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John Calvin on Infant/Covenant Baptism from Acts 2:39

 

Calvin on infant/covenant baptism from Acts 2:39:
"Let us now come to what Peter says: 'Unto you, and to your children.' In the first place, he addresses those who are of age. That is why he says to them, 'Repent.' From the outset he confronts them with repentance with the view to speaking about baptism. Those who are at the age of discretion cannot be baptized (I mean those who are not the people of God), unless they have repented of their sins and confessed to being Christian. But Peter repeatedly adds that the promise is to the children of the Jews, as indeed we see that it is our Lord's promise to Abraham, when he says to him, 'I shall be your God and the God of your seed for a thousand generations' (cf. Gen. 17:7). That is how our Lord wishes to declare himself the Savior of those who are in his church at the present time as well as the Savior of those who come afterward and their children, because he recognizes and accepts them as his own. And that is what Peter is saying here: 'The promise is unto you, and to your children.'
In that statement we have a singular consolation inasmuch as we understand God is not content to be our Savior at the time we call upon him and he answers our prayer, but he extends his mercy to our children and wishes them to be participants in the same grace which he bestows upon us liberally. That means the children are in their mother's womb like animals in respect of awareness. Yet God acknowledges them as his own and promises them eternal life. That is to show his great goodness toward us, that great goodness which he wishes so much to impress upon us and to extend to our posterity and lineage.
And yet, let us look more closely at this passage: 'The promise is unto you, and to your children.' Now when baptism is added later, it is to ratify that promise. That is why we baptize our small children today. Baptism is not a creation of men, but of God. For just as he spoke to Abraham in the time of the law and commanded circumcision, so he now does for us with the institution of baptism. So then, when our Lord receives our children as his own, they must be marked with his sign, and that promise must be confirmed by baptism."
Quoted from Banner of Truth's edition of Calvin's Sermons on the Acts of the Apostles, pages 44-45

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