By Greg Holt

If you have not read part one and part two of this series, you can find them here, and here.

When should we be baptized?  There is not one instance of infant baptism in the bible, not one.  Jesus Himself was baptized at about the age of thirty, and this was when His earthly ministry began (Luke 3:21-22).  Any verses in the New Testament speak of believing in Jesus and confessing, and repenting of sins to be baptized, or confessing and repenting of sins in the case of John the Baptist.  So, the idea here is that one needs to be able to understand that they are a sinner in need of Jesus forgiveness (Mark 1:5; Luke 3:7,12; Acts 2:38, 41).  There are more verses then these, but the idea is that all the people being baptized knew that they were sinners in need of a Savior. 

Baptism is supposed to be the outward reflection of the inward transaction that has occurred between an individual and Jesus Christ.  If this is not the case; as in an infant or very young child, whom cannot possibly recognize their need for forgiveness, then why be baptized?  I’m not at all suggesting that anyone who was baptized as an infant, that this was wrong (I was).  I’m simply saying that from all the information in the bible, adult, or older child baptism is what is biblical, because then the one being baptized has an understanding of what the baptism actually means, and this is very important.

Many people believe in the baptism of infants; there is not one verse in the bible that teaches this.  This should not be confused with infant dedication (Which while not really necessary, there is nothing wrong with doing so), which is the public promise of the parents to raise the child in faith to follow the Lord Jesus Christ.  John Calvin taught infant baptism, but this is not taught anywhere in the bible!

“The fact that Calvin neglected to include faith in this discussion is disturbing, especially in the context of infants. To Calvin, baptism joined an infant to the church and provided the infant the benefit of receiving exhortation by older believers to embrace God and serve Him.

“Calvin tried to address the question whether faith should precede baptism. He allowed for the possibility of faith in infants, but he could not explain how. It was certainly not the kind of faith adults have, Calvin maintained, but he stated he “would rather leave the question undecided.” He held that infants can have faith in some way.” (Source) **Underlining mine**

An example of a verse used to teach infant baptism is; “¹⁵ He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation. ¹⁶ Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.” Mark 16:15-16

First notice the above verses say nothing of infants.  Next we see that Jesus says to “preach the good news,” you can’t preach the good news to a baby, what profit is there in preaching to a mind that is not capable of understanding?  Then we see that Jesus says, “whoever believes will be saved,” babies don’t “believe” anything about Jesus because even if you told them, the baby would be incapable of understanding!

Another set of verses used to “prove” infant baptism in the bible,  “¹³ People were bringing little children to Jesus to have him touch them, but the disciples rebuked them. ¹⁴ When Jesus saw this, he was indignant. He said to them, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. ¹⁵ I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.”¹⁶ And he took the children in his arms, put his hands on them and blessed them.” Mark 10:13-16

Notice first off that baptism is not mentioned in these verses anywhere.  Jesus laid His hands on the children and blessed them.  He did not baptize them.  Surely if Jesus wanted to baptize the children He would have.  It is always stressed that one needs to believe in Jesus to be saved and believe the Gospel message; infants are not capable of this.  Yes older children can believe and be baptized, but people use these verses as proof that infants should be baptized.  In Mark 10:15, Jesus says, “I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.”  This is a reference to child-like innocence, receiving what is spoken to them without doubting like an adult tends to do automatically.  Compare Mark 10:15 with Matthew 18:3-4, which states, “³ And he said: “I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. ⁴ Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.”  Children are humble, and they are teachable, willing to learn.  If the child does not understand, he/she asks questions until they get an answer they can understand.  These verses have absolutely nothing to do with infant baptism.

Here is another verse used to indicate infant baptism, “³⁰ He then brought them out and asked, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” ³¹ They replied, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved–you and your household.” ³² Then they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all the others in his house. ³³ At that hour of the night the jailer took them and washed their wounds; then immediately he and all his family were baptized” Acts 16:30-33. 

Look at what is said in verse 31, ”Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved,” an infant is not going to be able to hear the Word of God and believe in Jesus.  So the members of the household in view here were adults or adults and older children capable of understanding and believing in Christ.  The bible says repeatedly that we need to repent of our sins; confess them to Jesus and believe in Him to obtain eternal life, if this precedes baptism, and it does, then an infant can not be baptized, for they are not capable of doing any of these things.

Nowhere does the bible ever mention, or even hint at a baby dying and being sent to hell because he/she was not baptized.  That is simply not true, you will not find that in the bible.  The bible also does not speak of an un-baptized infant winding up anywhere else either.  The bible does not in fact address the issue of infants in relation to baptism at all.  Therefore we must look for our answers elsewhere in other teachings of the Word.

Next time we will look at sin, hell, and the role of baptism as it relates to all of these things.

Part four, the last article in this series can be found here.