For our Scripture reading this morning, turn with me to Acts chapter 2. Acts chapter 2, as we read just a few verses, a small portion of that chapter, 37 through 42. Acts chapter 2, 37 to 42. You will recall that this, of course, is that chapter where we read about Pentecost, and especially the pouring out of the Holy Spirit on that Pentecost holiday. as well Peter's powerful sermon on that day in which he looked at the people and said, You are the ones who crucified the Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory. And then we pick it up at verse 37 as we give our attention to the reading of the Word of God. When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, Brothers, what shall we do? Peter replied, 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. The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off, for all whom the Lord our God will call. With many other words, He warned them and He pleaded with them, Save yourselves from this corrupt generation. Those who accepted His message were baptized and about 3,000 were added to their number that day. They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread, and to prayer. And turn with me also, if you would, in the back of the Psalter hymnal to Lord's Day 27. Lord's Day 27, page 35, in the back of the Psalter hymnal. In God's providence, He saw fit that, as I already made clear, And you see in the bulletin, we administer the sacrament of holy baptism in the earlier service. The infant son of Rob and Greta Wybinga. And now we consider Scripture's teaching regarding infant baptism as summarized in the Catechism. Page 35, Lord's Day 27, as we confess together what we believe with these three questions and answers that we find there. Question 72 asks, Does this outward washing with water itself wash away sins? No, only Jesus Christ's blood and the Holy Spirit cleanse us from all sins. Why then does the Holy Spirit call baptism the washing of regeneration and the washing away of sins? God has good reason for these words. He wants to teach us that the blood and spirit of Christ wash away our sins just as water washes away dirt from our bodies. But more important, he wants to assure us by this divine pledge and sign that the washing away of our sins spiritually is as real as physical washing with water. Should infants too be baptized? Yes, infants as well as adults are in God's covenant and are His people. They, no less than adults, are promised the forgiveness of sin through Christ's blood and the Holy Spirit who produces faith. Therefore, by baptism, the mark of the covenant, infants should be received into the Christian church and should be distinguished from the children of unbelievers. This was done in the Old Testament by circumcision, which was replaced in the New Testament by baptism. Beloved congregation of our Lord Jesus Christ, again, even though you were not able to attend the administration of the sacrament this morning as a congregation, it has been our privilege to witness the infant baptism of a child born to believing parents. And these parents brought their little boy to be baptized not because they believed that baptism itself somehow superstitiously saves their child. For as Question and Answer 72 explains, no, the outward washing with water itself is not the washing way of sin. Only Jesus Christ's blood and the Holy Spirit cleanse us from all sins. They brought Him not because they believe he already has true faith. The truth is he can't even talk yet. They would have no way of knowing that. But they brought him at the command of God because that little boy belongs. He is a part of God's covenant and a part of the visible church of God having the blessing of being born to Christian parents. And therefore, those parents, as the rest of us who have brought our children for infant baptism, brought their child because God's covenant blessing is for believers and their seed. This covenant blessing includes both the covenantal possession and the covenantal obligation. Now it's no secret that when it comes to baptizing infants, our Baptist brothers and sisters strongly disagree with us for a number of reasons. Reasons which I believe can all be proven incorrect and inconsistent according to Scripture. But one of those reasons is that they say there is no text in Scripture that commands us to baptize infants. And if you want to reason that way, the truth is there didn't need to be a Scripture verse that explicitly commands this because infants and children of believers have always been considered a part of the church. They have always been, as the catechism says, in God's covenant and are His people. Or as the older version says, included in the covenant and church of God. Talking about the visible church. This, of course, was true in the Old Testament as Israel, national Israel, was the Old Testament church. As well, infant baptism has always been observed in the New Testament church. The early church fathers, some whose lives overlapped by a few years with the apostles' lives, testified in their writings that infant baptism was a common practice. It was common in the church. Justin Martyr seems to refer to those who were baptized as infants. in his writings around 80 or 90 A.D. In 185, Irenaeus writes about the blessing of baptism, including infants. Tertullian, who lived anywhere from 150 to 225, gives a warning that those who wrongly believe that baptism itself actually saves should not have their children baptized. That means the practice was common. He was warning them, if you think that baptism saves your child, then stay away. Don't do it. Infant baptism was never questioned because it was considered biblical. It wasn't really until the time of the Anabaptists springing from the Reformation of the 16th century that infant baptism was strongly questioned, therefore question and answer 74 of the catechism. The truth is that if infant baptism is not to be practiced, there would most likely be an explicit command forbidding it, but there's not. And a good reason for this is because long before our Lord came to earth, children were included by God in His covenant. In Old Testament Israel, baby boys were circumcised on the eighth day after birth to demonstrate that they were included in the covenant community. Baptism is about inclusion. Inclusion. God established His covenant with families, with generations. We find this with Abraham in Genesis 17, verses 10-12 tell us, This is my covenant which you shall keep between me and you and your descendants after you. Every male among you shall be circumcised. And you shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskin. And it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you. And every male among you who is eight days old shall be circumcised throughout your generations. God's covenant of grace with His church through Abraham was that, as verse 7 of Genesis 17 says, that He would be a God to Abraham and to His descendants after Him. And the very same covenant with Abraham is fulfilled in Jesus Christ. Not wiped out, not put aside, but fulfilled in Jesus Christ with the same promises and blessings of that covenant passed on to those who are in Christ even today. Paul says in Galatians 3, verse 29, And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's offspring, heirs according to the promise. Thus tying the Old Testament church, national Israel, to the New Testament church from every tribe, every tongue, every nation. You cannot separate the Old Testament church and the New Testament church. And just as circumcision was a bloody sign and seal of the promises of the covenant in the Old Testament, baptism is the watery sign and seal of the promises of the covenant in the New Testament. Both share the same spiritual significance. Both point to the righteousness promised to us by faith. Paul in Colossians 2 makes the connection between the two when he says, And in him, in Christ, you were also circumcised with a circumcision made without hands in the removal of the body of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ, having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised up with him through faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead. And when you were dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions. The beauty here, congregation, is that infants and children of believers have never been excluded. They have never been outside. We know that there are passages that seem to include infants and children from baptism, such as Mark 16, verse 16, which says, he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved. As well, the words we read in Acts 2, verse 38, repent and be baptized. And those verses rightly speak of adults first believing and then being baptized, but they say nothing for or against infant baptism. These passages in no way wipe out the practice of generations of circumcision, which has been replaced by baptism. Now, we know that the early New Testament church was in a mission age. And as the Word was preached and many believed for the very first time, they confessed their faith and they were baptized. But Scripture is clear that New Testament believers were baptized with their households. Again, it doesn't explicitly say there were young children, but it doesn't say there were not either. Households. But why were they baptized with their households? Because as Peter says, the promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off, for all whom the Lord our God will call. Believers and their seed own the covenantal possession. What is that possession? That possession is the promise of God. It's interesting that Jesus Himself never excluded children. The Bible teaches us that He embraced them. He laid His hands upon them. And when the disciples were trying to send them away, To turn them away, Jesus said, Permit the children to come to Me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. And the Greek word Jesus uses there is the word for nursing babies, infants. He's not saying that those who are like babies have the kingdom, but little children. You see, as Peter says, they too have, they too possess the covenantal promise. On Pentecost, with the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, our Lord provided for the ongoing ministry of His church. The giving of the Holy Spirit was Christ's guarantee that the kingdom which came with Him would continue on. The same Holy Spirit is the spirit of promise that the prophet Joel speaks of. The Spirit unites the sinner to the risen Christ. Jeremiah speaks of that promise in Jeremiah 31 when he says, But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord. I will put my law on their minds and write it on their hearts and I will be their God and they shall be my people. You see, the promise is an intimate relationship between God and His people through the work of Jesus Christ. And this promise, as the Catechism rightly says, includes the forgiveness of sin through Christ's blood and the Holy Spirit who produces faith. Again, as the older version of the Catechism speaks of redemption from sin through Christ's blood and the Holy Spirit, the author of faith. This assurance, congregation, the thing promised, in other words, actual forgiveness, is real for those who believe. And this assurance then, the assurance is promised to children of believers if and when they believe by the grace of God. And that is because they, as well as adults, are in the covenant and are His people or are in the church of God. Now we need to understand something here that the promise of forgiveness and the thing promised, in other words, actual forgiveness, the assurance of forgiveness, are two different things. Please don't confuse them. Please don't put them together. There is the promise and there is the thing promised. We don't know if and when our children have the thing promised, actual forgiveness, until they claim this promised forgiveness by some sort of profession of faith. That's the only way we, as fellow human beings, can know. Because even then, we only go by the outside, but God looks at the heart. Yes, infant children of believers are to be baptized because the promise is real. The promise is good. And the promise belongs to them. Therefore, they are to be given the sign and seal of that promise. Again, the fact that infants are baptized doesn't mean they understand what that promise is. It doesn't mean that they are regenerated already, but that's not the point. The point is that as a Christian parent, I believe God at His Word. God is saying to me as a believer that the thing promised, actual forgiveness, belongs to me when I believe. That's my assurance. And the promise itself belongs to my children, whom He has blessed with believing parents. Infant baptism is a glorious promise that God makes to you, beloved. In that He says, I will be a God to you and to your seed. It's not, first of all, your dedication of your child to God. When we present our children for baptism, we do make promises. Promises were made this morning again. Promises to instruct and teach. But that's not what baptism is about, first of all. Baptism is not about what we as parents do. That we make promises to God. No, baptism is first and foremost about what God does. Because our promises as parents mean absolutely nothing apart from God's promise. Baptism is God's pledge. His promise of the covenant and its blessings to which you and I are called to respond. I am a sinner and my only hope is in the promise of God. And that promise is to me and my children. And only when I and they understand our sin as the people on that day of Pentecost, what shall we do? Only when we understand that can we take comfort in God's promise. But we must understand, congregation, that this promise is not made to every child in the world. What I'm saying is, as the Catechism says, baptism is administered to distinguish covenant infants, children of believers, from the children of unbelievers. Children who are born and raised in unbelieving families, many of them by God's grace do come to know Him later on in life as adults. Maybe some of you did. And then you receive the sacrament of baptism upon a profession of faith, a sign of the promise to you that indeed your sins are forgiven. But here we're talking about, we're not talking about how God deals with children of unbelievers, but we're talking about how God deals with children of believers. How does He look at them? What is their status? There is a distinguishing that takes place. Circumcision did that in the Old Testament. Distinguishing those who were in the church, God's visible church, from those who were not in that visible church. This distinguishing is not as to nature. It's not as to who you and I are as to ourselves, but it's as to grace. And baptism, as circumcision did, draws a line in the sand. And that line is between believers and their children and unbelievers and their children. This is a truth that reflects the teaching of Scripture. The promise, as Peter says, is for all whom the Lord our God will call. And as Isaiah 44 verses 1-5 point out, God will pour out His Spirit on the children and those who receive the Word of God in faith will receive His blessing and their children will be given His Spirit to say, I am the Lord's, I belong. Beloved, God's promise to believers and their children for the sake of Jesus Christ is a promise of life. But those who possess that promise also have the covenantal obligation. There is a responsibility given to those who enjoy that promise. And this includes both parents and their baptized children. And this is where baptism indeed can get dangerous. The Catechism says infants must also, by baptism, the mark of the covenant, be received or engrafted into the Christian church and should be distinguished from the children of unbelievers. These are outward, visible things. The mark of the covenant, that water, received, engrafted into the Christian church, the visible church, Distinguished from children of unbelievers. These are outward, visible things that become inward and invisible by the grace of God. Again, baptism is a sign and seal of being set apart by God. He places His mark upon these infants as the water is sprinkled on their head. The church then is the visible manifestation of the kingdom of God in the world and is indeed separate from the world. And then children of believers are in the visible church. And the promise of God is that for those who repent of their sins and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, they are members then of the invisible church by grace through faith. God makes our children a part of the Christian church by the power of His Spirit through instruction and training. This is also how children of believers are to be distinguished from children of unbelievers. As Christian parents, we swear an oath, again, as was heard this morning. Many of you have made this promise that we promise and intend to instruct these children as soon as they are able in the aforesaid doctrine and cause them to be instructed there into the utmost of our power. Isaiah 54, verse 13 says, All your children shall be taught by the Lord, and great shall be the peace of your children. Beloved, this obligation is fulfilled by Christian instruction in the home through the training and Christian example of parents. It is accomplished by Christian instruction in the school, distinguished from non-God-fearing instruction. And it is done by instruction in the faith in church through preaching and catechetical training. And parents, this obligation never ends. And this is especially true with our teenage children. You are to make sure that they come, for example, to catechism prepared. Having done the written and the memory assignments, You must check them. You must work with them. You see, the original purpose of catechization was that it be done at home by the parents. Not left to the church. But that the church simply would be an aid to the parents in the home. You must work with your children. You must study it with them. And why is this so important? Because through catechetical training our children learn the truth of the faith and teaching of Scripture and they are equipped to stand up out there against the attacks of error and that which is false instead of compromising the truth because they don't know any different. If you think that there's no difference or very little difference between what is taught in this Christian church, our understanding of Scripture compared to some even in our own neighborhood, you are sadly mistaken. even as adults, our learning is never to end. The sad truth today is that even within many of the Reformed churches, and I know some even within this congregation, there is a misunderstanding of the place of our confessions, the catechism, the gift that God has given to us, and that which we call the Reformed understanding of the faith. So many today don't understand why we need it, what's the big deal. Give me the Bible, only the Bible, nothing but the Bible. Don't tell me what man says in those confessions. But you see, congregation, the confessions of the church are man's, the church is not man's, the church's studied response to what God teaches in His Word. God speaks, we respond. The confessions that we hold dear are a precious gift from God given through wise men, given wisdom by God. To confess, as we know, means to say the same thing. We are to say the same thing about God as He says about Himself. That's what our confessions help us to do. Even as a body of believers, we are to say the same thing with one another within the church, the body of Christ. Our confessions help us to do that. Our confessions help us to understand what God teaches us in His Word. There are some texts in Scripture that seem to contradict each other. Even these with regard to baptism. Repent and believe. How do we deal with them? They mess so many people up. They confuse so many. God has given to us our confessions to help us understand what God is saying in His Word. So these passages no longer contradict each other. We must understand that the promise of God, which is signified and sealed by baptism, though, is not a one-sided guarantee. It is not a promise from God of a free ride to heaven without repentance and faith. It signifies and seals being included in that covenant relationship with God. But that covenant has two parts. God says, I will be your God. But don't forget, He also says, and you shall be My people. To be the people of God means by the gracious operation of the Holy Spirit to worship and serve and obey Him. The covenant comes with responsibilities. God makes His promise and calls from His people a response. Parents have the responsibility to teach their children what their baptism means. Boys and girls, you didn't see the baptism this morning, but you've seen baptism. And every time you see baptism up here, you must ask your moms and dads what that means for you. What your baptism means. And as parents, we must teach our children that they are conceived and born in sin and that they are sinners and deserve death, but by the grace of God, they are also children of promise. God's promise. God has promised that if you believe the saving sacrifice of Jesus Christ, if you believe that it's for you, then all your sins are forgiven you. But that promise does not include that even if you don't believe, it doesn't matter, your sins are still forgiven. God does not promise that. You see, God calls us to respond to His covenant promise with repentance and faith. And that means that we are not to ignore our baptism like some paid-up insurance policy. Baptism must be raised daily when your child asks, Why can't I do this or that? Why can't I participate in the enjoyment of the world? Why can't I go to this particular movie? Why can't I listen to this particular group? Parents, you must answer because you were baptized. God has set you apart. He has placed His mark on you, and that means you are different. You are to be distinguished from the world. You are a part of the church and the covenant community. You are not a part of the world. This is the instruction that parents are to give their children. All who grow up in God's covenant favor, in the covenant of God's favor, must wrestle with the question, what does it mean that God made me a promise? and calls for me a life. Children and young people, you also as those who have received God's promise. You have a responsibility. God's promise is not empty or meaningless. It is very real. It cannot be broken. Baptism again is a promise of forgiveness of sins and renewal of life for those who by God's grace repent of their sins and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. And this is just as sure, just as real, As water washes away dirt, as answer 73 says. You've been greatly blessed by God with the privilege of being raised by Christian parents. God Himself has put His mark on you. He has promised to be your God. And He calls you to claim His promise and live like a child of the King. And to not claim His promise is to reject Him and His promise. It's kind of like a check. This is an illustration that I know some don't think is very good, but I think it has some merit. A check is a sign of something. It represents the cash in the bank. But we know that check is not that cash. Baptism is not the thing promised. Actual forgiveness. But it represents. It is a sign of what we have by faith. Now, of course, a check is no good unless it is signed, right? Baptism is God's signature. It's His seal. Yet there are no benefits from a check until you cash it. And by grace, through the exercise of faith, you cash in on the promises of God. But not all cash in. Esau didn't. Neither did the sons of Eli. But that doesn't mean that God's promise was faulty. It doesn't mean He broke His promise. He did not break His promise. they rejected Him. They said, we don't want it. But those who exercise faith, those who do exercise faith and receive the full assurance of God's promises do so only by the regenerating power of the Holy Spirit. We sing, He moved my soul to seek Him seeking me. It's only after we believe by the grace of God that we also go back and understand that it was God who did it all. He worked in us to bring us to Himself. Children and young people, along with your privilege, you must expect your parents to remind you every day in some way about your baptism. Daily, you must be reminded with these words, don't forget to whom you belong. Don't forget whose mark is on you. Beloved, all believers and their seed are branches of the vine, yet those that bear no fruit or those that bear bad fruit, as Jesus says, will be cut off. In a sense, baptism is also a dangerous thing because those who reject the promises of God will drown eternally in the water of baptism, which will be to them a curse. Why do we baptize infants? Not because they are already saved. Ishmael and Esau received at God's command they received circumcision but they were covenant breakers is it because they have faith? no because that would make God's promise dependent upon them you first believe then I'll give you my promise it doesn't make sense that's not how it works we baptize them because God gives them his promise he has the right to extend his promise to whomever he chooses and he gives it to believers and their seed what a glorious possession therefore it must be our desire to have our children baptized God says to us for the sake of the redeeming blood of Jesus you are mine now don't forget to whom you belong amen shall we pray Father indeed in Jesus name we come before you once again only in his name we praise you for the sake of His saving sacrifice. We praise You for the forgiveness which is ours. That all of our sins are washed away by the blood of Jesus. That eternal life is ours. That we not only have that comfort in this life, but even one day as each of us, unless the Lord comes first, as each of us will face death to this life. That even at that time, we have the comfort and the assurance that our life is secure in the palm of our Father's hand. Father, may we not spurn the promise of God. May we not reject that promise. May we rejoice in the truth of that promise fulfilled in those who truly believe. We ask these things in Jesus' name and alone we pray. Amen.