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Covenant and Baptism: Principles and Practice
The Unity of God’s Covenant
The covenant is the means by which God enters into relationship with
His creation. Therefore, all of God’s dealings with His creation are
covenantal. This means that there is one gracious covenant that
stretches through the course of redemptive history, which each
successive covenant expanding on the relationship established before.
John Calvin wrote that the covenant of grace is one in substance and
diverse in modes of administration.
Following are 5 biblical arguments that support this claim:
1. The covenant promise of life and salvation is described in the same
way throughout Scripture: “I will be your God, and you will be my
people.” See Gen 17:7; Ex 19:5; Deut 29:13; 2 Sam 7:14; Jer 31:33; Heb
8:10; 2 Cor 6:16; Rev 21:1-8.
2. The Mediator of the covenant is the same in every administration of
God’s covenant: the Lord Jesus Christ. See Heb 13:8; Gen 3:16; Rev
13:8; Heb 13:20; 1 Tim 2:5; Ac 4:12.
3. The gospel preached in the Old Testament is the same as the gospel
preached in the New: the gospel of grace. See Gal 3:8; compare Gen 3:15
and 1 Cor 16:20; Gal 3:13-14.
4. The obligation of God’s covenant is essentially the same throughout
the course of its various and successive administrations: faith working
through obedience. See Rom 4; Gal 3; Rom 1:6.
5. The people of God are organically connected throughout covenantal
history: there is but one people of God. See Jer 31:31; Heb 8:8; Gal
6:16; Phil 3:3; 1 Peter 2:9-10; Heb 8:10 (it is God’s law that is
written on the hearts of His people in the New Covenant).
Principles:
The New Testament authors recognize the basic and essential unity and continuity between the Old and New Covenants.
The New Testament testifies to the Old Covenant growing into a
final, expansive, and more glorious covenant inaugurated by Jesus
Christ.
This means that unity and continuity should be presumed over discontinuity.
Continuity of the Covenant Household
The key idea in establishing covenant baptism in Scripture is the idea
of continuity. I believe that examining the cumulative evidence of the
many lines of continuity that run throughout the pages of Scriptures
makes a compelling case for covenantal baptism.
We have investigated several lines of continuity running through the
Scriptures. First, there is the continuity of the covenant of grace.
What can at a cursory reading of the Bible appear to be many
unconnected covenants in Scripture between God and man are really
expressions of the one covenant bond that unites God and man in a
relationship of grace in Christ. There is a fundamental unity spanning
throughout the Bible from the Older Covenant to the Newer Covenant and
culminating in Jesus Christ. Second, there is the continuity of the
people of God. God has always called out a people for Himself with whom
He entered into covenant and through whom He worked to establish His
covenantal kingdom in the world for His glory. Old Testament Israel and
the New Testament church are essentially one. Third, there is the
continuity of covenant signs. Just as circumcision was a sign and seal
of the covenant of grace under the Older Covenant, so now baptism is
the sign and seal of the covenant of grace under the Newer Covenant.
God has been pleased to apply His sign and seal to believers and their
children throughout all of His covenant dealings with His people. The
covenant sign of baptism marks one’s entry into the covenant, where
there is blessing for those who repent and believe, and curse for those
who do not repent and believe.
Today I want to demonstrate a final line of continuity running through
the Scriptures, and it is one to which we have already turned our
attention in past weeks as we examined the doctrine of covenant
succession and Peter’s sermon at Pentecost in which he told the
assembled Jews that the promise of forgiveness and the Holy Spirit is
for them and for their children. This line of continuity is that of the
covenant household, which shows us the beauty of including infants in
God’s covenant. God has been pleased throughout the history of His
covenant with man to work through the household – both for the display
of His grace and also for the exercise of His judgment.
In order to gain an appreciation for the continuity of the covenant
household, we must recognize certain assumptions that are almost
inescapable for us as 21st C. American Christians. We live in a culture
with a long tradition of emphasizing the self, individual choices, and
personal rights. This tradition can be traced back to the Renaissance
(15th. C.) philosophy of man-centered individualism. The rugged
individualist is the American ideal, our own cultural archetype, and it
pervades our thinking, I believe, more than we realize. It is an
ever-present and real temptation to project our culture and its
assumptions back onto the people of the Bible. It is a difficult and
challenging task, but we must diligently attempt to understand what the
people of the Bible meant when they used words, and furthermore we must
try to step outside of our own cultural assumptions and seek the mind
of the Spirit, who was pleased to inspire the Bible to be written a
long time ago in cultures very different from our own.
Our emphasis on the self, individual choices, and personal rights is
quite foreign to both the Hebrew culture of the Old Testament and the
Greco-Roman culture of the New Testament. Instead, there is a constant
emphasis on the household, the family, the tribe, the clan, the people,
and authority, identity, and loyalty were bound up with these in a way
that we may find difficult to comprehend. In short, the corporate
reality of the family is vital for understanding the covenant and the
redemption that God provides in a covenantal context.
While Baptists have historically emphasized the individual (and in fact
most Baptist scholars claim the ideas of soul competency, religious
liberty, and individual choice as the great heritage of Baptist
theological influence – no doubt true, with very mixed effects on
society), the Scriptures instead emphasize the larger unit – the
family, the household, the tribe, etc. In fact, if the covenant teaches
us anything, it is that God’s purposes of redemption reach far beyond
the individual. They include the individual, and it is not as if the
individual is unimportant or individual redemption is unreal. But God’s
purpose of redemption reaches to every area of life. Indeed, when God
purposed to redeem Adam after the fall, He provided a gracious
redemption for Adam personally, but God’s redemption reached to the
heirs – the house – of Adam by promising redemption through a future
Seed who would rise up in the midst of the sons of Adam in order to
redeem the entire race (Gen. 3:15). So just as the whole race is cursed
in Adam, so the whole race is blessed in the New Adam, Jesus. As the
head goes, so goes those under the head. And so the corporate thinking
continues all the way through the Bible – through Noah, Abraham, the
people of Israel, and the church. The climactic scene of the Scriptures
is a gathering of every tribe, tongue, people, and nation – considered
as corporate entities – worshipping God as one kingdom (Rev. 4, 5, 11,
22). In between the first Eden and the final Eden is a story of God
dealing with man covenantally – which is to say, corporately, by means
of representation. Representation, authority, and succession are
fundamental features of God’s covenant.
The Old Testament concept of the household
Scripture is filled with definitive examples in which households are
understood as including all those under the authority of the head of
the covenantal family unit – husband, wife, children, even slaves and
servants. As the head of the household went, so went the rest of the
household, with each individual member being affected. The following is
a small sampling from the great body of Old Testament evidence:
- Gen 7:1 – Noah
- Gen 17:12-13, 23, 27 – Abraham
- Ex 12:27 – Passover
- Num 3:15 – Levites numbered according to household membership
- Deut 29:10-13 – Covenant renewal
- Joshua 24:15 – Joshua’s great declaration
- Instances in which God judges based on household membership:
- Gen 20:17-18 – Abimilech
- Ex 20:5, 34:7 – Punishments for breaking the law
- Joshua 7:15, 24-25 – Achan
- 1 Sam 3:12-14 – Eli
- 2 Sam 12:10 – David
Add to this the dozens of Scriptures throughout the Old Testament in
which God makes specific promises of blessings for believing parents
and for their children. See, for example, Deut. 4:37-40; Psalm 78:4-7;
100:5; 102:28; 103:17-18; Isa. 44:3; 54:13; 59:21; 65:23; Jer.
32:38-39; 35:19; Ezek. 37:25; Zec. 10:6-7. Since God’s purpose is to
redeem entire households, we would expect to find redemptive promises
made to heads of households. The Bible is full of these promises, and
they are set within the context of God’s everlasting commitment to His
people. We are not left in the dark about God’s intentions for our
households. One primary means of evangelism and kingdom expansion is
the godly household. The Lord has purposed to use godly parents to
beget a godly seed (Mal 2:15), which will go forth and establish new
households to His glory who are faithful to their covenant God. This
purpose was expressed when God covenanted with Abraham and His
children. See Genesis 18:19.
In all of this Old Testament evidence, we see that the parent-child
relationship is organic. God views parents and children not simply as
individuals that happen to be related by blood but as a
divinely-wrought unit extending through generations. These many
Scripture passage illustrate this principle of the organic unity of the
family.
The New Testament concept of the household
The Old Testament view of the family as an organic unity continues in
the New Testament. As Kenneth Gentry has said, “There is nothing in the
New Testament that undermines and invalidates the Old Testament
covenantal principle of family solidarity.” In fact, far from
undermining, the New Testament evidence supports this principle.
Consider these passages of Scripture:
- Matt 15:38 – The reckoning of the headcount of those present at
this miracle reveals a household mindset that was prevalent in the 1st
C., just as it had been for centuries.
-
Eph 5:22-6:9 (see Col 3:18-4:1) – The Christian household was
addressed as the “saints who are in Ephesus, and faithful in Christ
Jesus” and the “saints and faithful brethren who are in Colossae.”
-
Phil 4:22 – These were probably slaves yet were considered to be a part of Caesar’s household
-
1 Tim 3:4, 12 – Qualifications for elders and deacons
-
Titus 1:6 – Elders again
A very important passage of Scripture is Acts 2:39. Peter, on this
remarkable day of covenant transition and public declaration, had been
addressing the “men of Israel” (v. 14) and “brethren” (v. 29). Peter
speaks to these heads of household and tells them that the promise of
forgiveness of sins and the gift of the Spirit is for them and for
their children. Peter is linking the New Covenant promise of salvation
with the previous promises of salvation which had been applied to
households – will continue to be.
Another important passage is 1 Corinthians 7:14, which is set in the
context of a pagan city to which the gospel had spread and in which the
cohesion of the Christian family was being challenged. Unbelieving
spouses and children are sanctified or made holy by believing spouses.
Children of believers are set apart covenantally in a privileged
category of humanity because of the sanctifying work of God through the
household. While children are not automatically the recipients of
saving grace (any more than the spouse is), they do nonetheless come
under the covenant of grace and occupy a distinctly consecrated
position in the eyes of the Lord. They are set apart from the world and
consecrated to God. This, incidentally, is precisely the significance
of both circumcision and baptism. It is altogether appropriate for the
children of believers to receive the covenant mark of baptism as a sign
that they have been set apart by God for God.
In a number of passages in the gospels, little children were brought to
Jesus, and He blessed them (Matt 18:1-6, 14; 19:13-15; Mark 9:36-37;
10:13-16; Luke 18:15-17). Jesus taught that anyone who entered the
kingdom had to become like a little child. While aimed at adults, this
message applied to children also because children were already like
children! Some, if not all, of the children brought to him were infants
(the word used in Luke 18:15 means “nursing infant”), so Jesus said
that the kingdom belongs to such infants. No doubt it was faithful,
believing parents who brought their children to Jesus as the promised
Messiah. They sought a real blessing, and Jesus did not respond with a
public relations event – it was a real action of substance. Jesus
counted the parents as members of the visible covenant, and He did
their children as well. He received the children and blessed them, just
as He had done throughout covenantal history. For centuries faithful,
believing parents had presented their children to Jesus to be blessed
by Him, and for centuries Jesus had tenderly and faithfully accepted
these little ones and blessed them as they trusted in Him along with
their parents.
Household baptisms in Acts
A much-disputed topic in the debate between proponents of believer and
covenant baptism is that of the household baptisms in the book of Acts.
In these baptisms there is no explicit mention of an infant being
baptized, but we are also not told that there were not any infants in
these households. We are informed that households, as households, were
baptized. Given what we have seen that the household comprises in
Scripture, it is safe to conclude that if there were infants present in
these households, then they were certainly baptized. These passage, as
much as any in the Scriptures, reveal what we have seen throughout this
study – one’s understanding of a Scripture passage is greatly affected
by one’s assumptions and point of view. If you come to these household
baptisms with a dispensational point of view (emphasizing the
discontinuity of the covenants), then they can be made to harmonize
quite nicely. However, if you come to the household baptisms with a
covenantal view, then these passages are in full support and
consistency with the infant baptism view.
In the New Testament there are 9 people who are specifically mentioned
as having been baptized. In Acts there are 7: the Ethiopian eunuch,
Simon Magus, Saul of Tarsus, Cornelius, Lydia, the Philippian jailer,
and Crispus of Corinth. In 1 Corinthians there are 2: Gaius and
Stephanas. Of these nine baptisms, two probably did not have any
family: the Ethiopian eunuch and Saul of Tarsus. We are not informed
about the families of two others: Simon Magus and Gaius. In the
remaining five cases, the entire household was baptized. Again, there
is no mention of infants included in these household baptisms, but it
would be presumptuous indeed to conclude that by the nature of the case
there were no infants present at these baptisms. That said, the case
for covenant baptism does not rest on whether there were infants
present at these household baptisms. There is a larger issue at stake:
the individuals within households were baptized not because they
necessarily believed (though no doubt many did), but because they were
members of the household of believers.
The Scripture references for the baptism of the five heads of household are as follows:
- Cornelius – Acts 10:44-48
- Lydia – Acts 16:11-15
- The Philippian jailer – Acts 16:30-34
- Crispus of Corinth – Acts 18:8
- Stephanas – 1 Cor. 1:14-16
What is plain is that in every case where the apostles administered
baptism to the head of a household, they also administered it to the
entire household as well. The Bible does not tell us that the household
was baptized because each member of it believed and professed personal
faith (though once again, there were certainly some who did). The
reason given in Scripture for the baptism of household members is that
they were members of the household. It is the covenantal explanation of
the redeemed household and family solidarity that provides a clear and
simple explanation for the widespread practice of household baptism in
the early church.
The underlying principle
The principle at work in all these instances in Scripture is this:
parents represent their children before the Lord. Infants of believers
do not make conscious choices when they are baptized and brought into
the covenant of grace, just as during the days of circumcision. They
are not expected to do so. The head of the household obligates them to
carry out the terms of the covenant, and he is in fact authorized to do
so. See Gen 17:14. The adult or the child who is uncircumcised is a
covenant breaker. The question arises: how can God blame a child, one
who is unaware of his actions or his omissions, because the parents
failed to secure the covenant sign? God does so because He views the
family as an organic unity, in which, if the head sins, all the parts
of the organism are held to be sinful with it. Under the New Covenant
if a believing parent does not have his infant baptized, then that
child is objectively outside the covenant and therefore outside the
realm of covenant promise. This does not mean that the children of the
believing parents will not be redeemed or are somehow non-elect. It is
to say, however, that the parent is removing himself and his child from
the realm of the assurance of the blessings of the covenant, which are
only received by faith in Christ and by acting on that faith. Applying
the covenant sign of baptism to our children is our response to the
goodness of God, our acting on the promises of the gospel. God gives
more grace to those who believe His promises and act on them.
Since children were members of the Abrahamic covenant, we must assume
that they continue to be members of the new covenant because there is
no command in the New Testament that excludes them. God has
consistently dealt with households in every age and has embraced
children along with their parents. We see this in God’s covenant with
Adam, with Noah, with Abraham, in the destruction on Sodom, in the
destruction of the Canaanites, in the whole structure of society, and
in the government ordained by God. In all of these, the infant children
go where the parents go because the parents represent them. If the
church were different in these regards, if would certainly be an oddity.
So, the households of believers have played a prominent role in
redemptive history, and this role continues today because God’s Word
says it does. As Randy Booth asks, “On what grounds would we expect
that God no longer sees believers’ households redemptively? At what
point did God shift his love and concern away from our children?.... We
must not forget that once God has spoken concerning any matter,
including spiritual privileges, his word cannot be altered, revoked, or
annulled with the further revelation of God himself. God has,
throughout redemptive history, expanded the scope of his privileges and
blessings. He granted the spiritual privilege of participating in the
covenant and of receiving the initial covenant sign to the entire
household of Abraham (including his infant children, Gen 17:10-12).
This privilege must stand forever, unless God expressly revokes it or
replaces it with a greater privilege. But rather than including the
children of believers in God’s visible covenant community, Baptists
place their children in the pagan community.”
Households and infant baptism
Since God has included children of believing households in the covenant
of grace from the very beginning of the covenant, it seems incredible
to imagine that they would be excluded from the covenant of grace
without notice in the pages of Scripture.
The biblical idea of the household as a covenantal unit is a dominant
feature of God’s redemptive plan and remains so in the New Testament.
The head of the believing household has a duty to obligate his entire
household to the service of God. We do not have the right to exclude
persons (including our children) from covenant privileges that God has
always allowed. Neither may we withhold the sign and seal of covenant
membership (baptism) from our children. It is the sign and seal of
baptism that sets our children apart from the pagans and those outside
the church. We must say with Joshua, “As for me and my house, we will
serve the Lord.”
It is indeed difficult to think in patterns that are foreign to our own
culture. However, we must strive to interpret the Bible from the
standpoint of those who first heard its words. Biblical society was
patriarchal. It thought in terms of family solidarity. It would be a
great exception for some members of a household to reject the faith of
its head. This is not to deny the need for individual, personal faith
in Christ and faithfulness to God’s covenant, but it is to say that the
call for individual faith is not a novelty in the New Testament. Being
included in the covenant has never automatically conferred personal
salvation on anyone. All men must repent and believe. But members of
the covenant household are set apart, instructed in the faith, and
receive many covenant privileges because of their relationship to
Christ established through baptism. They are likewise obligated to
repent of their sins, believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and faithfully
follow Him in obedience.
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