. The parent signifies, first of all, that God is able to save his child. Like the multitude of Christians who think it appropriate to pray for the salvation of individuals, so the parent who presents his child for baptism is faithfully asking God to save his child. The sacrament of baptism becomes a touching drama as the parent yields his child to have the mark of the Christian family placed upon the child in faith that God will bring the salvation symbolized in the baptism to a living reality in the consciousness and experience of the child. 

That there are promises to believing parents of children can scarcely be denied. Exodus 20: 5-6 and Psalm 103: 17-17 reveal the covenantal way in which God works. Proverbs 22: 6 is not only a sociological rule, it is virtually a statement of this family covenant. Observation of God's actions in Scripture and in human experience confirms this. 

It is interesting that those who reject infant baptism often have a ceremony in which they dedicate their children to God. Indeed, they should. I personally have regularly dedicated the children of those who could not accept the Scriptural authority of infant baptism in the conviction that some semblance of covenanting is better than no covenanting at all. 

One must not think, however, that dedication is just baptism without water. Though the same forms and words may be used as are used for baptism, it is not baptism. This is primarily because in infant dedication God says nothing apart from the general statements he has revealed in Scripture. In baptism, God speaks: "I will save this child and I accept him into my kingdom." Consequently, in infant dedication the parent has nothing specific upon which to rest his faith other than the general promises of God. 

When individuals have been baptized as covenant children, there are unique situations created in the areas of transition to mature adult faith. The idea that everybody has to remember when he was saved in order to give a credible profession of faith is widely believed. Those who hold to the validity of covenant baptism are more concerned with the external reality of God's purpose to save the individual than with the moment of personal regeneration. The important question is not "When were you saved?" but "Are you saved?" Rather than the unhappy experience of children rebelling and only then manifesting repentance and faith in the Savior, the ideal is quite to the contrary. The ideal is to have always understood that Jesus is the Savior and to remember no time in the past when the child did not trust in him. Blessed is the child who is granted such an experience. 

The universal experience of Christian parents shows their implicit belief in the rightness of this. Parents rightly teach their children to pray not just: "God be merciful to me a sinner and save me for Jesus sake." but to pray in such a way as to imply that they belong to the Lord and are entitled to the benefits of faith in Christ. Whether the prayer is "Now I lay me down to sleep" or "Our Father, who art in Heaven," or "Savior like a shepherd lead us, much we need thy tender care," the language is that of presumed Christian faith. Nothing more cruel can be imagined than for a parent to make an essential division in the family which implicitly excludes the children from the thing closest to the parents heart until they are old enough to be corrupted and only then converted. On the other hand, to argue an "age of accountability" at which the child suddenly becomes responsible for his sin is as unscriptural as it is impractical. The Bible says nothing about it and the most ingenious advocates cannot agree on the human age at which it occurs. 

The fact is, God has consecrated the Christian's children to his kingdom. It is something analogous to international law where the children of foreigners are citizens in their parents country even before they have set foot in their native land. To abandon the child to the local culture upon the parents' return home, no parent would condone. So in infant baptism, the parent officially marks his child with the mark of the parent's spiritual country. It is the parent's responsibility to walk before his child and maintain his faith in God and to cry out to God for the early commitment of his child to the Savior. 

It has usually been the custom among Christians who baptize their children to allow youngsters publicly to confess their faith in Christ and to assume adult responsibilities in the church by means of some sort of ceremony. It is sometimes called "confirmation". In other circles it is merely becoming a "communicant member" of the church. This is practical inasmuch as it forms a smooth transition between covenant relationship to the church and confessing relationship to the church. The latter category is often called communicant membership on the assumption that only then may a child partake of the communion. A better name might be "confessing membership". 

That some children who have been baptized prove not to be Christians must be noted. In fact, many adults who have been baptized as professing believers prove to be no believers after all. Both children and adults are baptized on the basis of our belief that they have (in the case of adults), or will (in the case of infants), believe in the Savior. The assurance of their salvation is always presumptive. 

As in the case of the personal covenant an individual makes with God to accept Jesus as his Savior and Lord, so in this covenant to rear a child in the Lord and walk before him as a Christian example, the promise is imperfectly kept. No doubt, if parents could perfectly obey the covenant they make in infant baptism they would have perfect success in the Christian profession of their children. The New Testament, in fact, recognizes that the failure of children to believe in and obey the Lord is a mark against the parents. (Titus 1: 6) This could be just only if the parent were, in some respect, responsible. 

This must be applied with great gentleness. Due to the frailty of God's people, one cannot presume to consider his covenant with God as if he were an equal. The covenant is a gracious covenant and by no means does the parent "earn" the salvation of his children. God graciously agrees to save the child. The condition is the parent's obedience. Frequently in God's inexplicable lovingkindness and mercy he fulfills the covenant even when it is wantonly broken by the parent. In any case, the parent must cry out to God for his mercy and favor in spite of his imperfect performance of the covenant. He ought to pray for his children on the basis of the mercy of God and not on the basis of any obedience he has been able to demonstrate. God's apparent failure to save his child must be accepted in humility and in faith that God will ultimately work his salvation. 

Even in cases where a parent has miserably failed the Lord's covenant, he should not diminish his repentance, faith and petition to God that he, the God of all mercy, would work the salvation of the children. One takes comfort from the prophetic message to Israel in the days of Joel when the sins of Israel had brought a locust plague upon them. Even then, if they were to repent God would, "restore the years that the locusts have eaten." God is merciful to his people even in the midst of his discipline.