Thread: Presbyterians and Baptist Members

Friendly reminder: This thread was placed in 'Paedo-Baptism Answers' for a reason. As per forum rules only paedo-baptists may answer these questions. If you want to debate the substance or answer them as a credo-baptist please start a new thread.

And, for my Presbyterian brothers, please note that I am not trying to bait anyone here. I just want sincere answers to these questions.

I am aware that many Presbyterian denominations & churches allow Baptists to become members of one kind of another.

1) Does a Presbyterian elder who allows Baptists to become members take exception to WCF, Chapter 28, Sections 4&5?

Not only those that do actually profess faith in and obedience unto Christ, but also the infants of one, or both, believing parents, are to be baptized

Although it be a great sin to contemn or neglect this ordinance...

If not, how does one explain that a Baptist is not sinning by not baptizing their child as a member under your care? Is it simply, then, a matter of admonishment left to the decision of each family?

2) Are there any Presbyterian denominations or churches who do not allow Baptists as members?

Thank you in advance.

I am a layperson, so I can't speak for the OPC. This is what I understand to be the procedure. A person who publicly professes faith in Christ and who's profession has been reviewed by the session is welcome to join.

In our congregation, prospective members are given instruction in the history and doctrine of the reformed faith which would include an explanation as to why we believe paedo-baptism is consistent with scripture. If parents decide not to baptize their children, it would be noted but respected with sadness -- generally we love to have children of believing parents as covenant members of our church.

The OPC leaves this matter to the individual session. Our session receives people with baptistic views.

Yes, those who don’t baptize their infants do sin, as sin is any lack of conformity to the revealed law of God. Their sin is not presumptuous, but a sin of ignorance.

Pastorally, we recognize one should not violate their conscience on such a matter. That too would be sin.

Given the confusion on this issue in the Protestant, Evangelical and Reformed churchs at large, it seems wise to accept all who may sincerely affirm the four membership vows, have them accountable to biblical elders, and gently allow them to consider what we confess and teach.

I don’t take an exception to saying failure to baptize is a sin. However, pastorally, one does not need to constantly point out every sin, beyond noting what our confessions say and what one may expect us to teach and preach.

In every case where we’ve admitted those with baptistic beliefs and young children, within a short time, we have been asked to baptize those children.

We are all sinners, in itself sin is not grounds for Church discipline, it is ones attitude to that sin that is important.

If a Baptist is holding his position out of his prayerful understanding of Biblical authority then unless we can say that such a position cannot reasonably be held I see no grounds for discipline.

It is one thing to neglect the ordinance for no godd reason and another to neglect from a reasonable theological basis.

The WPCUS might be the closest to not accepting baptistic persons as members but I could be wrong.

We are in our second PCA church, this in NJ and one before in PA. In between we had five years at a (supposedly) Reformed and Baptist chruch that went off the rails.

Membership in the PA PCA was open to anybody who was a professing believer in Jesus Christ, but only those holding to the church doctrine could ever be in leadership. I was allowed to join when at the time I was only a 4 pointer, and I think some members may have joined with less points than that . They were officially cessationist but plenty of continuists were there, as well as Baptists. The position was that if you are a member of the body of Christ then you can be a member of this church....although of course you are to be submissive and not contentious if you disagree with a doctrine.

I thought it interesting that when we moved to the non Presby Baptist in NJ that they were wary of having people join who had issues with church doctrine including all 5 points of TULIP. Membership seemed stricter than in the PCA when it came to TULIP. It was not necessarily enough to be a member of the body of Christ on earth.

My current PCA appears to be like the last one we were members of.....they do three hours of class covering all the basics and a personal interview with the elders. Anybody can join- and serve in teaching Sunday school, pray freely at prayer meetings, participate fully in small groups, etc- but cannot be an elder if they don't agree with the WCF.

Its pretty clever really...people like me rather reluctantly and grudging end up realizing that you can't get around Irenaeus and Polycarp and the parallels with circumcision, and those paedos might have a point after all You'd be amazed how many die hard Baptists end up in the other camp after hanging out with the Presbys.

Originally Posted by Glenn Ferrell

The OPC leaves this matter to the individual session. Our session receives people with baptistic views.

Yes, those who don’t baptize their infants do sin, as sin is any lack of conformity to the revealed law of God. Their sin is not presumptuous, but a sin of ignorance.

Pastorally, we recognize one should not violate their conscience on such a matter. That too would be sin.

Given the confusion on this issue in the Protestant, Evangelical and Reformed churchs at large, it seems wise to accept all who may sincerely affirm the four membership vows, have them accountable to biblical elders, and gently allow them to consider what we confess and teach.

I don’t take an exception to saying failure to baptize is a sin. However, pastorally, one does not need to constantly point out every sin, beyond noting what our confessions say and what one may expect us to teach and preach.

In every case where we’ve admitted those with baptistic beliefs and young children, within a short time, we have been asked to baptize those children.

Excellent post, Glenn.

Originally Posted by lynnie

The position was that if you are a member of the body of Christ then you can be a member of this church....although of course you are to be submissive and not contentious if you disagree with a doctrine.

This is the key point, the Church is a universal body and the visible Church should not attempt to undermine this truth. It is God who will seperate the sheep from the goats and look into peoples hearts, not the Church.

Sectarianism is a very great sin.

Originally Posted by lynnie

We are in our second PCA church, this in NJ and one before in PA. In between we had five years at a (supposedly) Reformed and Baptist chruch that went off the rails.

Membership in the PA PCA was open to anybody who was a professing believer in Jesus Christ, but only those holding to the church doctrine could ever be in leadership. I was allowed to join when at the time I was only a 4 pointer, and I think some members may have joined with less points than that . They were officially cessationist but plenty of continuists were there, as well as Baptists. The position was that if you are a member of the body of Christ then you can be a member of this church....although of course you are to be submissive and not contentious if you disagree with a doctrine.

I thought it interesting that when we moved to the non Presby Baptist in NJ that they were wary of having people join who had issues with church doctrine including all 5 points of TULIP. Membership seemed stricter than in the PCA when it came to TULIP. It was not necessarily enough to be a member of the body of Christ on earth.

My current PCA appears to be like the last one we were members of.....they do three hours of class covering all the basics and a personal interview with the elders. Anybody can join- and serve in teaching Sunday school, pray freely at prayer meetings, participate fully in small groups, etc- but cannot be an elder if they don't agree with the WCF.

Its pretty clever really...people like me rather reluctantly and grudging end up realizing that you can't get around Irenaeus and Polycarp and the parallels with circumcision, and those paedos might have a point after all You'd be amazed how many die hard Baptists end up in the other camp after hanging out with the Presbys.

Every PCA church I've been a member of has had the exact same policy. An assistant pastor at my current church said the body is very broad in their beliefs but the more involved you become the more "Presbyterian" you have to be. Obviously pastors and others have to be "fully Presbyterian."

It's another issue the Bowen case deals with. In the PCA you can be a member if you don't believe in infant baptism or limited atonement, but you can't be an Elder or Deacon.

The more open position seems to be necessary for every church which wants to evangelize. If you witness to someone and they profess faith in Christ, do you have to indoctrinate them in all the distinctives of your church before you let them join? If not, then the new believers joining may not even be Calvinists!

Someone might counter by saying that there is a difference between no belief and wrong belief, and I admit that is a point. However, as long as the Arminian or Baptist or whatever is submissive and not contentious, isn't teaching people better doctrine a major purpose of the church? It seems that both the brand new believer and the Arminian need the same thing - teaching and shepherding. If we turn people away from our churches because their theology isn't good enough for us, we fail to carry out our task and relegate them to other churches which will not teach them better.

BTW, even though I'm currently listed as LBC, I'm actually leaning much more toward the other position. *Please don't tell my mother.*

The Dutch churches are frequently "member-confessing" churches. Members are expected to affirm the church's doctrine. Whereas in Presbyterian churches, that level of commitment is not expected of the members. So the respective vows express the differences.

As for my position, I desire baptist-minded members, I will gladly receive them, though I think they are in error. With one caveat: I am not willing simply that someone promise not to be contentious; they should, during the time they are among us, seek to be taught, even differently from their present conviction. They should at least seek to understand the position they cannot hold as well as the ones that do. If every time there is an infant-baptism, this person or family deliberately absents themselves from the body, this is a travesty of the very concept of membership, vows of submission to elders, etc.

Anyone who establishes his own "condition" for membership: i.e. "I freely join myself to this church, but I reserve the right to refuse to let you teach me on this subject," is in no position to take the oath of membership to begin with. Would we admit a person who refused to take instruction on "freewill"? Refused instruction on the propriety of the Lord's Supper? Refused to be taught anything out of the book of Jonah?

"If every time there is an infant-baptism, this person or family deliberately absents themselves from the body, this is a travesty of the very concept of membership, vows of submission to elders, etc."

I agree, but I've never seen that happen.

"They should at least seek to understand the position they cannot hold as well as the ones that do."

Yes, but works both ways. I think one reason my own pastor has had such effectiveness is that he will engage and talk with anybody, and make a huge effort to listen and comprehend their position. Baptists, charismatics, heathen, the local liberal PCUSA pastor (who is a real whacko). When you realize somebody fully understands you, then it easier to listen to their position. Hub went through this at WTS as a young believer mid 70's. Richard Gaffin could truly listen and understand and talk with students and therefore he eventually had a huge influence on the zealous young ones. Others just spouted the confessions with no ability to kindly engage with arminians/baptists/etc, and their influence was almost worse then nothing, they turned people off with arrogance and contempt. We must all be gentle.

I was able to turn a modalist/oneness friend to the truth by careful understanding, but it took years. And I took many years to truly accept P of Tulip. Some folks take decades to accept L. We must accept our brethren with great patience.

So what would y'all think about this scenario: You have a credo family whose teenage son has made a profession of faith and wishes to be baptized. However, the session decides to not baptize this young man until he also consents to join the church. The reason for this being that baptism is not just a testament to your faith but also "for the solemn admission of the party baptized into the visible Church...to be continued in His Church until the end of the world." So in essence they are leaving out a crucial aspect of what the sacrament is all about. Just baptizing the boy as a credo would not deal with the heart issue. It would be analogous to a man who stops beating his wife because his hand is hurting rather than because his wife is hurting! Despite the fact that he stopped, the "great sin" (as the WCF says) has not been dealt with. Does that question make sense? I'm not sure I explained it well!

Originally Posted by Poimen

1) Does a Presbyterian elder who allows Baptists to become members take exception to WCF, Chapter 28, Sections 4&5?

No, it isn't the elder that is sinning, it is the new member. So no exception would need to be taken by the elder.

The new members should be properly taught about baptism. You certainly aren't going to let them hold church office or teach their error.

Yes, they (the new members) are sinning by not baptizing their minor children. All your other members are sinning as well, perhaps in different ways.

In the PCA, members are not required to subscribe to the standards. Only officers are required to subscribe. Members must answer affirmatively the 5 constitutional questions. Nothing about Baptism in there.

When the members of a communicant class join the church, on the average a couple of the kids will need to be baptized, meaning that their parents did not have them baptized when they should have.

Originally Posted by Hamalas

So what would y'all think about this scenario: You have a credo family whose teenage son has made a profession of faith and wishes to be baptized. However, the session decides to not baptize this young man until he also consents to join the church. The reason for this being that baptism is not just a testament to your faith but also "for the solemn admission of the party baptized into the visible Church...to be continued in His Church until the end of the world."

As an adult, to be baptized or become a member of an OP church, a person must answer yes to these four question:

Do you believe the Bible, consisting of the Old and New Testaments, to be the Word of God, and its doctrine of salvation to be the perfect and only true doctrine of salvation?

Do you confess that because of your sinfulness you abhor and humble yourself before God, and that you trust for salvation not in yourself but in Jesus Christ alone?

Do you acknowledge Jesus Christ as your sovereign Lord and do you promise, in reliance on the grace of God, to serve him with all that is in you, to forsake the world, to mortify your old nature, and to lead a godly life?

Do you agree to submit in the Lord to the government of this church and, in case you should be found delinquent in doctrine or life, to heed its discipline?

Note question four.

Is there a difference in communicant member and non? Because obviously children who are members will not have this knowledge early. Yet they are members, just non-communicant.

So must an adult, or any age, communicant member know more than a non-communicant?

ie. would you let the boy previously mentioned become a credo member but not communicant?

The Scottish churches vary but some have adherents and communicant members.

I prefer adherents to be those who come and are not members.
Communicant to be a member, and their children of course are members.
But there seems some wisdom in the other Scottish practice of adherent non-communicant members.

Do we have an icon for rabbit trails.....

Just to press you a bit,

When a stranger would come to Israel to live and stay or even because of a conviction to worship God, all of his make children would be circumcised.

No exceptions for those who said, well I am young in the faith and not convicted of this part yet..

How do we reconcile this and not be a poor example to our baptist friends of the importance of this

God was going to kill Moses for not circumcising his son.