To Whom Is Baptism to Be Administered?

The 95th question of the Westminster Shorter Catechism asks, "To whom is baptism to be administered?"
It answers, "Baptism is not to be administered to any that are out of the visible church, till they profess their faith in Christ, and obedience to him; but the infants of such as are members of the visible church are to be baptized."

To whom should baptism not be administered? 

Baptism should not be administered to any that are out of the visible church, and so strangers from the covenant of promise. We do not baptize those who are strangers from the covenant of promise to thereby convert them. 

We might be tempted to say that only the regenerate should be baptized. But we cannot look into the heart and see the new birth directly. All kinds of churches baptize some people who turn out to be unbelievers. The question then is, whom does Scripture tell us should be received as members of the covenant? What is the visible criteria we should use for welcoming someone into the church? Baptism is to be administered to the visible church, to those who are visibly members of the church. 

What is the visible church? 

As the Larger Catechism puts it, “The visible church is a society made up of all such as in all ages and places of the world do profess the true religion, and of their children.” (1 Cor. 1:2, 7:14)

What can and should people outside the visible church do to join it and be baptized? 

They should profess the true religion, that is, they should “profess their faith in Christ, and obedience to him” (e.g. Acts 2:41, 22:16, 1 Cor. 1:2). The form for such a profession in our denomination consists of five questions, and they are also called membership vows, since it is by such a profession that the visible church is joined together and obligated to each other. Such a profession should be credible, that is, a believable profession, one that is not unbelievable due to the person’s ignorance or manifest ungodliness.

What about the children of those who profess faith in Christ and obedience to him? Should they be baptized? 

Yes, as the catechism said, “the infants of such as are members of the visible church are to be baptized.” 

Why? 

The Larger Catechism expands on this statement by saying, “but infants descending from parents, either both, or but one of them, professing faith in Christ, and obedience to him, are in that respect within the covenant, and to be baptized.” Here are a few arguments for infant baptism:

1. Baptism is a sign and seal of the covenant of grace (Gal. 3:27-29, Ezek. 36:25-28), and the covenant of grace is made with believers and their children (Gen. 3:15, 6:28, 17:7, Deut. 29:10-15, Acts 2:38-39, 16:31), therefore the children of believers should be baptized.

The covenant of grace, simply put, is God’s covenant in and through Jesus Christ, requiring faith as the condition to receive the benefits of Christ’s mediation, promising life and salvation from sin in him. God has always established his covenant of grace with professing believers and their children, receiving them into the visible administration of his covenant. This is true as God made his covenant of grace with Adam and Eve and their offspring, so that Cain was not simply an unbeliever but an apostate (Gen. 3:15), with Noah and his household (Gen. 6:28, 9:9), with Abraham and his offspring (Gen. 17:7-13), with Israel, including their little ones (Deut. 29:10-15), and in its new covenant form, to you and your children (Acts 2:38-39, 16:31). The potential for apostasy through unbelief has always been possible, and thus all members have been called to keep the covenant. Your baptism is a sign of God’s covenant mercy and ought to stir you to respond with gratitude and loyalty all your life, keeping the covenant by believing in Christ and demonstrating such faith by obedience to God’s word.

Believers are to enter the covenant with their little ones, affirming that they and their offspring will serve the Lord (Deut. 29:10-13, Josh. 24:15). They are to follow through on this statement by teaching their children to serve the Lord, teaching them God's word and raising them to embrace the obligations of the covenant (Deut. 6:7, Gen. 18:19, Ps. 78:5-8). The covenant is conditional, and the members of the visible church have committed to keep the covenant. As Louis Berkhof explains, 

In this connection it is highly necessary to bear in mind that living in the covenant relationship is something more than living under the gospel, under the free offer of salvation. There is here something more than an offer, something more than a promise; there is an agreement. The covenant is an established covenant, a covenant agreed to, agreed to by parents also for their children. When they sought the seal of baptism for their offspring, they promised, as Joshua did in the days of old: ‘as for me and my house, we will serve Jehovah.’ This means that, for the children of the covenant, the covenant is not merely an offer which they can accept or reject, but an agreement which they entered; and that, if they do not live up to the terms of the agreement, they are covenant-breakers. (“The Covenant of Grace and Christian Education,” Foundations of Christian Education)

2. Circumcision was the initiatory sign and seal of the covenant in the old administration (Gen. 17:1-14, Rom. 4:11) and baptism is the functionally equivalent sign in the new covenant representing the same thing (Col. 2:11-12). As circumcision was applied to infant children of believers, so baptism should be as well.

Circumcision was a sign and seal of the righteousness that is by faith (Rom. 4:11) and the conversion of the heart (Deut. 30:6), and yet was given to infants who could not give a profession of faith. These children were then called to live in accordance with the symbol as heirs of the covenant (Deut. 10:16, Jer. 4:4). Sometimes they embraced God from their earliest years (Ps. 22:9-10, 71:5-6). But if they fell away, they were not told to be circumcised again, but to bring themselves into accordance with their circumcision by turning to the Lord and circumcising their heart.

Likewise, baptism into Christ is a new covenant sign and seal of the same blessings (Acts 22:16, Rom. 6:3-5). In Colossians 2:11-14 and Galatians 3:27-29, Paul argues that Christians need not be circumcised since they presumably have the spiritual substance of this ceremony already, something symbolized now by baptism. Like circumcised children in the Old Testament, children who are baptized are to be raised to live in accord with it, to trust in Christ for their cleansing from sin and to put on the ways of the new self in Christ and to put away what belongs to the old sinful nature.

Circumcision was given only to male believers and male children, due to the nature of the sign, although both male and female believers and their children were members of the covenant (Deut. 29:10-13). Circumcision was unique to the old administration of the covenant, but in the new covenant it is replaced by a ceremony that does not require the shedding of blood, similar to how Passover is replaced by the Lord’s Supper.

3. Baptism is our initiation as disciples of the Lord Jesus (Matt. 28:18-20). The children of believers are disciples of the Lord Jesus, to be raised by their parents as such (Eph. 6:1-4). Therefore we should baptize the children of believers.

Our infants receive baptism so that from their earliest years they might be reminded that they are Christ’s disciples, learning from their baptism to rely on Christ for their spiritual washing and to learn from him as their Lord and Teacher.

4. The actions of the apostolic church recorded in the New Testament are fully compatible with the practice of infant baptism. Households were baptized following the conversion of a parent (Acts 16:14-15, 31-34), just as households were circumcised in the Old Testament (Gen. 17, Ex. 12:48). The inclusion of children would have been assumed because of the prior biblical pattern, and there is no teaching about a change in practice as would be expected if there was a change.

5. Baptism is to be administered to every member of the visible church (1 Cor. 12:13), and the visible church is composed of those who profess faith in Christ and obedience to him, and of their children (1 Cor. 1:2, 7:14). Therefore, those who profess faith and obedience and their children should be baptized.

Paul writes to the church of God that is in Corinth, which is composed of “those sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints…” (1 Cor. 1:2). Later in that epistle (7:14), he applies that terminology to describe the children of believers. For his argument concerning marriage, he takes as a premise admitted by everyone that the children of at least one believing parent are not unclean, but are “holy” (or, holy ones, the same Greek word translated “saints” in 1:2).

To say that these children “are holy” does not mean the same thing as saying the unbelieving spouse is “made holy” or “sanctified,” as is clear from the argument. The unbelieving spouse is made holy with respect to the believing spouse, so that the believer is not defiled by continuing in that marriage (similar to food being made holy for our use, 1 Tim. 4:1-5). But there was no question of a believer being defiled by their children. Rather, the fact of the believer’s children being holy was something everyone agreed upon and served as an argument to support Paul’s point - if the unbelieving spouse defiled the believing spouse, then their children would be unclean; but that is in fact not the case. The point is not that the believer makes his/her children holy unto him/her (as with the spouse), but that the believer’s children are holy, visible saints. As the Westminster Directory for Public Worship argues, such children “are Christians, and federally holy before baptism, and therefore are they baptized.” 

Consider also how Paul writes to “the saints who are in Ephesus, and are faithful in Christ Jesus” (Eph. 1:1), and in that letter addresses children: “Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right” (Eph. 6:1). Thus, the children of believers are included in the church as some of the saints. He exhorts the children to obey in the Lord, which in Paul’s usage refers to the Lord Jesus (cp. Eph. 3:11, 4:4-6, 5:20, 22). He holds forth to them the covenant promise contained in Exodus 20:12. He tells fathers to bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.

Jesus himself received children, even infants, and blessed them (Luke 18:15, Mark 10:13-16), saying “Let the children come to me, and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God” (Luke 18:16). While this has relevance for all of us, that we should receive the kingdom of God like a child, this also has relevance for children and infants themselves, as evidenced by the fact that they themselves were received and blessed by Christ. It would be odd for the kingdom, which is to be received like a child, to exclude children.

Is infant baptism a different sacrament than adult baptism? Is its meaning different? 

No, there is only “one baptism.” Baptism means the same thing for infants as it does for adult believers. They bear the name of God, they have been called out of the world, they are disciples of Christ, his benefits are theirs, and they are his, provided they keep the covenant through faith in him and repentance unto life. It means they are visible saints, having the identity of Christians rather than pagans, to be treated as such, with hope and charity, as brothers and sisters.

Baptism is not a guarantee of salvation to those without true faith. We have the examples of the circumcised and “baptized” Israelites in the wilderness (1 Cor. 10:1-14) and the baptism of Simon the magician (Acts 8:9-24). Therefore parents ought to be diligent in bringing up their children in the ways of the Lord, knowing that God uses the instrumentality of parents to raise up another generation to serve him (Gen. 18:19, Eph. 6:4). And all the church, of whatever age, ought to be exhorted to repent and believe in Christ, living in accord with their baptism and embracing its promises. “In our baptism, the Lord puts his name on us, claims us as his own, and summons us to assume the obligations of the covenant. He calls us to believe in Jesus Christ as our Savior, to renounce the devil, the world, and the flesh, and to walk humbly with our God in devotion to his commandments.” (OPC Directory for Public Worship)