4. Promises for Children 1

It is my joy to baptize my first granddaughter this morning. [Child] was not born into an unprotected environment of wolves, but into a covenant home. My wife and I were listening to a series of lectures defending credobaptism (which means believer’s only baptism), and it made me realize once again how much these guys are missing. One of the assertions made on that series of CDs was that there is no difference between the children of believers and the children of unbelievers — both are in need of conversion. I agree that both need to be brought up to make profession of faith, but I utterly disagree with their belief that there is no difference between the children of believers and the children of pagans. Let me quickly give you eleven massive differences between our children and the children of pagans.

1. And since this is Palm Sunday, let me quote something Jesus said on that day — “Out of the mouth of babes and nursing infants You have perfected praise” (Matt. 21:16). That implies that the praise of some is not perfect and is sinful. And indeed it is. Several Scriptures say that the worship, the prayer, the sacrifices, and the music of unbelievers is either an abomination to God or an offense to God. But it is certainly unacceptable. Thus, many consistent Reformed Baptists will not allow their children to sing in church or to pray in devotions until they have gotten converted. But did Jesus wait until children could make profession of faith? No. He said, “Out of the mouth of babes and nursing infants You have perfected praise.” If [child] makes noises of glee or noises of crying this morning, they are accepted; they are perfected. Praise God.
2. Second reason, they are said to be holy. That word holy can mean being inwardly set apart by the Holy Spirit or to be outwardly set apart by the Holy Spirit. And there aren’t any other definitions of holy. But let’s just assume the outward setting apart — the very fact that they are set apart from all other infants for the work of God’s Spirit makes them different. So, 1 Corinthians 7:14 says, “For the unbelieving husband is sanctified by the wife, and the unbelieving wife is sanctified by the husband; otherwise your children would be unclean, but now they are holy.” They are set apart; they are holy; they are different than the children of families where there are not believers.
3. Third reason — they are cleansed. That verse I just read says that the whole family is set apart, but in addition to being set apart, the children are cleansed. I don’t think it is an inward cleansing necessarily, but an outward one. He is using language the Jews were familiar with because baby boys were circumcised and baptized on the eighth day and baby girls were baptized on the sixteenth day ever since the time of Moses. They were unclean up until that baptism, but from that time on they were counted as clean. So the third benefit is being recipients of covenant cleansing through baptism. The children of unbelievers don’t have that.
4. Fourth, they are heirs of the Abrahamic covenant. Galatians 4:1 after dealing with the Jew, Gentile, men, women, free, and slave who were baptized (and the whole context is the baptism of heirs), goes on to say, “Now I say that the heir, as long as he is a child, does not differ at all from a slave.” He doesn’t have a choice — God simply says to our children — “Look, I’m going to give you an inheritance. You are an heir of the covenant.” No child of an unbeliever can have that said of him.
5. That same passage gives the fifth difference. It says, “…but is under guardians and stewards…” Since every believer serves God as a steward or guardian of all that he has, his children are God’s property and they are stewards or guardians of that property. That is not true of unbelievers. God does not receive them as His guardians or stewards. They are enemies. But [parents] are guardians and stewards of a child that God has entrusted to them. In fact, in Ezekiel He speaks of “children born to Me.”
6. The seventh difference is that Christ blesses the little children and says, “for of such is the kingdom of heaven.” They are brought into the kingdom even before they have the faith to embrace the kingdom for themselves. This is why I say that God doesn’t abandon our babies to the wolves. He protects, and blesses them within the kingdom” (Matt. 19:14; Mark 10:16; Luke 18:15-16), and Luke 18 said that included infants.
7. Matthew 18:10 gives another radical difference. It says that every child of a believer has at least one angel assigned to him or her. [Child] has an angel in this room who has been assigned to protect her. I hope you are seeing that the Baptist position is far-fetched.
8. Here’s an eighth reason: Nowhere is the following promise made to the children of unbelievers — “For I will pour water on him who is thirsty… I will pour My Spirit on your descendants, and My blessing on Your offspring,” and the next verses speak of those children growing up to make profession of faith. So it starts with water poured (that’s water baptism), Spirit poured (at some point that is Spirit baptism), then profession of faith. That’s the usual order.
9. What happens before they make profession of faith? Isaiah 40:11 tells us (and this is the ninth blessing) — God “will feed His flock like a shepherd; He will gather the lambs with His arm, and carry them in His bosom, and gently lead those who are with young.” This church is a flock, and God isn’t just interested in the rams and yews. He is interested in the little lambs, and He promises to protect and carry them and draw them to His bosom. Don’t tell me that the children of believers are no different than the children of unbelievers.
10. Tenth, they are in the church according to Colossians 3:20 and Ephesians 6:1. They are not in the world. They are in the church.
11. Eleventh, Christ commits Himself so closely to our young children that He says, “whoever receives one little child like this in My name receives Me” (Matt. 18:5). And we are going to be receiving this little child into our midst this morning through the ordinance of baptism.

And this baptism can be a means of strengthening your faith as you witness it. When entire households were baptized in the Old Testament as well as in the New Testament they were in effect saying, “Lord, I believe your wonderful promises on behalf of my child. I don’t want to treat my child as outside the covenant. I don’t want my child to be out there with the wolves. Instead, take my child in Your arms. I lay hold of your covenant promises by applying the sign of the covenant to my child.” Can you see why covenant baptism is so precious to me? As [parents] bring [child] for baptism, I want each of you to reaffirm your faith in God’s covenant by laying claim to these eleven glorious promises for your own children.