QUESTION: Can Infant Baptism by immersion be proved from Scripture having in mind the six households mentioned where baptism would have taken place?
ANSWER: Firstly, as to the mode of baptism, we are informed in Scripture that it is to be with water, unto Jesus Christ (Rom. 6:3) in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost (Matt. 28:19). We are not told anywhere how the water was applied. Arguments from the word “Baptizo” are quite inconclusive. Baptism signifies burial with Christ and therefore immersion may be the most suitable method. On the other hand it also signifies washing (Acts 22:16) putting on Christ as a garment (Gal. 3:27). Obviously one method cannot symbolize things so different as burial, putting on a garment, washing. As Scripture tells us nothing about it, the way the water is applied cannot be very important.
One cannot find six cases of households being baptized, only three definite cases—Lydia, the jailor, and Stephanus—and two possible ones—Crispus and Cornelius. There is nothing in Scripture to justify indiscriminate baptism of infants, but when Christians had households, the Scriptural practice was for the households to be baptized. There is nothing to show that these households contained small children and nothing to prove that they did not. We must judge whether believing parents should have their children baptised by our understanding of the meanings of baptism. It is an individual matter and need not affect fellowship between Christians in any way. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind and put what he believes into practice.
The Baptist view can be easily obtained, but the case for so-called Household Baptism is not so easily found in print. Accordingly I will quote from some notes by the late Mr. A Jacob, not hitherto published.
“I should judge that there are few who would deny that baptism is a figure of death (Rom. 6:4). But death of what? Is it death of me—if so, that would be the end of me and this it cannot be, because I am to walk in newness of life. Verse 6 explains that it is the death of “the old man” called elsewhere “The flesh” (that is in my view). I, therefore, am buried with Christ in death that the “old man” may die and the “new man” live in the power of the Spirit.
“But the sign is not the reality and must not be confused with it. A man may have been immersed in water as an adult believer and yet be an utterly unchanged man in heart. We have a clear case of this in Acts 8:13. Before he was baptised Simon Magus was a heathen—what was he after it? In my judgment he was a professing Christian—he had been identified with Christ in baptism and it was not until after-events showed that there had been no real change within him that Peter said, “Thy heart is not right in the sight of God,” because it is with the heart that man believeth unto righteousness (Romans 10:10). Peter in effect said he was not a child of God which is a very different thing.
“There is an exact parallel to this under the old covenant. In that case every Jew was circumcised and he might claim to be and was recognised as an Israelite—but he was no true Israelite unless there was also an inward work of the heart (see Rom. 2:28-29).
“This brings me to another point. Col 2:11-12 declares that a true believer is circumcised. Now we know that circumcision is not preached by Christians (in a literal sense) at all; but the Apostle goes on to say that the believer’s circumcision is baptism. Some who fear the force of those verses deny this, but for me the words are clear and the point settled. Baptism is thus to us what circumcision was to the Jew. What did circumcision do? It marked off by a ceremony a race of people from all others. That rite also signified, spiritually, the putting away of the flesh or the old man. Every circumcised man was admitted into the covenant with God and he was recognised as such by God whether he was Jew or Gentile, but it did not (as shown before) make him an Israelite inwardly. Spiritual things can only be brought about by spiritual means—otherwise we would soon be in the company of those who profess baptismal regeneration.
“Water, a visible thing, can only accomplish a visible result—identification with the Christian profession. Death with Christ (a spiritual thing) accomplishes a spiritual result—the death of old man—in so far only as we are truly dead with Christ; and we then walk in newness of life.
“Now who was circumcised? Abraham and Isaac. Romans 4:9-16 gives a beautiful exposition of this. In those days to the Jew it was all important that they were Isaacs, the seed of Abraham, and circumcised on the eighth day as babes, and they could hardly bear the thought that anyone might be of the real seed of Abraham and be circumcised as an adult! They did let in some proselytes however.
“So Paul is pressing hard the case of the despised adult-believer! He goes on to show that Abraham himself was circumcised as an adult as a sign of the faith he had. This is stressed to show that all who are baptised as adults (after faith has come) are to share equally with the Isaacs who are born in the household of faith and were baptised as babes. In this way Abraham becomes father of all the faithful (verse 16). Fancy having to write half a chapter of the Bible to establish the right of adult believers who are thereafter baptised to equality with those who are baptised as babes!
“Where the Gospel is preached to those who have not heard it before and they believe, those who believe are baptised. They are ‘Abrahams.’ Later on children are born to believers and they will have their children baptised and they (the children) will be ‘Isaacs.’
“But people say, ‘Oh but supposing they don’t believe afterwards.’ Well we have shown that circumcision did not make a true Jew and neither does baptism make a true child of God, but both rites did have an outward effect. Circumcision made a Jew outwardly and baptism makes a Christian outwardly. Is that not clear?
“My judgment therefore is that if I had children I should most certainly baptize them in the faith and expectation that such children would in due course be born of the Spirit and become the true children of God. I would endeavor to keep before their eyes, mind and hearts what had been done to him and why: he could not have known otherwise.
“Sometimes the foolish question is asked: ‘In what way is your child who has been baptised better off than mine who has not?’ It would be equally easy to ask as foolish a counter question, ‘In what way are you who have been baptised as an adult believer better off than I who have not?’ No power of the Spirit enables one believer to discern whether another has been immersed as a believer or not.
“As a matter of fact, if there is spiritual perception in the parents, I think there is a very important difference and that is their own approach to the presence of God on behalf of their child and the instruction the child receives. If believing parents bring their child unbaptized to God they bring them in the flesh unjudged, and as such subject only to condemnation; if they bring them baptized in virtue of the death of Christ, they acknowledge that death with Christ is the only way of deliverance and that in His Name they acknowledge that death with Christ is the only way of deliverance and that in His Name they seek a blessing through the new man. This is what I would do anyway, but none can act in another’s faith.”
—W.R. Dronsfield