What Must I Do?
What Must I Do?
In this lesson we examine whether infants should be baptized.
We know that baptism is "for the forgiveness of sins" (Acts 2:38). So if an infant has sins, then an infant needs baptism. People baptize babies because they believe the baby was born sinful. They believe that Adam's "original sin" is passed on to all human beings by procreation. People who believe that babies are born innocent, do not baptize them. So let us think about innocence first of all.
Jesus recognised the state of innocence in little children. "The kingdom of God belongs to such as these" (Lke 18:15-17). Little children are not damned but in a state of grace.
Nobody is born a sinner, nor is sin inherited from one's fathers. Nobody is condemned before having grown up and committed personal sin. "The soul who sins shall die" (Eze 18:2-4).
We are all born perfect, because God created our inmost being (Psa 139:13). The "spirit returns to God who gave it" ( Ecc 12:7). The soul or spirit is a gift of God, and all God's gifts are "good and perfect" (Jas 1:17).
Some will try to cancel out these facts with David's statement, "I was brought forth in iniquity... In sin did my mother conceive me" (Psa 51:5). However this must be interpreted so as not to contradict the other scriptures.
David is not saying he was sinful as a child in the womb, nor is he saying his mother was sinful to conceive him. He is just saying that through conception he was brought into a sinful world. The terms "in iniquity... in sin" simply mean, in this poem, "in an environment of sin". David also says to God, "You wove me in my mother's womb..." (Psa 139:13-16). Here David attributes procreation to the Creator. God brought David (and every other child) into being in the womb. God can only weave something good. He cannot weave something corrupted. Therefore the child in the womb or new born is in a state of innocence (note Acts 7:20).
The state of innocence is a state of grace, not a state of merit. Nobody except Jesus can claim eternal life by personal merit.
An infant has done no evil by which to be condemned. Yet neither has an infant done righteous works by which to claim merit. So an infant, like all human beings, relies entirely on the grace of God through the righteousness of Christ. Although infants lack sin, they also lack righteousness unless God imputes to them "the righteousness of God in Christ" (2Co 5:21).
Next we will look at the question of nature.