One of my co-workers is at this meeting this week. It’s been interesting to me that many of my moderate/CBF leaning friends, particularly the older ones, are old fashioned anti-Catholics. This is rhetoric from back in the day when worrying about RC schools getting tax money could really get ‘em going in a lot of Baptist churches. Of course, now a lot of Protestant kids are going to RC schools, and Baptists are starting private schools all the time.

BTW….my school gets one tiny bit of Fed money for a USDA program of school lunches. I hate that money and all we have to go through to get it and I hope we can one day give it up. Even though it’s almost nothing, it’s not something we should take.

Maybe someone can give the reference, but J.I. Packer once reportedly (I have a very reliable source on this) wrote/said/ that presumption was such a serious issue in the Anglican Church that  he wished  all infant baptism would cease for the sake of the purity of the church until this problem was solved.  Non-believing Church of England adults (all you have to be is a citizen of England) are  bringing their babies for “christening” and then disappearing, presumption fed by infant baptism regeneration.  Do Packer and Stott hold to baptismal regeneration?

The guitar priest is really annoying to read both content and style, mainly content though. When I was leading ALPHA and non-believers were coming up with whacky stuff, one way I steered them back was to say, “Wow, in all my readings and studies of creeds and church history NO ONE HAS EVER COME UP WITH THAT.”  Worked like a charm.  They immediately retreated and said, “Guess that can’t be right then…”  Wonder what his beef with experiencing the new birth now is? James 1:18, 1 Peter 1, speak of it as past tense for believers.  I’ve never seen “under-realized” eschatology as very appealing….   

Guitar Priest on Baptism

Part 6
Part 7

You might want to know what the Thirty-Nine articles say on regeneration and baptism:

XXVII. Of Baptism.
Baptism is not only a sign of profession, and mark of difference, whereby Christian men are discerned from others that be not christened, but it is also a sign of Regeneration or New-Birth, whereby, as by an instrument, they that receive Baptism rightly are grafted into the Church; the promises of the forgiveness of sin, and of our adoption to be the sons of God by the Holy Ghost, are visibly signed and sealed, Faith is confirmed, and Grace increased by virtue of prayer unto God.

The Baptism of young Children is in any wise to be retained in the Church, as most agreeable with the institution of Christ.

Stephen J. Wellum writes a wonderful essay on the meaning of Christian baptism, fairly honors both sides and laments the loss of baptismal consciousness in evangelicalism. A real keeper.

Sandlin on the Facade of Theological Jockeying.

Centuri0n answers some questions on believer’s baptism. Worth reading.

John: Your illustration demonstrates my point. Not that you are wrong, but that the mountain you have climbed is important to you. I have made a choice with my life and there are no paedo choices for me. At age 50 I am not going to a paedo church. My wife won’t leave OBI. I’m off the job market. If I were convinced, it wouldn’t matter. I’d still be here. We live our lives and some of us have to live our choices. I’ve wrestled with some of these “Baptist” questions since high school. I am deeply emotionally invested in what I believe scripture teaches. It’s tied to what I believe about the work of the Spirit in my life and to people I love and respect. This is part of why I’ve had a major crisis over a family member even taking a serious look at the RCC. It doesn’t overturn verses. It overturns me.

Your scripture question is easy:

1) The first part of I Peter 3:21 that states Baptism saves you. The second part of the verse explains the unusual language.

2) If I accepted anything past Mark 16:8 as canon, I’d be bothered by Mark 16:16.

3) Acts 16:33 says the household was baptized, but it also says the household rejoiced, so I’m not too concerned.

David: I mean, can infants lose their faith while they are still infants?  In other words, is faith truly independent of cognition or only the reception of faith?

John: Why do you think it would be a rare occurrence?

I still want to know if infants can lose the faith granted to them in baptism.

And I still want to know what that has to do with the price of fish. (jn)

OK, here’s an answer: I dunno, I guess so, but I think it’s about as common as three-year olds falling out with their parents so badly they leave home.

Michael:

we don’t have discussions of what scripture says. We defend what we believe scripture says. More importantly, we defend the choices we’ve made with our lives.

Fair point, but in my own personal case it’s worth bearing in mind I used to hate the notion of baptismal regeneration with the intensity of a thousand suns – to the extent I insisted on editing the Anglican order of baptism at our elder son’s baptism to remove the slight wisps of baptismal regeneration that cling to the C of E’s current baptismal service – and one of the things that changed my mind was going through the NT physically writing down all the overt references to baptism, and being struck by what an “instrumental” view the NT seemed to take.

So my presuppositions (which were firmly against baptismal regeneration) were overturned by reading the Bible. Or perhaps misreading, but that doesn’t alter what happened. (Ditto on the real presence, which I liked even less than baptismal regeneration.)

But anyway, here is another game we can play. One thing I’ve appreciated about this latest round of discussion on baptism is that we have engaged more with Scripture than in some previous similar discussions. So to keep the focus on Scripture, I’d like to throw this question into the mix: What is the scriptural text that you find most difficult to reconcile with your understanding of baptism, and how do you deal with it? In other words, what do you see as the biggest scriptural threat to your views(/presuppositions) on baptism, and why do you continue to hold those views nonetheless?

Forgive me for not giving my answer now (it’s late, I’ve been at a wedding all day, and I’m knackered), but I’d be interested to see what people come up with overnight.

I still want to know if infants can lose the faith granted to them in baptism.

I sent you one, too, and I haven’t received your original E-mail.

I’m not getting an iPhone…yet. :-P

I still want to know if infants can lose the faith granted to them in baptism.

Matthew: I haven’t seen you on IM in ages. I sent an email to your gmail address.

Bill, if you haven’t gone anywhere on vacation yet, please IM me. I need some input/advice.

MOD: Go ahead. Buy the iPhone.

Vern Poythress, NT Prof at WTS Philly writes about baptism in a way that tries to bridge the gap between Credos and Paedos here.  I like a lot of what he says.

Michael, this could be the position paper for your new denomination.  Please do keep it a synod in good standing in my denomination that transcends denominations…

J.S. Bangs, well at least you are consistent.  But the internal consistency of a system is not something I put any stock in when I see glaring inconsistencies with scripture. When I wrestled through Romans reading a gajillion and three commentaries and all of Lloyd Jones sermons, the one thing that most impressed me and stayed with me was that Romans 5 is about how those who are justified will also be glorified.  Romans 8 picks up this and drives it home also. 

Michael, Van Til and I are not controlled by presuppositions.  We base our positions on what the Bible says, and the Bible is TRUE! Although I’ve heard that Van Til has given some paedo baptists like me some nasty bites…

In all seriousness, these discussions in my opinion do shed some light and are helpful. 

Spring semester is over.

Summer school teaching is over.

Independent study with a student who didn’t graduate is over.

Ph.D. coursework is over.

Conference paper I was writing is over.

Graduations and parties are over.

Weddings for the summer are over.

VBS is over.

And for me, work is over until August.

I’m on vacation baby!!!!   Wooohoooo!!!

Five years of discussing baptism and the Lord’s Supper at the BHT has absolutely convinced me that we don’t have discussions of what scripture says. We defend what we believe scripture says. More importantly, we defend the choices we’ve made with our lives. That’s what humans do. It’s why we defend the biggest mountains we climbed on our journey as the most essential for others to climb.

I don’t have that exegetical despair for myself. But I most certainly do in an ecumenical context. Let me give you the email of the RC apologists who are in my mailbox. Heck, ask David a question :-)

Bob, just to prove how consistent I am, I do think that both of the verses you cited are references to baptism. I believe that salvation (which I suppose includes regeneration) is granted in baptism, and can be lost.

Michael your exegetical despair is depressing. The discussion is entirely controlled by presuppositions? Then how are we supposed to interpret anything? Someone bring me a Tradition, stat!

My new doctrine of immersing infants as soon as they can say “I wuz Jebus” or sing part of a CCM worship chorus should allow me to convert millions of white, suburbanites to my new denomination.

Guitar Priest continues the series on regeneration:

Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5

D.A. Carson exegetes and teaches John 3:1-21. (It’s in the list. Look for it.)

Tim: Not all paedobaptists are created equal.  Our Lutheran and (I think) Catholic friends would say that faith is imparted when the baby is baptized.  Not that they had faith before.  Our Presby and Methodist friends baptize the infant based upon the faith of the parents.  I still don’t know what Anglicans think.

Tim: A voluntary, personal response to Jesus? Are you sure? Were you there? (jn)

Bill/John: The idea of “wasted grace” is in the same file of my theology with “limited atonement.” Amen to Bill. God does as he pleases, but he DOES as he pleases. (I am ready, by the way, to grant a lot more of God’s superlatively generous grace than any stereotypical Baptist you can think of. But- presupposition here- Baptism is only half a matter of God’s action, but is also a matter of “an appeal to God” as Peter says. God isn’t the one “appealing.” The person being baptized is, and that has a lot to do with being cognizant of participation.

Careful where you point that thing, John. Pretty soon I’m going to think Baptists have a higher view of baptism than the lot of you :-)

I guess I’m really late to this discussion, maybe because I grew up among simple, illiterate baptists: “Separation of faith from cognition”? So we’re baptizing people because they might have saving faith and not know about it? And if they do, we want to baptize them without cognition too? Why?

And this is a concern in the New Testament? That people might have faith and not know about it and so they need to be baptised to—what? Again, just a basic confusion: you have grace showered upon you and not know it, but you can’t have faith and not know it. Somebody just made that up.

“But they might have faith and not know it, and WE wouldn’t know it, either.” OK. The light in your refrigerator MIGHT be on when the door is closed.

Take a step back and look at the big picture. We started with a text (the NT) whose ENTIRE concern is to elicit a voluntary, personal response to Jesus, and somehow we morphed part of it into an apparatus for saving – via magic ritual* – those who have not yet personally responded, as far as we know. This is what you’d expect to hear after falling down a rabbit hole. This is what happens when you exegete the exegesis of the exegesis.

*footnote 1: a liturgy is something you do. A magic ritual is something that is done to you.

Anne Lamott is fabulous on writing in “Bird by Bird”.

On Jesus—well she does say this

As we sat there on the runway the man reading the book about the apocalypse commented on the small gold cross I wear on a necklace. I would describe him physically as being rather prim and tense, maybe a little like David Eisenhower with a spastic colon. “Are you born again?” he asked as we taxied down the runway. I did not know how to answer for a moment. “Yes I am – I am.” My friends like to tell each other that I am not really a born-again Christian; they think of me more along the lines of that old Jonathan Miller routine where he says, ‘I’m not really a Jew; I’m Jewish.’ They think I’m Christianish but I’m not, I’m just a bad Christian maybe. And certainly like the Apostle Peter I am capable of denying it, of presenting myself as a sort of leftist liberation theology enthusiast and general Jesusy bon vivant, but it’s not true. And I believe when you get on a plane if you start lying you are doomed. So I told the truth that I am in fact a believer and a convert. I’m probably about three months away from slapping an aluminum Jesus fish on the back of my car.

John:  Not quite.  Most baptists, barring some here I think, don’t hold to the idea of “means of grace” so they don’t fear that any type of grace is wasted in baptism of infants or those who ultimately turn out to be lost.  Likewise Calvinists (and here I’m on less certain ground) don’t fear wasted grace either.  We just believe that God finishes what He starts, so that those whom He adopts as children will not die as orphans.

This is the big thing here, at least to me.  Paedos make a lot of noise about the separation of faith from cognition, hence the justification of the baptism of infants.  But there seems to be an urgency to make sure the person is baptized before they are too old, as if cognition somehow screws up the formula.  Is faith separate from cognition, or isn’t it?  Or does that rule only apply to pre-cognition?

Yeah and Amen to the Baptist Confessional statement on Regeneration! The guitar priest article is just about the worst exegesis attempt on John 3 I’ve ever read. But it is consistent with the  Anglicanism that kicked George Whitefield and John Wesley out into the fields to preach. If anyone agrees with his novel interpretation, then consider yourself anathamatized out of my new denomination that transcends all denominations. The Holy Trinity is now the Father, the Son, and Church Membership???     D.A. Carson’s commentary on John is very insightful here.

Guitar Priest/Father Peter says Baptists are wrong on regeneration, and he starts a series to demonstrate why. Here’s the New Hampshire Confession of Faith on Regeneration:

Of Grace in Regeneration We believe that, in order to be saved, sinners must be regenerated, or born again (37); that regeneration consists in giving a holy disposition to the mind (38); that it is effected in a manner above our comprehension by the power of the Holy Spirit, in connection with divine truth (39), so as to secure our voluntary obedience to the gospel (40); and that its proper evidence appears in the holy fruits of repentance, and faith, and newness of life (41).

Ray Anderson of Fuller Theological Seminary proposes Ten theses on Dietrich Bonhoeffer: theologian, Christian, martyr.

And if all this arguing about baptism is making you hungry, then here’s what a 120-calorie snack looks like.

As I’ve said: baptism is the gospel. So I’m only saying “baptism saves without faith” if I’m also saying “the gospel saves without faith”, and I’m only saying “baptism saves in the absence of ongoing Christian nurture” if I’m also saying “the [initial preaching of the] gospel saves in the absence of ongoing Christian nurture”. Which I’m not. So let’s move on.

However, I’m struck by a further point concerning what lies behind these differences between us. Both Calvinists and Baptists seem concerned to ensure that the grace of God isn’t wasted. So Calvinists restrict the scope of the promises of the gospel to those who ultimately receive them by faith. None of the promises of the gospel go to waste, because those promises don’t apply in the first place to those who ultimately reject them.

Equally, Baptists restrict baptism to those who have already consciously accepted the promises of the gospel, and are concerned about those who receive baptism as infants but then fail to continue in faith into adulthood. None of the promises attached to baptism go to waste, because care is taken (at least in principle) to ensure that the baptismal waters are restricted to those who have already received and accepted those promises.

From a Lutheran point of view, however, God does “waste” his grace and his promises on us. Jesus died for the sins of all and has won forgiveness and life for them all, and yet some (even many) reject the salvation he has won for them. The promises of baptism are given with equal truth and unconditionality to all who are baptised, and yet some (even many) reject those promises.

That doesn’t affect the validity either of what Jesus did on the cross and in his resurrection, or of the promises of the gospel lavished upon us in baptism. In the parable of the sower, it’s exactly the same seed that falls on all the different types of ground.

(It’s worth adding that God even “wastes” his grace on those who do receive the promises of the gospel. Forgiven people arrive at church and are absolved, then those same forgiven people hear the gospel preached and are forgiven, and those forgiven people go to the altar and receive the body and blood of Christ for their forgiveness. God seems determined to make sure we don’t miss his point!)

Travis, you are correct. None of those texts you offer have anything to do with water baptism in my opinion. If they do, then the two I offer below also do.

Ezekiel 36:24 ” ‘For I will take you out of the nations; I will gather you from all the countries and bring you back into your own land. 25 I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. 26 I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. 27 And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws.

Hebrews 10:22let us draw near to God with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water.

But hey, I’m the guy who wants us all to get along in different synods of the faith, sharing the same denominational label, health insurance plan, with cable TV and a free laptop… and Travis, I’d rather get real picky in my SYNOD about being missional, giving to the poor,etc. Besides, you agree that without faith no baptisms occur. We’re pretty close then… But I don’t see baptism in either of these texts, nor the ones you cite. But I respect your conviction. And I’m not suggesting I get baptism completely, or regeneration for that matter.

Of course I’m feeling completely betrayed by Shea. How can a Believer’s Baptist/ Evangelical Free Guy who preaches expository sermons be soft on baptismal regeneration and positively affected by Anne Lamott (her view on abortion in later books is inexcusable). I guess my best friend in here is Van Til after all….   Come here boy,,.... who’s your buddy … have a snausage snack on me boy…

If infants can have faith, can they also lose their faith (as infants?)  If not, why not?

Those who hold to baptismal regeneration also hold to the possibility of loss of salvation.  How then is baptism a means of assurance?

Those paedo-baptists who don’t believe that baptism regenerates or saves, how then is baptism a means of assurance?

I’m just asking.

Normally I would jump in on Shea, but anyone who can slip in a Zoolander reference like that deserves a break :-)

Wright has addressed this over and over. Anyone can read it in books, at Wrightsaid, in talks, in articles, in a letter to his critics. For you to say he denies what he expresses differently than you is your judgment. There’s nothing else to be said.

You might as well say I deny Baptism, the Lord’s Supper and the inspiration of scripture. Oh wait! You’d have to get in line. (jn)

Yeah… I noticed Wright is the only one who does that.

deny imputation… Flat out not true. Takes issue with someone’s version of it.

>When you claim to be channeling Paul….

Yeah… I noticed Wright is the only one who does that. (jn)

Now…how about people channeling Spurgeon….

>deny imputation...

Flat out not true. Takes issue with someone’s version of it.

I like to keep you guessing.  Anne Lamott freely admits that she is, like me, a “bad born again Christian”.  NTW claims he is simply Christian and faithful to the text and I think he’s wrong when it comes to Paul, so I can’t resist arguing with him.  When you write about Jesus following you like a little cat after you had an abortion I weep at the mercy of God.  When you claim to be channeling Paul and deny imputation I get pissed off.

.....Likes Lamott and Yaconelli…..Wright is heretic on imputation….....

Bartender…..the large bottle with the green stuff in it please,,,

Oh, I also wanted to say that I’m reading Anne Lamott right now (and loving it) and it’s downright freaky how often I’m running into her, including today’s masthead quote.  I’m also reading Mike Yaconelli’s Messy Spirituality, and he quotes the same portion of Anne Lamott in chapter 1 that I am posting to my blog this week.  I think that’s the first time I’ve had two books in my bag one quoting the other at the same time.  Anne Lamott is like Hansel, so hot right now.

I didn’t say much today, but look at the mess I made!

Tomorrow is the first day of my second week of study leave and one of the things I will be doing is reading the new book edited by Tom Schreiner and Shawn Wright called Believers Baptism: Sign of the New Covenant in Christ.  Maybe I should just drop in every morning this week and leave a quotation to keep you all riled up.

One of the most interesting things about this tavern is the way alliances keep shifting.  For example, Bob is my twin on imputation, but when it comes to baptism, I have to say that I think that Galatians 3:27 makes plausible sense to my view and to John H’s view, but is a big problem for Bob’s view.  And since John H’s view is clearly absurd, that leaves my view as the only one standing. (jn)

On Tuesday I’ll be driving from Austin, MN to Oregon, IL with little else to do.  Anyone nearby want to meet me somewhere and keep me out of trouble?

Michael, that was my point.

MOD: I’m not dogging you about it. I agree completely.

Now we’ve gotten as far as quoting scriptures that all the big scholars would divide on, right down the middle according to their denominational paychecks. Half would see baptism, and half wouldn’t. This goes nowhere. There’s no help for anyone who wants to know what the Bible really says.

Presuppositions control this entire discussion.

Find me any passages that mention baptism as the instrument of regeneration. Find me one. You’ll search in vain.

John 3:5 Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.

Titus 3:5 he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit

Romans 3:3 Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4 We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.

Bob, one might search in vain for a text that satisfies you, but I don’t think it’s fair to say that the case for baptismal regeneration is built without any supporting text whatsoever.

I agree with everything your post under the quoted statement above, though.

Perhaps this will peg me forever as a minimalist Presbyterian, but I agree with Michael on this one.

The primacy of the Word to bring salvation to non-believers is key for me. Scripture itself emphasizes this in places like Romans 10: “The word is near you”, how shall they call on Him without a sent preacher? Note it does not say “baptizer” it says PREACHER. Look at Romans 10:14-17. 

8But what does it say? “The word is near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart,”^[d] that is, the word of faith we are proclaiming: 9That if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved. 11As the Scripture says, “Anyone who trusts in him will never be put to shame.”^[e] 12For there is no difference between Jew and Gentile—the same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him, 13for, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”^[f]

James 1:18 He chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of all he created.

1 Peter 1:23 For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God.

In Acts baptism followed the believing reception of the preached Word. If no one repents and believes in response to preaching then no baptisms take place.

And yes, the Word must be joined with faith. If they don’t believe the Word doesn’t profit (Hebrews 3-4) same with baptism. No faith, no salvation.

Hebrews 4: 2For we also have had the gospel preached to us, just as they did; but the message they heard was of no value to them, because those who heard did not combine it with faith

JS:  In the other cases where the baptized cannot consent, we can baptize in the reasonable hope of faith on the part of the baptized.

John:  you seem to make the most basic confusion between the many modes of communicating the gospel and the single mode of receiving the gospel.  You say the gospel is communicated by vibrating air, by water, by pictures, whatever—all true.  But this is not to say these things save.  The preached word does not save any more than the water word saves; in both instances the word must be united by faith in the heart of the hearer.

So also if we’re talking about the many means of grace: grace does not save, by itself.  Grace—no matter the means—saves only through faith.

But why can’t I baptize my incapacitated elderly parent and say they are a regenerated Christian? That’s not ridicule. That’s a valid pastoral question. (I’ve had retarded teenagers brought for baptism before.)

I say you can. I have no idea what the other sacramentalists will say, but I see no reason not to baptize people who are incapacitated, handicapped, comatose, or otherwise unable to request (or deny) baptism for themselves. In the case of elderly parents, my only worry would be that the baptized not have refused or resisted baptism previously. It’s one thing to baptize an infant in the expectation they’ll grow in faith, and another to baptize someone who is actively resisting the faith.

If someone believes that baptism is efficacious unto salvation without faith, I cannot agree.

But no one is saying that. Paedobaptists believe that infants can have faith, and that their adult faith will complement their child baptism. In the other cases where the baptized cannot consent, we can baptize in the reasonable hope of faith on the part of the baptized. And because of that, I wouldn’t baptize someone that had previously resisted Christ because we have no reason to think or hope that they have faith.

Once again, we’re talking about baptism when we all know daxx well that our assumptions are too different to have the conversation. The assumptions at work in equating the work of the Holy Spirit in preaching and what is happening in baptism are massive. And those assumptions are all here and are all at work. Bill is not being snarky, and he’s not sneering. He’s summarizing what we continually hear from the other side. Bill is completely on target as to how it sounds from our side. Now we as credos can explain why Joe can hear a sermon and not respond, and I hear the same language of sovereign grace from the other side in regard to baptism. So yes, preaching (the Gospel) provides the Word that is believed unto salvation or it doesn’t. I’m fine with that. Is there someone who isn’t? But why can’t I baptize my incapacitated elderly parent and say they are a regenerated Christian? That’s not ridicule. That’s a valid pastoral question. (I’ve had retarded teenagers brought for baptism before.)

You guys are also aware that Baptists dedicate and nurture their children within covenantal lines and language without denying our belief that a person must believe and confess the Gospel to be baptized and received as a member of the visible church. If you hang around Baptist parents, you know we have to go through a lot in answering questions about communion and baptism because of that tension. Our refusal to equate new covenant water baptism with old covenant circumcision makes things more difficult. But I counsel hundreds of kids who were infant baptized and have no thread of an idea where they stand with Jesus. If I said, “You believe. You have faith. You were given faith at baptism,” or “You were regenerated at baptism. God did it all right then,” I might solve the problem in YOUR context, but I wouldn’t solve the problem in THEIR context.

We can all write some really great sermons on how baptism provides assurance, and we can say “You’re baptized. There is no assurance issue,” but my pastoral experience isn’t impressed. No more so than with aisle walking or with joining the church or being voted in. Assurance is a fruit of the Spirit that brings the abba cry to the heart of the believer. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of Christ. If a person abide in me, he will bear much fruit.

I grew up around Church of Christ and Roman Catholic Christians, both of whom believed in the necessity of water baptism for sins to be washed away and regeneration to occur. The Church of Christ still considers me lost because I am not a member of the true Church, and before V2 had its effect, my RC friends were sure I was going to hell. Of course, I believed the same about them. Now, I believe we are all saved by grace through faith, and faith sees baptism as its visible point of rebirth.

If someone believes that baptism is efficacious unto salvation without faith, I cannot agree. If you believe baptism is a point where faith in Christ is visible in water, I accept your baptism. I believe Baptism is a Confession and that the confession requires a conscious participant. If that undermines the whole thing, then we’re back to square one, i.e. we can’t talk about it.

John, a better, clearer, and more winsome depiction of all things Lutheran and  the Lutheran view of baptism I have never heard.  Be encouraged.

My rewrite of Marlburg:
Luther adamantly carves into table “This is my Body”.  Calvin sees it and says, “Hey, Brother Luther, this whole Reformation did not start over the sacraments, let’s not fragment it and give our adversaries reason to doubt the unity of our cause.  Let’s form a Presbyterian Synod and a Lutheran Synod and meet annually for ways to promote gospel work and continue our discussion.    Let them have the adjective Roman Catholic, and let us take the name Catholic.  We need to organize, plan mission strategies, work on contending for the gospel and contextualizing.”  Luther says, “Cal, that speaks to my heart.  I’m not about to give in but I’m also not about to allow this to fragment this movement of God’s Spirit.”

UPDATED EDIT: Calvin responds high fiving Luther, “Praise the Lord brother!  Besides, we both expect this strange reaction by Rome to our teaching will soon correct itself and we’ll all be one once again. Until that happens it’s important that we stick together, lest we tempt others to schism over less than essential matters. Now, what’s your millienial view?”

Bill: I’m not going to argue with you. All I’m going to say is “Careful where you’re pointing that thing”.

What Lutherans believe about baptism is that it is the gospel coming to us in the medium of water. Now, perhaps we’re cracked to believe that, but nevertheless it is the same gospel that comes to us in the medium of vibrating air (in preaching) or light waves (when reading the Scriptures). These are all means used by the Spirit to work faith in us, and we intend to say no more and no less about baptism than is true about those other means by which the gospel comes to us.

A moment’s reflection will show that, from that point of view, your comment can be reworded as follows, with equal force and truth:

[The gospel] saves, except when it doesn’t.

[Preaching the gospel] is necessary for salvation, except when it isn’t.

[VBS] seems like a lot of trouble to go through to win the kids to Christ if all we have to do is [preach the gospel to] them.

Why do the means provided by God sometimes not “work”? It’s a mystery. Why do people sometimes get saved in unexpected ways rather than by the conventional operation of the means of grace? It’s a mystery. Why do we find we need both the gospel and huge amounts of effort to keep our children in the faith (or, for that matter, to bring others into it)? It’s a mystery.

But if we start mocking the notion of baptism as an effectual means of grace used by the Spirit to work faith in God’s people, then let’s just remember that all the other means used by God – some guy talking at the front of the church, some book you find in the back corner of the store, those idiots sat in the pew next to you – seem equally contemptible and ineffectual in the eyes of the world.

Bill: See, this baptism discussion (in which I’m not getting involved) is exactly why we need to pay attention to the Federal Vision, rather than getting our panties in a wad because it sometimes contradicts our favorite interpretation of our favorite 16th-century theologians. Baptism unites us with the visible church, conferring some of the benefits of Christ’s passion and death, but bringing with it accountability, and only those who persevere are (we find out) united with Christ and part of the invisible church.

Packer on Lloyd-Jones (via JT). There’s one anecdote in there that’s a keeper.

Check out the concentrations for this degree program.  I really though this was a joke at first but I was wrong. 

If we’re going to extend baptismal efficacy to incapacitated elders then we should be able to extend abortion to sub 18 year-olds.

Baptism saves, except when it doesn’t.

Baptism is necessary for salvation, except when it isn’t. 

I’d love to chime in further and mock all the paedos in a loving and gracious manner but I have to go play Skyler the Sky Squirrel at the VBS closing.  Seems like a lot of trouble to go through to win the kids to Christ if all we have to do is baptize them. (JN)

Actually, this discussion makes me want to see if the Lutherans, etc. have any insights on this verse:

I Cor 15:29 Otherwise, what do people mean by being baptized on behalf of the dead? If the dead are not raised at all, why are people baptized on their behalf?

Meanwhile, “Summer Camp for Atheists” is a great post.

UPDATE: I’m getting wimply Lutheran non-answers. Boooooooooooooo.

>By the way, if it were up to me, I would have had Calvin and Luther stand together despite differences over sacraments.

sigh Yes people…I know…I know….sometimes I miss having Pirate around, too. Especially with sentences like that one in the air.

Michael: I don’t know about your infants, but mine were believers. :-P

These baptism discussions are always so much fun. Bill used to AIM me with really funny comments during them. I miss Bill.

I just remember that if any of you guys baptize someone who has no faith in Jesus, and then talked about what just happened, we’d have a much more interesting argument.

Leave them babies alone. We all know how you feel about them. How about baptizing my 75 year old pagan uncle Bert? If I can get him in the church. Or- like Constantine did his armies- march him under a shaken wet limb with a minister saying the right words. What do we have then? Really….infants are easy. Can we baptize our incapacitated parents and get a later version of “infant faith?” Will baptism act on any unbeliever who walks into a church, or only the little ones?

John, I respect what you’re saying, and really admire the depth of your conviction and understanding.  I just can’t follow you there.  Romans 10:17 “Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of Christ”.  Paul didn’t come to Corinth to baptize but to PREACH the Gospel (1 Corinthians 1). 

By the way, if it were up to me, I would have had Calvin and Luther stand together despite differences over sacraments. 

PS Love your life verse.  Didn’t know Lutherans were allowed to have life verses…  jn…

Bob: If I may be permitted to engage in a spot of editing:

The reason I think [the preaching of the gospel] diminishes the Cross is that the Cross is the means of my regeneration as I read John 3. Jesus must be lifted up like the serpent. It’s conjecture, but I think that Nicodemus was regenerated when he saw Christ on the Cross and the penny dropped for him about those mysterious references Jesus made to Numbers 21. [The preaching of the gospel] domesticates regeneration. Regeneration is untamable. Wild like the wind. We see it’s effects but don’t know where it comes from… John 3:8

My point is that, while God is not bound by means, he has nevertheless provided means by which we receive and appropriate the benefits of the cross. Baptism is one of those means. So is the preaching of the gospel. In both of them, the same word of promise comes to us and is used by the Spirit to create faith in us.

To quote my life verse (semi-JN):

And he said to them, ‘Thus it is written, that the Messiah is to suffer and to rise from the dead on the third day, and that repentance and forgiveness of sins is to be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem.’

In other words, the means by which we receive forgiveness (the proclamation of “repentance and forgiveness of sins” in word and sacrament) are as much a part of the gospel message as the means by which forgiveness was won for us (the Messiah’s suffering and resurrection).

JS Bangs, I think that Van Til needs to talk with you about the necessity of being born from above and how it is completely distinct from baptism.   I won’t even try…

Travis, glad you’re thinking of City ministry and  committed to being missional.  To me, both of those are much more important in God’s signt than having the correctly nuanced view on baptism. ( I don’t claim to have the correctly nuanced view.)

John, not to waken a dead horse, but the reason I think baptismal regeneration diminishes the Cross is that the Cross is the means of my regeneration as I read John 3.  Jesus must be lifted up like the serpent.  It’s conjecture, but I think that Nicodemus was regenerated when he saw Christ on the Cross and the penny dropped for him about those mysterious references Jesus made to Numbers 21.  Baptismal regeneration domesticates regeneration.  Regeneration is untamable.  Wild like the wind.  We see it’s effects but don’t know where it comes from… John 3:8

What JS said. “Born from above” has obvious echoes of the Holy Spirit descending on Jesus in his baptism (don’t it?), not least because Jesus’ own explanation of what “born from above” means is “being born of water and Spirit”. John 1:31-34 then places this firmly in the context of baptism.

I repeat: what happens in our baptism is to be identified with what happened to Jesus in his: the Holy Spirit descends on us (“born from above”) and God declares his delight with us as his beloved children.

Of course you must be born again. “Born again” is a synonym for “baptism”. Just like Jesus said: “Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved.”

Dead horse? I don’t see any dead horse?

I get the distinction between a conscious conversion experience and regeneration. 

But, unless you are born from above, you are not a Christian.  Jesus says so three times in John 3.  Countess Huntington sp? asked George Whitfield, “Why must you always preach that you must be born again?”  Whitfield replied, “because you must.” 

Agree with John and JS – Being “born again” or “regenerated” has become synonymous with “having a conversion experience,” and I’m not sure that’s the most helpful or biblical way to understand the word. 

JS: I think I agree, which is why I prefer to use the more concrete language relating to our life in the ministry of the church – the life of faith and baptism and absolution and hearing the gospel and participating in the Supper and so on – rather than abstract terminology of “regeneration” (or even, for that matter, “justification”, crucial as that concept is).

“The one who believes and is baptized will be saved”. How (and where) the word “regeneration” applies to that is secondary.

I don’t think that “regeneration”, used in this sense, is a particularly helpful concept. As used by the Reformed, it usually refers to an inward event in which you are “born from above”. But plenty of people have never had such an event, and I don’t see Scripture talking about it much. Such experiences are doubtlessly meaningful and important to those that have them, but they can’t be made the basis for salvation. Paul was “regenerated” in the usual language on the road to Damascus, but when he got they he still had to hear “Arise, be baptized, and wash away your sins.”

Seems to me regeneration is one second you’re dead and the next second you’re alive. 

Shea: I wonder if this is how the Reformers understood the word.  Maybe I’m not remembering correctly, but I seem to recall that Calvin, in the Institutes, used “regeneration” in a much different way, more in line with the term “sanctification” than the moment of being “born from above.”

Shea: I was baptised as an infant, and that is when I was regenerated. (I then fell away from grace and was brought back again, but that’s a different matter).

“Baptismal regeneration” is really only shorthand/jargon for what is summed up in the Small Catechism as follows:

What benefits does Baptism give?
It works forgiveness of sins, rescues from death and the devil, and gives eternal salvation to all who believe this, as the words and promises of God declare.

How can water do such great things?
Certainly not just water, but the word of God in and with the water does these things, along with the faith which trusts this word of God in the water. For without God’s word the water is plain water and no Baptism. But with the word of God it is a Baptism, that is, a life-giving water, rich in grace, and a washing of the new birth in the Holy Spirit…

As for those who are already regenerate, that doesn’t mean their baptism isn’t “a life-giving water, rich in grace, and a washing of the new birth in the Holy Spirit”. It just means it’s another example of how God pours out his grace upon us over and over again, forgiving the forgiven.

Seems to me regeneration is one second you’re dead and the next second you’re alive.

Indeed so, but identifying the point at which this occurs can be difficult for some people, which can undermine people’s assurance (think of the people – including me for a short time – who “say the prayer” multiple times because they’re not sure they “did it right” originally). At the very least, baptism provides a point to say “I was regenerated no later than then”.

John H: Amen to everything you just said, but if you grant that I was regenerate before baptism, why in the world do you call it baptismal regeneration???  I don’t have a problem calling baptism a means of grace, but how can it be a means of regenerating grace?  Do you believe in progressive regeneration?  Seems to me regeneration is one second you’re dead and the next second you’re alive. 

This baptismal regeneration thing just baffles me. Bottom line for me: I was regenerated over a year before I was baptized.

Shea: Can’t speak for the RCs, but Lutherans don’t believe baptism is the only means by which we receive God’s forgiveness. We are saved through the promises of the gospel, and those promises come to us in a number of ways: baptism, preaching, absolution, the Lord’s Supper. That’s why I was careful to separate out infant from adult baptism in my earlier post.

But even for adult converts, baptism can provide an important source of assurance. Even though you were regenerate before your baptism, your baptism is still the occasion when God said to you in a very particular and definite way, “You are my dear child; I am delighted with you”. That’s true even if it wasn’t “new information” for you (any more than it was for Jesus!)

This baptismal regeneration thing just baffles me.  Bottom line for me: I was regenerated over a year before I was baptized.