"Teaching God's Word to God's World"
2766 Airport Road, Peru, Indiana 46970, (765) 472-4111
Should your baby be baptized? The answer is simple. Your baby should be baptized if he can meet the following qualifications.
I. IF YOUR BABY CAN BELIEVE THE GOSPEL, THEN HE SHOULD BE BAPTIZED.
"Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized, shall be saved; but he that believeth not, shall be damned" (Mark 16: 15, 16).
Belief must precede baptism. Jesus did not say, "He that is baptized and is saved shall believe''. He said, "He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved". Babies cannot believe, Will they be condemned? Of course not! A God who would condemn a child because HIS PARENTS would not have him baptized is not the God set forth in the Bible. The grown person who rejects the commands of God is worthy of judgment, but is God so unrighteous as to condemn an innocent baby?
In Acts 8:36-40 the story is told of a man who wanted to be baptized. He said to the preacher, "Here is water; why can't I be baptized?" Philip answered, "If thou believest with all thine heart, thou mayest." Then Philip baptized him in the water after he confessed his own personal faith.
Yes, if your baby can believe, then he should be baptized.
II. IF YOUR BABY CAN REPENT, THEN HE SHOULD BE BAPTIZED.
"Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost" (Acts 2:38).
Repentance also precedes baptism. But wait! Of what does the little baby have to repent? Innocence? Lack of knowledge? Unbelief? No. Then of what is he to repent? Adam's sin? No, Adam needed to do that. Listen to what the Scriptures say:
"When the Son hath done that which is lawful and right, and hath kept all my statutes, and hath done them, he shall surely live. The soul that sinneth, It shall die. The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son: the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him. and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him" (Ezek. 18:19, 20).
Sometime I would like one of the students of the doctrine of original sin to explain to me why God forgives original sin in the father and then places the guilt of it upon the new son again! Did God forgive original sin in you? If so, why did He pass the guilt on to your son? Did God forgive it, or didn't He? If you father the child after you were forgiven of the sin, how did you pass it on?
Yes, if your baby is a sinner who can repent, then he should be baptized.
III. IF YOUR BABY CAN CONFESS HIS FAITH IN JESUS CHRIST, HE SHOULD BE BAPTIZED.
"Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord, shall be saved" (Acts 2:21).
"And now why tarriest thou? Arise, and be baptized, and wash away thy sins, calling on the name of the Lord" (Acts 22:16).
Yes, if your baby can call on the name of the Lord, he should be baptized to wash away his sins (if he has any to wash away).
IV. IF YOU CAN FIND AN EXAMPLE IN THE BIBLE OF ANY BABY'S BAPTISM, THEN' YOURS SHOULD BE BAPTIZED, TOO.
We challenge the religious world to find an instance of infant baptism in the Scriptures. Some teachers and priests quote the following verse in an attempt to prove infant baptism:
"Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me: for of such is the kingdom of heaven" (Matt. 19:14).
But there is no mention of baptism in this verse
Others assume that Lydia, the seller of purple in the book of Acts, had babies baptized because the account of her conversion says:
"And when she was baptized, and her household, she besought us, saying, If ye have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come into my house, and abide there, And she constrained us" (Acts 16:15).
But to find infant baptism here, one must assume several things:
Such assumptions may be fine for some, but are they worthy of being called logic or argument?
Yes, if you can find a case of infant baptism in the Scriptures, you should have your baby baptized immediately.
V. IF YOUR BABY IS PREPARED TO BURY THE OLD MAN AND ARISE TO WALK IN NEWNESS OF LIFE, HE SHOULD BE BAPTIZED.
"Know ye not that so many of us were baptized into Jesus Christ, were baptized into His death? 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. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of His death, we shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection: knowing this, that our old man is crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin" (Rom. 6:3-6).
If your baby can be immersed as this verse teaches and decide for himself to bury the old man of sin and arise to walk in newness of life, he should be immersed without delay. However, if you are going to do his believing for him as well as his repenting and his confessing, then why not be baptized for him also? Why not be like the Mormons and have proxy baptism?
We can give many proofs from the Scriptures, from church history, and from the meaning of the Greek word from which "baptism" is derived to show the early church immersed. Protestantism copied infant baptism and sprinkling from the Roman Catholic Church even though Rome admits that the early church immersed. Infant baptism has many defenders but no defense.
If you can find any child in the Scriptures was sprinkled, then your child should be sprinkled too.
VI. IF YOUR BABY KNOWS THE LORD AND HIS DOCTRINES, THEN HE SHOULD BE BAPTIZED.
The Old Testament was a covenant that one was born into, after which he was reared to know God and His laws. However, the new covenant is different. The new covenant is one that an individual is not born into as a child. He is born into it spiritually when as a mature person he chooses to be in the covenant with God by his own free will. He will not have to be taught who God is, for he knows the Lord and His doctrines before entering the covenant. Listen to the Scripture on the subject:
"Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah: not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers, in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; because they continued not in my covenant, and I regarded them not, saith the Lord. For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel, after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them into their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people: and they shall not teach every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for all shall know me, from the least to the greatest. For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities I will remember no more" (Heb. 8:8-12).
This new covenant, then, must be entered by persons making an intelligent decision themselves to follow the Lord and His ways.
If your baby knows the Lord and has God's law written on his heart, then he should be baptized into Christ and enter the new covenant on his own decision.
CONCLUSION . . .
We hope these thoughts have provoked your thinking. Let your child grow up and accept Jesus Christ. Teach the child concerning God and His laws and then let the child decide whether he wants to follow Christ's teaching. God nowhere commands infant baptism, and where there is no law, there is no transgression (Rom. 4:15).
And how about you? Were your faith and repentance and confession by proxy; that is, did someone else do them for you? Were you 'buried' with Him in baptism, or were you sprinkled? Jesus said, "He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved." Did you have faith before you were baptized?
With over three hundred churches in the world claiming to be Christ's church, you need to examine yourself to see whether you are in "the faith". A priest's boasting of theirs being "the first church" or a preacher's claiming to be "right" is a poor foundation for your eternal destiny. Jesus quotes Isaiah, saying:
"Howbeit, in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men, as the washing of pots and cups: and many other such like things ye do . . . Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition" (Mark 7:7-9).
If you love your child, you will be very careful what he is taught. You take special care with his diet and his health and his education. Why be careless with his soul?
In Luke 6:46 we hear Jesus question us:
"Why call ye me Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say?"
Why do you?