Practical Benefits of Infant Baptism

Scott · #1 (**permalink**) 05-20-2008, 03:00 PM

A day or two ago I was talking to a mother who recently has come to accept infant baptism. Her tesimony was very moving. She has a number of children, ages 7 and below. She was often faced the question of exactly how to handle spirituality with her children. The children would want to pray, seek wisdom from the scriptures and the like, but her baptist friends would scold (her word) her for allowing them to do so. According to them, the children were not Christians yet, because they were too young to understand the gospel. According to her Baptist friends, the parent's focus of the child's spiritual formation should be as with any other heathen, simple evangelism. As the children were not Christians, they had no right to pray in Christ's name or the like. They were not Christians, or members of the covenant, but rather just unbelievers and should be treated as such.

I have seen this viewpoint in some baptist child-rearing materials, as well. The Ezzo's Growing Kids God's Way teaches this, for example. It says expressly not to let them pray in Jesus name or anything like that until they reach a certain age and are able to make a credible profession.

Anyway this dear lady had a troubled conscious, saying she felt like the children were asking for bread but that she was forced by her theological beliefs to give them stones, at least until they reached the right age and could make a credible profession of faith.

After she was taught about infant baptism, she wept, seeing the beauty of God's covenant and God's love for families. It was quite moving.

I know not all Baptists take the view of the Ezzos or of this lady's friends, but to the extent they do not, they are (thankfully) engaging in a blessed inconsistency. Children are either disciples (the covenant view) or heathen (the Baptist view). Those ideas have consequences, at least if one really lives by them. Logically one should treat a disciple differently than a heathen.

Anyway, it was quite wonderful.

PuritanCovenanter · #2 (**permalink**) 05-20-2008, 03:07 PM

Come on Scott.
I always encourage unregenerates to seek God's counsel and to ask him questions. I even ask them to seek his guidance and pray for supplication. He is their creator. He is the Father of all creation. He is the source. He rains on the just and unjust. God loves the Elect in a way that differs from others. Not all of our Children are Elect and to presume so is just wrong and deceitful.

I see the beauty in God's Truth also.

Blueridge Baptist · #3 (**permalink**) 05-20-2008, 03:14 PM

I have never in my 24 yrs of Baptist life heard a baptist tell thier children not to pray in Jesus' name. This is a new one on me. I encouraged my child to pray from the moment she could say da-da.

jogri17 · #4 (**permalink**) 05-20-2008, 03:14 PM

While now i believe in infant baptism I do want to warn about the idea of presumptive regeneration. You must instruct your children in the ways of the Lord. Even most baptist churches have sunday school classes for children. The problem with the traditional southern baptist (Not the Mohler and Dever types) is that they carry on the Finnylike tradition of decisional regeneration and making claims to faith as the sign of conversion as opposed to spiritual fruits. We baptize children because of the promise of faith not because they have that saving faith. But God is not obligated to save someone just because of their parents... that undermines the doctrine of unconditional election.

Davidius · #5 (**permalink**) 05-20-2008, 03:17 PM

I've never understood how one can teach their children to pray without presuming their regeneration. God does not hear the prayers of the wicked. Wouldn't teaching someone whom you assume is not regenerate until they reach a certain age when they can "comprehend" be having your child heap up condemnation on itself?

Pilgrim's Progeny · #6 (**permalink**) 05-20-2008, 03:23 PM

Scott,
I tell my children to pray to God in Jesus name, I tell them that Jesus is the Savior of all who confess their sins, repent, and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. When my son, who is four, says he belives in Jesus I encourage him to continue to believe. I refuse to tell him he is not a Christian. The following words of Christ always resound in my conscience:

Quote:

But whoso shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea.
Matt 18:6 (KJV)

for all I know he has already been regenerated, and quite frankly he even at time shows signs of conversion. I savor these things and ponder them in my heart and encourage his faith. He does has faith, as far as I can see, and it is faith like his that all must have to be citizens of the kingdom. When he is five he will most likely be baptized and begin to partake of communion. I know this sounds inconsistent for a Baptist, but I am still working through these things, and this is where I am at.

Davidius · #7 (**permalink**) 05-20-2008, 03:34 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pilgrim's Progeny

for all I know he has already been regenerated, and quite frankly he even at time shows signs of conversion. I savor these things and ponder them in my heart and encourage his faith. He does has faith, as far as I can see, and it is faith like his that all must have to be citizens of the kingdom. When he is five he will most likely be baptized and begin to partake of communion. I know this sounds inconsistent for a Baptist, but I am still working through these things, and this is where I am at.

That's refreshing to hear, even as a Presbyterian.

Scott · #8 (**permalink**) 05-20-2008, 03:41 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pilgrim's Progeny

I know this sounds inconsistent for a Baptist, but I am still working through these things, and this is where I am at.

You are doing the right thing and I am sure your children will be blessed by it!

Gryphonette · #9 (**permalink**) 05-20-2008, 03:44 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Scott

A day or two ago I was talking to a mother who recently has come to accept infant baptism. Her tesimony was very moving. She has a number of children, ages 7 and below. She was often faced the question of exactly how to handle spirituality with her children. The children would want to pray, seek wisdom from the scriptures and the like, but her baptist friends would scold (her word) her for allowing them to do so. According to them, the children were not Christians yet, because they were too young to understand the gospel. According to her Baptist friends, the parent's focus of the child's spiritual formation should be as with any other heathen, simple evangelism. As the children were not Christians, they had no right to pray in Christ's name or the like. They were not Christians, or members of the covenant, but rather just unbelievers and should be treated as such.

I have seen this viewpoint in some baptist child-rearing materials, as well. The Ezzo's Growing Kids God's Way teaches this, for example. It says expressly not to let them pray in Jesus name or anything like that until they reach a certain age and are able to make a credible profession.

Anyway this dear lady had a troubled conscious, saying she felt like the children were asking for bread but that she was forced by her theological beliefs to give them stones, at least until they reached the right age and could make a credible profession of faith.

After she was taught about infant baptism, she wept, seeing the beauty of God's covenant and God's love for families. It was quite moving.

I know not all Baptists take the view of the Ezzos or of this lady's friends, but to the extent they do not, they are (thankfully) engaging in a blessed inconsistency. Children are either disciples (the covenant view) or heathen (the Baptist view). Those ideas have consequences, at least if one really lives by them. Logically one should treat a disciple differently than a heathen.

Anyway, it was quite wonderful.

I'm not saying it doesn't happen, mind, but I don't believe it's at all common. Christ Chapel Bible Church, where we attend, is doggedly credobaptist but children are discipled from the get-go, and definitely pray in Jesus's name.

My son, Alex, attends a Baptist church in Yokosuka and my three year old granddaughter, Hannah, prays in Jesus's name and is being discipled.

Good grief! "Oh, oh...! Mustn't pray in Jesus's name until you're older!"?

Unbelievable. But also not an integral part of credobaptist theology.

If this whoppy-jawed teaching is what that woman had been involved in, for sure a hearty, heart-felt "Praise God!" is in order that she has come out of it.

Scott · #10 (**permalink**) 05-20-2008, 03:46 PM

BTW, I want to stress again, that I am not saying that all Baptists refuse to allow their children to pray in Jesus' name, receive comfort from God's promises to believers, and the like. But there are many who do take this approach, including the very popular Growing Kids God's Way child rearing materials.

I do think it is inconsistent for Baptists on the one hand to teach that their children are heathen and outside of God's saving love and promises and on the other hand to teach them as if they were. But it is a blessed inconsistency from which the children benefit.

Scott · #11 (**permalink**) 05-20-2008, 03:50 PM

Anne: You do see it in popular child-rearing materials, like GKGW. Perhaps it is less common in reformed leaning baptist churches.

Scott · #12 (**permalink**) 05-20-2008, 03:52 PM

For those Baptists who teach their unsaved kids to pray in Christ's name, how does this make sense?

From the Larger Catechism:
Q. 180. What is it to pray in the name of Christ?
A. To pray in the name of Christ is, in obedience to his command, and in confidence on his promises, to ask mercy for his sake; not by bare mentioning of his name, but by drawing our encouragement to pray, and our boldness, strength, and hope of acceptance in prayer, from Christ and his mediation.

Can an unsaved heathen really expect to draw on the mediatorial work of Christ, something reserved only for the elect? Praying in Christ's name is reserved only for the saved.

Pilgrim's Progeny · #13 (**permalink**) 05-20-2008, 03:56 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Scott

For those Baptists who teach their unsaved kids to pray in Christ's name, how does this make sense?

From the Larger Catechism:
Q. 180. What is it to pray in the name of Christ?
A. To pray in the name of Christ is, in obedience to his command, and in confidence on his promises, to ask mercy for his sake; not by bare mentioning of his name, but by drawing our encouragement to pray, and our boldness, strength, and hope of acceptance in prayer, from Christ and his mediation.

Can an unsaved heathen really expect to draw on the mediatorial work on Christ, something reserved only for the elect? Praying in Christ's name is reserved only for the saved.

I do not have an answer here, then again I do not call my children unsaved heathen. They are holy by virtue of their place in the covenant entity of my household. What is a proper classification to give your unconverted children in this context?

Scott · #14 (**permalink**) 05-20-2008, 03:59 PM

I call children of Christian parents Christians, covenant children and the like (unless and until they show themselves otherwise). BTW, I think your view of them being holy is dead-on.

tcalbrecht · #15 (**permalink**) 05-20-2008, 04:13 PM

Quote:

9. It remains briefly to indicate what benefit redounds from the observance, both to believers who bring their children to the church to be baptised, and to the infants themselves, to whom the sacred water is applied, that no one may despise the ordinance as useless or superfluous: though any one who would think of ridiculing baptism under this pretence, would also ridicule the divine ordinance of circumcision: for what can they adduce to impugn the one, that may not be retorted against the other? Thus the Lord punishes the arrogance of those who forthwith condemn whatever their carnal sense cannot comprehend. But God furnishes us with other weapons to repress their stupidity. His holy institution, from which we feel that our faith derives admirable consolation, deserves not to be called superfluous. For the divine symbol communicated to the child, as with the impress of a seal, confirms the promise given to the godly parent, and declares that the Lord will be a God not to him only but to his seed: not merely visiting him with his grace and goodness, but his posterity also to the thousandth generation. When the infinite goodness of God is thus displayed, it, in the first place, furnishes most ample materials for proclaiming his glory, and fills pious breasts with no ordinary joy, urging them more strongly to love their affectionate Parent, when they see that, on their account, he extends his care to their posterity. I am not moved by the objection, that the promise ought to be sufficient to confirm the salvation of our children. It has seemed otherwise to God, who, seeing our weakness, has herein been pleased to condescend to it. Let those, then, who embrace the promise of mercy to their children, consider it as their duty to offer them to the Church, to be sealed with the symbol of mercy, and animate themselves to surer confidence, on seeing with the bodily eye the covenant of the Lord engraven on the bodies of their children. On the other hand, children derive some benefit from their baptism, when, being ingrafted into the body of the church, they are made an object of greater interest to the other members. Then when they have grown up, they are thereby strongly urged to an earnest desire of serving God, who has received them as sons by the formal symbol of adoption, before, from nonage, they were able to recognise him as their Father. In fine, we ought to stand greatly in awe of the denunciations that God will take vengeance on every one who despises to impress the symbol of the covenant on his child, (Genesis 17: 15) such contempt being a rejection, and, as it were, abjuration of the offered grace.

John Calvin, Institutes, 4.16

KMK · #16 (**permalink**) 05-20-2008, 06:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Scott

I do think it is inconsistent for Baptists on the one hand to teach that their children are heathen and outside of God's saving love and promises and on the other hand to teach them as if they were.

Of course you do! I would expect nothing less from a paedo. I don't see how a paedo could look at us baptists and not see inconsistancy.

It is the same kind of inconsistancy that we creedos see in the two-tiered church membership system in a paedo church. But I am sure the paedo does not see it as an inconsistancy.

The Arminian looks at a Calvinist and sees the desire to preach as an inconsistancy.

The hyperpreterist sees the orthodox preterist as inconsistant.

I guess the whole world looks at us Christians as being inconsistant.

Just because someone sees an inconsistancy does not mean that an inconsistancy exists.

Regardless, I am glad the woman was delivered from the false teaching.

PuritanCovenanter · #17 (**permalink**) 05-20-2008, 07:11 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Scott

For those Baptists who teach their unsaved kids to pray in Christ's name, how does this make sense?

From the Larger Catechism:
Q. 180. What is it to pray in the name of Christ?
A. To pray in the name of Christ is, in obedience to his command, and in confidence on his promises, to ask mercy for his sake; not by bare mentioning of his name, but by drawing our encouragement to pray, and our boldness, strength, and hope of acceptance in prayer, from Christ and his mediation.

Can an unsaved heathen really expect to draw on the mediatorial work of Christ, something reserved only for the elect? Praying in Christ's name is reserved only for the saved.

God is not required to hear the heathen but I prayed as a heathen and I am sure God heard me. He rains upon the just and unjust it says. As I said in my first post I encourage every person to call upon God in the name of Christ. And I believe God even heals pagans. He does good to those who are his enemies even. Why wouldn't a heathen be able to be heard by God?

Who was the guy who dipped seven times and was healed?

One more thing. Is the unregenerate unconverted spouse considered a Christian along with their children just because one parent is a converted Christian? Are they a saint? I don't think so. Holy has a different connotation in the context of 1 Cor. 7:14 as I noted in the Baptism thread Pilgrim started.

queenknitter · #18 (**permalink**) 05-20-2008, 10:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Scott

Anne: You do see it in popular child-rearing materials, like GKGW. Perhaps it is less common in reformed leaning baptist churches.

Yes, yes. You do. Maybe it's my (former?) neck of the woods -- very Ezzo-focused. It blows my mind. Do you remember which edition of GKGW this was in? I assume you're familiar with ezzo.info.

My brother and I were having a lengthy discussion about this very thing last week. I do not remember hearing anything of this sort as a young child growing up as a fundy (Arminian-ish) Baptist. I do not hear it in the PCA churches we've been visiting as we have been finding a new church home. I did hear it often and just recently in our former Bible church here in Greenville, SC -- from the pulpit and in the Mother's Room.

Ezzo goes to the multi-campused Seacoast Church conglomerate here in South Carolina now. I assume you all know his spotty church history. But his ideas are very popular down there. . . . Maybe it's the SC soil or something.

Scott · #19 (**permalink**) 05-21-2008, 09:48 AM

I went through the course about 10 years ago and so it was whatever version was around then. I remember the Ezzo wife on the tapes expressly explaining why we should prevent kids from praying in Christ's name and the like.

Quote:

Originally Posted by queenknitter

Quote:

Originally Posted by Scott

Anne: You do see it in popular child-rearing materials, like GKGW. Perhaps it is less common in reformed leaning baptist churches.

Yes, yes. You do. Maybe it's my (former?) neck of the woods -- very Ezzo-focused. It blows my mind. Do you remember which edition of GKGW this was in? I assume you're familiar with ezzo.info.

My brother and I were having a lengthy discussion about this very thing last week. I do not remember hearing anything of this sort as a young child growing up as a fundy (Arminian-ish) Baptist. I do not hear it in the PCA churches we've been visiting as we have been finding a new church home. I did hear it often and just recently in our former Bible church here in Greenville, SC -- from the pulpit and in the Mother's Room.

Ezzo goes to the multi-campused Seacoast Church conglomerate here in South Carolina now. I assume you all know his spotty church history. But his ideas are very popular down there. . . . Maybe it's the SC soil or something.