[I said I wouldn't post until I had something important to say. Well now I do.]
Two words I would love to see retired: credo-baptist and pedo-baptist. People talk about “credobaptist” (baptizing believers) vs. “pedobaptist” (baptizing newborns) as if there are two different kinds of baptism to chose from, each with its own pros and cons. But the debate shouldn’t be, “Are you a credobaptist or a pedobaptist?” It should be, “Are you a baptist or not?” Pedobaptism is not baptism.
Baptism (from the Greek baptizo) means immersion, and in Scripture the only candidates for baptism were believers. Baptism is a public profession of Christ. It symbolizes His death, burial and resurrection—just as the believer was once dead in sins and has been born again. “Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life” (Romans 6: 4).
How does the act of flicking a few drops on a newborn’s head fulfill this public profession? Not only is the mode of pedobaptism wrong, but the recipient of the mode is wrong as well. Pedobaptism is the sprinkling of an infant whom everyone would agree is a nonbeliever. Yet the word that’s used interchangeably with pedobaptism—christening—implies that it marks the moment the individual officially becomes a Christian. Ask a pedobaptist when they became a Christian and you’re likely to hear about an event they don’t even remember: their sprinkling.
Nowhere in Scripture will you find an infant baptized. Nowhere in Scripture will you find any unregenerate person baptized. “Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized…Then they that gladly received his word were baptized” (Acts 2: 38, 41). Certain Pharisees wanted to be baptized, but John the Baptist wouldn’t allow it because they offered no evidence of repentance.
Millions of people have been murdered throughout the centuries simply because they would not embrace the doctrines of pedobaptists over the Biblical model. It’s a historical fact that infant baptism is found nowhere for the first couple centuries after Christ. But slowly errors and misunderstandings crept into churches. Some confused baptism with regeneration; and if that were the case, why not administer it as early as possible? And since you can’t immerse an infant, why not sprinkle it?
The practice of pedobaptism spread. It was easier, more comfortable than what the Bible commanded. Ultimately it was institutionalized by the Roman-Catholic state as a way to ensure that everyone joined the state-church before they were even given a choice. Any family who refused was persecuted or executed. True baptists had to flee to the outskirts of the empire and live in hiding for many centuries. They found a little breathing room at the start of the Reformation, but in short order were persecuted also by those reformed state-churches that came out of the Roman-Catholic model (pedobaptists themselves). These true baptistic churches fled to Holland, Wales, England—and eventually to the New World, where they finally had an unprecedented opportunity to blossom and spread.
Now many churches from that same heritage are waffling about credobaptism vs. pedobaptism, or dropping the ordinance altogether, or offering “baby dedications.” They’ve not only forgotten their history, they’ve forgotten their Scripture.
But don’t take my word for it. Here’s the testimony of a former pedobaptist who finally read Scripture in context and realized it teaches credobaptism…er, baptism.
Baptism (from the Greek baptizo) means immersion, and in Scripture the only candidates for baptism were believers. Baptism is a public profession of Christ. It symbolizes His death, burial and resurrection—just as the believer was once dead in sins and has been born again. “Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life” (Romans 6: 4).
How does the act of flicking a few drops on a newborn’s head fulfill this public profession? Not only is the mode of pedobaptism wrong, but the recipient of the mode is wrong as well. Pedobaptism is the sprinkling of an infant whom everyone would agree is a nonbeliever. Yet the word that’s used interchangeably with pedobaptism—christening—implies that it marks the moment the individual officially becomes a Christian. Ask a pedobaptist when they became a Christian and you’re likely to hear about an event they don’t even remember: their sprinkling.
Nowhere in Scripture will you find an infant baptized. Nowhere in Scripture will you find any unregenerate person baptized. “Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized…Then they that gladly received his word were baptized” (Acts 2: 38, 41). Certain Pharisees wanted to be baptized, but John the Baptist wouldn’t allow it because they offered no evidence of repentance.
Millions of people have been murdered throughout the centuries simply because they would not embrace the doctrines of pedobaptists over the Biblical model. It’s a historical fact that infant baptism is found nowhere for the first couple centuries after Christ. But slowly errors and misunderstandings crept into churches. Some confused baptism with regeneration; and if that were the case, why not administer it as early as possible? And since you can’t immerse an infant, why not sprinkle it?
The practice of pedobaptism spread. It was easier, more comfortable than what the Bible commanded. Ultimately it was institutionalized by the Roman-Catholic state as a way to ensure that everyone joined the state-church before they were even given a choice. Any family who refused was persecuted or executed. True baptists had to flee to the outskirts of the empire and live in hiding for many centuries. They found a little breathing room at the start of the Reformation, but in short order were persecuted also by those reformed state-churches that came out of the Roman-Catholic model (pedobaptists themselves). These true baptistic churches fled to Holland, Wales, England—and eventually to the New World, where they finally had an unprecedented opportunity to blossom and spread.
Now many churches from that same heritage are waffling about credobaptism vs. pedobaptism, or dropping the ordinance altogether, or offering “baby dedications.” They’ve not only forgotten their history, they’ve forgotten their Scripture.
But don’t take my word for it. Here’s the testimony of a former pedobaptist who finally read Scripture in context and realized it teaches credobaptism…er, baptism.
