I am saying NO ONE should be baptized before they hear and accept the gospel.Not even babies.
This would be normative for adult converts but not for infants, and the scriptures and Church history bear witness to this.
Old Covenant
Genesis 17:9-14
9 Then God said to Abraham, “As for you, you must keep my covenant, you and your descendants after you for the generations to come. 10 This is my covenant with you and your descendants after you, the covenant you are to keep: Every male among you shall be circumcised. 11 You are to undergo circumcision, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and you. 12 For the generations to come every male among you who is eight days old must be circumcised, including those born in your household or bought with money from a foreigner—those who are not your offspring. 13 Whether born in your household or bought with your money, they must be circumcised. My covenant in your flesh is to be an everlasting covenant. 14 Any uncircumcised male, who has not been circumcised in the flesh, will be cut off from his people; he has broken my covenant.”
Leviticus 12:3
3 On the eighth day the boy is to be circumcised.
These texts show the circumcision of eight-day-old babies as the way of entering into the Old Covenant.
Connection to New Covenant
Col 2:11-12
In him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of flesh in the circumcision of Christ;
12and you were buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead.
Baptism is the new “circumcision of Christ” for all people of the New Covenant.
Do Infants Need Baptism?
Job 14:1-4
1 "Man born of woman is of few days and full of trouble. 2 He springs up like a flower and withers away; like a fleeting shadow, he does not endure. 3 Do you fix your eye on such a one? Will you bring him before you for judgment? 4 Who can bring what is pure from the impure? No one!
Psalm 51:5
5 Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.
We are conceived in the iniquity of sin. This shows the need for baptism from the moment of conception.
Jesus Extols Child-like Faith
Matthew 18:2-5
2 He called a little child and had him stand among them. 3And he said: "I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. 4Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.
Jesus says unless we become like children, we cannot enter into heaven. **So why would children be excluded from baptism? **
(cont.)
