Infant Baptism

[Gregory95]

Do i need to point it out or can you see when you go back and read?

 

[ViaCrucis]

I think I have given enough information here. If you don't want to see it, that's fine.. Continue to believe that nobody here is saying that unbaptized infants go to hell.

Also, notice, that not one post has answered my question as to where they believe that the souls of infants go, if they are not baptized.

An answer to where they go, would answer the OP's question.

By what you are saying here... you believe that infant baptism is not a salvation issue.

If so, why all the hype? Why all the pressure?

If God says He acts through X, then we promote X. That doesn't mean God is limited to X. So we baptize our children because we know that God works through Baptism. It does not follow that, therefore, anyone who isn't baptized must be hopelessly lost and condemned forever.

See my earlier post about the problem of salvation legalism.

You want to frame the discussion as we baptize infants because if we don't then they will go to hell. But that isn't the argument being made. That we believe that God works through Baptism to save us--including children--does not mean that anyone who is unbaptized must, therefore, be hellbound. That simply isn't the way we think of salvation, we don't believe in these kinds of black and white, formulaic, and rigid ways of thinking and talking about salvation. Salvation isn't about formula, rigidity, or getting certain t's crossed and i's dotted; it's about God graciously and lovingly coming down to meet us, encounter us, through His means. Where God has promised to act, we confess in faith; where God has not spoken, we leave that up to His judgment and mercy. He's God, and we aren't; but He is faithful, true, and good, so He is trustworthy.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[ViaCrucis]

Repent and be baptized in just the little part of the chapter you posted i see so much in that whole chapter do you not?

Do i need to point it out or can you see when you go back and read?

If you could point out specifically what you think supports your argument against bringing children to Jesus in Baptism (in Acts ch. 2), that would be helpful, yes.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[Gregory95]

If you could point out specifically what you think supports your argument against bringing children to Jesus in Baptism (in Acts ch. 2), that would be helpful, yes.

-CryptoLutheran

Well first we have to understand you misunderand

argument against bringing children to Jesus in Baptism

i nevee said this nor believe this

First Children can profess faith as they can speak infants cannot speak

Second you are bringing NOONE TO CHRIST only God the Father can do that!

Third you do not understand what baptism is if you think its the water

Any issues

Or

We on common ground now and i can show you what you can't apparently see

 

[ViaCrucis]

Well first we have to understand you misunderand

argument against bringing children to Jesus in Baptism

i nevee said this nor believe this

First Children can profess faith as they can speak infants cannot speak

Second you are bringing NOONE TO CHRIST only God the Father can do that!

Third you do not understand what baptism is if you think its the water

Any issues

Or

We on common ground now and i can show you what you can't apparently see

Perhaps you misunderstood what I mean by bringing someone to Jesus. I don't mean it in the sense of converting someone, or making them Christian. I mean it in a more literal sense, Jesus is there, present, in His Word and Sacraments. So much like those who brought their children to Jesus--literally, they took their little ones to hear Jesus speak, and to have Him bless them--we bring our children to Jesus who is there in Baptism. We aren't converting our children, God is. Because the Lord is present in His Word and Sacraments.

Baptism isn't only water, but it does include water. Baptism is water connected to God's word; it's not mere water that makes Baptism Baptism, but rather God's word. That's why the Apostle says that Christ has cleansed His Church through the washing of water by the word (Ephesians 5:26).

Water, by itself, isn't Baptism. Otherwise anytime someone got wet it would be a baptism; but it's not. But rather Baptism is water connected to God's word; and where God's word is, there is God's indelible promises. That's why the Apostle St. Peter can say that we receive the Holy Spirit through Baptism, or St. Paul saying that we have been buried, dead, and raised with Christ in Baptism, etc. Because God has connected His word and promise to it, that all who are baptized into Christ have put on Christ.

But Baptism isn't some invisible thing done apart from the exterior expression. After all, the preaching of the Gospel is efficacious because it is God's word; but that word is found connected with the exterior preaching. "How can they call on one they have not heard, and how can they hear unless one preaches" etc. So God works through visible, exterior means to bring forth His saving work. Not because the voice of the preacher saves, or because water saves, but because God connects His word, His promises, to these exterior things. So that the preaching of the Gospel is efficacious; because here in that preaching is God's word.

So you are quite right that Baptism isn't (merely) water, since water by itself isn't Baptism. But one doesn't have Baptism without that exterior element, since without that water there is no visible means by which the word is connected to and communicated. So Baptism is both: water with the word. That is what makes it Baptism, what makes it a Sacrament.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[timothyu]

It seems to have become by mere conversation, yet another distraction from the Kingdom. Cannot religion of man keep things simple?

 

[ViaCrucis]

It seems to have become by mere conversation, yet another distraction from the Kingdom. Cannot religion of man keep things simple?

"But Jesus called them to him, saying, 'Let the children come to me, and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God.'" - Luke 18:16

-CryptoLutheran

 

[Gregory95]

"But Jesus called them to him, saying, 'Let the children come to me, and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God.'" - Luke 18:16

-CryptoLutheran

You are intervhanging a child who can make the choice to come to Christ and a infant this thread isn't child baptism its infant baptism.....

 

[timothyu]

Children wouldn't be arguing over baptism and infants would be looking for the next feed. They've got their priorities straight. That's why Jesus said we need to be as they in order to enter the kingdom. Keep it simple.

 

[ViaCrucis]

You are intervhanging a child who can make the choice to come to Christ and a infant this thread isn't child baptism its infant baptism.....

Read the surrounding context of the passage:

"Now they were bringing even infants to him that he might touch them. And when the disciples saw it, they rebuked them. But Jesus called them to him, saying, 'Let the children come to me, and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God.'" - Luke 18:15-16

It's not about our "making a choice to come to Christ", it's about God's grace, not our works. Decisionism is false gospel.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[Gregory95]

Read the surrounding context of the passage:

"Now they were bringing even infants to him that he might touch them. And when the disciples saw it, they rebuked them. But Jesus called them to him, saying, 'Let the children come to me, and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God.'" - Luke 18:15-16

It's not about our "making a choice to come to Christ", it's about God's grace, not our works. Decisionism is false gospel.

-CryptoLutheran

Yes God Grace not our work YES

You make it seem man has no free will

 

[Gregory95]

Read the surrounding context of the passage:

"Now they were bringing even infants to him that he might touch them. And when the disciples saw it, they rebuked them. But Jesus called them to him, saying, 'Let the children come to me, and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God.'" - Luke 18:15-16

It's not about our "making a choice to come to Christ", it's about God's grace, not our works. Decisionism is false gospel.

-CryptoLutheran

Yes God Grace not our work YES

You make it seem man has no free will

 

[Gregory95]

Also don't remember seeing it say infants remember my texts translated from the original Greek saying children

 

[ViaCrucis]

Yes God Grace not our work YES

You make it seem man has no free will

Because the will of sinful man isn't free. We came into this world slaves to sin and death and the passions of our flesh, which is why God in His mercy sent Jesus Christ. That while we were God's enemies, while still sinners, Christ died for us, and reconciled us to God. Having been dead in our trespasses, Christ saved us, and made us alive to God.

The will of unregenerate man is enslaved to sin, which is why we need a Savior to rescue us, redeem us, and heal us.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[ViaCrucis]

Also don't remember seeing it say infants remember my texts translated from the original Greek saying children

Here's the Greek text

προσέφερον δὲ αὐτῷ καὶ τὰ βρέφη ἵνα αὐτῶν ἅπτηται ἰδόντες δὲ οἱ μαθηταὶ ἐπετίμων αὐτοῖς ὁ δὲ Ἰησοῦς προσεκαλέσατο αὐτὰ λέγων ἄφετε τὰ παιδία ἔρχεσθαι πρός με καὶ μὴ κωλύετε αὐτά τῶν γὰρ τοιούτων ἐστὶν ἡ βασιλεία τοῦ θεοῦ

Thayer's Lexicon:

"βρέφος, -ους, τό;
a. an unborn child, embryo, fœtus: Luke 1:41, 44; (Homer, Iliad 23, 266; Plutarch, rep. Stoic. 41 τὸ βρ. ἐν τῇ γαστρί).
b. a new-born child, an infant, a babe, (so from Pindar down): Luke 2:12, 16; Luke 18:15; Acts 7:19; 1 Peter 2:2; ἀπὸ βρέφους from infancy, 2 Timothy 3:15 (so ἐκ βρέφους, Anth. Pal. 9, 567)."

-CryptoLUtheran

 

[Gregory95]

Also don't remember seeing it say infants remember my texts translated from the original Greek saying children

It says little children separating them from normal children

 

[timothyu]

We came into this world mammals like the others but hybrids with the spirit of God within us. God merely wants us to subdue our animal nature in order to not have it override the species we were meant to be.

 

[ViaCrucis]

It says little children separating them from normal children

People were bringing their children, including infants, the disciples tried to stop them. Jesus told His disciples to not prohibit any of these children--including the infants--from being brought to Him.

There is no "separation" of children here. The text says what it says.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[ViaCrucis]

We came into this world mammals like the others but hybrids with the spirit of God within us.

We received God's Holy Spirit when we were adopted as children by His grace.

We are all born into the world with a nephesh, a "soul", even as we read that God breathed into Adam's nostrils and he became "a living soul". And so we all have the breath of life that comes from God.

But God's Spirit, the Holy Spirit, is a gift we receive from God. He comes and dwells in us by the grace of God, as promised by Christ: "I will not leave you as orphans" (John 14:18) He says, "I will ask the Father and He will send to you another Comforter" (John 14:16), that Comforter is the Holy Spirit, who was poured out on Pentecost for the whole Church in fulfillment of St. John the Baptist's prophecy ("I baptize you with water, but the One who comes after me, whose sandals I am unfit to tie, He will baptize with the Holy Spirit and with fire") and Christ's promise.

And so the promised Holy Spirit came, and He lives in all who belong to Christ, the promise we received in our baptism (as St. Peter said), and who, as St. Paul says, dwells in us by which we know we are sons and daughters of God the Father: For we are children and heirs of God, joint-heirs with Christ, with the Spirit in us crying out, "Abba! Father" (Romans 8:14-16, Galatians 4:6).

-CryptoLutheran

 

[timothyu]

That is fine and dandy but none the less it is our animal nature some fight and most follow to some degree..