A Concise Case for Infant Baptism
Christian doctrine has never been determined by one or two proof texts. It’s always a matter not only of considering everything Scripture teaches on a subject, but then also using reason to collate and systematize all of that teaching. The classic example would be the doctrine of the Trinity. There’s no one passage explicitly teaching that there is one God who exists eternally in three distinct persons. Instead, that’s been formulated taking into account the full scope of what the Bible teaches about God and working with it.
I submit that a failure to realize this is behind much opposition to infant baptism. The easy thing to argue is that the Bible nowhere commands it or gives an explicit example of it; therefore it ought not to be done. Easy, but also simplistic. With the same theological reasoning, Jehovah’s Witnesses reject the Trinity.
Behind the question of infant baptism, there are two other key questions needing to be answered. Once those questions are answered, it should be apparent that infant baptism, while not explicitly biblically commanded, makes biblical sense and is according to God’s will. Both of these questions relate to covenant theology.
Do children belong to the covenant of grace in the New Testament?
Let’s assume there’s such a thing as the covenant of grace – God’s special relationship with his people. Our interest here isn’t in proving that. Rather, we’re interested in who belongs. Believers, obviously. But their children too?
1 Cor. 7:14 is one of the strongest passages pointing to the affirmative. It says that the child of even just one believer is “holy.” That designation is covenantal. Deut. 7:6, “For you are a people holy to the LORD your God. The LORD your God has chosen you to be a people of his treasured possession…”
Another strong passage arguing for the affirmative is Eph. 6:1-3 (cf. Col. 3:20). There Paul addresses children as part of the Ephesian congregation. Not only that, but he addresses them with the Fifth Word of the covenant. The children in Ephesus are included, not excluded.
Heb. 8:6 reminds us that the new administration of the covenant of grace is better. One must ask how it would be better for that new administration to now exclude the children of believers. We usually don’t regard more exclusive arrangements as being better.
Finally, in the book of Acts we see no evidence to suggest that children were excluded after the cross. It is hard to imagine that God would include children in his covenant at the dawn of Good Friday and exclude them before dusk. One can well imagine that if this had been the message of the apostles, it would have created a great debate amongst Jewish Christians. As it is, Peter preached on Pentecost that God’s covenant promise was still for “you and for your children” (Acts 2:39).
So our first sub-conclusion is that children do indeed belong to the covenant of grace in the New Testament, just as they did in the Old.
Is baptism a sign and seal of the covenant of grace in the New Testament?
Having established membership in the covenant, the next question concerns whether there’s a necessary connection between baptism and the covenant of grace. I will argue that there is. Though it may need less argument than the first question, I’ll provide it nonetheless.
Matt. 28:19-20 is often mentioned in discussions about baptism, but one element is sometimes overlooked. It speaks of baptizing in or into (Greek: eis) the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. That preposition is critical. It expresses a relationship between the one being baptized and the one into whose name he/she is baptized. The same phenomenon is evident in 1 Cor. 10:2 (baptism into Moses) and 1 Cor. 1:13 (baptism into Paul).
If baptism points to a relationship, then what kind of relationship? What other relationship between God and his people is there besides a covenantal one? Baptism and the covenant of grace are inseparable. The first points to the second.
Furthermore, according to Col. 2:11-12, baptism has replaced circumcision as the initiatory sacrament of the covenant of grace. Physical circumcision is obsolete after Christ. Baptism has replaced it, pointing as it does to the promise of the circumcision of the heart for all who believe. Male believers and their male children underwent a bloody sacrament before Christ. All believers and their children now receive a bloodless sacrament after Christ.
So our second sub-conclusion is this: baptism is the sacrament by which we are publicly initiated into the covenant of grace in its New Testament administration.
Conclusion
Let me lay this out for you logically:
Premise 1: The children of believers belong to the covenant of grace in the New Testament.
Premise 2: Baptism is the sacrament by which those included in the covenant of grace are publicly initiated into it in its New Testament administration.
Conclusion: Therefore the children of believers should receive baptism.
Circumstantial Corroboration
I wouldn’t marshal the household baptisms of the New Testament (Acts 16:15, Acts 16:33, 1 Cor. 1:16) as a strong argument for infant baptism. I wouldn’t dismiss them too easily either. We’re dealing here with probabilities, so it’s an inductive argument. Statistically speaking, how likely is it that none of these three households had young children? It beggars belief that none of them did.
Objections
I can’t address every objection, but let me briefly take on four common ones.
Doesn’t infant baptism lead to the belief that baptized children are already saved? While there have been and continue to be those who believe that, it isn’t necessarily the case. It isn’t any more necessarily the case than the belief that every adult who is baptized is surely saved. In both situations, we recognize the need for a true faith in Jesus Christ. Every baptized child is called to respond to their baptism by resting and trusting in Christ alone when they are able to do so. Ideally, infant baptism should lead to a profession of faith.
Someone may continue to insist that infant baptism requires an explicit command from God. However, what if we were to apply that to the Lord’s Supper? Do we have an explicit command or example of women participating in the Lord’s Supper in the New Testament? We reason with the Scriptural data to reach the conclusion that it is God’s will for women also to participate in that sacrament.
Another person may argue that infants can’t understand the meaning of baptism; therefore, they shouldn’t be baptized. However, if it is true that the spiritual significance of something has to be grasped immediately by the human being addressed, then what do you do with circumcision in the Old Testament? Male babies were addressed with a spiritually significant sacrament – one they could only understand later in life. If that could be the case then in the covenant of grace, why not now?
Finally, one of our Baptist friends might assert that baptism requires a profession of faith. Since a baby can’t make a profession of faith, a baby shouldn’t be baptized. Certainly passages like Mark 16:16 and Acts 2:38 make a connection between faith and baptism. However, those passages are in the context of ministry to adults. Reformed churches believe that an adult convert should believe first and then be baptized. But we also believe that the full context of Scripture teaches that if he has any children, they should also be baptized.
A Final Thought
Over my years in ministry, I taught the above reasoning to numerous people in inquirers’ classes. Almost everyone found it convincing; to keep me humble, there were some exceptions. I find the reasoning persuasive and so do a lot of other people, but there will always be some who either can’t accept it or don’t accept it right away. Ultimately, like with any teaching of Scripture, our arguments cannot accomplish anything without the help of the Holy Spirit. We need to pray for his gracious help.
