An article by and his Jewish listeners are cut to the heart, asking, “What shall we do?” (v. 37). Peter responds in Acts 2:38-39:
Repent and let each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is for you and your children, and for all who are far off, as many as the Lord our God shall call to Himself (Acts 2:38-39).
The argument for infant baptism is found in Peter’s declaration that “the promise is for you and your children”—not just you, but you and your children. According to paedobaptists, the promise that Peter refers to in Acts 2:38-39 is the same promise that God made to Abraham and his descendants in Genesis 17:1-8. As Robert Booth explains:
This was a promise that [the Jews] would have heard of and talked about many times. Since they were now entering the new covenant era of the church, the question of their children’s relationship to the church would naturally have been on their minds. Being a Jew, Peter was certainly aware of their concern and immediately moved to address the issue. He assured them that the promise was still for them and their children.
Therefore, writes Booth, “If the children of believers are embraced by the promises of the covenant, as certainly they are, then they must also be entitled to receive the initial sign of the covenant, which is baptism.”
To evaluate this argument from Acts 2:39, it is helpful to consider three basic questions: What is the promise?; Who were the recipients of the promise?; and Who was baptized?
What Is the Promise?
In Acts 2:39, Peter says that “the promise” is for his hearers, for their children, and for all who are far off, as many as the Lord calls to Himself. Even though Peter does not specify the content of the promise here in this verse, his meaning was clear to his original hearers, for he had already referred to this promise several times in the earlier part of his sermon: (a) “I [God] will pour forth My Spirit” (v. 17); (b) “the promise of the Holy Spirit” (v. 33); and (c) “you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit” (v. 38). This promise is the gift of the Holy Spirit and the salvation that accompanies Him.
This understanding of the promise is further supported by Luke 24:49 and Acts 1:4. In Luke 24:49, Jesus speaks of the coming Holy Spirit, saying, “And behold, I am sending forth the promise of My Father upon you; but you are to stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high.” Then, just before His ascension, Jesus commands His disciples “not to leave Jerusalem, but to wait for what the Father had promised” (Acts 1:4), a clear reference to the Holy Spirit.
But upon whom exactly will He pour out the Holy Spirit? To whom has He made this promise? This leads to the second question.
Who Are the Recipients of the Promise?
In Acts 2:39, Peter identifies three groups of individuals who are the recipients of this promise: (a) “you,” (b) “your children,” and (c) “all who are far off.” But Peter doesn’t stop there. Instead, he qualifies all three groups with the clause, “as many as the Lord our God shall call to Himself.” In other words, to how many of you has God promised the Holy Spirit? As many as the Lord shall call to Himself! To how many of your children has God promised the Holy Spirit? As many as the Lord shall call to Himself! To how many of those who are far off has God promised the Holy Spirit? As many as the Lord shall call to Himself! God has promised to give the Holy Spirit to those whom He effectually calls and draws to Himself in salvation. This includes Peter’s immediate hearers (“you”), succeeding generations (“your children”), and even Gentiles in distant places (“all who are far off”).
The Greek words translated “as many as” (hosos an) in Acts 2:39 qualify and limit the recipients of the promise to those whom God calls to Himself in salvation. Their use in Mark 6:56 is similar:
And wherever He entered villages, or cities, or countryside, they were laying the sick in the market places, and entreating Him that they might just touch the fringe of His cloak; and as many as [hosos an] touched it were being cured (Mark 6:56).
Not everyone was cured—only those who touched the cloak. Likewise, in Acts 2:39, not everyone is a recipient of the promise—only those whom God effectually calls to Himself. This is clear from verse 38 as well, for only those who repent in response to the gospel will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
Therefore, in the very passage that paedobaptists hold up as an express indication of continuity, there is an express indication of discontinuity. After all, the promise is not for all of your children without exception (like the Abrahamic promise), but rather only for those whom the Lord calls to Himself in salvation.
As Paul Jewett notes, the paedobaptist ear appears to be so attuned to the Old Testament echo (“you and your children”) that it is deaf to its New Testament crescendo (“and for all who are far off, as many as the Lord our God shall call to Himself”). In fact, most of the time that paedobaptists quote Acts 2:39 as an argument for infant baptism, they leave off the final clause—”as many as the Lord our God shall call to Himself.”
In no way, then, does Peter single out the children of believers as recipients of the promise apart from the effectual calling of God, and in no way does he identify them as automatic members of the New Covenant and therefore rightful recipients of baptism as the sign of that covenant. What then, if anything, does this passage indicate about the recipients of baptism? This leads to the third question.
Who Was Baptized?
After his declaration in Acts 2:39, Peter continues by exhorting the people of Israel to repent and be saved (Acts 2:40), and “those who had received his word were baptized; and that day there were added about three thousand souls” (Acts 2:41). What strikes me here is Luke’s description of those who were baptized: “those who had received his word.” Not “those who had received his word and their children“—just “those who had received his word.” Period. Only those who repented in response to the gospel were baptized.
In the end, the corresponding parallel that paedobaptists are looking for between Genesis 17 and Acts 2 is simply not there. Consider the differences: In Genesis 17, the covenant is “between Me and you and your descendants after you” without qualification (v. 10); but in Acts 2, the promise is for you and your children, but only for as many of you and your children as the Lord shall call to Himself (v. 39). In Genesis 17, the eight-day-old males are to be circumcised (v. 12); but in Acts 2, only those who repent are commanded to be baptized (v. 38). In Genesis 17, infants are circumcised; but in Acts 2, only those who received Peter’s word are baptized (v. 41). The account in Acts 2 actually provides better support for believer baptism than it does for infant baptism.
[This article was adapted from Matt Waymeyer, A Biblical Critique of Infant Baptism (The Woodlands, Tex: Kress Christian Publications, 2008).]
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In a related article Matt Waymeyer writes:
In paedobaptist teaching, baptism is seen as a mark of divine ownership, a sign and seal given to those who are God’s own possession. When an infant is baptized, not only does he enter God’s covenant family, but “his parents declare that their child belongs to God” (Daniel Doriani). In this way, baptism is considered a sign of initiation by which an infant is received into the church and “reckoned among God’s children” (John Calvin). As John Murray writes, infants who are baptized “are to be received as the children of God and treated accordingly.”
This idea that children of believers are automatically children of God provides part of the rationale for infant baptism. According to one paedobaptist, “The children of Christians are no less the sons of God than the parents, just as in the Old Testament,” and since “they are sons of God, who will forbid them baptism?” In this view, just as “the adoption of sons” belonged to infants in Old Testament Israel (Rom 9:4), it now belongs to infants in the New Testament Church, and therefore the latter should be baptized just as the former were circumcised. Although it is true that baptism is a mark of divine ownership which should be given to those who are children of God, the practice of baptizing infants betrays a misunderstanding of the doctrine of divine adoption. Specifically, it ignores a significant point of discontinuity between corporate adoption in Old Testament Israel and individual adoption in the New Testament church.
In the Old Testament, the corporate adoption of the nation of Israel was such that individual Jews were considered sons of God regardless of whether they themselves were personally saved. In Deuteronomy 14:1-2, Yahweh said to Israel:
You are the sons of the Lord your God; you shall not cut yourselves nor shave your forehead for the sake of the dead. For you are a holy people to the Lord your God; and the Lord has chosen you to be a people for His own possession out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth (Deut 14:1-2).
God chose Israel, set His love upon her, and redeemed her out of slavery (Deut 7:6-8), and as a result He was a Father to her (Deut 32:6; cf. Exod 4:22; Mal 2:10). But not all Jews who were part of this adoption were in a right relationship with God. In fact, throughout the history of Old Testament Israel, most were not, but nonetheless they were still children of God in a corporate and non-salvific sense.
This corporate adoption of Old Testament Israel can be seen in the New Testament as well. In Romans 9:2-4, as the apostle Paul expresses his desire to see fellow Jews come to Christ, he describes the various privileges which belong to the nation of Israel:
I have great sorrow and unceasing grief in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were accursed, separated from Christ for the sake of my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh, who are Israelites, to whom belongs the adoption of sons and the glory and the covenants and the giving of the Law and the temple service and the promises (Rom 9:2-4).
According to this passage, Israel enjoyed the status of being adopted as Yahweh’s children even though the nation was largely unbelieving. Under the Old Covenant, then, a Jew who was part of the covenant community could be considered a child of God even though he himself was unsaved and on his way to hell, in need of the very gospel that Paul proclaimed.
According to paedobaptists, the continuity between Old Testament Israel and the New Testament church requires us to baptize infants of believers. Regardless of their individual spiritual status, it is believed that they are children of God and therefore should be baptized as a mark of divine ownership just as infants were circumcised in the Old Testament.
Precisely where the paedobaptist sees continuity, however, Scripture indicates discontinuity, for under the New Covenant, only those who believe in Christ are children of God (Gal 4:5). The New Testament knows nothing of a corporate, non-salvific adoption of God’s people, but instead teaches an individual adoption unto eternal salvation (Eph 1:5). For example, in Romans 8:15-17, the apostle Paul writes:
For you have not received a spirit of slavery leading to fear again, but you have received a spirit of adoption of sons by which we cry out, “Abba! Father!” The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, heirs also, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him so that we may also be glorified with Him.
As Greg Welty notes, in Old Testament Israel, adoption belonged even to those who were destined for condemnation (Rom 9:2-4), but under the New Covenant it belongs only to those are destined for glory (Rom 8:15-17). This can also be seen in John 1:11-13, where the apostle John describes how the nation of Israel rejected her Messiah:
He came to His own, and those who were His own did not receive Him. But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name, who were born not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.
According to this passage, nobody starts out as a child of God, regardless of his ancestry. An individual becomes a child of God not when he is born to Christian parents but rather when he believes in the name of Christ and is born again by the Holy Spirit. For this reason, unlike with the Old Covenant, everyone who is a child of God under the New Covenant has a right standing before Him and is eternally secure in Christ.
Baptism is indeed a mark of divine ownership, just as paedobaptists say it is. But as such, it should only be given to those who give evidence of having been redeemed and adopted by God as His children—those who profess repentance and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
[This article was adapted from Matt Waymeyer, A Biblical Critique of Infant Baptism (The Woodlands, Tex: Kress Christian Publications, 2008).]