Covenant/Election and 'just getting wet' in Baptism

David Field has been imagining a world where the new covenant is co-terminous with eternal decretal election and seeing what happens, here, here and here. It's not pretty.

Particularly worth some thought is what happens when you try to move from the (alleged) unbreakability of the new covenant to antipaedobaptism:

You'd have to think that you could identify the big-E Elect by their faith. But that would exclude the possibility of false faith or temporary faith. And since you can't know for sure that someone's faith isn't false faith or temporary faith then you'd never baptise anyone at all.

If the response is, "we're not claiming to baptize the Elect, only those who look like the Elect because they have faith" then you've just separated out baptism from the New Covenant and said that baptism is for "those who look like the Elect to us".

Which is fine, because that's what paedobaptists / covenantalists are claiming: that we operate at the level of the "look like Elect to us" and that's how God intends it to be.

Mind you, if baptism is then the initiation rite for the New Covenant then you've just said that there are people who rightly receive the New Covenant sign but who are not big-E Elect. But if they rightly receive the New Covenant initiation rite then they break the New Covenant then the New Covenant is breakable.

So if you want to argue that everyone in the New Covenant is a big-B believer (decretally Elect) and yet that we rightly give the New Covenant initiation rite to those little-b believers (non-Elect, those with false faith / temporary faith etc) then you must deny that the New covenant initiation rite actually initiates people into the New Covenant. That is, that the baptism of the non-Elect isn't baptism, it's just "getting them wet". And the NT evidence for that is what precisely? Non-existent, that's what.

The importance of being humble

One of the things I've come to see over the last three years is that some of the things that I didn't think mattered that much, really really do matter.

But all of this is not to say that everything matters to exactly the same degree or at the same time. David Field is passionate and persuasive about covenant infant baptism, but here he is explaining his personal experience of fellowship in a baptist church and the baptism of his own children.

It's a reminder to people like me (who arrived at college fairly convinced paedobaptists, and are now really really convinced and keen to advocate and teach it for the sake of Christ) of the need for patience, gentleness, respect, love and never being more exclusive than Christ is. As I finish semester 1 of my final year, and really do start to look forward (in both senses of the phrase) to the next stage, it seems extremely important to remember that.

Also available at Dr Field's blog are the essay questions I'll be selecting from for semester 2's Puritans module.

Are paedobaptists unrepentant?

Some words of sanity on a difficult issue where Christians often disagree can be found here. As an unrepentant paedobaptist I welcome the stance taken by John Piper and co., even if others think it fuzzy.

Jeremiah 32 and Infant Baptism

Neil Jeffers (who, I understand, leaves Oak Hill today) wrote a good short dissertation in his third year on Jeremiah 32:37-41 and infant baptism, and I've just finished reading it. To understand the relevance, imagine the following (imaginary) conversation between a (reformed) paedobaptist and a (reformed) baptist:

Baptist: Oi, stop baptising babies, where do you get that from in the bible eh?

Paedobaptist: Er, no, I'm not gonna stop. Baptising infants of believers is taught in the bible, so it is.

B: Where?

PB: Well, in that whole covenant thing.

B (since he is a reformed baptist): Covenant? Yeah, I've heard of that. Proceed my good man, how does it establish your bizarre watery practices?!

PB: Well, y'know, that thing about the children of believers being included in the covenant along with their parents, and therefore receiving the covenant sign too - circumcision in the old, baptism in the new.

B (being an amicable fellow): Ah, I see. There's one problem with that...

PB (also being an amicable fellow): What's that then my ole chum?

B: Doesn't Jeremiah 31:31-34 teach that the new covenant is different from the old in some crucial ways, ways which would lead to (so to speak) 'knocking baby-baptism' on the old head?

Now, whilst PB would always have had plenty of responses at this point (such as 'hmmm, to what extent do you think Jeremiah 31 is eschatologically fulfilled?'), Neil Jeffers has ably provided another, and that derived from a parallel 'new covenant' passage in Jeremiah:

PB: Good point my good man. However, I fear that Jeremiah 32: 37-41 speaks of the new covenant and includes the children of believers.

B: (mumbles something about Spurgeon and heads for the hills)

Ok, so it's not as straight-forward as that (and obviously Reformed Baptist's would hardly be conquered by a single text). If you want the arguments in all their exegetical and systematic detail then read Neil's dissertation (sorry if you're reading this and not at Oak Hill and therefore can't).

BTW I love my baptist brethren, John Bunyan was a legend, Piper is an inspiration, etc. etc. etc.