When I was a zealous Baptist back in my twenties, before I became a convinced Presbyterian in my thirties, one of the ways I used to goad my Presbyterian friends was with a simple challenge: Show me a verse for baptizing babies. And because they couldn’t show me a verse, I said I wasn’t convinced.

That worked—until I met a Presbyterian minister who told me he did have a verse for me.

The Verse I Wasn’t Expecting

He turned me to Genesis chapter 17, verses 10 to 13:

“This is my covenant, which you shall keep, between me and you and your offspring after you: Every male among you shall be circumcised. You shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you. He who is eight days old among you shall be circumcised. Every male throughout your generations, whether born in your house or bought with your money from any foreigner who is not of your offspring, both he who is born in your house and he who is bought with your money shall surely be circumcised. So shall my covenant be in your flesh, an everlasting covenant.”

After reading that passage, the minister said something to me that stuck: If you see the paradigm of Genesis 17, it will overwhelm you, and you won’t need another verse.

I confess, it took me a bit of time to see it—to feel it—but once I did, the weight of the paradigm overwhelmed me. And I haven’t been able to unsee it since.

The Covenant Paradigm: To You and to Your Offspring

The paradigm was simply this: God’s covenant of grace, in its various expressions throughout the Old Testament, was always made to the adult individual believer and to their offspring.

The covenant with Adam and Eve in Genesis 3:15 was to them and to their offspring.
The covenant with Noah in Genesis 6–9 was to him and to his offspring.
The covenant with Abraham in Genesis 12, 15, 17, and 22 was to him and to his offspring.
The covenant with Israel was to Israel and to a thousand generations (Exodus 34).
The covenant with David was to David and to his offspring (2 Samuel 7).

That is the paradigm, over and over again: to you and to your offspring.

Does the Paradigm Continue in the New Testament?

The question, then, is whether this paradigm continues in the New Testament.

The Baptist says no. The promise about children, we are told, is now only to spiritual children, not physical children.

The Presbyterian says yes. The promise still includes our physical children. And the Presbyterian does, in fact, have a New Testament verse to match the Old Testament one.

That verse is Acts chapter 2, verses 38 and 39. After Peter preaches his Pentecost sermon and the people cry out, “What shall we do?” Peter replies:

“Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is for you and for your children and for all who are afar off, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself.”

Notice the three categories: for you—Jewish adults; for your children; and for all who are afar off—Gentiles.

Those are the exact same three categories spoken to Abraham. Abraham was to put the sign of the covenant on himself, on his children, and on any foreigners in his house—that is, Gentiles.

Continuity, Not Discontinuity

What we have, then, is a paradigm that continues. There is continuity, not discontinuity, in the covenant principle of to you and to your children.

That means Presbyterians do indeed have a biblical basis for baptizing our children. If God commanded believing adults in the Old Testament to put the sign of the covenant on their children, why would he not command the same of believing adults in the New Testament?

If the paradigm continues from Old Testament to New Testament, then it is best practice to place the sign of God’s covenant on the infants of believers in the New Testament.

Where Are the Visions and Angels?

When God makes a big change between Old Testament times and New Testament times, he explains it clearly—often through visions and angels.

For example, in the book of Acts, when there is a shift from Old Testament food laws, where some foods were considered unclean, to New Testament teaching in which all foods are clean, God gives Peter a vision and sends an angel to confirm the change.

With a change of that magnitude, supernatural phenomena accompany the transition.

But no such phenomena accompany any supposed change in the paradigm of God’s covenant dealings with believers and their children. The Baptist argues that there is a change—that children are no longer included—but with a change that significant, we would expect a vision, an angel, or some divine explanation.

And it would have been a seismic change to remove children from the covenant, since they were included in every Old Testament covenant. Yet there is no explanation. There is no vision. There is no angel.

Why? Because there is no change.

Two Verses and No Embarrassment

Nothing changed between the old covenant and the new covenant with respect to the covenant paradigm of to you and to your children.

And so, as Presbyterians, we have two verses for baptizing babies: Genesis chapter 17 and Acts chapter 2.

On this basis, we baptize babies—and we will do so without embarrassment.