Believer's Baptism (Part 2)

Welcome to Have You Not Read, a podcast seeking to answer questions from the text of Scripture for the honor of Christ and the edification of the

Saints. Before we dig into our topic, we humbly ask you to rate, review, and share the podcast.

Thank you. Welcome back to You May Have Not Read. With me is

Michael Durham, Andrew Hudson, and I'm Dylan Hamilton. We have Andrew with his book

Believers Baptism, and he's going to start off with a chapter that is particularly dense, right?

That's true. This chapter represents probably, it is the largest chapter of the book, so this is chapter number four,

Baptism and the Relationship Between the Covenants by Stephen Willem. Where we left off last time was in Baptism in the

Epistles, and I think one of the last things that we talked about was how this Baptism in the Epistles was not a third -party, hopeful, this -might -stick type of Baptism.

It was a Baptism performed by disciples upon disciples who were hope -filled themselves by the

Spirit. So going into this fourth chapter, you're immediately confronted with old, or is he talking about, so between the

Relationship Between the Covenants, is he talking about old versus new? And the answer to that is yes.

However, in Covenantal Theology, you have another type of categorical distinction.

It's really a theological category. You will not find the wording listed in Scripture as in the

Covenant of Works opposed to a Covenant of Grace. That doesn't mean that there are things that we believe and have a name for it that are not, you know, necessarily derived from the teaching of the

Scripture. One of those would be the word Trinity. I think that's a classic example. But what is the difference between the

Covenant of Works and Covenant of Grace? Michael, could you help us to understand that? Right, so these are sometimes referred to as theological covenants, meaning that these are these are terms that you would find in a systematic theology.

And the ideas that these terms express are biblical ideas observed from a variety of different passages, and they're put together in a certain way to provide something of a hermeneutic, a way of reading the

Bible. So Covenant of Works pertains to the arrangement God had with Adam and Eve in the garden when he made all things very good and gave them instructions to live by.

Somebody who holds to the Covenant of Works would find in this original state of man a live expression of God's eternal moral law, later on expressed as the

Ten Commandments. And they would see Adam and Eve abiding by these Ten Commandments, abiding by God's eternal moral law in the garden, and that he's called them to live in righteousness so as to maintain all manner of blessings and bounty that he has set before them.

And then readers of Scripture notice that even after Adam and Eve sinned and their lives are filled with separation from each other and from God and so on, sin brings death.

Nonetheless, God mercifully spares their lives and gives them coverings, animal skins for coverings, and begins to deal with them in merciful and gracious ways.

And so the interpreter will then say, well, we've moved now from the Covenant of Works where Adam failed, and now we're in the

Covenant of Grace where we have the promise from Genesis 315 about the seed of the woman, the second

Adam, the last Adam to come who will be the Redeemer. So the promise, right. And the intervening period, a period of forbearance.

Yes, and so the Covenant of Grace, they would say, pertains to everything past the fall all the way through all the different covenants.

So if you're reading about the covenant of Noah with Noah, or the covenant with Abraham, or with Israel, or with David, or the new covenant in Christ, any one of those covenants, which we would call biblical covenants, meaning that you find those covenants expressed in passages in the

Bible, those would all be subsumed under the theological term, the

Covenant of Grace. Okay, so you're using that theological term, or the proponents of this are using that theological term to draw a circle around these biblically derived covenants.

Yeah, and they'd say that each one of those biblically expressed covenants is an expression of the Covenant of Grace in a variety of ways, some of them kind of in the shadow, and then of course the new covenant being, you know, the

Covenant of Grace in, you know, in its high noon full majesty. Okay, now a lot has said about the continuity and discontinuity of the covenants.

Is that expressed in old versus new, or how is that expressed in Covenant of Works versus Covenant of Grace as far as, there's a lot going on in these two differing types of terms here.

Yes, that's a good observation. So when we think about continuity versus discontinuity, this is usually a question not between Covenant of Works and Covenant of Grace, which are theological terms, but between the old covenant and the new covenant, or the first covenant and the second covenant as Hebrews expresses it.

And depending on your reading of the text, many would say that the old covenant prefers only to the covenant that God made with Israel at Mount Sinai, and that there is a clear discontinuity between that covenant and the new covenant in that Christ is fulfilling the sacrificial laws and so on and so forth, and you see a real big change with Christ as our

High Priest as Hebrews talks about it. Others would see covenants that God made with Noah and Abraham and Moses and David all as expressions of that old covenant, that they are sometimes referred to in the

New Testament as the covenants, plural. Sometimes they're referred to as the old covenant. Sometimes in the contrast that Paul will make between the old covenant and the new covenant, he'll talk about the old covenant in terms of circumcision, or he'll talk about it in terms of sacrifices.

So it depends on who you're reading, but the main question about continuity -discontinuity is how much has changed?

And if so, what? Sure, so what of the old is of the old and what of the new is new?

Yes, how big of a change are we talking? Okay. And so those on the far end of discontinuity say, well, you know, everything's changed and there's not much relating the two.

And then somebody on the other side is saying, well, it's not really an old covenant and a new covenant.

It's simply an older administration and a newer administration of the same covenant of grace. So you can kind of hear how they're maximizing continuity.

They're not saying that nothing has changed, but they're trying to maximize the continuity. I think one way that I found helpful to talk about this,

John Reisinger was famous for saying that there is perfect continuity between the

Old Testament and the New Testament. And what is he referring to there? He's talking about promise and fulfillment, perfect harmony, perfect agreement.

And then he says there's perfect discontinuity between the old covenant and the new covenant. So he's playing with those terms,

Testament, right? In the Bible and covenant, which of course are talked about in the

Bible. But what he's trying to point out there is in the promise and fulfillment, there's perfect harmony, but a lot of things have changed.

So that's what folks are trying to figure out. And it pertains, therefore, to the question about baptism.

Right. That's the reason why I believe Stephen Wellam introduced to the readers these concepts initially, is because these concepts have implications if you affirm or deny covenantal theology.

Yes. If you affirm covenantal theology, it leads to things like, specifically, the question that was asked that led us down this, is infant baptism biblical?

So the implication is that household members of the newer administration of the covenant of grace would receive a sign that they are under that covenant.

Just like in previous covenants, there was a sign or a seal of members of that covenant.

Why is that such a big deal to understanding how that inference from covenant of grace and works leading toward household infant baptism, without the testimony of faith, how does that come into biblical category for someone who's reading the

New Testament and they see all of what's happening in the book of Acts, that people are being born again and yet there are plausibly members of a household that are not of believing age?

Yeah, so I think one of the one of the main concerns for somebody who ascribes to baptizing infants, a paedo -baptist who is trying to work out consistently their covenantal theology, is that in the old covenant even the children were part of the covenant and it was the responsibility of the parents to see that the male infants were circumcised and therefore taking upon the sign of the covenant and that their daughters would marry those who were circumcised and not be given away to foreigners outside the covenant.

So the covenant that you're referring to right now is the Abrahamic covenant as we see in like in Genesis 17 you're talking about circumcising members of the household?

Yes and and then it's important I think to see how the the covenant God makes with Israel at Sinai builds very strongly upon the matrix that he laid out with Abraham so that the two is very difficult to separate one from the other, especially when you begin to read the instructions that God gives to Moses and all the

Israelites about circumcision given in the Sinaitic covenant and so there was great concern that they circumcised their children as God commanded them and this was very very important.

So the concern is that when you come to the new covenant we instinctively know as Christians that the new covenant is bigger, better, brighter and so the argument very often comes down to simply this, well if the old covenant is lesser and the new covenant is greater, then it doesn't make sense to eliminate the children from the covenant because that wouldn't be going to the greater, that would be making the new covenant the lesser.

Exactly. And that is very often a concern for those who are trying to be consistent with their covenant theology.

Another reason is that given the importance of circumcising children and coming into the new covenant passages that talk about the promise of forgiveness, the promise of salvation, the promise of the new covenant is for you and for your children as we read in Acts and so forth, they would see that there's no instructions that they can find that says, oh and by the way, even though you have heard it said of old, circumcise your children, but I say to you, don't baptize your children until they profess faith.

And they don't see any of that argument specifically. So after reading this section, in fact, the covenant theologians or those who advocate for paedobaptism would definitely say they would need a scriptural prohibition from doing so because of the necessary implication or that which was derived from the reading of the scriptures.

The idea is that the early church being made up of so many Jews right there at the very beginning, that they wouldn't have any other thought other than the fact that their children would be right in the new covenant with them just as it was in the old.

And so that is an argument for continuity saying, you know, this is just going to be a one -to -one connection.

I would say that there are passages in the New Testament that direct the believers expectations even as Jews away from such an idea, even back as far as John the

Baptist preaching and say, you know, don't say to me that you're Abraham's children. God can raise up children from these stones.

So there's a systematic downplaying of the genealogical aspect.

Physical lineage. Yes, in the preaching of the new covenant. Okay, now I'm gonna go ahead and read from Jeremiah 31.

So I'm gonna begin in verse 31. Behold, the days are coming, says the

Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers and the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt.

My covenant, which they broke, though I was a husband to them, says the Lord. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the

Lord. I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts and I will be their God and they shall be my people.

No more shall every man teach his neighbor and every man his brother, saying, know the Lord, for they shall all know me from the least of them to the greatest of them, says the

Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity and their sin I will remember no more.

Is that of the same type of character that we see with those who are of that covenant?

That they would, from the least to the greatest, know them. Is that consistent with a continuity of the covenant of grace or a discontinuous idea from an older to a newer administration?

Yeah, so what's the big difference, right? What's the big change? And so when

God says he's gonna make a new covenant, the way that he emphasizes the difference is that it's not going to be like when he brought them up, brought them up out of Egypt and forged this covenant with them at Mount Sinai, says there's gonna be a new thing.

Before it was required that all of Israel be faithful and compel one another to fear

God, to know God and to fear him, because the covenant blessings and cursings

God promised were dependent upon Israel as a whole. How well did they keep covenant or how much did they break covenant?

Later on, the the performance of the nation was consolidated into the consideration of one, the king.

When God made his covenant with David, he began to talk about the promises to David's son, his heirs, and he talked about the king the way he used to talk about the whole nation, and it was all gonna be riding on him.

And so in this case, God says in the new covenant, now all of them, from the least to the greatest, is a way of talking about all of them.

All of them are forgiven of their iniquities. All of them are forgiven of their sins.

All of them know God because his word, his law, his instruction that the wise man meditates on day and night, so that he flourishes as a tree, you know, not like dead chaff, but he's really really genuinely alive because the word is in his heart, that's going to be characterizing all those who are in this new covenant.

And that makes a big difference. In the old covenant, you can have all sorts of members of the old covenant who were not born again, regenerate, alive from the inside out, who knew the

Lord. You certainly had some of those. You certainly did, and God's grace was operative there, the

Holy Spirit was active there. However, the difference in the new covenant is every single last one of them, from the least to the greatest, are going to be completely his.

And so those who baptize infants would say that there is a difference between being a child of the covenant and someone who has had their sins forgiven, a saved child of God.

But this reading of the text doesn't support that. Right, so there's not a category given in this passage or in the passage, this is quoted in full as the longest

Old Testament quotation in the New Testament. It's quoted in full in the book of Hebrews, and we are not given a category anywhere that says you can be a member of the new covenant and have yet to have your sins forgiven, yet to have your heart renewed, yet to know the

Lord. There's no category of an unregenerate new covenant member that we can find.

Well then what about the passages in Hebrews chapter 6, warning those against apostasy?

Now I would, if I were to say, to take up the other side of this argument, I would say well this is obviously pointing me towards people who are part of the community that lacked faith or went back on their faith.

Yep. There's a couple of ways that people have thought about this chapter, Hebrews 6 and Hebrews 10 and so on.

And one of the ways is that the warnings themselves are a means of grace for the perseverance of the

Saints. This is not talking about the genuine possibility, but this is a warning to the

Saints that actually ensures their perseverance. A surprising number of interpreters throughout church history have taken it that way.

I also think it's compelling when reading Hebrews 6, the terms being used.

So when we read in Hebrews chapter 6 and verse 4, it says, Now when we read that, first of all, some of those terms like, well that's, these are descriptions of Christians.

Now they can certainly be used to describe Christians, but these are not terms that are exclusive to Christians.

In other words, people can have positive spiritual experiences being around the

Saints who are filled with the Spirit and see the realities of the new covenant and Christ's kingdom.

And in other words, have their socks blessed and yet at some point walk away as the seed that was sown on shallow soil or the seed sown in thorny soil as Christ once told us.

Now why is it that if they fall away, it's impossible to renew them again to repentance? Well again, think of the context, the writing to the

Hebrews. So what he's warning his audience, he's warning them from going back to the

Old Covenant. Consider the superiority of Christ in the New Covenant. Don't go back to the Old Covenant. If you do, what's going on in verse 6?

He says, if they fall away, meaning if they go back to the Old Covenant who are actively rejecting, what are they doing?

They're joining, they are giving an amen to those who crucified the

Son of God and put him to an open shame. They crucify again for themselves, meaning... Calling him a liar.

Yeah, in themselves and of themselves, they give a hearty amen to all of those who said crucify him.

So what Savior do they have if they reject Christ? Well, there's only one mediator between God and man, the man

Christ Jesus. Now as we keep on reading though, we read the following, for the earth which drinks in the rain that often comes upon it and bears herbs useful for those by whom it is cultivated receives blessing from God, but if it bears thorns and briars it is rejected and near to being cursed whose end is to be burned.

So there's two different types of soil. Now we've heard that before in a parable somewhere. Okay, but verse 9 says this, but beloved we are confident of better things concerning you, yes things that accompany salvation though we speak in this manner.

In other words, the stuff that he's just talked about, he is confident of things far better than those things concerning those to whom he's writing, things that actually accompany salvation.

So in other words, here's the case of people who have tasted this and tasted that and experienced this and yet return and end up giving the amen to the crucifixion of Jesus, but however we're confident of better things concerning you, things that actually accompany salvation.

To me that's more compelling reading of the text. I would say that if you hold to an idea of there being unregenerate members of a new covenant, then you would read this passage with that hermeneutic and it would fit nicely, but this passage doesn't actually teach that hermeneutic.

Right, that would have to be imported into the reading of this, specifically this passage. And that's why they talk about how this baptism is not some type of magical, and I know we talked about it previously, it's not some type of magical wand, the waters didn't do something magical.

However, it's also not regenerative in and of itself and nor is it presumptively regenerate, and that's why you know this category of the covenant community really comes into play and that's where they see it in this text as well.

All right, so moving on from that, the blessings and cursing. So I think you could probably go to what

Hebrews 10 and for another warning. Yeah, Hebrews 10 verse 26.

Yes. Then, for if we sin willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins but a certain fearful expectation of judgment and fiery indignation which will devour the adversaries.

So in that context, the blessings and cursings that are part of a covenant, is this a demonstration of what would be consistent with the cursings of the

New Testament? Well, I think when God spoke to Abraham in Genesis chapter 12, he said that those who bless him and his seed will be blessed, those who curse him will be cursed.

And Paul in Galatians says the promises were to Abraham and to his seed who is

Christ. We find that to be true in the New Testament, that those who are in Christ are blessed, those who bless

Christ are blessed, and those who curse Christ are cursed. We see that in spades in the

New Testament. And in the blessings and cursings listed in terms of the covenant

God made with Israel in Deuteronomy, right, and in Leviticus, God was saying that if Israel was faithful, a faithful son, they would be blessed.

If they were an unfaithful son, they would be cursed. Now, when we come to the

New Testament, everything that the New Testament says about Christ, the

Old Testament said about Israel. So, here is a faithful son who does everything the

Father says for him to do, and he is greatly blessed, and so all who are in him. Though he bears our curse, those for whom he dies, he bears their curse, and all those who remain outside of him, they are cursed by God.

But what is the nature of that? It's blessing and then judgment or salvation and judgment.

Those who are outside of Christ, outside of the faithful son, who do not have his blessed merits speaking for them, obviously they're under the judgment of God.

Those who are in Christ are blessed and receive all of the blessings that he earned by his own righteousness.

So, the template that God put into place, the picture, the type that God put into place with Israel is fulfilled in Christ.

So, the question really just comes down to, are you in Christ or are you out of Christ? Okay, so moving into the in versus out, in Romans chapter 4,

I'll start at verse 9, does this blessedness then come upon the circumcised only or upon the uncircumcised also?

For we say that faith was accounted to Abraham for righteousness. How then was it accounted?

While he was circumcised or uncircumcised. Not while circumcised, but while uncircumcised. And he received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had while still uncircumcised, that he might be the father of all those who believe, though they are uncircumcised, that righteousness might be imputed to them also, and the father of circumcision and the father of circumcision to those who not only are of the circumcision, but who also walk in the steps of the faith which our father

Abraham had while still uncircumcised. So, we have consistently maintained that this being part of, united to, in Christ is a matter of faith.

Abraham was faithful. I'm gonna go back to this covenant with Abraham because it comes up so much.

He was faithful. He did as his faith led him.

He believed God, right? But it also manifested in objective signs.

Their circumcision was one of those signs that we see objectively, his faithfulness as he was commanded.

How does that relate to the New Covenant then? Is there no sign of the New Covenant? So, when we see what happened with Abraham, he believed and it was accounted to him for righteousness, that's

Genesis 15 6, and then he was circumcised, well that's

Genesis 17. So, after he believed and was justified by faith, then this sign was given to him afterwards.

And so, we see that this clarifies that the promise, the eternal plan of God, that he had been promising salvation from the days in the garden, that this promise of salvation that he kept on talking about in new ways, either to Noah or Abraham or Israel or David and so on, this promise of salvation to come that he gave to Abraham, Abraham believed and thus he was justified by faith, not by works, not by taking a sign.

And so, when we come to the New Covenant, what relationship does this have to the New Covenant? Right. That, is there no sign of the

New Covenant? Right. What about those who believe and are united to Christ by faith?

By faith, just like Abraham. Exactly. So, what is, well Abraham, when

Abraham believed, I think some people will confuse, conflate the work of the Spirit, when

Abraham believed, did he believe of his own merits, his own accord, his own abilities? No. We understand biblically that the only people who believe are those who are given that by the

Holy Spirit, their hearts are regenerated by the Holy Spirit. So, the regeneration of hearts is not the sign of the

Holy Spirit, but the difference between the Old Covenant and the New Covenant that we see in Acts chapter 2 moving forward, the

Spirit of God filled the tabernacle in the Old Testament, he filled the temple in the Old Testament, and occasionally we see the

Spirit coming upon certain servants who were anointed for various special works, people like prophets and priests and kings.

But now Christ as Messiah, whose prophet, priest, and king has sent forth his Holy Spirit to indwell, to fill all of the members of the

New Covenant who are now called the temple, the living stones of the temple. And this is why the

Spirit's indwelling is the sign of the New Covenant. Well, the Spirit himself, he's called a sign, he's called a seal, he's pointed to as the significance of, hey, you'll know it's the

New Covenant when the Holy Spirit comes. That's what Peter said to the critics on the day of Pentecost, you know, you think these guys are drunk.

No, actually this is what Joel prophesied about the New Covenant, that the Spirit would show up in this way, and he has.

So that that would be like the visible people of God, those that were demonstrably born again.

Yes. So, well, born again, again, so Jesus says to Nicodemus, you must be born again, and then he uses language from Ezekiel and so on, and he's like, you're the teacher of Israel, you don't know this, you know, this is how you see the kingdom of God, is that you have to be born again.

And the fact of the matter is, that was true, the need to be born again was true whether you're in the

Old Covenant or in the New. That's the same. I mean, Moses talked about, you know, what you all need is have your heart circumcised.

You know, the problem is that internally you're wrong, you know, you're not right with God on the inside, and we have lots of language like that in the

Old Testament. The difference in the New Covenant is that now the Holy Spirit actually indwells the people of God, which is what

Jeremiah was talking about. Now, not only all the members of the Covenant now are born again, that's a change, that all members are born again, not just some.

But that even this, that you have the law of God, the instructions of God, God himself having his words written on your heart so that you know

God directly. You're not being told to know God. How is this? This is the ministry of the

Holy Spirit. How did Jesus talk about the ministry of the Holy Spirit as another comforter who would bring to mind all the things that I have taught you?

You don't need a teacher, you have an anointing which is from God. These are the expressions that we have about the

Holy Spirit which makes a vast difference between the new and the old. And this is the sign that accompanies the

New Covenant. So why are these distinctions such a big deal between Baptists, Credo Baptists, and Paedo Baptists?

Is there really something that separates the two as to why does this even matter?

Why do we keep asking this question about, is Paedo Baptism correct? Is it biblical? Or is it

Credo Baptism? Who has the right answer here? Yeah, and it's not really about how much we love our children, you know.

And it's not really about how serious we take church, you know. Sometimes the conversation's got to go that direction.

It's not about how serious we take ordinances. Or sacraments. Or sacraments, you know.

How do we talk about those? It's not really about those topics. It's really about hermeneutics.

It's about the way we interpret the Bible. How do we understand the story? How do we see that story progress?

What changes have come about because of the life, death, and resurrection, and ascension of Jesus? That's why there are these differences.

So if we have, for instance, it makes a big difference. If you have a framework given to you by a treasured confession such as the

Westminster or even the 1689 Second Lenten Baptist Confession. If you're given a framework of covenantal theology and then you begin to read your

Bible with that framework in your mind, then you're going to say, ah, this is how it all fits together, right?

And we all need to recognize that we come to the Bible with some kind of hermeneutics, some sort of connective matrix in our mind about how this all fits together.

None of us come like with a blank slate when we do that. So we just have to recognize that the differences are hermeneutical.

And so if I come expecting to find there to be a covenant of works and a covenant of grace and an overarching covenant of redemption, then

I'll find it, because I know it's there. You see what I mean? Yeah. Or if I come to the text and say,

I'm going to find a progression of covenants from the garden all the way through Christ, as Stephen Wellham does in his many works, you're definitely going to be seeing that.

The question is, which hermeneutic can be best supported by the scriptures themselves?

And so we have to always call into question our creeds and confessions and see whether or not they're being consistent.

So I guess in the final estimation of all things, I think we would both agree, the covenantal theologians and non.

Michael, who does need to submit to the gospel? Well, everybody. What is it that they need to submit to?

Jesus said, if anybody wants to come after me, he must deny himself, take up his cross and follow me. And so that means everything.

It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me, Paul says. So the person and work of Christ must be all -encompassing.

You know, I'm still me when God saves me, but it's not me anymore. That's the language of the

Bible. It's something of a mystery, but it's true that I'm still who

God made me to be, but in Christ, his glory eclipses everything else.

So I'm to be entirely about him. So everything has to be submitted to him because of who he is in all of his glory,

King of Kings and Lord of Lords, as my righteousness before God, my only reason why

I am a child of God through his adoption, because of his satisfying the wrath of God upon the cross, propitiating the wrath of God, and then expiating my guilt, taking my guilt away into his tomb, into his death as far as the

East is from the West, and his resurrection from the dead, so that I may have eternal life with him eternally at the right hand of the

Father, interceding on my behalf, and coming again to raise the dead and set all things right.

So because of who he is, everything about me has to be submitted to him. Thank you for that, Michael.

I'm gonna wrap it up there, and the reason why I was introduced to this book, it really had to do with, is this biblical baptism?

Is is credo baptism biblical? And I came away, I'm a little bit of a spoiler,

I know we're not through with the book, but I came away reading this with a reminder that all things need to be submitted, and that I need to come to the text willing to submit, and to follow

Christ wherever he goes. So I thank my dear elder who recommended this book for me, to me, to help me with that, and it's been very enlightening using this book as a jumping -off point to get involved into the text of Scripture on specific topic like baptism.

So I'm also very grateful for the opportunity to answer the baptism question whenever it comes to credo versus pedo.

So just wanted to say that before we wrap this up. A couple of clarifying questions from someone who hasn't read the book, and both of you have.

In light of this book, Believer's Baptism, I don't think it's gonna hurt us to say it over and over since we're recommending it.

In light of Believer's Baptism, you have a child who professes belief. How would you explain the importance and meaning of baptism?

Having gone through this book, has it colored it differently now for you, or is it is it the same? Have you landed in the same area, or would you explain it a different way to them now?

You know, maybe it has. In just telling them the truth of the good news of the gospel, the kingdom, if they believe, and I really don't know of a reason to withhold baptism from them because of this book.

I'm convinced that I can't know if someone is truly elect, and I'll put those in air quotes,

I know you can't see, but I can be faithful. I can be faithful to the word. I can be faithful to Christ to tell the truth about who

Christ is and what he's done, and it's a work of the Spirit. It's entirely a work of the

Spirit. My role in telling them the good news has basically ended there, and if there's a demonstration or an affirmation or an amen to that, baptize them.

I mean, if you have a child who suddenly seems to have just a great awareness of the fact that Jesus Christ is

King, and he's King because of who he is and what he did, and they have an idea of what that means, and they're happy about it.

They're all for it, and they see themselves as in need of that forgiveness, and so on and so forth.

You know, it's one of those things where they're affirming the truth of the gospel in their own way.

I mean, they're not going to be systematic theologians about it, but they're affirming it in their own way. It's the idea of, you know, here we have a new loyal citizen of King Jesus, subject of King Jesus, who is rejoicing in his authority.

You know, put on the royal regalia, give them banners to fly, let them blow a trumpet, and everybody who is loyal to Jesus also rejoices with them.

I mean, that's like your baptism. And then, as often as we gather to feast at the King's table, yeah, hey, here's your spot, right?

And they grow in that, and their understanding of that will become all the more cherished. Yeah, our dear brother

Ken delivered a homily on, I think, either a Wednesday or a Sunday night talking about sanctification, and it's gonna look differently for different people.

One, but you know, if the idea is maturity, children are not at the same maturity as adults are, right?

So, the things of maturity or sanctification are going to look different for children than they are for adults.

You know, I don't, I'm obeying my father and mother in a different capacity now as an adult as I, than I was whenever I was a child.

So, there are ramifications to a child professing faith which is different than an adult.

It's not gonna be the same thing. And I would say there's a difference between, like, in my illustration about, you know, this child actually is rejoicing in the kingship of Jesus, you know.

So, now, an infant can't do that. Now, it's a precious thing to see mother and father and the attendant family, like, thanking

King Jesus for the life of this child, and rejoicing, and even wrapping the child up in the garb of the king.

That's a precious thing to see, but that's not what we're given in the instructions in the

Scriptures about baptism. This individual needs to be professing and rejoicing themselves, somebody who really does believe.

So, there's no coattailing of the faith of their parents. Right, yeah. So, I'm not saying that infant baptism isn't something filled with Christian faith and joy, and sincerity, and so on, because it could be a very precious thing to look at.

I just think it's out of order. As much as I think it's out of order for, you know, a seven -year -old to come to faith in Christ, and unfortunately they're part of a covenantal reformed

Baptist Church who says you can't be baptized until after you're 12 years old. I think that's out of order, too.

Right, I think that if they profess Christ, they need to be baptized.

One last thing, we can kind of make this quick, but would you, having read the book, would you say that there's anything missing, or is there areas that you would have had covered better, or emphasis that you would have liked to have seen?

You know, honestly, because the editors of this book took the approach of an anthology, it's pretty well -rounded.

That's not to say that this book is perfect. No, I wouldn't say that.

In fact, there's an area that I sincerely disagree with the author of this chapter, but it's not something that I would say is a reason not to enjoy reading through this book.

Okay. Yeah, I think, I don't know how Stephen Whelan was given this much space compared to some of the other chapters, but they obviously said just run with it, brother, and he did, you know, but there was a lot of material to cover, to survey in a short amount of time regarding this particular question, so you could tell that a lot of effort was put into it, and I'm, you know, same with Andrew.

There are things about his way of interpreting it, interpreting the covenants, and so on, that I'm not exactly 100 % with him on it, but I understand exactly where he's coming from, and again,

I think what he's trying to affirm is something that all true believers truly desire, that we want our beliefs to be fully reflective and a true genuine

Amen of what the Bible is saying. Amen. Well, I think that about wraps up this portion of that book.

We'll be back to finish it up at some point, right? Soon. Okay, soon, but we can go ahead and move on to what content we'd recommend for this week.

Michael, we'll start with you. Okay, there's a book by Stephen Nichols, For Us and For Our Salvation, and the

Doctrine of Christ and the Early Church. This was given to me on the occasion of my ordination to the ministry, let's see, when is this,

November 11th 2007, so it's been a little while, but this is a really, it's a good book.

It's not, I mean, some of the concepts are a little bit thick, you know, because we're talking about a very important mystery and doctrine of the

Incarnation, but it's it's a survey of how the doctrine of Christ became all the more clear through the various false teachings that threatened the witness of the

Scriptures about who Christ is, and he's fully God and fully man, and so reading that gave me a deep appreciation for that doctrine.

So again, it's by Stephen Nichols, For Us and For Our Salvation. Andrew? Well, I think you know what

I've been reading and rereading. Like I said last time, I'm also a college or university student, so really focused on that.

However, there are times that I see things in the curriculum that I'm being taught, like rules of logic and even in logical fallacies and informal logic.

If you haven't taken the time to study a little bit of formal logic to try to see when someone has a fallacious conclusion, that's very helpful whenever you want to speak to someone, whether it's apologetics or evangelism or just in your daily life when someone's trying to sell you something, and you're like, you know what, that didn't make sense, so maybe check out just a little bit about formal logic.

You have anywhere specific that you would recommend on that? You know, I get in trouble all the time for recommending Wikipedia, but it would be a good place to jump from.

Logic is not something that's cherished. Well, it is.

It's cherished by a smaller and smaller sector of society, and I know that one of the problems with recommending a site like Wikipedia is that it is really open to editing from those who want to try to hide the truth that God has put into his reality, right?

Like his creation, what we call our reality, he has made in a way that's fully consistent, and those laws of logic help what we use to describe some of those things that we see as conclusive, real, and factual.

Okay, well I've been thinking about children's literature quite a bit recently, and one that I continue to go back to, and my kids continue to go back to in our home, is

Sir Batelot and the Cranky Dinky Dragon by Rachel Jankovich, and it's illustrated by Forrest Whitaker.

The illustrations have them enthralled each time, and the text has me wanting to come back to it.

I'm sure you guys have dealt with the issue of a book that might look good, but you do not care to read it, so that might go to the closet with the other ones that are piled up back there.

Yeah. But this is one of those where I feel like I can pick it up, I enjoy the language, I enjoy the meter and rhyme, and I can handle that over and over again, and not feel like it's just being that noise in the back of my head all day long, and be annoyed by it.

So my boys pick that one up quite a bit, and I'm okay with that. So I'm I'm recommending Sir Batelot and the

Cranky Dinky Dragon. Isn't it that interesting that just some of the aspects of beauty that you're talking about, we intuitively know these things.

It's like it seeps down into you. It's hard to describe. Well, it's order. We enjoy order.

When we see order, it's pleasing, and form and order are pleasing to us. It has a lot to do with, like, when you see characters in, like, the dragon is not a beautiful character, right?

And so when you look at that character, you kind of go, yeah, I wouldn't want to be around that guy.

And when he's disordered, and he brings about disorder, that's when the stress is entered into the story.

And anytime, like now, in our country, when the stress is entered into the story, what's produced?

But ugliness. And we struggle hard with that, and we struggle hard on how to quantify that, and explain that.

But I would say, when you're talking about rhyme and meter, especially, specifically with the language, the more you can constrict yourself as a writer, the more order you bring to it, and the more beauty you can actually extract.

And it's a harder work to do, but the more beauty you can extract and distill down into your work. You know, that's interesting, because engineering talks about constraints as being a way to bring about creativity.

Well, I always bring it back to baseball. You have two white lines, you have bases, and you have a fence.

Those are constraints. And when you see people out there who are at the top, top levels, that is artistry.

That is beauty. And some of the things that you witness on a baseball field seem to defy those laws of logic you were talking about.

They seem to defy certain physics, but when they're done, and you watch it over and over again, you realize how many times that guy might have had to do that before in order to display that beauty.

That's artisanry right there. Yeah, yeah. Well, since we are done recommending things, what are we thankful for this week?

I am thankful for the children and the families of our church. I had the opportunity last night to do a special lesson for our fourth, fifth, and sixth graders, and with their families and so on.

And it was a good time talking to them about love and how to love one another in the church. So I'm thankful for the parents who are laboring, you know, for the good of their children week in and week out, and for the opportunity to help shepherd and come alongside in those ways.

So I'm just thankful for that. Amen. Andrew? I'm thankful for money that seems to go twice as far than what you thought you were gonna get for it.

So when you exchange value with someone, and you have a quoted price, and they end up doing what you thought would be about like twice the amount of work for what it cost you, that's a that's a really big blessing.

I'm thankful to God for just a kindness, a favor, in this age of inflation or hyperinflation.

It's a rare thing. It's a rare thing for someone to do an honest work and to leave you with more value than what you you thought that you paid for.

You know, it's just it's a big blessing. I'd say it's also a blessing to even be able to recognize it. Sometimes we've all experienced doing good work for somebody, and they thought that they needed more out of out of what you gave them.

And I would say as Christians we can we can rightly recognize and weigh these things and say

I got I got a lot out of that. Like out of that that bill I just get handed that man, he gave me a lot more than what

I expected for it. Yeah, like how often are you grateful to be able to pay someone to do such a great job? Yeah.

You know, like that's a blessing. That means something more about the things that are happening around you are just sometimes they're better than what you would wildly expect.

Amen. I'm thankful for the how would

I put this the enjoyment of good taste and knowing that that is a good thing with when it comes to like food.

I've been thinking about this recently like just the amount of blessing that God gives to us at a table and not just because we think we think about it as just sustenance right or we think about it as the thing that is getting me to the next thing but it should be a celebration of man everything that has at this table he has brought this to me from far and wide stuff that I could not

I could I I've tried to grow these things before or I've tried to husband this thing before and I failed multiple times but some somehow he has brought it to my table and he's done it in such a beautiful way to where he's allowed me to have spices from all over the world seasonings from all around the world and then placed it in one plate and I can give that to my children and and my wife and she can she can bring it to me at my seat it's it's a wonderful and beautiful thing for just things that are just so simple but takes so many things to bring together and it's all the work of our