The following document was received as information at Evangel Presbytery’s Feburary 2025 stated meeting. No vote was taken to formally adopt the document. Still, we post it here for the same reason that it was written in the first place: to provide help and counsel to local sessions weighing the difficult questions surrounding baptism.
Introduction
Holy baptism is one of only two sacraments our Lord instituted. It is meant to unite those abiding in Christ, and so has tremendous potential for unity. Yet it has also been the grounds for some of the sharpest controversies within the church. It is the purpose of this document to give guidance to the sessions within our communion as we care for the souls under us. The purpose of this is not to establish doctrinal boundaries, nor to give dogmatic interpretations of how our constitutional documents are to be interpreted. Nor is this intended to provide guidance for every possible situation. Rather, this document is intended to guide sessions into proper and productive thinking as they weigh the various issues that will arise on these matters. It is, in short, intended more to prompt the questions sessions need to ask rather than the judgments they will need to make. We trust that the Holy Spirit has equipped each session, and the Presbytery as a whole, with the wisdom needed to resolve any matter. Yet we also recognize that this same Spirit has, through the broader Church, provided resources such as these to help guide His people into all truth.
1. Administration vs. Recognition of Baptism
Sessions must recognize the distinction between administering a baptism and recognizing a baptism. The former is a matter that Scripture, supremely, and the WCF, subordinately, addresses (see WCF XXV, par. 2; XXVII, par. 1 and 4). Moreover, the BCO explicitly lays down injunctions on how baptism is to be performed in Evangel Presbytery churches, and all our churches must adhere to these precepts. This means that a session need not concern itself with, for example, whether to allow a paedobaptism in the case where neither parent is a Christian—for the BCO forbids it (BCO 56.1). On the other hand, recognizing a baptism is more a matter of church membership than of baptism per se. Nor does Scripture, the WCF, or the BCO give as many or as clear of stipulations on what baptisms may be recognized. At all times this distinction should be kept in mind: that what WCF prescribes is not necessarily the same as what a local session may deem valid.
2. Invalid vs. Irregular Baptism
Sessions must also bear in mind the distinction between an invalid baptism and an irregular baptism. Our Lord and the Apostles gave us by example and instruction several boundaries for administering baptism, and the historic Church has supplemented these with others which may be known by good and necessary consequence and wisdom. Yet not all of these are on the same level, and some strike closer to the heart of the doctrine of baptism than do others. Deviation from these guidelines may be enough to mark a baptism as irregular, yet not close enough to the essentials to render it invalid. Thus, a baptism is considered invalid (i.e., not a baptism) when the sacrament as performed lacks the essentials the sacrament requires. An irregular baptism, by contrast, lacks desirable qualities, but does not in essence or spirit go against our Lord’s or the apostolic instruction.
3. Proper Elements of Baptism
a. The Presence of Water
If there is no water present, there is no baptism. Water is constitutive of the meaning of the word baptizo.
b. Invocation of the Trinity
This is a sine qua non (essential element) of baptism. By our Lord’s express command, baptism must be done in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. A baptism that omits this blessing of the Holy Trinity is no baptism at all. It is well for sessions to make a habit of discerning whether an incoming member’s baptism has been administered in the name of the Trinity.1
c. The Presence of Confessional Faith
Characteristic of Scripture and, following it, Protestant doctrine is that the sacraments are always tied to faith. Contrary to the prevailing views of the Roman Catholic Church, the sacraments while really and truly accomplishing the work they are created to do, only do so in the presence of faith. They are means by which God dispenses His grace to the recipients, yet they are appropriated and made effectual only in the presence of faith. Accordingly, by the uniform example of Scripture, and the historic practice of the Church, baptism is properly accompanied by a profession of faith.2 For a credobaptism, following Scripture’s example, baptism is properly done after confession and profession of faith on the part of the recipient. For a paedobaptism, the faith in view is that of the parents, who renew their own confession of faith, acknowledge their child’s need of faith, and claim the promises on behalf of their child, who by their faith is considered federally holy (1 Cor. 7:14).
d. Public Setting
Though Scripture does not prescribe a location for baptism, it is clear that the practice of the Church was to baptize publicly. Baptism is a mark identifying and binding a Christian with the visible Church, and so should be done where the brethren of that Church are able to participate. Private baptisms are injurious to the proper nature of the sacrament and are to be avoided.3 Whether or not unbelievers and the world at large are present, it is essential that the saints be present. Finally, baptism, like the Lord’s Supper, should properly be accompanied by the reading and preaching of the Word, and as part of a worship service.
e. Baptism into a Locally Constituted Church
He can no longer have God as his father who has not the Church as his mother (St. Cyprian, 3rd c.)4
The Scripture knows little of baptism into the universal Church without baptism into a particular church. This means that not only should other believers be present at a baptism, but there should also be an institutional Church presence—and an understanding that the baptized is joining a body of believers with authority of the keys given by Christ to bind and loose. In spiritually destitute or frontier situations, there should be at least an evangelist or missionary present who can exercise the power of these keys—preferably one under the care of a church or provisional session elsewhere.
f. Baptism within the Bounds of a True Church
If baptism must be into the visible Church, then that body must be part of Christ’s body. This, then, excludes any body that rejects a foundational doctrine of the Faith (e.g., a doctrine laid out in the Ecumenical Creeds) such as the virgin birth, the orthodox doctrine of the Trinity, the resurrection of the dead, and so on). Any “baptisms” done in the context of heretical groups such as the Jehovah’s Witnesses, Latter Day Saints (Mormons), and so on are to be considered invalid, and baptisms into mainline Protestant bodies (e.g., UCC, PCUSA) should also be carefully scrutinized.
Baptisms into the Roman Catholic Church or Eastern Orthodox Church can be a thorny matter. There has been no consensus among Protestant or even Reformed bodies on the presumptive validity of such baptisms, and arguments can be mounted on both sides. Often, context and other factors (e.g., the presence of a functioning congregation, belief of the parents, etc.) will sway the matter in one direction or the other, but in all cases, sessions should carefully weigh these matters, remembering the serious errors of these ecclesiastical bodies yet also the arguments, example, and precedent of the magisterial Reformers (none of whom were re-baptized).5
g. Baptism by an Ordained Minister
Within Presbyterian churches, proper baptism is generally understood to be administered by a teaching elder (pastor), not a ruling elder or licentiate, and indeed within Evangel Presbytery only such officers are permitted to baptize. Yet it must also be borne in mind that church polity structures differ, and a session in recognizing a baptism is not called also to render judgment on another church’s polity. Frequently, a member will not know whether his baptism was done by an ordained man, yet if the man fulfilled this function within the Church on regular and recognized basis, sessions should give considerable latitude on this point.
More difficult situations will occur where a baptism was not done by any recognized minister or even a church officer at all. Increasingly, baptism by parents and friends is becoming common. In such situations, sessions must consider the context carefully. Was the lack of an ordained minister a result of design and principle or of dearth and accident? In other words, was the baptism administered in a context where church authority was rejected and supplanted with parental authority, or was it done because no ministers were available? The latter is frequently the case in frontier or missionary situations where the Church is persecuted. Thus, a father who baptizes his child in the Chinese Church because finding a ordained minister is difficult is not at all the same case as a father who baptizes because he refuses to submit to any church authority.
Even more difficult cases may occur where baptisms are done by women, homosexuals, transsexuals, or indeed by those flaunting any deviation from God’s sexual design. In such cases, sessions must look even more carefully at whether the practice reflects circumstance or principle. Again, to use a Chinese context, many women perform the functions of a minister of the Word because of a lack of men available. In doing so, while on the one hand they violate God’s precepts on sexual order, their baptizing is a different situation from, say, PCUSA “minister” who baptizes as an act of conscious rebellion against God’s design. Sessions must thus take care on the one hand not to treat the minister’s personal holiness or obedience as the grounds of baptism’s validity (thus making the error of Donatism), yet on the other must be aware of the errors of our time that can turn the baptismal into a blasphemy of the instructions our Lord has given.
4. Weighing Candidates’ Convictions and Feelings
We live in an age where subjectivity and sentimentalism hold sway throughout the Church, but especially on matters of sacramentology. So often, the factors used in determining who may receive baptism and the Lord’s Supper are entirely subjective in nature, and ignore any objective realities which may tend to discriminate or divide. And yet churchmen must not therefore react by denying that subjectivity can play a role in decisions about the sacraments. More to the point, in decisions on the sacraments, sessions must take care to act pastorally and with careful account of the consciences of those in their care. A prospective member, for instance, may be burdened in conscience about a baptism because of the context it occupies in his life, or because of changing convictions he has come to concerning it. In such cases, sessions should be diligent to ensure they are shepherding the conscience of those under their care. In some cases, this sensitivity may lead the session to pastor the member toward greater assurance of the validity of his previous baptism; in others, the member’s concerns may be regarded as an indication that the baptism should be judged invalid.
5. Paedobaptist/Credobaptist Concerns
Fundamental to Evangel Presbytery is a commitment not to divide over the timing and mode of baptism. It must always be remembered that the heart of this unity requires both credobaptists and paedobaptists to compromise: credobaptists by recognizing paedobaptisms as valid, if (according to their convictions) irregular; and paedobaptists by regarding as valid credobaptists’ withholding of baptism until profession of faith. This basic principle6 must be kept in mind when difficult situations arise, as decisions on hard cases have potential to disrupt or complicate the unity we hold. For example, situations involving baptisms outside a member’s home congregation (particularly if in a non-Reformed church, given the diverse understandings of baptisms in the Church at large) can pose challenges. Beyond that, a basic principle is that hard cases make bad law, and care should be taken such that exceptional decisions not be seen as creating precedent. In all cases, it must be remembered that both the consciences of the parties and the unity of the church must be safeguarded, with the recognition that these principles are often in tension.
6. Baptism and Admittance to the Lord’s Table
Remember that the administration of baptism, though not granting faith ex opere operato, is nonetheless a sign and seal of membership in the visible church. Moreover, in the case of a credobaptism, in admitting a person to baptism a session is concurrently and intrinsically also granting eligibility to the Lord’s Supper. These acts are inseparable. A session must bear this in mind in membership interviews, realizing that a profession of faith given in that context should be such as can be regarded sufficient for eligibility to the Lord’s Table. If a prospective member cannot give a credible profession of faith, and evidence his discerning of the body of our Lord, then neither is he eligible to receive baptism.7
- In doing so, sessions may, however, decide to give latitude to baptisms in the name of Jesus as the mediatorial representative of the Trinity, where that communion is clearly Trinitarian in doctrine. For more, see, e.g., the PCA Report of the Study Committee on questions relating to the validity of certain baptisms, 15th General Assembly (1981), Appendix P, pp. 416-428. ↩︎
- It must be acknowledged that professions of faith may themselves be hypocritical and, where doctrine and practice become corrupt, may even be regarded as themselves the ex opere operato agents of saving faith. But this abuse does not invalidate the general purpose of professions. Sessions must of course do all diligence to evaluate the veracity of professions of faith, but in the end their judgments will inevitably remain essentially outward; God alone knows the heart and whether faith is present such as to render the baptism effectual in granting grace to the recipient. ↩︎
- See, e.g., BCO 53.4.b. ↩︎
- Cyprian of Carthage, Treatise 1: On the Unity of the Church, sec. 6. ↩︎
- See PCA Report of the Study Committee on questions relating to the validity of certain baptisms, 15th General 4 Assembly (1981), Appendix P, pp. 416-428. ↩︎
- See, e.g., BCO 16.6. ↩︎
- The situation with paedobaptism is different, in which case baptism is conditioned upon covenant promises rather than the child’s profession of faith. In this case, it must be stressed that sessions must be careful not to let the link between (credo-) baptism and admittance to the Lord’s Supper lapse into paedocommunion. Paedobaptism does not grant admittance to the Supper, nor can it without expressly violating the apostolic mandate for self-examination and discerning of the Lord’s body (1 Cor. 11:27–29). ↩︎