Vision Forum: I just noticed that you are promoting “The Great Debate over Baptism and the Covenant”. As an elder in a former Reformed Baptist church, now moving towards Presbyterianism, I am grieved to see Vision Forum take this divisive stance. There are many changes going on in our ministry in the area of integrating church and home that are a direct result of our seeing the Presbyterian understanding of the Covenants. Your promotion of this Baptist work is, in our case, a direct attack on everything else your ministry teaches regarding church and home. Again, your ministry is now attacking the very theological foundation upon which church and family integration is built. Why is it that Vision Forum has decided to make this stand against the Reformed position? Robert T.

Dear Robert:

I am truly thankful for this important email and that you would write to explain this concern. If I thought that Vision Forum or any other ministry which I supported was deviating from a covenantal and reformed perspective on Scripture, I too would be greatly concerned. Thankfully this is not the case here.

The purpose of the tape series “The Great Debate over Baptism and the Covenant,” is, frankly, to address the very issue that you raise—-the necessity of a distinctively covenantal and reformed perspective on baptism. The position taken by Mr. Einwhecter is not only that dispensational credo-baptism fails to meet this standard, but that many “Reformed Baptists” also lack a covenantal perspective on baptism. The CDs also refute and expose as mere theological posturing the tactic often employed by Presbyterians to define “Reformed” and “Covenantal” as being the exclusive domain of Presbyterians. This tactic is often based on fundamental misunderstandings and miss-defining of what we would understand to be the biblical doctrine of the baptism of disciples alone. Having grown up under the tutelage of Reformed Presbyterians and Reformed Baptists, I believe such posturing is not only harmful to the body of Christ, but does absolutely nothing to help believers wrestle through the issues with exegetical precision. I am uncomfortable with Reformed Baptists labeling all Reformed Presbyterians as “Romanists” (though some may be influenced by such), even as I am uncomfortable with Reformed Presbyterians mocking Credo-Baptists for being non-Reformed and non-covenantal (though many may fit this description). The issues are more complex and we must define our terms accurately.

We recognize that reasonable men can disagree on the issue of baptism. We also recognize that where one stands on baptism may well influence other issues, but we categorically reject, and challenge others to defend to the contrary, that the credo-Baptist position is inherently non-covenantal or non-reformed. Such a stance can not honestly be maintained unless one warps the meaning of the terms.

In our view, and that of the other Presbyterians and Baptists with which we have worked since the very beginning on building unity between church and home, the issue of credo vs. paedo is not inextricably linked to the message of a family-integrated perspective on the local church. The critical issue is whether we are building our position on an exegetically sound perspective. We believe that such a perspective is inherently Reformed and covenantal, but not inherently credo-Baptist or paedo Baptist. In our meetings and discussions we have also agreed that as to “secondary” issues like paedo-communion, and baptism itself, that such issues are beyond the purview of the narrowly tailored work of the NCFIC.

Of course, Vision Forum itself deals with broader issues than the NCFIC itself does, and we made a decision to publish these CDs with the goal of promoting unity in the Body of Christ. Because of the confusion over the doctrine of baptism and the unfortunate misplaced heavy rhetoric (i.e. “You are a credo-Baptist, therefore you are not reformed and can not truly have a covenantal family integrated church.”) of some, we believed it necessary to present a formal defense of the covenantal position on credo-baptism, and to help build bridges within the Reformed community by demolishing straw men which only serve to confuse and move us away from the real issues.

Here is my recommendation: Get the CDs and listen to them. I think you will be challenged and refreshed. Also, I think you will benefit from the dialogue which occurs at the conference between strongly-committed paedo-baptists and the speaker. After the conference I spoke to several very committed paedo-baptists who were fundamentally challenged by the presentation, and who indicated that they had grown immensely in their respect for credo-baptism as a position which can squarely stand within a covenantal view of Scripture.

If after listening to the whole conference you still believe that “Your ministry [VFM]is now attacking the very theological foundation upon which church and family integration is built,” than I urge you to write me again and make a case for your beliefs. But I do not believe that you will reach such an opinion. Even after you have listened to the CDs, we may not agree on the issue of baptism, but I do hope that we will find solid common ground in our fundamental assumptions about Scripture which lead to the defense of a family-integrated church.

Thank you for your passionate zeal to defend the faith and acknowledge the great principle of covenantal faithfulness in the Scriptures.

Blessings,
Doug Phillips

For information on our CD series Baptism and the Covenant, click here.