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Lastly, there are practical flaws in the paedobaptist theology. Those who sprinkle infants are on the horns of a dilemma. Either they must tamper with the definition of baptism to make it signify something less than personal spiritual union with Christ as the Bible clearly teaches; or they will be driven to teach infant salvation or presumptive regeneration. If the first course is chosen, one must also corrupt the New Testament view of the church and its discipline. If some who are less than saved are properly to be considered as members of Christ’s body.

Here Chantry simply identifies in Presbyterian churches, a problem common to all churches – the problem of Tares and Wheat.

Is the fact that some, who participate in “believer’s baptism”, fall away from the Church and thereby prove their own lack of regeneration, an indictment of the propriety of baptizing new adult converts into the Church? No, it is not.

All churches teach “presumptive” regeneration to at least some extent, for while God looks on the heart, Man looks on the outward appearance. Chantry’s argument here really has no particular and unique applicability to paedobaptism at all.

I can sympathize with students who are wrestling with the problem of baptism. I can remember when I wished to be convinced of the paedobaptist position. There would be many practical advantages. Another forceful factor is the great history of godly men who were paedobaptists, especially the Reformers and Puritans. But as history gave me the problem, so it has suggested a solution…. Once the constitution and discipline of the New Testament church has been rightly conceived, the hangover of infant baptism must fall way.

Again, Chantry assumes his own conclusion.

At a fundamental level, Chantry is arguing a discontinuity of Covenant… for which he simply does not have the Scriptural support he requires. “If, after two thousand years of having their children included in the covenant, the fulfillment of that Covenant in Christ now meant the exclusion of their children from the covenant (for if they are in fact members of the covenant, to withhold baptism would be to exalt the sign above the reality signified), if they were now excluded, that would not only be regarded as covenant regression, it seems reasonable to assume that quite a ruckus would be raised over that very point and would have needed to be addressed in the early church…” (Schlissel). Yet there is no instruction of Covenantal exclusion whatsoever.

The Covenant is Visible and One.

These are issues over which we do not wish to lose fellowship with paedobaptist brethren. Yet they are principles which we will not jettison for the sake of fellowship.

I have no desire to break fellowship with Mr. Chantry over this matter.
Rather, I leave the ball in his court.

At a fundamental level, Chantry is arguing a discontinuity of Covenant… for which he simply does not have the Scriptural support he requires.
“If, after two thousand years of having their children included in the covenant, the fulfillment of that Covenant in Christ now meant the exclusion of their children from the covenant (for if they are in fact members of the covenant, to withhold baptism would be to exalt the sign above the reality signified), if they were now excluded, that would not only be regarded as covenant regression, it seems reasonable to assume that quite a ruckus would be raised over that very point and would have needed to be addressed in the early church…” (Schlissel).
Yet there is no instruction of Covenantal exclusion whatsoever.

Nor were Jewish females circumcised under the Old Covenant. But both men and women (and undoubtedly some children) were baptized as believers under the New Covenant.

This mere repetition of Schlissel only hammers home the basic flaw in his argument from the perspective of a Christian of Jewish descent.

The Covenant is Visible and One.

The Old Covenant has passed away completely, the central point of the first half of Hebrews 10, a passage we've esamined at length. I'm beginning to watch myself for signs of using these verses as a Swiss Army knife, having noted that tendency in others. And yet, there are very few statements in the entire New Testament which speak so clearly and so conclusively of the New Covenant in Christ.

I believe in the New Covenant of believers in Jesus Christ, signified by baptism of believers, the only examples of baptism in the New Testament.

The notion set forth by Warfield and others that the Baptists "argue from silence" is among the weakest for their position. The uniform example of the New Testament is: belief in Christ, baptism, communion with a church of believers. Baptists follow this example in imitation of the New Testament example.

The position of the paedobaptists is, at best, merely an claim that they are not forbidden to baptize infants. And yet, there are no examples in the scripture of the baptism of infants. Again, the only justification for infant baptism must resort to covenantalism and the Old Testament, opening the door to Rome. In the case of Reformation churches, the door to Rome was simply never fully closed.

In this sense, Baptists are not Reformers. We never were. We completed the final Reformation and the rejection of all of Rome's practices, the corrupted practices of the state religion of the Roman empire. I believe that the retention of practices like infant baptism in most Reformed churches or celebrating the Eucharist in Lutheran churches have caused their mainstream denominations to decline.

As I've said repeatedly, much of this theology does not tell us whether someone is actually saved. I don't question your salvation. I say this repeatedly. I am more interested in the soundness of doctrine that enables churches to persevere in sound doctrine. The underlying issue is whether churches can maintain a sound theology over the course of decades or centuries. Certainly, Baptists have had their own problems as one observes the historical vicissitudes of Arminian notions in Baptist theology. And one sees when they stray to modernism and to Arminianism that they also decline. Generally, I see Spurgeon as the best exemplar of what a Calvinistic Baptist should be though he is no more absolutely infallible than Calvin was. Or any pope.

Here Chantry simply identifies in Presbyterian churches, a problem common to all churches – the problem of Tares and Wheat. Is the fact that some, who participate in “believer’s baptism”, fall away from the Church and thereby prove their own lack of regeneration, an indictment of the propriety of baptizing new adult converts into the Church? No, it is not.

To me this is the strongest argument for infant Baptism.

The truth is that many adults stand for baptism without having been saved. There is an element of presumption in adult as well as infant baptism.

Uriel do the reformed churchs do baptism by immersion at all,or is it all similar to the Roman tradition?

What is your churches position on a baptised infant later seeking an adult baptism as a outward sign of their salvation? Would it be seen as to no effect,would one of your pastors preform a "second" baptism.

GW what about Baptists? Wesleyans would ,in fact, encourage an adult baptism of a baptised infant (not as a requirement,but as a outward sign)