Why Baptize Children: Part 2

I must note that much of the knowledge on this subject has come from Francis Schaeffer's article “Baptism” as well as a wonderful book by Daniel Hyde called “Jesus Loves The Little Children: Why We Baptize Children” a very easy to understand and simple book on the subject and short at about 80 pages long, I could not recommend it more for anyone wanting to learn more on the subject.

 Some might ask “were in scripture does it say to baptize the children of believers?” I would equally ask “were does it say not too?” Modern Christianity has centered itself largely on scripture proofs, which are specifics books, chapter and verse used to support a position. When you limit yourself to this you end up throwing so much scriptural teaching of the last 2000 years out the door. Infant baptism has no verse that is used to defend itself from which is rises or falls on, instead Paedobaptists use the complete and total continuity of the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, and it is by reading scripture as whole that we come to the conclusion we do on baptism. You might disagree that this is not right, I must stop you and point out that you most likely use this type of method for many different views on scripture. I’m assuming you believe in the Trinity, well the Bible does not say “and you shall worship the Trinity.” But a reading of the entirety of scripture points out that although the word is not used the concept and the idea is completely there, a complete reading points that God is most certainly Father, Son and Holy Spirit, or commonly called the Trinity. So this is how Paedobaptists reach the conclusion infants of believers should be baptized.

See it all starts with Genesis; God made a Covenant with Abraham that God would be his God, and his descendants God as well. The sign of this covenant was circumcision of the male children. I ask the question: for Abraham what came first, his believing in God or his circumcision. The answer is believing, he was circumcised because he believed, but God also commanded that Abraham’s children be circumcised. So here we see that in the Old Testament the sign of the covenant was given to those who believed and their children. Paedobaptists believe that the continuation of this covenant of Abraham is Baptism, and that naturally this means that the sign of the covenant continues to be applied to Believers and their children. Furthermore it would be the natural assumption by any Jewish convert to Christianity in the early church that children receive the sign.

Schaeffer I think puts it best when he says: “These questions would be further aggravated by what this saved Jew himself would have heard taught in the New Testament time. For example, he would have heard Peter in his sermon on the Day of Pentecost, Acts 2: 38, 39: Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. For the promise is unto you and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call." Remember, Peter said this to Jews, Jews who were used to having the outward sign of their faith applied to their children.

With all these things in his mind, he would expect his child to be baptized. If it were refused, what would you have done in his place? You would have asked the Apostles the reason why. So would the thousands of Christian Jews in that day. The question would have been asked in a hundred meetings; and Peter, John. Paul, and the others would have sat down and written in their Epistles to clear up the matter, just as they answered other questions that arose. The New Testament would have contained the clear answer as to why in the Old Testament the Covenant sign was applied to the infants of believers, but in the New Testament it was to be withheld from them.

The only reason possible for the New Testament not dialing with this problem is that the problem did not exist. The only possible reason that there was no problem in the Jews' minds was that the believing Jews did apply the covenant sign to their children. They baptized their babies as they had circumcised them in the Old Testament dispensation.

In the light of the teaching of the whole Bible, for not to baptize babies there would have to be a clear command in Scripture not to do so. Instead of that, the emphasis is all the other way. Of the seven cases of water baptism mentioned in the New Testament, three were of families. Someone may say, "But it does not say that them were infants involved." I would point out to you that in the light of the natural expectancy of the saved Jew, if babies were not baptized, the Scripture would have made it clear that such was the case. God deals with families in the 0. T. and in the N. T. too. The promise made to the Philippian jailer, Acts 16:31b, "And thou shalt be saved, and thy house," adequately shows this. No matter what interpretation we, individually, may hold concerning this passage, certainly God here does show that He deals with families not only in the Old Testament but in the New Testament as well.”

We know that children were baptized early on Origen born 180AD claimed to be baptized as a infant. Polycarp who was born in 69AD and was a disciple of John the Apostle was also Baptized as a infant. It seems to me that baptism of infants was a natural assumption to Jewish converts plus historically it existed relatively early. If Credobaptists are right in that infant baptism is not Biblical then why did Paul and the Apostles who were vocal on so many heresies and false teaching on the subject remain completely silent.

So we have just gone through the scriptural reasoning of why children of believers are baptized. This by far is not been an exhaustive explanation but simple a brief primer on the subject, the next post will focus on what baptism is.