Dr. John MacArthur had an insightful sermon on an important subject. Most of the words below are his. Please read:
One of the strange paradoxes in the church is that the world is full of baptized non-Christians, millions of them, all over the planet. While at the same time, the church is full of non-baptized Christians. And it raises the issue of baptism, and what it is, and why people are so confused about it. What does the Bible say? Its method? Its meaning? There are too many people who don’t know that it is important, and who don’t think the methodology is important, or even the time when a person is baptized. In particular, we will look at the baptism of infants, which is how you get a world full of baptized non-Christians. Because of the “media-oriented” church of today, many people come to Christ by listening to radio or from TV evangelists, or going to a crusade. They might hear nothing about baptism. They might be going from church to church to find more connection, and baptism never becomes an issue for them. Many churches, striving for what’s pragmatic to people, don’t see baptism as pragmatic, and don’t emphasize it. But baptism in Scripture is a command. The Great Commission is very clear at Matthew 28: 19:
Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit…
All nations need to hear the Gospel, and those that believe need to be baptized. Peter, in the first sermon on the day of Pentecost in Acts 2 says, “Repent and be baptized.” On that day there were 3,000 baptized, and thousands more, day after day in the early days of the church. It is clear in Scripture that baptism is a requirement, seeing His Words spoken to individuals and to the church.
Still, its confusion is widespread, and we have millions of baptized non-Christians, and millions of un-baptized Christians. So let’s cover Scripture on this. Some of you need to face the reality that you should be obedient to this command, and you cannot be indifferent to it. Perhaps you’re defiant, perhaps you’re not willing at all to confess Christ openly and publicly—which raises the issue of whether you are a Christian at all.
Much confusion over baptism has come from the phenomenon known as pedo-baptism, or baby baptism. Where did this come from? For those of you who are Roman Catholics, or former Roman Catholics, you were likely baptized as a baby. For those of you who were raised by Presbyterian parents, or Lutheran parents, or Episcopalian parents, or Anglican parents, or Methodist parents, and we can pretty much go down the line of “mainline” denominations and see baby baptism—until we get to the Baptists. So baby baptism is widespread. It is woven into Catholic tradition—and the Eastern Catholic church as well. It is part and parcel of Protestant theology, except for Baptists and those who identify with their view of believer-baptism. From the fourth century on, infant baptism has been the norm for both Catholics and the later Protestant theology. The Reformation in the 1500s didn’t change the view of baby baptism—so it was an “incomplete Reformation.” (I will explain that term later). Tradition ruled the day, and still does.
You say, “Well, is it a really big issue?” It’s a huge issue, and I’m going to show you why. I will give you 3 reasons why we must reject infant baptism.
Here’s the first one, and that would be enough: Infant baptism is not in the Scripture. Scripture nowhere advocates or records any baptism of an infant. It is therefore impossible to support infant baptism from the Bible. There’s not an incident of it, and there’s no mandate for it. A German theologian, so from a Lutheran background, affirmed that infant baptism is not Biblical. Most highly-esteemed theologians of the Church of England not only affirm the absence of baby baptism from the New Testament but the absence of it from apostolic and post-apostolic (AD 100-300) Christian writers. Keep in mind, the Church of England, the Anglican Church, does infant baptism. A reputed Presbyterian theologian could not confirm baby baptism either. So how did it come about?
Infant baptism began in the 2nd and 3rd century, and was the norm by the 4th century—when the Catholic Church merged with the Roman government. This provided a relief from Roman persecution, which was wonderful short-term, but a disaster long-term. Infant baptism ruled unopposed for 1200 years. But the Reformation didn’t change it either, so it is still the norm in most Protestant and all Catholic Churches to this day. But they knew it wasn’t Scriptural, so simple tradition doesn’t answer “why” they took to it. Looking into details, here are some important facts: during the Middle Ages, severe ecclesiastical laws were created as part of the civil code. (Civil code ruled how you must behave in public. Punishment was meted out for profanity, gossiping, etc.) In Europe, nations were divided. There were Catholic nations, and there were Protestant nations. To keep the State united, they wanted one religion; you could not be Protestant in a Catholic country, and vice versa. Church and state were merged; civil code was designed to make everyone toe the line and accept the religion of that country. Thus there was no religious freedom. You were baptized as an infant as Catholic, let’s say, or if the family refuses, that means you would not wash out Original Sin, per church tradition (not in Scripture, by the way). If the baby died (which sadly happened frequently), the baby could never go to heaven. Whatever decision the state rulers said, it was backed up by the religious rulers. The religion and the state maintained tyranny—but this ensured compliance and unity.
You would think baptism would not divide anybody, since “everybody” did the same baptism of infants. But there arose “re-baptizers,” or Anabaptists—who read Scripture, realized their baptism as infants did not ensure heaven, and decided to baptize adults who truly believed in the reconciliation of Jesus Christ. Believer rebaptism, operable in the early church, was born again in the 1200s or so—which had been long gone since 300 A.D.
The devil must have really hated this believer-baptism idea, because the persecution of Anabaptists (I have a blog on them, by the way), was beyond unbelievable. (Ed.Note: I also have a blog on how believer baptism is part of salvation). The rulers decided, particularly on the Catholic side, that re-baptizing was a capital offense! It was an act against the state, against the state church, and you usually would pay with your life. (Read the book Foxe’s Book of Martyrs for some horrible but true tales of man killing man in the name of religion). It was a heresy, so it deserved death. Hatred of re-baptizers went a long way back--to 391, in fact. In that year, the Roman emperors had a law that whoever “desecrates the holy baptism through heretical superstition” shall be “excluded from society.” That means if your belief system was “wrong,” you could not appeal the judicial decision, you could not make a will, or take possession of an inheritance, or be appointed heir by anyone. People would not talk to you. If they did, you would be banished, forced out of your home and the village. There was no making amends, no repentance, no way to legally come back to society. You were traitors. You’re Done—if you affirm anything other than infant baptism. In 413, the persection escalated—the one baptized and the baptizer would have “death without mercy.” After that, the humiliation of the family would go further; they would confiscate (total greed, I suspect) all the possessions of these people. But people were fearful, and few made public note of their different beliefs. As you can see, these persecutions were around for a long time, but there were few violators who went public until the late 1400s.
So if you came along and said that Scripture teaches us that you should first come to a faith in Christ and then be baptized—which is what the New Testament teaches—you would be violated like this. If this seems to be extreme persecution, and you wonder “why,” a writer puts some light on the subject: The real reason for such harshness was to secure the existence of the state, and individual liberties be damned. Believer baptism disrupted the national church, posing a threat to solidarity; the “corruption” it introduces might break the monolithic power of the nation. Once the Catholics formed powerful alliances between religion and state and controlled their populations under the tyranny of the Pope, the Protestants felt the only way they could match that power was to have the same “security” excuse and persecute people who think differently about religion the same way. Luther eventually felt the Protestant state would have to exist and not be overtaken by Catholics, so to preserve it, we must force everyone in Germany into the Protestant mold. No deviancy, disparity, diversion, and no heresy to weaken it. It was likely that even Luther knew that it was not Biblical, but “practicality” reigned. (Actually, there was no faith in God’s ability to defend the truth).
If you’re wondering how the Reformers treated the Anabaptists, even though they were supposedly more accurate than Catholics on “how to be saved and go to heaven,” they didn’t practice Scripture too well—they hated the Anabaptists too. Here they supposedly believed in “sola Scriptura,” yet they didn’t really practice what it clearly said about baptism, because they persecuted the Anabaptists only a little less aggressively than the Catholics. Instead of torture, they simply drowned the re-baptizers. They were called “devilish vermin.” Thus, freedom of conscience remained unknown in Protestant Europe as well. You want to be baptized? We’ll put you down and won’t bring you up until you’re dead. Through history, there were always believers in the New Testament way, believer baptism, but they were small in number, so not a great threat. Bohemian and Moravians were easily snuffed out, but not the Brethren—but they too were all few in number. The Waldensians finally had the boldness to take a public stand. They grew in number from the 1200s and took a public stand in the late 1400s, and endured unbelievable persecution in the 1500s. Martin Luther originally defended the freedom of Christian conscience, but under pressure from the ruling nobles, he crumbled. The Reformation began a new era of tribulation, tears, and blood. God was determined that satan would never take away the truth, so war was on. Between Catholics vs. Protestants, mainly. Through it all, a remnant of Anabaptists endured, and morphed into the Mennonites, the Amish, the Brethren. Let’s not forget the Zwinglians (who later became Mennonites) and Baptists. Despite their pacifist ways, they were to be flogged and banished from the cities forever (Today’s Baptists, who also follow Scripture in believer baptism, have a shorter and separate history, founded in the early 1600s). So, in summary, infant baptism was defended by fire, water, and the sword. Infant baptism was imprinted with divine authority, though it was a ceremony invented by men for the worst of political reasons.
So you may say, “Well, we need to agree on a lot of things, but baptism is a minor detail.” It’s not a minor detail if you’re going to be drowned for believing it. The city law for Hanover Germany (and other cities) called for re-baptizers to be beheaded. This had the specific approval of Martin Luther. (I have a blog on him).
Let’s talk about the Scriptural arguments presented to back up infant baptism. (1) Matthew 18, where it says, “Except you become a little child, you can’t enter the kingdom of heaven.” I don’t read anything about baptism there. It’s saying, childlike faith is necessary to come into the Kingdom. (2) Matthew 19:14 and others, “Let the little children come to me for such is the kingdom of heaven.” No baptism. It says God has a special care for the children—not just baptized children. Neither Jesus nor anybody else in Scripture baptized any children. (3) Five times in Acts and I Corinthians it talks about households being baptized. So they assume that the children are baptized under the protective umbrella of the father; his faith is the surrogate for them. But the truth is, in those 5 cases, it never mentions children ever. In Acts, in the case of Cornelius, “all in his house heard the Word” (more than a baby could do). The Spirit fell on all, and all were baptized. No mention of a child. If there were, receiving the Holy Spirit means you heard the Word and believed, something babies can’t do. Scripture accents that elsewhere. Same story in the jailer’s house, in Acts 16. In Acts 18, with Crispus, “all heard, all believed, all were baptized.” The same wording was in the account of Stephanas, where it also says that all were devoted to the ministry of the saints. (Now you have to understand “saints” means every believer in Scripture.) Therefore they weren’t infants. Another reference in John 4:53 talks of the nobleman’s son who was healed, that his household “believed.” But it says nothing about baptism. Also, all were old enough to believe. Finally, in Acts 16, in the case of Lydia, when her household were baptized, there are no children mentioned—in fact, no husband is mentioned. Possibly it was her, her mother, or her slaves. If no husband, it was more likely that there were no children. This next Scriptural example requires some explanation. In I Corinthians 7:12-14, the believing husband is urged not to divorce his unbelieving wife. And her for him. Then comes an interesting verse:
For the unbelieving husband is sanctified by the wife, and the unbelieving wife is sanctified by the husband; otherwise your children would be unclean, but now they are holy.
Catholics claim that here is the father acting as surrogate, which I mentioned before, the umbrella of protection for the family, justifying infant baptism. It’s true that a believing husband (or wife) can influence the family’s acceptance of Christianity. But no salvation floats the kids’ way, no grace is transitioned, simply because the father is baptized (the verse says nothing about baptism anyhow—again). This is the same kind of superstition as praying for the dead, or praying to the angels or saints. Those heretical actions have no impact on anybody. Finally, their last “proof” is Acts 2:39, where it says,
the promise is to you and to your children, and to all who are afar off… .
It’s likely here that “your children” refers to the next generation of Jews, since who are those who are “afar off?” The Gentiles. This isn’t about baptism, it’s the promise of salvation to future generations of all races. So these texts don’t prove infant baptism in any way.
So, there’s never mention of a child in any of these 5 texts. None of these “proofs” are compelling enough to take a radical stance away from behaviors and words of the earliest church fathers—and from clear Scriptures elsewhere. The Scriptural model in all 5: You hear, you believe, you are baptized. That’s pretty clear proof of believer baptism, instead of baby baptism. If the martyrs were asked to give proof for their beliefs, they could cite these Scriptures. The Foxe book indicates all the courts were kangaroo.
For our second reason to reject infant baptism, Infant baptism is not baptism. The Bible is crystal clear on directions for baptism. Barring unforeseen difficulties (water is unavailable or poisoned, or insufficient, person has a phobia of water, or weighs 400 pounds, etc), baptism is immersion, a total dunk. The Greek is clear. Baptism comes from Greek “bapto” and “baptizo,” terms that are always transliterated to our word “baptize.” It means “dip down.” “Sprinkling” comes from a completely different Greek word—never used to describe baptism. Even Calvin, who baptized babies, wrote “it is certain that immersion was practiced in the early church.” Here’s another guy who didn’t practice what he wrote. This immersion was inspired by God to convey the symbolism of the ordinance. The dunk was identifying Christ in His death for us, the time spent underwater (let’s hope it’s shorter than He was in the grave) is identifying us with His burial and the raising up identifies us who will someday be resurrected from the dead as He was. Sprinkling doesn’t convey any of that. Of course, the baby (and likely his/her parents) don’t make any connection anyhow. It’s Tradition. (Fiddler on the Roof comes to mind). Romans 6, Galatians 2 and 3, and Colossians 2 explain that theology of our union with Christ, our union in Him, if anyone would care to look it up. Note: The only other ordinance given to us is the Lord’s table—or Eucharist. We are to do both these things as a public declaration, or proclamation. Hopefully you can, from Scripture indicated, get a vision of how important believer baptism is, and how horrible it will be for those who deny this sacred symbol, or those who don’t bother to read His Word on such important subjects and practice a deviant or obscured form. In every real baptism, the believer is saying he receives Christ, renounces former life, embraces Him as Lord and Master of his life, and is eager to publicly confess to those facts. In every case of baptism in Scripture, personal saving faith is predisposed.
For the third reason to reject infant baptism, infant baptism is not, as its claimants contend, “a replacement sign for the Abrahamic mark of circumcision. The claim that infant baptism “takes the place of circumcision” is not identified anywhere in Scripture. A little bit about circumcision would help. Every Jewish baby boy was circumcised, a proof that they were Jews. But it was not a sign of salvation. What did Paul say in Romans 9?—“Not all Israel is Israel.” Meaning not all from Jewish lineage in the nation of Israel are saved. But saved was the faithful Israel, or Jacob. His lineage, among Jews and mostly Gentiles who are faithful to Christ, are saved.
Let’s not forget: As Jesus points out, the nation Israel became under divine judgment. As were Gentiles, I would hasten to add. That’s why we all need salvation. Which Jesus provided. The Jews were apostate and, as God repeatedly calls it, adulterous. They loved other gods—just not the one who had blessed them, and was ready to bless them again if they repented. Among that entire nation of circumcised people, only a small remnant were saved. So it is today; few Jews are saved.
So if you make infant baptism a replacement for circumcision, are you infant-backers saying the same thing about those who are baptized as infants? Do you want to claim that only a small remnant of those baptized as babies are saved? No, you back away. Are you willing to admit that circumcision was not an evidence of salvation? Bingo. It would have been nice if the Jewish people had faith in God, were godly, and wore the badge of circumcision, but they didn’t. We likewise pray that those who are baptized as infants will wear that badge and have real faith in God and Christ, and live godly. But again there is no guarantee.
Some Catholic, and some Christian communities that baptize babies, lately have a newer theology: they maintain that there is some “covenant community” that the baby is in once baptized. But for the most part, they’re not saying flat out that these kids were automatically saved. It seems to me, the children would be confused—as I am, reading about this. What state are they in? The Episcopalians can’t explain it, the Anglicans can’t either. Are they going to let the public, prone to self-deception, make that judgment? Let’s hope not. I don’t think God would want such fuzziness about such an important idea.
In all this, there is a weak connection between circumcision and infant baptism. Both are done involuntarily, before the little one knew what was happening. (Though circumcision is only for boys, while infant baptism is for boys and girls). It’s important to point out that no salvation, or even special grace, will follow automatically for either device, as Scripture indicates. (In case you’re worried about death of the little child before baptism, we believe little ones who die will go to heaven. Scripture says heaven is full of these little ones. That’s great. I love every little person. There are at least 60 million from America alone who have been aborted who will be joining the crowd, along with the gigantic number of infanticides when China made a demonic “one-child” argument. They were determined to have a boy—so there will be more cute little Chinese girls in heaven than boys.)
By the way, it is important to point out that this weak connection about circumcision does not talk about salvation, does not reduce the Scripture that clearly points out believer baptism. Infant baptism is a failed device and should be ended as soon as possible, as the rest of this paper convincingly shows. Let’s end tradition and go for whatever God says in His Word. (Ed. note: This third explanation for rejecting infant baptism is not John MacArthur’s words, they’re mine).
The fourth reason to reject infant baptism is that it confounds the nature of the church. With infant baptism, you can’t distinguish between the believer and non-believer. They say “the baptized becomes the church.” But as we have seen, there are many baptized infants who grow up unsaved. So is the church supposed to be a mixture of the saved and unsaved? Then how can you administer church discipline? Should unsaved people, who happened to be “members” because they were infant-baptized, be allowed to be haters and blasphemous and still unrebuked? What if they slow down the church’s growth, ultimately preventing people from being saved? So infant baptism destroys the reality of the regenerate church. Ideally, to be in the real church (God’s Kingdom), you must be saved, and that means you must abide in Christ (John 15:1-6). Churches everywhere, though, are some mixture of saved and unsaved. If churches want to reduce the unsaved membership, all they have to do is heat up the sermons and make life uncomfortable for the unsaved to listen. And practice church discipline. That would be a shocker.
Speaking of being confounded, I can’t pass up mentioning this. Scripture says works are not the path to getting saved. You begin by faith in Jesus Christ and what He did. You then lead a godly life through the Holy Spirit. Learning and doing His commands enable you to abide in Christ. But here are the shocking words of the Reformed Heidelberg Catechism. Wikipedia says it “is regarded as one of the most influential of the Reformed catechisms.” Thus it is accepted by most mainline Protestant churches who were in the Reformation. This was written in 1563 to counteract the Catholics and the Anabaptists (ie, it gave them a reason to call Anabaptists “heretical” and go about killing them without remorse):
74th question: Shall one baptize young children also? Yes, Infants as well as adults are included in God's covenant and people, and they, no less than adults, are promised deliverance from sin through Christ's blood and the Holy Spirit who produces faith. Therefore, by baptism, the sign of the covenant, they too should be incorporated into the Christian church…
Quoting Dr. MacArthur, ‘It says “Baptize them, because they’re promised salvation in the Holy Spirit.”’ Of all things, Luther calls this baptism a “bath of regeneration.” Considering how this is the opposite of faith, the opposite of Scripture, how much it introduces confusion: Was this man the great theologian we have all heard? He who believed in “sola Scriptura?” (I have a blog on him elsewhere—sorry for all the ads). How could theologians who claimed to believe in the great doctrines like justification and faith, if they truly believe that Scripturally we are not saved through sacrament, or rites, come to this sorry confusion? They are worshipping the apostate altar of a sacrament for salvation.
Frankly, I was shocked to read how warped the Reformed theology was on this important subject, which is not about infant baptism so much as it is about salvation! I could see why Dr. MacArthur called it an “incomplete Reformation” above. This document (taught in “Christian” seminaries everywhere) has the audacity to assert that there is salvation in an infant being baptized. He could live like hell and still be saved? God forbid. Nothing in this answer resembles Scripture, about how each individual needs to assert faith in Christ and live a godly life to be saved.
As you can see by the Catechism, infant baptism confuses all that. People who were baptized as infants are told repeatedly afterwards that they are going to heaven. This feeds their self-deception. A lot of people assume they will go to heaven, and infant baptism adds to that, but they often live a worldly life, ignoring God except for emergencies, and they will be surprised by Jesus’ words—“I never knew you.” Why add to the confusion and self-deception, which is bad enough already? They should cancel the infant baptism and start the Gospel by stressing that only a minority will go to heaven (Matthew 7:13,14).
Luther published another statement that seems to say something promising: “The Anabaptists are right, the baptism without faith profits nothing, and that thus in fact children ought not to be baptized, since they have no faith.” Sounds right, right? But let me finish the quote: “But the assertion of the Anabaptists is false; yes, we know the children cannot believe, but….” What? How did he conclude this crazy talk? Ah, yes: at first, it was the vicarious faith of the parents or the godparents that did the job. But that wasn’t enough for him (he had a reputation for changing his mind on important things). He thought some more, and concluded…yes, the Holy Spirit helps them to believe.” (Some “theologians” even called the Holy Spirit’s job in infant baptism is to grant “unconscious faith.”) Well, now Luther is on the verge of declaring that infant baptism makes a child an elect, thus he is guaranteed that God will get him to heaven. This idea was formalized by Calvin in his famous TULIP acronym. It is also called “once saved, always saved.” They actually believe God regenerates you before you accepted Him In your life. Presumably man doesn’t have free will. God picks who will go to heaven—and thus, unfortunately, who goes to hell. And such garbage as that. (I have a 3-part blog to discuss that).
MacArthur’s concluding quote: Infant baptism has no saving efficacy, delivers no grace, confers no faith, is a symbol of nothing. It is absolutely and totally pointless. It leads to ritualism, confusion, and false security.
May God help you to read all this and ponder how Scripture is pointedly clear, as opposed to tradition. Ignore the theologians. Just read Scripture—over and over and over.
Acknowledgement: Sermon by John MacArthur, delivered October 21, 2011.
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