When Should My Child Be Baptized?

Sovereign Grace Family Church

1 view

March 19, 2021

00:03: Hello, welcome back to Coffee with a Calvinist.
00:07: This is a daily conversation about scripture, culture and media from a Reformed perspective.
00:15: Get your Bible and coffee ready and prepare to engage today's topic.
00:21: Here's your host, Pastor Keith Foskey.
00:24: Welcome back to Coffee with a Calvinist.
00:26: My name is Keith Foskey and I am a Calvinist.
00:30: I want to begin today's program by reminding you that we're coming up on the weekend.
00:35: Today is Friday and that means that the Lord's Day is just around the corner and we would love to invite you to visit with us at Sovereign Grace Family Church this coming Lord's Day.
00:46: You can learn more about us at sgfcjax.org.
00:50: That's Sovereign Grace Family Church of Jacksonville, sgfcjax.org.
00:57: You can learn about what we believe.
00:59: You can learn about what we teach.
01:01: You can see information about us, articles that we've written and also see the hundreds of sermons that we have online available for you to listen to.
01:11: You can go and find out about us there and if you have any questions you can even send us a message.
01:16: We would love to hear from you.
01:18: This weekend is especially important because this weekend we're going to be having a baptismal service to begin our weekly worship service.
01:30: Now we have worship every week at 1030 a.m.
01:35: at Sovereign Grace Family Church, but we obviously don't do baptisms every week.
01:40: We don't always have someone to baptize, but this week I'm going to be baptizing a young lady that I have been discipling for about four months.
01:50: She came to me at the end of last year and said that she had repented and received Christ.
01:57: We began, me and her mother and my wife and others have begun to talk to her and encourage her and through the last few months have been bringing her to where she's ready for baptism.
02:12: I wanted to talk today a little bit about that, a little bit about what we would teach in regard to baptism and how we may differ from other Reformed churches.
02:22: I know I've talked about this on the program in the past, but I want to sort of, because of what's going on this weekend, sort of talk about this on a very practical level.
02:32: Years ago I wanted to write a book entitled, When Should Little Johnny Be Baptized? Because I know the question often comes up when in regard to young people, when should they be baptized? And of course, if you're in a Presbyterian church or another church that practices infant baptism, then that question isn't really a question because you're going to baptize the child when they are an infant.
03:00: But if you are in a Baptist church, as we are, a church that holds to what is known as credo baptism, that means the baptism of believers only, we do not seek to baptize those who have not made a profession of faith, and so we baptize upon profession of faith.
03:18: If that's the type of church that you're in, you have to deal with the question of, well, what is it that you're looking for in regard to a statement of faith or a profession of faith for someone to be baptized? And from a biblical perspective, we see that there wasn't an interim of time between when someone would proclaim faith and they were baptized.
03:43: If you go through the book of Acts, we see, such as Philip and the eunuch, he said, here is water.
03:49: What prevents me from being baptized? And so they went down immediately and he was baptized.
03:55: When the apostle Peter went to the house of Cornelius, he recognized that they had been given the gift of the Holy Spirit, they had believed, and so he says, you know, what would prevent us from baptizing these who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have? So the concept of making people wait long periods of time or testing and things like that is not necessarily a biblical concept, but when it comes to smaller children, I do think there is some wisdom in at least giving them time to have some counseling regarding their profession of faith to make sure that they understand what it is that they are doing.
04:39: And so that's what I've been doing for the last few months and looking forward to seeing this come to the conclusion of baptism, which actually baptism is not a conclusion.
04:49: It's the beginning of the profession of faith publicly and moving forward with church membership.
04:55: And so there's a lot that goes into this, a lot of that goes into this conversation.
05:00: But I know this is, again, a practical question that a lot of parents have.
05:05: When should I baptize my child? And first and foremost, as a credo Baptist, as a person who believes that baptism is upon profession of faith, my first statement to any parent who is asking the question about baptizing their child is, has the child made a profession of faith or are you just assuming that they believe? And that's important because as a parent, I know that there's nothing in the world that I want more than for my children to come to know the Lord.
05:41: And that can sometimes lead to some assumptions on the part of parents.
05:47: They assume that the child is a believer because they say the right things about Jesus and they say the right things about the church and they sing in church and they participate and they say, well, they must be, little Johnny must be a believer because look at all that he's doing in church.
06:07: But yet that's the culture that they have been brought up in.
06:11: And so we have to be careful that we're not creating little cultural Christians, but that we are actually looking for evidence of regeneration.
06:21: And so that would be the first thing is that you not assume that the child is a believer.
06:26: With our children, we have five children.
06:30: As many people know, my oldest daughter, who is the only one who has been baptized, we waited for her to come to us to say that she had received Christ, that she had repented of her sins, that she was, that she wanted to be baptized.
06:46: We waited for that from her.
06:49: We did not try to impose that upon her.
06:52: In fact, if anything, we were a little shy about even wanting to talk about it because we didn't want her to feel like she was being pressured, especially as the pastor's daughter, to get up and make a profession of faith.
07:05: We wanted to make sure this is something she wanted to do.
07:08: We did not want to make it something that we made her do or even expected her to do.
07:14: We wanted it to be something that was genuinely from her own heart, that the Lord had worked on her heart, certainly by us preaching the gospel to her and sharing the word with her and bringing her up in the fear and admonition of the Lord.
07:28: Certainly that is the tools and the means God used to bring her to faith.
07:33: But again, it was not something we forced upon her.
07:38: And then when she did come and say, I think I'm ready to be baptized, there was a time of counseling where I ensured that she understood the gospel.
07:49: Of course, none of us understand perfectly everything about the gospel, but I made sure she understood the rudimentary elements of the gospel, that she understood what she was professing as faith, and that she understood that when she went before the church and was baptized, that she was making a statement about her faith in Jesus Christ to the world, that she was receiving as it is the sign of entrance into this relationship with Christ, the external sign of the relationship, certainly the internal.
08:26: The true sign of the new covenant is the regeneration in the heart of the believer, the circumcision of the heart.
08:33: The Apostle Paul says that's the sign of being part of the new covenant.
08:38: But we receive this external picture, which is a picture of regeneration.
08:44: It's a picture of what happens on the inside, which we do on the outside.
08:48: And so again, if you're talking to your children about this, if you're thinking about your children and you're concerned about them, I would say the first thing is dealing with is this something that's coming from them, not that you're imposing on them, but something that's coming out of their heart, something, certainly you would pray for it and you would hope for it, but certainly would not want to manipulate.
09:12: Children are easily manipulated into things like baptism because they want to please their parents.
09:18: And the last thing you want is the child to go forward and be baptized simply to make you happy.
09:23: That would be a very bad thing for the child, that would be a very bad thing for you, because again, you're affirming faith that may not be genuine.
09:33: And so seeking to look for the fruits of repentance, seeking to ensure that the child of whatever age recognizes that they are a sinner, recognizes that Jesus is the only Savior, and recognize that Jesus calls us to take up our cross and follow him.
09:56: These are all the things that I would want to ensure that a young person understands and that they are as best as they can prepared to affirm those things before the people of God, to be able to affirm that I'm seeking to follow Christ, I have repented of my sins, I've trusted in him, and I'm taking up my cross and I'm following him.
10:27: And that's the goal of the Christian life, and that should be, again, what is affirmed by anyone who is receiving the sign of baptism.
10:36: Now I want to close the program today by telling a story.
10:39: And if you come Sunday, you'll hear this story again, because I'm going to talk about this in service, but I thought this would be an interesting way to close the program today.
10:47: Because when it comes to young people being saved, there's obviously a lot of questions that people have.
10:57: Well, how much do they really understand? How much do they really know? And I've told the story before.
11:04: I was eight years old when I was baptized, but I was not saved.
11:09: I didn't genuinely get saved until I was 19.
11:11: And so I was baptized later in accord with my faith, so I don't hold that my eight-year-old baptism was genuine.
11:19: I say my true baptism came after my salvation, and that's when I was truly baptized by Brother Jim Dutton, and I remember it very well.
11:28: So when I think about a child, I think, yes, a child can be, but we don't want to force them.
11:35: But here's the thing, and this is the story I want to tell, and I believe it was D.L.
11:39: Moody who told this story.
11:41: And it's encouraging when it comes to children, because we should never doubt for a second that God can save a young person, that he can reach down into the heart of a child, and he can bring regeneration, repentance, and faith to the heart of a child.
12:00: And this is what D.L.
12:01: Moody said.
12:02: He said he went to a church to evangelize, to preach, and when he came back to his home church, he was asked, well, Brother Moody, did you have any success in your evangelistic endeavor? And he said, yes, two and a half souls were saved.
12:25: And they looked so confused.
12:27: Two and a half souls, what do you mean? Two adults and a child? And Moody said, no, no, no, two children and an adult.
12:40: For the children who come to Christ have a whole life to live for Christ.
12:49: But the adult who comes has but half their life left to live for Christ.
12:56: And I've always thought that's very encouraging in regard to the salvation of children.
13:02: And so if you have children in your home, and you're concerned about their salvation, pray for them.
13:07: Pray for them and preach the gospel to them, and trust God to do what only he can do, and that is bring conversion to their soul.
13:16: And when he does, ask that he make it clear to you, so that you will be able to counsel them and with your pastor, counsel them through to the receiving of baptism.
13:28: Again, this has been Coffee with a Calvinist.
13:32: My name is Keith Foskey, and I've been your Calvinist.
13:35: May God bless you.
13:36: Thank you for listening to today's episode of Coffee with a Calvinist.
13:40: If you enjoyed the program, please take a moment to subscribe and provide us feedback.
13:46: We love to receive your comments and questions and may even engage with them in a future episode.
13:53: As you go about your day, remember this, Jesus Christ came to save sinners.
13:59: All who come to him in repentance and faith will find him to be a perfect Savior.
14:05: He is the way, the truth, and the life, and no one comes to the Father except through him.
14:12: May God be with you.