In May of 1527, as he had advocated that only those who had been born again were baptized seeing it as the ecclesiastical end of the reformation (if one is justified by faith, then those so justified should be baptized, and so the church should be made up of believers), Michael Sattler entered Rothenberg with his wife, was arrested, put on trial, and found guilty of heresy for his aforementioned teachings. Then, being sentenced to death, he was tied to an ox cart, whipped, and had parts of his flesh torn from him with hot tongs. Finally, he was forced to watch his wife drown before his eyes before being himself burned at the stake.

Now, just as a reminder, last week we looked at Colossians 2:8-15 and saw that the practice that Sattler was advocating, namely, that baptism should be administered only to believers for it is to mark not the fact that one is in the family of one who is a child of God (paralleling physical circumcision), but it is to mark the fact that one himself is a child of God (paralleling spiritual circumcision) is indeed true. But this week, especially in light of the results of this story, I want to ask us something else in light of Michael Sattler’s death.

Was this worth it? Was it even necessary? Was the struggle to ensure that only believers are admitted into the membership of the church, bearing the sign of entrance into the covenant community (i.e. baptism) worth these events taking place? After all, it cost his wife and him their lives. It was a teaching that departed from many notable Christian men who had preceded him. Should this issue of baptism be considered that important in light of the fact that it is not even tied to salvation?

There are a growing number of people who would say, “No” to these questions. Their argument might go along the lines of this statement: “Baptism does not save anyone. Thus, not being necessary for salvation we should not make a big deal of how (or more importantly) when it is administered and should definitely not make baptism as a believer a prerequisite for church membership.” Among such men was our beloved John Bunyan (author of The Pilgrim’s Progress), who though believing the Bible taught believers’ baptism did not exclude those from membership who had not known believers’ baptism.

So there’s one notable voice weighing in on the matter. However, we all know that at the end of the day, though it’s nice to know one is in agreement with those who have come before him, our authority is not man but the Scripture. Therefore, this morning I want us to turn to the word and attempt to answer the question, “Is the practice of believers’ baptism really something that we should hold to at the expense of others joining our congregation?” Or to ask it another way, “Is there really harm in administering the sign of entrance into the community of faith (the church) to those who are not believers, such as infants?” This is the main question I want to try to answer today.

And to answer this question I want to try to answer a few other questions, which when answered I think will provide the answer we are looking for in asking our main question this morning.

These questions are: “What is the church? What is the covenant community? What does it picture? What is its function? What is its purpose? What is the church to be in contrast to the world?”

Now, obviously we cannot answer these questions fully, but I want to point us to some distinguishing marks of the church’s makeup and function in 1 Peter 2:1-12 as we try to answer this question of the importance of believers’ baptism.

First, Peter shows us that the church is made up of those who believe, those who belong to God as his people (2:6-7, 9-10)

We read of this description in verse 6-7 as Peter writes, “For it stands in Scripture: ‘Behold, I am laying in Zion a stone, a cornerstone chosen and precious, and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.’ So the honor is for you who believe, but for those who do not believe, ‘The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone’” (emphasis added).

Again, we read in verses 9-10 as Peter notes the distinction of the church in comparison to the world, “But you area chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy” (emphasis added).

So, you see, God has a distinct people, those who have been called out of the darkness into the light, those who believe, those who are God’s very own possession, belonging to him. God has decreed that he will have a people, the gathered ones, the called out ones. This is a description of the church. The church is the people of God, those who have responded to the promises of God. One has defined the church as “the body of that people who have been called out of the world by God’s grace and who have been called together to glorify him by serving him in the world.” ¹

So, clearly God has deemed that there will be a called out people who believe and who are his very own. They are his church. We who are believers, who are God’s people, are his church. So, very simply the church is the group of believers, those called out by God, who are his people. The church is not a building but it is people, believers in the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Within that, those who are God’s people, his church, are to be driven, governed, and fueled by the word of God (2:2, 4-8)

Listen to Peter’s exhortation in verse 2 to those who are God’s called out people. He writes, “Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up to salvation.”

Now this analogy is real to me. Lili often passes my newborn boy, Michael, off to me to burp him in the middle of feeding him so that he doesn’t build up gas and isn’t fussy after his feeding. But it isn’t some precious time between father and son when this occurs because he simply wants more milk. He’s not finished. He’s not full. He’s craving it. And so he often screams until I give him back to his mom and he can finish eating. For him, to take him from his mom while he has gotten a taste of milk is like ripping him away from that which is most precious to him in all the world, that which is his life source, that which is his greatest desire. I know this analogy.

So, Peter says that in the same way, we’re to long for the word like that. We’re to see it as our life source, that which we need if we hope to grow and thrive and live.

So, if this isn’t us, the question may be, “Why isn’t it?” For if this is a description of what God’s people should be like and the analogy is even close to what I’m imagining having witnessed my little boy’s longing for milk, then we should have a craving for the word if we are believers.

Well, I can think of two options. The first would simply be that you’ve deceived yourself and your claim to be a believer is wrong. So, to reverse the saying, “If it doesn’t look like a duck, or walk like a duck, or quack like a duck, it probably is not a duck.” So, you, this morning, may need to examine your heart in light of this lack of craving for the word that is present within you, and see if you truly are of that first category listed, namely, those who believe and are God’s very own people.

However, as aforementioned, there is a second option. I have a quote hanging on my office wall to remind myself of this reality. It reads like this: “The strongest, most mature Christians I have ever met are the hungriest for God. It might seem that those who eat most would be least hungry. But that’s not the way it works with an inexhaustible fountain, and an infinite feast, and a glorious Lord … If you don’t feel strong desires for the manifestation of the glory of God, it is not because you have drunk deeply and are satisfied. It is because you have nibbled so long at the table of the world. Your soul is stuffed with small things, and there is no room for the great.”²

So, as you can probably see from the quote (which I think is quite true), that another possible reason you may find yourself not longing for the pure milk of the word in accordance with this exhortation in 1 Peter 2:2 is because you’ve starved yourself from it and filled yourself with lesser things. Yes, you may be a believer, but you’ve exchanged that which provides life and health for that which less. Thus, you feel no real longing as a craving for the word but you feel your soul aching within and your affection for the Lord wilting.

Then you need to obey this text. You need, in contrast to those who do not believe (as described in 4-8, capping in verse 8) obey the word and long for it. So the way that you may create hunger for the word is to begin to feed on it, and as you do, you will find your hunger for God’s word growing.

So, those who are God’s people, his church, should be characterized by a longing for the word. It is their fuel, what drives them, and what governs their lives.

The church, then, should be characterized as those whom God has declared holy and who are therefore growing in holy living (2:1-2, 5, 9, 11-12)

This is all throughout our text this morning. In verse 5, Peter tells these people that they “are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood” (emphasis added). In verse 9, he writes, “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation …” (emphasis added).

So God’s people through faith in Christ have been declared holy by God. They have the righteousness of Christ credited to their account. They are set apart [the meaning of “holy”] from sin. So, as God looks at one who is his own child, one who truly believes, he sees him as holy. That will be our final judgment in his sight.

And at the same time, knowing that will be our final judgment, we are to be growing in holiness within this life. Just as Ray read last week from Titus 2:12-13 that we are to live upright in this present age as we wait for the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, so Peter instructs his readers, those who await to be made perfectly holy in their entire being, to now separate themselves from sin. That is, he tells them as ones who will be perfectly holy, strive for holiness now.

He writes, “So put away all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander” (2:1). He writes in verses 11-12, “Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul. Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation.”

We are to be those who are striving to live according to the word and abstaining from sin. We are to live holy lives.

Finally, God’s people (the church) are to resound to the glory of God (2:3, 9, 12)

Ultimately God has called out his own people to live according to his word, to live holy, and therefore to glorify him. We exist for his glory. We see that clearly in verse 9. Peter says, “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light” (emphasis added). Thus, we have been called out to proclaim God’s excellencies, to magnify him, to resound to his glory.

In the same way, Peter parallels believing in Christ with tasting and seeing “that the Lord is good” in verse 3. But how does this resound to God’s glory? Well, by following Christ as your Lord, with your life governed by his word, you are by necessity rejecting the shallow and temporary pleasures found in sin and are saying to the world that you have found a deep and enduring pleasure in our Lord. That is why Peter can say in verse 12 that as unbelievers see our good deeds, they will glorify God. It is the same thing Jesus said in Matthew 5:16 as he said, “Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your father who is in heaven.”

One of the clearest testimonies of this reality (though negative) has come from my oldest sister, Sabrina. She often shares her testimony with young girls to promote abstinence. And within that, she tells of growing up and watching her biological mom leave her little girl (my sister) and her husband (my dad) to go have sex with other men.

And then my sister says that the reason she became sexually active prior to marriage was because she wanted to know what was so good about sex outside of marriage that someone would leave her husband and little girl for it. Do you see? My sister’s biological mother’s sin brought a false glory to that sin in my sister’s eyes. In a similar (though positive) way, may our holiness and obedience to our Lord, our tasting and seeing that the Lord is good communicate to the world that there is something greater here than you can imagine. My sister was disappointed, but he who seeks satisfaction in the Lord will not be disappointed, for he truly is good. And by our lives we give testimony to that reality.

So why do we look at all this about the church this morning? Why are we reminded that as God’s people we should be holy? It is because we need to remember that God’s people, the church, those in the covenant community communicate to the world what God is like. We are indeed his body.

This is why Paul, when finding out that there was great division among the church at Corinth asks, “Is Christ divided?” (1 Corinthians 1:13). He doesn’t say, “Is the church divided?” but “Is Christ divided?” Why? It is because he knew that the church was Christ’s body communicating who he is to the world. He remembered years earlier as he was persecuting the church that Christ had shone a light that knocked him to the ground and said to him, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?” (Acts 9:4).

Thus, realizing this reality that Christ’s church communicates to the world who he is, we strive to ensure that we are as a church giving a true and pure witness of him to the world. That is why we strive in allowing members into this local church to ensure that they are believers to the best of our ability. We have then share their testimony, articulate the gospel, sign the confession of faith, and agree to the discipline of this church. In fact, it’s why discipline in the church is practiced, so that those in the church will continue to give a true testimony of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Therefore, to baptize infants, thus allowing them to bear the sign of entrance into the covenant community, the church, ensures that (at least for a while) those who do not know Christ will be identified with his church. Thus, they cannot be characterized by the realities we have seen today (for it requires one to be called out of darkness into the marvelous light). And thus we will ensure that the church will give false testimony of the Lord Jesus Christ through the lives of its members.

Therefore, we must allow only those who give clear evidence of regeneration to bear the mark of baptism (the mark of entrance into Christ’s church) so that we may to the best of our ability ensure that true testimony is given of Christ through his church. We must follow this biblical practice of believers’ baptism so that the distinction that is to exist between the church and the world is not blurred. We do not stand on this practice merely because we’re Baptist instead of Methodist but because the Scripture teaches this practice and also tells us that the church is God’s choice avenue to display his glory in the world.

May he then be magnified through his called out ones, his holy ones, those who govern their lives by his word, those who because they have tasted that he is good proclaim his excellencies in the world. To him be glory through his church throughout all generations. Amen.

¹Mark Dever, in class lecture at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, January 7, 2003.

²John Piper, A Hunger for God, (Crossway: Wheaton, 1997), 22-23.

SHOULD WE PRACTICE INFANT BAPTISM? – PART 2