Friday, October 14, 2022

Fred A. Malone (Reformed Baptist): Paedobaptism Undermines the Doctrine of Particular Redemption/Limited Atonement

  

Another problem with the paedobaptist position that all infants of believers are in the New Covenant is that it does violation to the doctrine of particular redemption. Every New Covenant member has Jesus Christ as his effectual Mediator (Matthew 1:21). As Ridderbos says:

 

God’s people are those who whom Christ sheds his blood of the covenant. They share in the remission of sins brought about by him and in the unbreakable communion with God in the new covenant that he has made possible. (Ridderbos, Coming of the Kingdom, 202)

 

To call unregenerate infants “God’s people” and members of the New Covenant for “whom Christ sheds his blood of the covenant violates particular redemption simply because no one can be in the New Covenant without the effectual mediatorial sacrifice that establishes the covenant with every member. (Fred A. Malone, The Baptism of Disciples Alone: A Covenantal Argument for Credobaptism Versus Paedobaptism [rev ed.; Cape Coral, Fla.:  Founders Press, 2008], 95-96)