Category: Sacraments

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Sacraments

Who Deceives Whom with Baptism?

A discussion recently ensued when a Baptist brother claimed the following:

Another point I want to make is that every parent eveywhere is responsible for raising their children up in the LORD. It matters not if they are regenerate or not. We are all going to be held accountable for how we all discipled our children. It doesn’t take some kind of doctrinal Covenant inclusion to do this. In fact I think it is rather deceptive to teach a child they are in a New Covenant relationship with God when they may be strangers to the covenant. It neglects the nature of what the new Covenant is. A Covenant made based upon the forgiveness of sin and knowing the Lord. Not like the one that the early church fathers could break. It is an unbreakable Covenant.

I addressed my response to Baptists:

1. Baptists keep talking about an overarching presumption that, in telling children they are in the New Covenant, they can “rest on their laurels”. It’s like we’re saying: “Son, presume you are Elect and you have nothing to go to God for and say: ‘Save Me!'”

In so doing, Baptists are actually projecting the problem with their own presumption. Dr. Clark called it confusing decree and administration. As I noted before, what are you telling someone if you say:
a. The New Covenant is with the elect alone.
b. We only baptize those we have “maximal confidence” are elect
c. We are baptizing YOU, the man who just confessed Christ.

In essence, you are giving him an unwarranted presumption. In fact, I was just listening to Gene Cook and John Goundry say the other day that Preachers only have to tell those outside the NC to “…know the Lord” (i.e. repent and be baptized) because we don’t tell those in the NC that because that’s been fulfilled. Notice the presumption – they are baptized = they are in the New Covenant = they are elect.

This gets very confusing because I know if I press Gene on this he’s going to admit that he doesn’t know who’s in the NC so the exercise of who you can and can’t say “know the Lord” to becomes quite impossible. Do you see how Baptists can tie themselves into knots on this point if they actually thought about it? Yet, if you go back and read even portions of this thread we have people arguing that we should have people telling the Church: “Oh, I’m elect, the Holy Spirit told me so”.

Thus, I think the presumptive problem lies with the nature of Baptistic baptism and trying to find a nexus in the perfection of the New Covenant. It is not really fair for you to ascribe the presumption you have for the people you baptize with the hope and promise that we have for those we baptize.

2. Sadly, I feel a sense in which you are missing the very power and weight of the Gospel to convert. Romans 6 is part of the Gospel by the way. Notice what you guys keep saying about “presuming” on the part of sinners. Why do you think a reprobate man is going to presume any less for a Law passage (do this and live) than He is about a Gospel passage. If a man is dead in His sins and trespasses then he presumes upon everything. The Pharisees had presumption of the Law down pat as well as the threat of hell. They just deceived themselves that it didn’t apply to them.

Check out my teaching on Romans 6 at our website if you get a chance – http://www.baptistchurch.jp/teaching.html

It is my conviction that passages like Romans 6 can actually convert the soul. They feed hungry Christian souls. I think you guys worry too much about the reprobate presuming upon Grace and not enough about feeding Grace to the elect you have in your midst. Even as we sneer at Roman Catholics who say: “Don’t teach that kind of stuff because it’s a license for liberty”, we don’t preach it openly because we’re afraid (like them) that the wrong people are going to get the wrong idea. Worry about the right people getting the right idea more! Feed them this stuff. Stuff them with it! One-third of Romans is this stuff. It’s not merely doctrinally interesting but it is the basis for the ethics.

3. I love this point that Dr. Clark cited:

74. Are infants also to be baptized?

Yes, for since they belong to the covenant and people of God as well as their parents, and since redemption from sin through the blood of Christ, and the Holy Spirit who works faith, are promised to them no less than to their parents, they are also by Baptism, as the sign of the Covenant, to be ingrafted into the Christian Church, and distinguished from the children of unbelievers, as was done in the Old Testament by Circumcision, in place of which in the New Testament Baptism is instituted.

See, again, the problem I see is that it is the Baptists who presume too much. You guys presume, by your profession, that you’re elect and so you turn a wary eye toward the young’uns who haven’t. First, you shouldn’t be presuming upon your profession. Second, you should be seeing that everyone visible in your midst needs the kind of Grace I was just talking about.

You worry too much about the bad apples and you punish the whole crowd. You can’t figure out who to punish so you punish every child calling him unregenerate while claiming regeneracy for the adults. Where does such presumption come from? I’m not saying not to tell kids to repent but tell adults to repent too. Tell everyone to repent where Paul does. The Gospel is bouncing off the walls of your Church as you proclaim it to man, woman, and child. Stop worrying about who is elect among you and deal with the visible assembly in your midst. Let the Holy Spirit do its work but don’t preach with one arm tied behind your back. Preach the whole counsel of God and where it says “repent” tell everyone and where it says “rejoice” then proclaim it as the Word does. And let God sort out the rest.

Don’t even destroy the simplicity of the Gospel by demanding that solid, intellectual assurance that you want all adults to express. If a brother is struggling with assurance don’t impoverish him with “try harder” to determine if you’re elect. Focus him upon the Cross. Tell him that it’s as simple as believing. Do you believe Christ died for sin? Do you believe Christ raised Him from the dead? Believe! Proclaim Romans 8 to him. If he’s reprobate then that’s his problem but if he’s elect then let it feed him and establish him!

But stop impoverishing the flock by playing to the fear of the lowest common denominator.

***UPDATE***

After I posted this I got a response from a dear brother in the Lord who is a Baptist elder. He felt my words were intende to deny the fact that Baptists understand that Romans 6 is part of the Gospel. My extended remarks are as follows:

I think you need to take the position as a whole and not parse the issue and take it personally. I had to sum up a lot of people’s thoughts. I was unspecific because I wasn’t aiming it at a Baptist but a line of thinking that begins with the assumption that NC=elect -> Profession which necessarily excludes those who are too young to profess in a mature fashion.

There is then an underlying assumption that if you treat the immature as if they are spiritually minded that it will lead to presumption and that it is deceptive to teach them anything other than the condemnation of the Law. I repeatedly hear from Baptists (in general) that the only status that children have is that they are in Adam and unregenerate. They claim this on the basis of the child’s profession. Conversely, those that are professors are presumed (too much I think) to be regenerate on the basis of profession. There is an unhealthy mix of presumption about regeneration for professors and unregeneration for non-professing (young) members).

I wasn’t denying you believed all about Romans 6 and the Gospel in general. Please forgive me as I can understand how some of it came off as patronizing. I’m sorry to you and other Baptists if I sounded pejorative or condescending. I was trying to connect to the underlying concern in the OP, pull together some disparate posts, and draw it all out. I wanted to move from our common base of understanding regarding the Gospel and move to how the manner of Baptism and the way you talk about visible members actually undermines the program of the Gospel. In some aspects it is meant to sting (in a loving way) to get some to understand why the Reformed paedo baptizes into discipleship and not to declare of a person – this one is elect and this one is not.

The shoe fits for some or all aspects better than others, but credo-Baptism as an overarching system, in the way it treats the young – presuming them to be unregenerate – witholds an aspect of the Gospel from them. That witholding of the Gospel to the young is of the nature of Romans 6. It assumes that the only thing a child needs to hear is that they need to repent of their sins. On the other hand, it might see that adult professors don’t need to hear as much about repentance of sins (because after all they’ve professed). My view is that ALL in the visible Church need the full orbed presentation – professors or too immature to profess. The full presentation will mature and convert babes and the full presentation will mature and convert adults.

In the end, where the shoe fits, wear it. Your frustration is mine. As I stated in another thread, the Baptist view is very eclectic (even though you guys are all supposed to be 1689 LBCF) and some argue in different ways. I’m sorry that you feel slighted when I have to refer to a strain of Baptist thinking that is, in the main, representative of the issue. Conversely, Reformed paedobaptists are pretty monlithic in the understanding of the issue. Regardless of the aspects that you believe fit tightly or not, you have to answer for the reasons why you don’t baptize the young and why you believe profession alone is the arbiter of when discipleship begins. The difficulty in nailing down where Baptists fall on these issues communicates to confusion in the pews and why, when a Baptist calls up Pastor Gene Cook on the Narrow Mind he has no idea how he can possibly train his child in the fear and admonition of the Lord without training the child to obey the Law as a Pharisee might vice a motivation that focuses on love for God (Romans 6).

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Sacraments

The Gospel and the Sacraments Direct our Faith to the Same Object

I do so appreciate the opportunity to interact with Rev. Winzer on the Puritanboard. I learned long ago not to bristle when he challenges me on a statment I make. He challenged me today on my use of some sloppy terminology with respect to the sacraments and caused me to delve back into the Confession and the Heidelberg to determine the meaning of the Sacraments.

From Rev. Winzer:

Rich, thus far we have the gospel indiscriminately preached to all, whilst sacraments are administered to those in the visible church. We also have faith in the gospel essential to salvation whilst sacramental participation is not essential to salvation. The third and final point I am fairly sure you will concur with is that the gospel offers salvation as a present need, whereas sacraments are administered on the basis that salvation is a reality. Hence, the gospel is really and fundamentally a promise, whilst sacraments point to the fulfilment of the promise. Given these three qualifications, I would say the idea that sacraments are gospel is an unhelpful one, and it is best to distinguish Word (gospel) and Sacraments. Blessings!

When I think of promise in the Sacraments, I’m thinking along these lines:

WCF Chapter XXVII

III. The grace which is exhibited in or by the sacraments rightly used, is not conferred by any power in them; neither does the efficacy of a sacrament depend upon the piety or intention of him that does administer it: but upon the work of the Spirit, and the word of institution, which contains, together with a precept authorizing the use thereof, a promise of benefit to worthy receivers.

Heidelberg:

Question 66. What are the sacraments?

Answer: The sacraments are holy visible signs and seals, appointed of God for this end, that by the use thereof, he may the more fully declare and seal to us the promise of the gospel, viz., that he grants us freely the remission of sin, and life eternal, for the sake of that one sacrifice of Christ, accomplished on the cross.

Especially in Question 67, the Heidelberg underlines that both word and sacrament ar meant to point us to Christ. I realize that, after reading this, the Heidelberg distinguishes as you do from the teaching of the Gospel and assurance by the Sacraments. I need to be cleaner in my terminology. I won’t say they are Gospel but I will say they direct our faith to the same object that the Word does.

Question 67. Are both word and sacraments, then, ordained and appointed for this end, that they may direct our faith to the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross, as the only ground of our salvation? (a)

Answer: Yes, indeed: for the Holy Ghost teaches us in the gospel, and assures us by the sacraments, that the whole of our salvation depends upon that one sacrifice of Christ which he offered for us on the cross.

In Question 69, I love the way the Heidelberg links the sacrament as a visible sign that can be used to help us remember what was done for us by the sacrifice of Christ for us who have faith:

Question 69. How art thou admonished and assured by holy baptism, that the one sacrifice of Christ upon the cross is of real advantage to thee?

Answer: Thus: That Christ appointed this external washing with water, (a) adding thereto this promise, (b) that I am as certainly washed by his blood and Spirit from all the pollution of my soul, that is, from all my sins, (c) as I am washed externally with water, by which the filthiness of the body is commonly washed away.

And to anticipate the objections of those who believe too much is being promised here:

Question 71. Where has Christ promised us, that he will as certainly wash us by his blood and Spirit, as we are washed with the water of baptism?

Answer: In the institution of baptism, which is thus expressed: “Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost”, Matt.28:19. And “he that believeth, and is baptized, shall be saved; but he that believeth not, shall be damned.”, Mark 16:16. This promise is also repeated, where the scripture calls baptism “the washing of regenerations” and the washing away of sins. Tit.3:5, Acts 22:16. (a)

or from those who think that the water is somehow magical…

Question 72. Is then the external baptism with water the washing away of sin itself?

Answer: Not at all: (a) for the blood of Jesus Christ only, and the Holy Ghost cleanse us from all sin. (b)

But yet there is still something fundamentally spiritual going on in the Sacrament.

Question 73. Why then does the Holy Ghost call baptism “the washing of regeneration,” and “the washing away of sins”?

Answer: God speaks thus not without great cause, to-wit, not only thereby to teach us, that as the filth of the body is purged away by water, so our sins are removed by the blood and Spirit of Jesus Christ; (a) but especially that by this divine pledge and sign he may assure us, that we are spiritually cleansed from our sins as really, as we are externally washed with water. (b)

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Sacraments

Infant Baptism: The Difference between Roman Catholicism and Reformed Theology

What’s the difference between the RC view and the Reformed view of infant baptism?

Peace,

jm

Much in every way! The Roman Catholic view sees baptism first as an act of Grace that occurs “by the working of the works”. That is, the Sacrament itself, infuses Grace and effectively places the child in a state of grace before God. The grace infused, however, is conditional. The grace can be overthrown and killed in the individual by sin.

The Reformed view is that baptism is ministerial. That is, the minister announces what God has promised in His Word concerning the Covenant inclusion of children and it initiates the child into the covenant community. While the sign and seal of Baptism are not separate from what they signify (real union with Christ) they are not identical. That is to say that we do not believe that the minister is actually conferring union with Christ on the child by the “working of the works” but is announcing the promise of God. That promise is that what Baptism signifies (union with Christ) is promised to the child when he places trust in the Gospel. It is the same thing for an adult in fact. As surely as you see the water signifiying the washing of the filth of the flesh, so are your sins washed away if you believe in the Gospel. It is a visible sign and seal of God’s promise to us that we can look to when the enemy is so oft telling us we are not worthy of such Grace.

In RC baptism, you get in by the Church’s ability to infuse God’s saving grace and you stay in by cooperating with that grace lest you kill it and your “grace meter” goes to a point where justifying grace is killed.

In Reformed baptism, the minister declares the promise of God and seals God’s promises to the recipient. Grace, through faith, saves from beginning to end.

I have a problem with the term presumptive regeneration because presumption carries a connotation that I do not believe parents should have. When I presume something, it means I can take it for granted and little is expected on my part. I know that’s a semantic issue but words have consequences. I also don’t like the idea of presuming regeneration simply because I don’t know the hidden counsel of God. I look at it this way: my chilren are Christians and I treat them like that. I don’t treat them like they’re tiny pagans in my household with no different status than my pagan neighbors before God. They are holy because they are in my Covenant household. This gracious God says to me: “I’m not just promising to save you but your children as well.” A glorious thing indeed that those most dear to me in this world, beside my wife, are not my spiritual enemies.

I pray with them like little Christians with a seminal faith – faith as small as a mustard seed (thank you Rev. Winzer). I know that God has promised to save them if they call upon His name just as He has promised to save me under the same Covenant promise. I do not question their election any more than I question mine for my business is God’s precepts and not His hidden decree.

And so, contrary to my Roman Catholic upbringing, when my children sin, I do not raise them to worry that they’re in danger of hellfire as they have just killed the infused grace within them and need to have the Church dispense more saving grace in Penance. Rather, I discipline them as one who believes their sin has been punished in Christ. I train them to ask their Heavenly Father for forgiveness that they have offended Him in their sin, and I teach them to thank Christ for the salvation of sins found only in Him for those that believe in Him.

The difference between Roman Catholic Baptism and Reformed Baptism (aka Christian) is the difference between the doctrine of demons and a visible sign and seal of God’s Grace to His elect.

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Sacraments Theology

Responding to a concern that I misrepresented Greg Welty

I have been very busy as of late and was deployed to Korea for an exercise.  While there, a reader who is a friend of Greg Welty had concerns with my post A Critique of Greg Welty's Use of Galations in "From Circumcision to Baptism".  Here is the concern raised:

Greg had said in his paper: 

"What was the heresy of the Judaizers in the book of Galatians?

Fundamentally, their error was to contend that the command to circumcise was essential to the perpetuity of the Abrahamic Covenant and its promises and blessings. Thus, according to them, Gentile converts were required to be circumcised in order to be members of the family of God."

On Greg's view, central to the "promises and blessings" of the Abraham Covenant is *justification itself*. The error of the Judaizers was that you needed to be circumcised in order to be saved. As you rightly observed  "The error was trust in the Law. The error was a reliance upon the Law as a means of Justification." What he says is exactly what Greg believes.

Greg affirms that the Abrahamic Covenant was an administration of the covenant of grace, and is a redemptive covenant. And it's because he holds to classic covenant theology, that I stated things as I did.

His point in the material you cited was *not* to say that the error of the paedobaptist, in his view, was identical to the error of the Judaizer. He explicitly distinguished the two. In the very next paragraph (which you didn't cite), Greg wrote:

"While their error is usually not as serious as that of the Judaizers, the paedobaptist commits a similar error, by contending that the command to apply a covenant sign to one's children is essential to the perpetuity of the Abrahamic Covenant, and its promises and blessings."

The only reason he brought up the Judaizing error is to expose an *analogy* between it and the paedobaptist error. That's all. Also, that analogy bears little argumentative weight in his presentation. It's illustrative at best. My argument that the paedobaptist position is indeed an error is made on other grounds.

So, essentially, you seem to have latched onto an illustration as if it's an argument, but neither I nor Greg is sure you understood his illustration, since you seemed to impute a position to Greg that he does not hold, and that isn't entailed by what he wrote.  You might want to go back and revisit that particular entry.

First, let me state that I am not above reproach.  I carefully read what I wrote and I believe my criticism stands.  I criticized Mr. Welty on his exegesis of Galatians 3 and 4 and I believe that criticism is still valid.  My criticism at this point was not to suggest that it was material to his entire argument but his misappropriation of the "fundamental error" of the Judaizers is indicative of a larger error.

 If Mr. Welty had stated that their fundmental error was a reliance on the Law as a means of Justification then I would have no problem with the statement.  He zeroes in on the actual act of Circumcision, however, and then tries to attribute paedobaptism to a form of the Judaizing heresy, analogy or not.  I never said that Mr. Welty equated paedobaptism with the Judaizing heresy.  That he even put them in the same neighborhood is aggregious enough especially the way in which the analogy is formed.

I also, purposefully, did not deal with the portion where Mr. Welty merely calls the paedobaptist position a "similar error" (I wonder if the anathemas in Gal 1 are "similar").  Why?  Because he gets the Judaizing error wrong.  The Judaizers were not after a mere physical circumcision of the flesh.  To believe otherwise is to mis-read Paul's arguments.  They want the Galatians to take on the requirements of the Law as a means to Justification.  It was not "…the command to circumcise…" that was "…essential to the perpetuity of the Abrahamic Covenant and its promises and blessings…" as Mr. Welty insists.  The Judaizers expected far more than a mere circumcision of the flesh.  Their fundamental error was not even looking to the Abrahamic Covenant as I pointed out and am told that Mr. Welty agrees with.

So I'm left wondering:  If Mr. Welty agrees that it was a belief that Torah keeping=Justification then how does he go from that idea to the idea that the actual physical application of the covenant sign is what Paul has in view as the Judaizers fundamental error?  It's nice to hear from a friend that says that Mr. Welty understands the Judaizing heresy but, in his paper, he errs outright.

 I humbly submit, then, that my original critique be re-read to see that my focus was very specific:  the exegesis of Galatians 3-4 does not permit Mr. Welty to claim that the fundamental error of the Judaizers was that the command to circumcise was essential to the perpetuity of the Abrahamic Covenant.

While I bear no ill will toward either Mr. Welty or the person who asked me to reconsider, I cannot back off of this original critique. 

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Sacraments Theology

A Critique of Welty’s Use of Galatians in “From Circumcision to Baptism”

In a previous article, I posted Philip A's critique of Welty's article From Circumcision to Baptism.  I have posted my own critique of a foundational error made by Greg Welty and I include it here for your consideration.

Welty writes

What was the heresy of the Judaizers in the book of Galations? Fundamentally, their error was to contend that the command to circumcise was essential to the perpetuity of the Abrahamic Covenant and its promises and blessings. Thus, according to them, Gentile converts were required to be circumcised in order to be members of the family of God. But in this they were greatly mistaken, for in the New Covenant order of things, "circumcision is nothing" (1 Cor 7:19), and "neither circumcision or uncircumcision means anything" (Gal 5:6; cf. Gal 6:15). What they took to be essential to this everlasting covenant was in fact nonessential, and therefore done away with.

Welty is just flat wrong about the error of the Judaizers in Galatians. Read Galatians 3-4 for yourself. Nowhere does Paul once condemn the Judaizers for their trust in the sign "…as essential to the perpetuity of the Abrahamic Covenant." He misses the "fundamental" problem of the Judaizers. In fact, as I'll show, the Judaizers aren't even preserving the Abrahamic Covenant in the least. Listen to Paul:

Galations 3 1 O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you that you should not obey the truth,[a] before whose eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed among you as crucified? 2 This only I want to learn from you: Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith? 3 Are you so foolish? Having begun in the Spirit, are you now being made perfect by the flesh? 4 Have you suffered so many things in vain””if indeed it was in vain? 5 Therefore He who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you, does He do it by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?

The error was trust in the Law. The error was a reliance upon the Law as a means of Justification. So who does Paul roll out as an example that the Judaizers' belief is all wet? Abraham!

6 just as Abraham “believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.”[c] 7 Therefore know that only those who are of faith are sons of Abraham. 8 And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel to Abraham beforehand, saying, “In you all the nations shall be blessed.”[d] 9 So then those who are of faith are blessed with believing Abraham.

Paul then returns to the point that he repeatedly hammers regarding the Judaizing heresy. He says it so often that one cannot miss his repeated refrain: Justification by the Law only brings a curse. So much for your trust in the Law Judiazers.

10 For as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse; for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who does not continue in all things which are written in the book of the law, to do them.”[e] 11 But that no one is justified by the law in the sight of God is evident, for “the just shalllive by faith.”[f] 12 Yet the law is not of faith, but “the man who does them shall live by them.”[g] 13 Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree”[h]), 14 that the blessing of Abraham might come upon the Gentiles in Christ Jesus, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.

"You knucklhead Judaizers! Circumcision isn't even about keeping the Law!" is what Paul says here (Covenant Theology 101):

15 Brethren, I speak in the manner of men: Though it is only a man’s covenant, yet if it is confirmed, no one annuls or adds to it. 16 Now to Abraham and his Seed were the promises made. He does not say, “And to seeds,” as of many, but as of one, “And to your Seed,”who is Christ. 17 And this I say, that the law, which was four hundred and thirty years later, cannot annul the covenant that was confirmed before by God in Christ,[j] that it should make the promise of no effect. 18 For if the inheritance is of the law, it is no longer of promise; but God gave it to Abraham by promise.

Who do you think Paul is correcting here if not the Judaizers who think that Circumcision = Torah Keeping = Righteousness. This is the error that Paul is rebuking. Paul doesn't even have a problem with the physical act of circumcision, per se, but if you circumcise for the reason the Judaizers want you to then you've rejected the Gospel because you've rejected Grace.

Frankly, the problem with Welty's argument is that he needs to go back and read Galatians. This is frankly my biggest complaint as I've interacted with some other Baptists on these texts. Philip A alluded earlier to the way Welty wrests "circumcision is to no avail" snippets out of context and their meaning as Paul uses them. It's like Philip stated earlier, if you come to the text looking to justify Baptism and separate it from Circumcision then you run the danger of doing what Welty does by blowing by the basic error of the Judaizers. It turns the error on its head from Paul condemning the Judaizers for trusting in the Law (when it could only bring a curse) to an error of tying the sign to the perpetuity of the Abrahamic Covenant. The Judiazers weren't even looking at the Abrahamic Covenant but were preserving their perversion of it!

Thus, the basic "error" here is Welty's exegesis of Galatians 3. Since he misses the point of Paul's condemnation of the Judaizers, he applies an erroneous conclusion to paedobaptism.

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Sacraments Theology

Brief Critique of Welty’s “Circumcision to Baptism”

In a recent thread on the Puritan Board, Philip A presented a brief but excellent critique of Greg Welty's From Circumcision to Baptism. It is worthy of your consideration…

Let me preface my comments by letting you know that over the last few months I’ve come around to the paedobaptist position from what I would previously have called a “Reformed” and “Covenantal” Baptist position. I had first learned Covenant Theology from Richard Barcellos, and had read through his writings on the subject, as well as those by Welty, Malone, Tombes, Coxe, etc., and every Reformed Baptist Theological Review to date. I say that to make it clear that I am at this point arguing against my former self just as much as I am against Welty.

Welty does a good job of identifying circumcision as one of the central elements in the debate, but he falls short in that he misconstrues the meaning of circumcision. If you take a wrong turn at the very start, then whatever you do subsequent to that is of no consequence.

He does the same thing that I did when he deals with the paedobaptist argument regarding the meaning of circumcision ““ he acknowledges it, and then promptly ignores it. He cites a hypothetical response from a paedobaptist on page 7:

"…circumcision points to inward cleansing (Deut 10:16, 30:6; Jer 4:4, 9:25-26; Ezek 44:7; Rom 2:28-29)"

and follows it up by admitting that this “calls for an examination of these other texts”, but then proceeds to hand waving to dismiss them without the called for examination. Welty says, as you quoted,

"But one might as well argue that since OT sacrifices signified spiritual realities, we have warrant for continuing their use today. Clearly, we do not."

This completely ignores the fact that we have explicit NT texts abolishing the OT sacrifices, which is not the case for applying the covenant signs to children. But not only is the reason for his dismissal of the texts terribly flawed, but in place of them he goes rooting around in Genesis 17 and elsewhere making bad inferences, and then bases much of his subsequent reasoning on that misidentification of the meaning of circumcision.

Also, his argument on page 6 about the “historical-redemptive significance of Abraham’s circumcision” being prophetical of the inclusion of the gentiles is rather far-fetched; I was surprised to see him try and make this argument. Again, he ignores the explicit reason given in scripture for Abraham’s circumcision ““ “it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you” (Gen 17:11) and tries to back out from Romans 4 a wrongly inferred meaning. Paul is not at all saying “this is what circumcision means“, he is making an argument from the circumstances of Abraham’s circumcision to prove his point that possessing the sign of the covenant is not necessary in order to possess the substance of the covenant, and that is exactly what the Judaizers were arguing ““ no circumcision, no salvation (see WCF 28:5).

On page 8 he says:

"It is quite plausible to hold that circumcision was specifically applied to the seed of the OT people of God in virtue of this prophetic significance of the sign itself."

Again, he is arguing on the basis of “it is plausible for us to hold that circumcision means this”, over and against the texts of scripture that say “circumcision means this”. This was my favorite trump card, the argument from “prophetic significance” or “typology”, which at the end of the day is speculative at best. I could use it to dismiss any argument from the Old Testament that I didn’t like, but in reality it’s just an ipse dixit.

Welty also makes a few faux pas that take away from the credibility of his arguments. For instance, he accuses paedobaptists of using “abbreviated or paraphrased “˜citations'” (footnote 3, page 4), but he then proceeds to do the same thing on page 10, where he throws out his own abbreviated citations of “circumcision is nothing” (1 Cor 7:19), and “neither circumcision nor uncircumcision means anything” Gal 5:6), without addressing the context or the sense in which Paul meant those statements to be taken, or reconciling them to other places where Paul says “circumcision indeed is of value if you obey the law” (Rom 2:25) or “Then what advantage has the Jew? Or what is the value of circumcision? Much in every way”¦” (Rom 3:1-2). When I quote snippets of these texts the way he does with the others, I can make them appear to say the exact opposite of what Welty tries to make the others say.

To sum up, Welty dismisses explicit biblical texts on the meaning of circumcision in favor of his own misconstrued meaning of it, and bases his reasoning on that. His error was the same as mine was; I was ignorant of the spiritual meaning of circumcision, and hence made up my own meaning of it to fit with my theology. Any subsequent arguments based on that premise are all invalid.