From the TeachingtheWord Bible Knowledgebase

Part 3 of a series. Read part 2.

The position on baptism presented in this series is the author's personal doctrinal position, and is not part of TTW's official doctrinal statement.

We shall now define the conservative paedobaptist position by quoting the standards of churches that hold to it.

"The warrant for infant baptism is not to be found in the New Testament, but in the Old Testament." - B. B. Warfield [1]

To engage in a fruitful discussion of any issue, it is vital to define terms. Therefore let me begin by more fully defining the conservative New Covenant paedobaptist position. To do so I will cite the official statements on baptism of the denomination in which I was first ordained, since that is the standard to which I once voluntarily bound myself as a minister. Those standards were far more explicit than those of most other Presbyterian bodies in rejecting certain errors about baptism.

The PCA's and OPC's Confusing Positions

For example, the Presbyterian Church in America's standards confuse the matter by stating that baptism, for both infants and adults, "is a seal...of our ingrafting into Christ, and of our union with Him, of remission of sins, regeneration, adoption, and life eternal."[2] Similarly, the Orthodox Presbyterian Church's doctrinal standards state that baptism "witnesses and seals unto us the remission of sins and the bestowal of all the gifts of salvation through union with Christ."[3] Leading PCA and OPC theologians use these words to teach a doctrine of saving union with Christ brought about by water baptism.[4]

A More Clear Position

The founders of the denomination in which I was ordained deliberately and commendably shunned such language, and they included wording to make it clear that water baptism saves no one. Nevertheless, that denomination's standards contained statements (italicized below) with which I came to differ. If those words are removed, I agree with what remains.

1.) Before the administration of the sacrament of baptism, the minister shall give instruction as to the institution and nature of the sacrament:

Baptism is a sacrament ordained by the Lord Jesus Christ. It is a sign and seal of the inclusion of the person who is baptized in the covenant of grace. Teaching that we and our children are conceived and born in sin, it signifies and seals unto us the remission of sins and the bestowal of all the gifts of salvation.

Baptism with water does not save the one who is baptized. Rather, it signifies and seals cleansing from sin by the blood and the Spirit of Christ for those who come to personal faith in Christ, together with our death unto sin and our resurrection unto newness of life by virtue of the death and resurrection of Christ. Since these gifts of salvation are the gracious provision of the triune God, who is pleased to claim us as His very own, we are baptized into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. Baptism summons us to renounce the devil, the world and the flesh and to walk humbly with our God in devotion to His commandments.

2.) When an infant is to be baptized, the minister shall proceed to give instruction as to the ground of infant baptism:

Although our young children do not yet understand these things, they are nevertheless to be baptized. For the promise of the covenant is made to believers and to their children, as God declared unto Abraham: "And I will establish my covenant between Me and you and your seed after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be a God unto you and to your seed after you."
In the new dispensation no less than in the old, the children of believers, born within the church, have, by virtue of their birth, interest in the covenant and right to the seal of it and to the outward privileges of the church. For the covenant of grace is the same in substance under both dispensations, and the grace of God for the consolation of believers is even more fully manifested in the new dispensation. Moreover, our Saviour admitted little children into His presence, embracing and blessing them, and saying, "Of such is the kingdom of God." So the children of the covenant are by baptism distinguished from the world and solemnly received into the visible church, though they have not yet received Christ as their Savior. We baptize our young children in the hope that God will graciously bring them to personal faith in Christ.[5]

Points Where the Author Came to Differ

To summarize, through personal study of the Scriptures I came to disagree with three key premises of the paedobaptist position embodied in the italicized statements above:

1. That baptism is to be administered to both believers and their infant children.

2. That baptism with water in the New Covenant is the direct replacement of physical circumcision in the Old Covenant, and that both signify membership in a visible body.

3. That baptism is to be administered to infants who have at least one believing parent, because the parent's position as a believer confers the special status of New Covenant membership upon the child.

References:

1. Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield, Studies in Theology (London: Oxford University Press), 399.

2. Book of Church Order, Presbyterian Church in America, 56-4.b.

3. Directory for Public Worship of God, The Orthodox Presbyterian Church, IV.B.1.

4. I discuss this doctrinal deviancy at length in Christianity and Neo-Liberalism: The Spiritual Crisis in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church and Beyond (The Trinity Foundation, 2004).

5. These statements appear in the Directory for Public Worship of The Evangelical Reformed Presbyterian Church, sections V.1 and V.2.

Next: Hermeneutical Principles and Priorities

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