Should Infants Be Baptised?

Question 9004.

Infant baptism is practised by the majority of professing Christians worldwide, and any Baptist writing about it should begin by admitting that he is in a minority and that the people he disagrees with include many he expects to meet in glory. This is not a question about who is a Christian.

It is, though, a question about what Jesus commanded, and I do not think it can be dodged by good manners. My conclusion is that infant baptism is not taught in Scripture, and I want to show my working rather than simply asserting a Baptist position.

The case for infant baptism, stated fairly

The strongest argument runs through covenant theology. Circumcision was the sign of the covenant applied to infant boys on the eighth day. Baptism, it is argued, is the new covenant equivalent, and since the children of believers were included under the old sign they should be included under the new. Colossians 2:11-12, which mentions circumcision and baptism in adjacent breaths, is usually cited.

A second argument appeals to the household baptisms in Acts. Lydia’s household, the Philippian jailer’s household, the household of Stephanas. In the ancient world a household included children, so infant baptism is thought to be implied.

A third appeals to history. The practice is attested early and became universal, and it is argued that so widespread a custom must have apostolic roots. A fourth appeals to the promise in Acts 2:39 that the promise is for you and for your children.

Why the circumcision argument does not hold

The parallel breaks at several points. Circumcision was applied to male infants only, and to every male in the household including slaves and foreigners, regardless of faith. If baptism simply replaces it, we should be baptising boys only, on the eighth day, along with anyone employed in the house. Nobody does this, which suggests the parallel is already being applied selectively.

Circumcision was also the sign of membership in a national, ethnic covenant with physical descendants. The new covenant community is not entered by birth. Jeremiah’s promise is of a covenant in which they shall all know the Lord, from the least of them to the greatest, which is precisely what could not be said of national Israel.

As for Colossians 2, the circumcision Paul speaks of there is made without hands, and it is a description of what happened to the believer inwardly. Colossians 2:11-12 goes on to say that they were raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God. Faith is right there in the sentence.

Why the household argument does not hold

This is the argument from silence, and silence is a poor foundation for a practice. Nobody disputes that whole households were baptised. The question is whether anyone in them was baptised without believing, and the texts themselves answer it.

Of the Philippian jailer, Acts says he rejoiced along with his entire household that he had believed in God. Of Cornelius, that the Spirit fell on all who heard the word, and they spoke in tongues, before they were baptised. Of the household of Stephanas, that they devoted themselves to the service of the saints.

Every time the text tells us anything about a household beyond the bare word, it tells us they believed. To find infant baptism in these passages you have to want it to be there. I have gone through the same material in who should be baptised.

No command and no example

This is the heart of it for me. The New Testament describes a great many baptisms in considerable detail, and not one of them involves an infant. There is no command to baptise infants and no instruction anywhere about how a church should go about it, which is remarkable given how much practical instruction the letters contain about everything else.

Paul writes to children directly in Ephesians and Colossians, telling them to obey their parents. He never once tells them to remember their baptism, and he never tells parents to have their babies baptised. For a practice of such supposed importance, the apostolic silence is deafening.

Arguments for infant baptism therefore have to be built from inference. That is not a criminal offence in theology, and we all infer things. But an inference is a weaker thing than a command, and it should not be used to establish a sacramental practice binding on the whole church.

What baptism means excludes infants

Baptism pictures union with Jesus in his death and resurrection. It is an appeal to God for a good conscience. It is the public confession of a person who has repented and believed. Every one of those descriptions presupposes somebody who knows what is happening.

This is not a technicality. If baptism is a sign, the sign has to signify something in the person receiving it. Applying the sign to someone who has no faith detaches it from what it means, and once detached it starts to be understood as doing something in itself.

Which is exactly what has happened historically. Where infant baptism is practised, baptismal regeneration is rarely far behind, and a great many people in this country believe themselves to be Christians on the strength of a ceremony they cannot remember. I have written on that in what baptismal regeneration is.

Church history is not our authority

The practice does appear early. It is also true that Tertullian, around the turn of the third century, argued against it, which shows it was neither universal nor uncontested at that stage. The earliest clear evidence is later than the New Testament by a considerable margin.

But even if it were attested in the year 110, that would not settle the matter. The apostolic churches were drifting within Paul’s own lifetime, and half the New Testament exists to correct them. Antiquity establishes what was done, not what should have been.

I say this as someone with a great deal of respect for church history and no interest in the fantasy that the truth vanished for fifteen centuries until my tradition recovered it. Tradition is a useful servant. Mark 7:8 shows what happens when it is promoted.

What about children who die?

Parents sometimes ask about infant baptism because underneath the question is a fear about their child’s eternity. Let me answer that fear directly. Baptism does not save anyone, and an unbaptised infant who dies is not in danger because of a ceremony that did not happen.

I hold that there is an age of accountability, a point before which a child who dies is received by God’s mercy through the work of Jesus. David expected to see his infant son again. Whatever the details, the God we are dealing with is not one who consigns babies to judgement on a technicality of water.

If that is your real question, please do not let anyone answer it with a font. Take the comfort from God’s character, which is where it actually rests.

What should we do with our children then?

A good deal, as it happens, and none of it involves water. Bring them to church. Teach them the Scriptures from infancy, as Timothy’s mother and grandmother did. Pray with them and for them. Many churches hold a service of thanksgiving and dedication, which asks nothing false of the child and commits the parents publicly before God.

Then wait, and watch, and talk with them as understanding grows. When a child comes to genuine faith, baptise them, and make a proper occasion of it. That is a far better thing to give a child than a memory they do not possess.

And be patient with believers who see this differently. I would not receive an infant baptism as baptism, and I would still take communion beside a paedobaptist without a moment’s hesitation.

What Acts 2:39 actually promises

The verse most often quoted in support of infant baptism is Peter’s line that the promise is for you and for your children and for all who are far off. Read on its own it sounds decisive. Read to the end of its own sentence it does not.

Peter finishes the thought with the words everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself. Acts 2:38-39 has already told us what the promise is received by, which is repentance and baptism, and Luke tells us three verses later that those who received his word were baptised.

The phrase all who are far off is the other half that gets overlooked. If children are included by physical descent, then so is every distant Gentile, and nobody argues that Peter meant to baptise the unbelieving inhabitants of Rome. The promise is offered widely and received by faith, and that is the whole shape of the sentence.

A word to paedobaptist friends

I want to be careful here, because I have colleagues in ministry who practise infant baptism, preach the gospel with real power, and have led more people to Jesus than I have. Nothing above is meant to suggest they are careless with Scripture. They read the covenants differently, and their position is a reasoned one held by serious men.

Where I think it goes wrong is in the underlying framework rather than in any single verse. If Israel and the church are one continuing covenant people, infant baptism follows quite naturally. If, as I hold, the church is a distinct body begun at Pentecost and entered by faith, the parallel never gets off the ground. I have set out that distinction in what the church is.

So the argument is really about hermeneutics, not about water. That is worth knowing when you next find yourself in the conversation, because it saves everybody a good deal of proof-texting.

So, now what?

So where does this leave you? If you are weighing infant baptism as a parent, read Acts through and look for one clear instance. If you find none, ask yourself honestly what the practice is resting on.

If you were christened as a baby and have since come to faith, I would encourage you to be baptised as a believer. That is not a slight on your parents, who almost certainly acted in love. It is obedience to something that has not yet happened to you.

And if you hold the other view and have read this far, thank you for the patience. I hope you found the case for your position stated fairly, even if I could not follow it to the end.

Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Matthew 28:19 (ESV)