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The thoughts I had regarding the "Historic Church Documents" page here are thus: There is quite a variation in confessional position represented by the documents here. Reformed, Anglican, Lutheran, and of course, creedal documents from the early undivided church are here. I must conclude that their presence represents affirmation by the proprietors, which presents problems by the fact of the variance alone. Possible Reasonable Explanation: The differences between them, say the authors, are less than the gulf between all of us and Tridentine Rome. But if it were a united Protestant front, wouldn't they unite ecclesial governments? I cannot conclude that the documents' presence was an act of mere reportage, because there is nothing overtly contrary to the Reformed tradition on the page. That they believe all these traditions can broadly be called Reformed is astonishing, and is an insult to anyone holding the other confessions. Still, perhaps it's a way of affirming a soteriological monergism that they all share (to some extent). Even if that could describe all the documents (which it doesn't) it's pretty reductionistic to say the Reformed faith is wholly about soteriological monergism. If that weren't enough audacity (and not the hopeful kind, I'd add) for one web page there's this mind-boggling quote: The delivery of Christ’s doctrines and commandments by men does not make them the doctrines and commandments of men. ... Their dogmas are not man's, they are God’s dogmas." --J. Girardeau. Which would be a refreshing recovery of the dogmatic principle if I knew which communion I should worry about getting tossed out of! But they don't seem to know. On a personal note, when I saw the Baptist Confession of 1689, I almost flipped out. Nothing personal, but I feel more comfortable among people who believe God's saving work happens objectively in some sense and in keeping with how God has always done things (see Passover, circumcision), not by way of articulation or knowledge in every case. ("Believers' baptism" is dumb.)

(Sigh.)

[In Defense of Baptists, and Other "New Testament Church" Types: I know lots of you, and by and large, you're lovely people who love Christ. And I'm all for people understanding their faith as much as possible, too. And I don't see the papists force-feeding their infants the Eucharist, so you're not entirely insane. But I guarantee you, there will be about a bajillion infants and other young children who confessed diddly-squat before they left us for whatever reason, and God will embrace them, because that's just how God is. Please tell me you're not giving an aptitude test for the sign of the New Covenant. Please. "Please tell me you have something more, counselor. These men are on trial for their lives. Please tell me you haven't pinned their hopes to a phone bill." Sorry. I get movie quote-itis at times.]

JK

Sorry, that turned into a rant, and a blog post.

Comments

J. Patrick Smith said…
Just read your post... and kind of got here by way of happy accident and the help of Google. Basically, my night started out with some research into genealogy (looking up my grandfather Nat Jacob Smith, to finding the blog of my cousin, whom I always knew as "Tommy" but whom you seem to know of as "Rabbi Tbone." Anyway, googling that latter name led me to your blog.

So, preliminaries aside, after reading this post I felt like making a comment. The inclusion of the earlier documents (the creeds, etc.) on a page devoted to documents of the Reformed Faith is easily understandable. The purpose of the Protestant Reformers was not to abandon the Church catholic, but rather to make reforms where the Roman Church had apparently gone astray. As such, the Reformers felt just as much connection to the early Church and its Creeds as those on the other side of the Tiber did.

The inclusion of that other document, the 1689 Confession, might need more explanation...

There are those in the "Reformed Camp" who reject the notion that Particular Baptists can properly be called "Reformed" as they see the covenantal view of infant baptism as being inherent to defining what it means to truly be "reformed."

Dumb or not, I am a adherent to both Believer's Baptism and the 1689 Confession. And I would agree with you that there are plenty of children who "confessed diddly-squat" whom God will welcome into Heaven. Aptitude test? Hardly. What I think you are doing is shoehorning your pedobaptist view of baptism to the credobaptist practice of baptism. We Baptists simply have completely different view of what the Bible teaches regarding baptism, one that we feel flows directly from the concept of Sola Scriptura. There simply is no place in the Scripture that clearly teaches that Baptism was ever performed on a non-confessing child. And the argument that baptism is the NT corollary to OT circumcision can used by the Baptist just as well, who would state that the practice should be performed after the second (spiritual) birth, not after the first (physical) birth. Yes, God predestinates one's coming to faith, but He ordains that coming to faith at a particular time in the course of one's life and scripture teaches that this time occurs after one has heard the Gospel call.

Perhaps I could say it like this: Let's say you have someone who is an adult who does not believe in the Christian faith, but he was born to parents that a Christians. Do you FIRST baptize him and THEN call him to repentance and faith? No, of course not. But pedobaptists will gladly baptize the same man on the same conditions if they can get him to the baptistery when he is an infant. Credobaptists, however, would baptize the man under neither circumstance which we feel is the more consistent position.

Well... thems my thoughts...

Bless
3:16 AM
J. Patrick Smith said…
Just read your post... and kind of got here by way of happy accident and the help of Google. Basically, my night started out with some research into genealogy (looking up my grandfather Nat Jacob Smith, to finding the blog of my cousin, whom I always knew as "Tommy" but whom you seem to know of as "Rabbi Tbone." Anyway, googling that latter name led me to your blog.

So, preliminaries aside, after reading this post I felt like making a comment. The inclusion of the earlier documents (the creeds, etc.) on a page devoted to documents of the Reformed Faith is easily understandable. The purpose of the Protestant Reformers was not to abandon the Church catholic, but rather to make reforms where the Roman Church had apparently gone astray. As such, the Reformers felt just as much connection to the early Church and its Creeds as those on the other side of the Tiber did.

The inclusion of that other document, the 1689 Confession, might need more explanation...

There are those in the "Reformed Camp" who reject the notion that Particular Baptists can properly be called "Reformed" as they see the covenantal view of infant baptism as being inherent to defining what it means to truly be "reformed."

Dumb or not, I am a adherent to both Believer's Baptism and the 1689 Confession. And I would agree with you that there are plenty of children who "confessed diddly-squat" whom God will welcome into Heaven. Aptitude test? Hardly. What I think you are doing is shoehorning your pedobaptist view of baptism to the credobaptist practice of baptism. We Baptists simply have completely different view of what the Bible teaches regarding baptism, one that we feel flows directly from the concept of Sola Scriptura. There simply is no place in the Scripture that clearly teaches that Baptism was ever performed on a non-confessing child. And the argument that baptism is the NT corollary to OT circumcision can used by the Baptist just as well, who would state that the practice should be performed after the second (spiritual) birth, not after the first (physical) birth. Yes, God predestinates one's coming to faith, but He ordains that coming to faith at a particular time in the course of one's life and scripture teaches that this time occurs after one has heard the Gospel call.

Perhaps I could say it like this: Let's say you have someone who is an adult who does not believe in the Christian faith, but he was born to parents that a Christians. Do you FIRST baptize him and THEN call him to repentance and faith? No, of course not. But pedobaptists will gladly baptize the same man on the same conditions if they can get him to the baptistery when he is an infant. Credobaptists, however, would baptize the man under neither circumstance which we feel is the more consistent position.

Well... thems my thoughts...

Bless
3:20 AM
Jason said…
Mr. Smith,

Because you are related to "Tommmy," you are a friend of mine. Thanks for stopping by.
1:09 PM
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