Micro approach supporting Infant Baptism

Why we Baptize

1.) Baptism is a subset of covenant theology. In covenant theology God calls a people and says to them “I shall be your God and you shall be my people.” This covenant calling extends to not only the called but to all who come under the household of the called.

9 And God said to Abraham, “As for you, you shall keep my covenant, you and your offspring after you throughout their generations. 10 This is my covenant, which you shall keep, between me and you and your offspring after you: Every male among you shall be circumcised. 11 You shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you. 12 He who is eight days old among you shall be circumcised. Every male throughout your generations, whether born in your house or bought with your money from any foreigner who is not of your offspring, 13 both he who is born in your house and he who is bought with your money, shall surely be circumcised. So shall my covenant be in your flesh an everlasting covenant. 14 Any uncircumcised male who is not circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin shall be cut off from his people; he has broken my covenant.”

2.) So from the beginning it has been as Peter said in Acts, “39 For the Covenant promise is for you and for your children and for all who are far off, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself.” When Peter mentions “for your children and all who are far off,” we hear this as a covenant promise. The children are included and those afar off are understood as the generations yet to come who remain afar off.

Peter’s language is reminiscent of the language of Moses in Dt.

I am making this covenant both with you who stand here today in the presence of the LORD our God, and also with the future generations who are not standing here today.

God has always built His Church as a family of Families. Not a family of Individuals.

So, all of God’s covenants have included families. Even the major prophecies of the new covenant clearly indicate the continuance of the household as the basic unit of the people of God. See Gen. 12:3; Isa. 54:10, 13; 59:21 (the Old Testament backdrop to Acts 2:39); 61:8-9; Jer. 32:38-40; Ezek. 37:25-26; Zech. 8:5; 10:7, 9; 12:10-14; 14:17. In response to the use of the new covenant passages made by our Baptist friends, we must show that in those very passages the household principle remains as an aspect of the new covenant. If noble Christians “searched the Scriptures” (i.e., the Old Testament) to find out whether the things taught by the apostles were so (Acts 17:11), where would they have found warrant to abrogate the household principle?

3.) We see nothing in the NT that changes this covenant family arrangement. When God calls people into the Church of Jesus Christ he calls the children with him. Consider the household Baptisms

Cornelius (Acts 10:47-48; 11:14)
Lydia (Acts 16:15),
Philippian jailer (Acts 16:33-34),
Stephanas (1 Cor. 1:16)

Now it is conceded that in ZERO of these Baptisms are children explicitly mentioned as being Baptized. However, that is irrelevant to our appeal because the whole theology of “Household Baptism” is that on the basis of Household Baptisms babies would have been Baptized had they been present. The whole identifying reality of household baptism is that all who are in the household would be baptized. So, even if no infants were in those NT households baptized the point is that, upon the principle of household baptism, if they have been present they would have been baptized. Household means all considered part of the household.

Where do we find, with the coming of Pentecost, that God now deals with individuals as opposed to families?

Of course we do ourselves what we forbid God to do when we deny His place to call our children His own prior to their concession to God’s claim. When we have children we name them without their permission. When we have children we care, provide, and protect them without their permission. We call them our own without their permission. This is what God does in Baptism. He marks us as His own. He cares, provides, and protects via His Sacrament that conveys Grace and this without their permission. In Baptism He calls them His won without their permission. So, we allow ourselves the claim of ownership upon our children without their permission but we do not allow God in Baptism to have a claim of ownership upon His people.

4.) Continuing on as to why we Baptize our children,

We Baptize our children because we confess that they are partakers of Adam’s sin and have need to become partakers of Christ’s righteousness. Scripture says that “In sin did my mother conceive me.” We are born sinners with the sin nature.

When we baptize our children we trust God’s promises that Christ is the cure for the wound of Adam’s sin that we are all born with. Romans 5 teaches that in Adam’s fall, we sinned all. It teaches that we are born sinners and that Christ is the only cure. We understand that Baptism conveys Christ to those who have been set aside for salvation.

All of this is taught in our Catechism when it asks,

Question 74. Are infants also to be baptized?

Answer: Yes: for since they, as well as the adult, are included in the covenant and church of God; (a) and since redemption from sin (b) by the blood of Christ, and the Holy Ghost, the author of faith, is promised to them no less than to the adult; (c) they must therefore by baptism, as a sign of the covenant, be also admitted into the christian church; and be distinguished from the children of unbelievers (d) as was done in the old covenant or testament by circumcision, (e) instead of which baptism is instituted (f) in the new covenant.

So why is there so much controversy surrounding this idea that the Children of those who God owns are owned by God? One of my theories is that the way we think about the foundations of how society is organized wars against a covenantal understanding where the Children go with the parents.

According to the Lockean social contract myth, upon which our social order is based, had human beings being isolated Egos. Each of us have a will of our own, and each is free to make choices on our own. We are sovereign “I’s” first and foremost, though we may, for various selfish reasons, combine with other I’s into a political society

If this is really what is going on, then the most effective argument for infant baptism may be the creation account which teaches that man in isolation is not fully man. It is not until the creation of Eve, and so the inauguration of the community whole, that man is fully self. In short, man only finds the meaning of the individual self in the context of community. The vast majority of the contemporary Church denies this insisting that man as the individual must give assent to the community whole – The Church with Christ as King – before the community whole can recognize the individual as a member of the whole community.

In short the Christian holds that the primary building block of society is the corporate whereas the non Christian holds that the primary building block of society is the sovereign individual. When the sovereign individual is the primary building block then it is easy to understand why a child must concede to God’s calling before he is Baptized.