The Great Debate Over Baptism

Coram Deo · #1 (**permalink**) 10-30-2007, 11:03 PM

I have been listening through Pastor Einwechter's 11 cd set on The Great Debate of Baptism.. So far I am on CD 3 out of 11..... Already, I have problems with some of what he says through cd 1 - 3..

1. He redefines the covenants and does some juggling to which is unnecessary and frankly I find not biblical...
2. He places way too much discontinuity on the church and the new covenant. Way more then Orthodox traditional Reformed Baptist thinking does. Circumcision does have alot more to do with Baptism then Einwechter would like to believe, the same with the Passover and the Lord's Supper. It almost sounds like he believes that the indwelling of the spirit is the new covenant is the sign of the covenant but the indwelling of the spirit existed in the old covenant in the same way. The Passover was not a sacrifice but a sacrificial meal, the same as the Lord's Supper. The passover sacrifice was itself not being the Passover meal just like Christ is our sacrifice but the Supper is a sacrificial meal.... The church existed in the Old Covenant but is further revealed in the New Covenant with greater expanded promises but he sounds almost dispensational when he marks that the church is different then the old covenant israel.

He makes some interesting points on the family covenant but so far I do believe this to be the best defense of "Reformed" CredoBaptism. Sam Waldron is far better....

Michael

Coram Deo · #2 (**permalink**) 10-30-2007, 11:35 PM

As I am listening I am further disturbed......

He said we can not start with the Old Covenant with regards to Baptism but must look to the New first..... I find this faulty.... We must read the bible organically as a whole... Cirsumcision was the sign and seal of the Old Covenant and Baptism is the sign and seal of the New Covenant... Scripture is Revelatory and progressive.. So we start with the Old Covenant and see what Circumcision was and how it is adminstered. Baptism did indeed replace Circumcision and is the same in substance as Circumcision and unless there is an change in adminstration of the sign and seal of the covenant then continuity tells us that we continue the adminstration, to which I see in Jeremiah 31. We do interprat the old covenant with the new covenant but we must not isolate Baptism apart of the old covenant and say it is only dealt with in the new covenant and so we must not look to the old covenant......

He sounds very dispensational indeed which is weird since he is Theonomic and such....

Sad and disappointed indeed with such faulty understanding.....

clstamper · #3 (**permalink**) 10-31-2007, 12:00 AM

Pierre Marcel's The Biblical Doctrine of Infant Baptism is the mother lode for the 20th Century. It is also a book many RBs seek to refute.