Training · The 1689 Baptist Confession
Baptism
What baptism signifies, who it is for, and how it is administered - the chapter the Baptists are named for.
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What does baptism signify?
The person's fellowship with Christ in his death and resurrection, their being joined to him, the forgiveness of their sins, and their giving themselves to God to walk in newness of life.
Four things, and every one of them is something that has already happened or is being declared, not something the water accomplishes. Baptism is a sign of a union, and the sign is not the union.
We were buried with him through baptism into death, so that just like Christ was raised from the dead by the Father's power, we too can live a new kind of life.
Romans 6:4Confession 29.1
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Who are the proper subjects of baptism?
Those who actually profess repentance towards God and faith in and obedience to Christ - and only those.
This is the point at which the 1689 parts company with the Westminster Confession, and the whole difference is in the word actually. A profession has to be made by the person being baptised, which excludes infants.
As they traveled down the road, they came to some water. The official said, 'Look, here's water! What's stopping me from being baptized?'
Philip said, 'If you really believe with all your heart, you can.' The man answered, 'I do believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.'
Acts 8:36-37Confession 29.2
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What else has to be true elsewhere in the confession for believer's baptism to follow?
Three things settled earlier: that a church is gathered from visible saints, that the covenant of grace is one thing formally established in Christ rather than administered through a nation, and that worship is limited to what Scripture prescribes.
The disagreement over baptism is not really settled at the water. By the time the argument reaches it, it has already been made three times over - in the doctrine of the covenant, in the rule about worship, and in the definition of a church. That is why two confessions can look so similar on the page and still divide a congregation.
Confession 29.2
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What is the outward element in baptism, and what words are used?
Water - and the person is baptised into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
Both halves are prescribed rather than left open, which is the rule about worship applied to a particular case. The Trinitarian wording also ties the ordinance back to the doctrine of God: what a person is baptised into is the God described at the start of the document.
'So go to people everywhere and help them become my followers. Baptize them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.'
'Teach them to do everything I've told you. And remember, I'm with you always, right up to the end of the world.'
Matthew 28:19-20Confession 29.3
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How is baptism to be administered?
By immersion - dipping the person in the water. The confession says it is necessary to the ordinance being properly administered.
The argument is that the meaning depends on the mode. If the sign is burial and rising with Christ, then going down and coming up is the sign, and sprinkling does not picture it. The Greek word behind baptism means to dip or plunge, and the confession treats that as settling the question rather than as a detail of custom.
After Jesus was baptized, he came up out of the water. Suddenly, the sky opened up, and he saw God's Spirit coming down like a dove and landing on him.
Matthew 3:16Confession 29.4