Which side are you looking from...

A Post from 12 years ago has been getting a fair reading of late.

The post from 2006 is here.

This may be to do with some questions I posed on the Free Church friends face book page where there had been a lot of communication about baptism from a free church/various/Presbyterian prospective- as you would expect.

 I came from a Reformed background where baptism was administered to children/ babies not of the age of understanding.  In my youth I was moved to the position of believers baptism as in one believes first thereafter as a testimony in public baptism comes second. Now doctrine and influence, past, experience, and Westminster confession can all play a part in your understanding of the subject but when the Spirit of God convicts you then it overshadows teaching.  I quickly add if it is of God then it will not be contrary to the Bible.

I have heard several times that the jailer and his family were baptised so therefore it is all right to baptise children (not of the age of understanding). Yet if the jailer is working he is not now in the army, ...is he retired from the army therefore older therefore his children may well have been of the age of understanding?

Then there is the thought from the non Presbyterian if baptism is for the child /baby then what about circumcision why are the reformed churches not carrying out this act?

No doubt there is a response to this question  even although the basis of there stance is steeped in the old testament and the Westminster confession.

I have not come across many baptistic people defending the stance they take or the understanding they have on baptism. Of course maybe I have just missed them. Regarding the Westminster Confession we need to be on our guard that we do not hold the Westminster confession at a par with the Bible which we believe is the word of God. There has been many arguments about the inclusion of the Apocrypha and one danger was that it would be seen as part of the word of God and not a simple record of a part of Gods people travels.( See Haldane brothers and there stance against the Bible Society ( British and Foreign ).

Needless to say I have an issue with one part at least of the Westminster confession CHAPTER 28.

In short.

Those that believed were baptised... faith then public profession.

There will be those too who are dogmatic in the mode be it sprinkling or Full immersion. 

I am no scholar but the word implies dipping as far as I can see.

Of course we can make allowances for those infirmed etc.

Previous fairly recent post about my baptism. Summer 2018

Finally you may have hear of the person who asked two people to face each other and he laid an apple on the table (one side was eaten the other whole.)

He asked in general what do you see one said an eaten apple the other said a whole apple.  In this case they were both wrong and seeing things from a particular viewpoint.