So in the sacrament of baptism, sins are forgiven and the Spirit is received. That is what you are saying? Do you think that either forgiveness of sins or receiving of the Spirit happen apart from the sacrament? If so, are they just exceptions?

Finally, how does your view differ from either the Church of Christ view or the Roman Catholic view?

By the way, I really love your blog and find it very helpful. This one has just thrown me a bit.
Curt | 05.26.04 - 1:04 pm | #

God can confer grace whenever He chooses. Baptists tend to agree--except when it comes to baptism--they recoil at the thought of something supernatural happening there. I am not familiar with the Church of Christ. Clearly there is a great difference with the Catholic view in many respects. The Reformed view is that the sacraments are part of God's effectual calling. This is not the Catholic view. Also, there is of course a very different take on the elements.
David Heddle | Homepage | 05.26.04 - 1:20 pm | #

The necessity of faith in relation to the sacraments is always stressed by the Reformed tradition.

Furthermore, one might say that the 'personal' element of the sacraments is more accented. The sacraments are not means of grace as some impersonal substance, but means by which God expresses His good favour towards us and deepens His relationship with us.

God's ordinary means for bringing us to partake of the fulness of fellowship with Him and to partake of the Holy Spirit is through the ministration of the Word and the sacraments in the Church.

God is sovereign and can certainly confer the Holy Spirit and forgiveness of sins apart from any of this. However, this fact should not cause us to mute the truth that the Word and sacraments are the ordinary means employed by God.

Part of the problem at this point lies in the fact that people are not always clear on the meaning of 'salvation'. I understand salvation in terms of God's bringing us into, preserving and deepening us within, a covenant relationship with Himself and His people. Understood this way, Baptism is as important for 'salvation' as a marriage ceremony is for the relationship between a man and a woman.

Neither the Word or the sacraments accomplish our salvation single-handedly. Nor do I think that we should think of them conferring a mere generic grace. They are mutually dependent, just like saying the words 'I love you' to your wife and kissing her are both necessary in a healthy relationship.

From my experience of dealing with people in the Church of Christ and International Church of Christ, there are many important differences between David's position and theirs.

1. They generally deny the validity of infant Baptism and Baptisms performed by means other than immersion.

2. They demand a proper understanding of Baptism at the time when it is performed for the validity of the rite.

3. They (the ICOC, I presume the COC too) demand that the person have fully repented of their sins and be committed to living as a disciple prior to Baptism. The validity of Baptism depends on this.

These groups are the prime examples of the truth of Luther's charge that believers' Baptism makes faith into a work. I have met people from these groups who are unsure about whether they are saved because they are not entirely convinced that they were committed enough when they were first baptized.

We are certainly saved through Baptism. However, this salvation is God's work and not our own. The validity of Baptism is not dependent on our faith. Nevertheless, if we would be blessed by it, we are called to abide in the relationship established by it in faith.

If we despise our Baptisms and wilfully reject God we will provoke the Lord to jealousy and be destroyed. Judgment begins at the house of God.
Al | Homepage | 05.26.04 - 2:15 pm | #

David,

I have several issues with your position.

1) I remember you arguing in the past (convincingly in my opinion) that free will was an important part of the Reformed tradition and that it was a result of God's grace. In light of this, how does baptizing an infant allow them to exercise the free will they possess? You seemed to argue that when God's grace works in a person, they eventually reach a point where they trust in Christ through their own free will. How does this happen in an infant? It would seem from your argument that if I just threw someone in a pool and said a prayer over them, grace will have been applied to them. That seems more like an act of man than of God.

2) Several times you have mentioned that communion and baptism are both sources of salvific grace. In 1 Cor. Paul demands that man must examine himself to avoid taking the bread and the cup in an unworthy manner. Why doesn't a similar prohibition/warning apply to baptism?

My position personally is that how the water is applied (or even whether it is applied - the thief on the cross doesn't appear to have been baptized) doesn't matter. If God has applied his grace to the person and baptized them with the Spirit, they are saved. Because of the above admonition about worthiness, I do feel that a person must be able to choose to take the sacraments. This would prohibit most infants, I know, but not because I feel they can't be saved. I feel strongly that John the Baptist was born with a saving faith and thus a candidate for baptism. But I have no way of knowing how many other infants are also eligible.
Matt | 05.26.04 - 11:55 pm | #

Heddle, David (2005) Called Out Of Nashville, Back Home to Geneva: A Baptist Discovers the Pre-1895 Church. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans.
Tom R | 05.27.04 - 1:24 am | #

Matt,

Everything that makes an adult “worthy” is ultimately a gift from God. Why are infants excluded from those gifts?

Furthermore, in spite of our precautions of limiting the ordinances to adults, we would all agree that many unbelievers are, as adults both baptized and take communion, after making a credible confession of faith. Woe to them.

Keep in mind that all of this is viewed in the context of sovereign election and effectual calling. The Reformed position is that baptism and communion are both signs and seals, and that the grace offered is actually conferred, at a time that pleases God.
David Heddle | Homepage | 05.27.04 - 6:53 am | #

Tom R--there are already books in that genre. I'll leave that to the theologians. I would rather have my novel published--but can't get an agent to bite.
David Heddle | Homepage | 05.27.04 - 6:54 am | #

David,

I agree with you that many people do take the sacraments in an unworthy manner. But unless you assume that every infant is saved, don't you and I bear some responsibility for an infant taking a sacrament in an unworthy manner? The infant didn't request the baptism so isn't the woe really on us?

If baptism is a sign of God's grace conferred at any time, why do we assume that infancy is the default time this grace is conferred? If the infant is not baptized by water, they can still be saved, so why do we need to baptize them as infants?
Matt | 05.27.04 - 9:26 am | #

David,

Judging by a couple of the conversion stories I've read (or been handed), the boundary between that genre and the novel is a porous one...
Tom R | 05.27.04 - 4:19 pm | #

I like the questions here, but it seems to me that we should really address the scriptures that David brought up. Because if they really do teach salvation, then we need to come to grips with all the other implications.
Regarding Acts 22:16"And now why do you wait? Rise and be baptized and wash away your sins, calling on his name." I see this as teaching that the means by which our sins are removed is by "calling on his name". There apears to be three different commands here 1) Rise 2)be baptized 3)wash your sins away. I'm no Greek expert, but from an English standpoint these three commans are separated by a connecting conjunction. However, "calling on his name seems to be an explanation to the command "wash your sins away". Thus if we were to include baptism as necessary, would we not also have to include "rise"?
Brett Scollard | 05.30.04 - 10:17 am | #

Brett: No. "Rise" in the original is a circumstantial participle. So, in fact, is "calling upon the name of the Lord." The two things which are joined imperativally are baptism and washing away sins.
Tim G | Homepage | 07.06.04 - 8:56 pm | #