Broadly speaking, there are two schools of thought among Reformed and Evangelical Christians. There are those who say children are part of the church. The Dutch Reformed who trace their roots to continental Europe believe with the Heidelberg Catechism that their children are included in the covenant and church of God (Answer 74). In this view, the church is made up of believers and their children; together they constitute the people of God.

Baptists take the view that children are not really part of the church until they come to personal faith and repentance. They see the church as a gathering of true, born again Christians. Because it remains to be seen whether their children will experience the new birth, they cannot be received into the fellowship of the church until the change from death to life has taken place.

Closely related to this, of course, is the view of baptism. The Reformed administer this sacrament to both adults who are converted from the world and to infants of believers. Baptists restrict this ordinance — they do not call it sacrament — to those only who can give a credible profession of their faith in Christ. Thus baptism and church membership are synonymous and take place simultaneously.

It would seem that the differences between these two views are fundamental and therefore irreconcilable. But is there not a possibility of finding some common ground between these two branches of Bible-believing Christians? There are those in both camps who will say no. A number of years ago I attended a Sovereign Grace Baptist conference where one of the speakers was Dr. J.R. De Witt. After his speech, a lady said to me, I am really puzzled; "this man spoke the truth but he is a paedobaptist!" She had evidently been taught that ministers who sprinkle babies could not be true servants of God. On the other hand, I also know some paedobaptists who have great difficulties believing that Baptists are anything but sectarians.

But increasingly I find that people from both traditions are beginning to realize that they have much in common. This is especially so, of course, where Reformed paedobaptists and Reformed Baptists are concerned. What they share is a firm conviction that salvation is by grace alone through faith alone. The doctrines of grace as set forth in the Canons of Dort, popularized by the acronym TULIP, have proved to be a real binding force in the last 20 to 30 years.

That explains why so many ministers, as well as laypersons, can go to conferences such as the Banner of Truth and Ligonier to listen to speakers from different backgrounds and be blessed by what they hear. This is possible only because there is recognition of each other as members of the same family. There are still differences, some of them very important, but apparently not important enough to keep our distance and to avoid each other's company.

What is it that makes many of us believe that we are essentially one? I think it is the spiritual or experiential dimension of the Christian faith. By that I do not mean that our unity is based on feelings and emotions only. The mind is involved in this process too. But there is an emphasis on the practical, experiential aspect of the Reformed faith that binds us together and that leads to mutual recognition as members of the same family.

This also has a bearing on the way we view our children. Both Baptist and paedobaptist parents who have experienced the grace of God in their own lives will be concerned about the salvation of their children. Both know that their children are by nature dead in sins and trespasses and therefore unable to save themselves.

The Dutch Reformed confess this in several of their creeds and liturgical forms. For example, in the Heidelberg Catechism, where Lord's Day 4 states that "we are so corrupt that we are wholly incapable of doing any good and inclined to all wickedness except we are regenerated by the Spirit of God." In the Form for Baptism, parents bringing their infants to the font, confess that "they with their children are conceived and born in sin and therefore are children of wrath, in so much that they cannot enter into the kingdom of God except they are born again." Similarly, Presbyterians confess in the Larger Catechism of the Westminster Confession that "original sin is conveyed from our first parents unto their posterity by natural generation, so as all that proceed from them in that way, are conceived and born in sin '' (Answer26).

And what do Baptists teach in this connection? Basically, the same statements can be quoted from various Baptist Confessions. We also have the opinion of the great Baptist preacher C.H. Spurgeon. In his wonderful little book Come ye Children, he writes, "Parents, you must sorrowfully look upon your children as born in sin, and shapen in iniquity, heirs of wrath, even as others."

Listen to this warning coming from a Dutch Reformed preacher, Dr. R.B. Kuiper. While firmly believing that children of believers are members of the church and covenant of God, he nevertheless cautions parents that this fact should not cause them to take for granted that their children are on the way to heaven. In his book, To Be Or Not To Be Reformed, he writes, "Covenant children, like all others, must learn to know their sinfulness and must cast themselves as hell-deserving and helpless sinners upon the Christ crucified."

So we get this interesting conundrum. There are Baptists who believe that their infants are outside of the church and paedobaptists who are convinced their children are very much part of the church. Yet both agree with the basic truth that by nature they and their children are outside of the kingdom of God. All agree with what Jesus said in John 3, "Except ye are born again ye cannot see or enter the kingdom of God." All agree that the new birth manifests itself in faith that lays hold of Christ as our Lord and Saviour, as Jesus went on to teach Nicodemus in that same chapter.

To be sure, there are those in both camps who hold to different views. In the Reformed camp there are those who espouse the notion of presumed regeneration or the idea that children of believers should be viewed as having been regenerated from birth. In Arminian Baptist circles there is the widely held belief that infants enter the world with a relatively clean slate, at least in the sense that Christ by His sacrifice has paid for their original sin.

In connection with infant salvation it is very interesting that Spurgeon also believed that all infants, not just believers' children, but all children will go to heaven.

The only difference is that he believed the basis for their salvation is not their innocence, but the sacrifice of Christ. How are they saved? Not by works, for they don't have any. Not by natural innocence, for if they were innocent, they would not die. "They die because of Adam's fall ... (but) they live again because Jesus died and rose again, and they are in Him. They perish, as far as this life is concerned, for a sin, which they did not commit; but they also live eternally through a righteousness in which they had no hand."

It is not only Baptists who entertain such optimistic hopes for children who die in infancy. There are also some outstanding paedobaptists who share this view. For example, Charles Hodge and Benjamin B. Warfield, and in more recent times Lorraine Boettner — all of them Presbyterians of impeccable Calvinistic credentials — firmly believed in the universal salvation of children.

Not all paedobaptists hold this position, however. Presbyterians generally stick to the limiting statement of the Westminster Confession of Faith that only elect children dying in infancy are saved. One could argue, of course, that if all infants are saved because of the sacrifice of Christ, they are all elect.

The Dutch Reformed are a little more cautious. They hold the view set forth by the Canons of Dort. "Since children of believers are holy, not by nature, but by virtue of the covenant of grace, in which they, together with their parents are comprehended, godly parents have no reason to doubt of the election and salvation of their children whom it pleases God to call out of this life in their infancy" (1,17).

Not all Baptists agree with Spurgeon either. In his book, Children of Abraham, David Kingdon says:

It is popularly supposed that all infants dying in infancy are saved. Many Reformed divines have extended the phrase 'elect infants' to mean that all infants dying in infancy are elect, although it is questionable whether such a thought was in the minds of the authors of the Westminster Confession. Some, like Spurgeon, have maintained that heaven will contain more infants than adults, since the greater proportion of the human race has probably died in infancy. It seems to me that if Spurgeon, Hodge and Boettner do not intentionally go beyond Scripture, they certainly take the barest hints and press them so much that they become the assertion of this doc­trine of infant salvation. But nowhere in Scripture, as far as I can see, is there express warrant for this belief. This is not to say that God cannot save all children dying in infancy, nor to say that he does not, it is simply to recognize the fact that he has not chosen to tell us whether he does or not.

I believe Kingdon is right. We have to be careful not to go beyond what Scripture teaches. I suspect that Spurgeon and others who hold to this view are guided more by wishful thinking than by biblical evidence. I personally hope that Spurgeon is right, and I'm sure we all do, but our hopes and dreams are not the decisive issue here or anywhere else. I do think, however, that the way this issue is dealt with in the Canons of Dort is more scriptural and therefore more dependable. By speaking only of the salvation of infants of believers, the Confession does not rule out the possibility of other infants being included in God's saving grace. It only speaks with confidence about children within the pale of God's church and covenant.

Kingdon, however, rejects this "out" offered by the Canons because he thinks it is based on the doctrine of presumptive regeneration. He writes: "Since the ground on which a covenant child is to be baptized is presumptive regeneration, should that child die in infancy it is to be assumed to have been regenerated." Here Kingdon makes a big mistake. He and many other Baptists assume that all paedobaptists hold to the doctrine of presumptive regeneration. But this is not true.

Many paedobaptists, both in Reformed and Presbyterian churches, firmly reject presumptive regeneration, either as the ground for the baptism of infants or of their salvation should they die in infancy. Rather, the ground for both is the covenant promise that God is the God of believers and their children.

That covenant promise gives believers a pleading ground with God. "Godly parents," the Confession states "have no reason to doubt, the election and salvation of their children who die in infancy." Why? Because their children are holy in the objective, covenantal sense. They are sanctified or set apart by God for Himself.

Baptists cannot accept this interpretation. They know of only one kind of holiness and that is the subjective kind, synonymous with regeneration. Because they rightly believe that most children do not come into the world possessing this holiness, they wrongly believe that even children of believers cannot be viewed as members of the church and covenant of God.

Consequently, Reformed Baptists like Kingdon, restrict membership in the church and the covenant to believers only. They are fond of speaking of the New Covenant as being totally different from the Old Covenant, meaning that whereas the Old Covenant may have included both regenerate and unregenerate persons, membership in the New Covenant is restricted to the regenerate only. The position of children, therefore, is one of outsiders until such time as they can be admitted through the gate of faith and repentance.

Yet, for all their insistence on this point, Reformed Baptists like Kingdon, do recognize that children of believers do enjoy some kind of relationship to the church. Listen to these words: "It is true that birth connection does not entitle them to church membership, but it is also true that such connection is brought about by God in His providence so that they are born in the bosom of the church, of godly parents, who by their prayers, instruction, and example, will undoubtedly educate them in the true faith of Christ."

These are remarkable words for someone who does not believe that children of believers are members of Christ's church! They are born in the bosom of the church but they do not apparently belong to the church. Kingdon insists on making this distinction. "Believers' children," he says, "are privileged children because they are within the sphere of the preaching and nurture of the church, but they are not made Christian children by privilege, but by true conversion. We dare not confuse privilege with position or status. Our children are born into the Adamic race and we dare not presume that they have been regenerated until they give real evidence of the saving change."

There is much that I agree with. I also believe that our children are born into the Adamic race and therefore need to be born again. But why deny our children the position or status of being part of the church? A baby lying in his mother's bosom presumably came from her womb and is therefore her child, part of her flesh and blood!

In the Old Testament we find many references to covenant children who by their sinful conduct showed that they were unregenerate. It is no different in the New Testament church. In her bosom too there are many who live and die in unbelief and will therefore be cast out of the kingdom, as Jesus warns. But to be cast out of the kingdom implies that one has to be in it first! Or to change the metaphor, to be cut off the vine as an unfruitful branch, one first has to be attached to that vine as Jesus says in John 15.

Therefore, I have to disagree with my Reformed Baptists brethren on this point. I do understand their concern. It cannot be denied that many in paedobaptist circles have too optimistic a view of the position or sta­tus of covenant children. What Jesus said to Nicodemus, a covenant child if ever there was one, is often over­looked or downplayed by Christian parents and educators. "Ye must be born again" is a requirement for all sons and daughters of fallen Adam and Eve, including children of believers.

The mistake many make in this connection is to take the comforting truth of the salvation of children dying in infancy and to apply it also to children who live on. It is, however, one thing to believe that our little ones whom the Lord takes away early in life go to be with Him, but it is quite another thing to assume that also our children who grow up are in a state of grace. When it comes to the former, we have Biblical grounds for hoping and even firmly believing they are safe in the arms of Jesus. But to view our older children and teenagers with the same confidence is not always warranted.

In order for us to have such confidence we need to see certain evidences of godliness in our children. I do not mean that we should look for sudden and dramatic changes in them. Children brought up in Christian homes are usually led to faith in a much more gradual way than those who have spent years living in sin.

But whether gradual or more abrupt, our children need to know that they cannot die the way they were born. They need a new heart, that is a heart that loves God and the Lord Jesus Christ and that hates sin. They must know, not only that they must be born again, but also what the new birth means and involves.

Spurgeon, in the book I mentioned earlier, has some very helpful things to say in this connection. After first explaining that children, even very young children, are able to grasp biblical truth and that they often demonstrate a love for the Lord and trust in His Word which puts many older people to shame, Spurgeon goes on to list the things we should emphasize in teaching children. He is addressing Sunday school teachers, but of course the same applies to parental instruction. "Be sure," he says,

whatever you leave out, that you teach them the three Rs, — Ruin, Redemption, and Regeneration. Tell the children they are Ruined by the Fall, and that there is salvation for them only by being redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ, and regenerated by the Holy Spirit ... Tell the children of the joy and blessedness of being Christians ... Lay stress on this point, that the righteous are a blessed people while here below, and that they will be a blessed people forever in heaven above. Let your children see that you belong to that blessed company. If they know you are in trouble, if it be possible, come to your class with a smiling face, so that your scholars may be able to say: Teacher is a blessed man, although he is bowed down by his troubles. Always seek to keep a joyous face, that your boys and girls may know that your religion is a blessed reality. (p.95)

We have seen that Reformed Christians are divided on the position of children in the church. Some say they are in the church and in the covenant; others insisting that they are not yet part of the church, even though they are willing to grant they are in the bosom of the church.

Whatever the difference, there does seem to be consensus when it come to the task of Christian parents, namely to bring up our children in the fear and admonition of the Lord. There is no doubt in my mind that the Lord is working with His grace and Holy Spirit in the lives of parents and their children in both branches of the Christian church. As Donald Bridge and David Phypers write in their book The Water that Divides, "A thorough-going paedobaptist should not be surprised when the children of Baptist parents who neither recognized nor gave symbolic expression to the 'covenant-promises' do as a matter of fact often turn to Christ in later years. Equally, a fervent Baptist should not be surprised when the Holy Spirit continues to work in circles where (he feels) the need for personal decisive commitment is confused by a premature sacrament. Yet the facts proclaim that this is so."

Why is this so? Because, as the authors conclude, both camps are convinced that we are saved by grace through faith. As Peter said at the Council of Jerusalem (Acts 15) with reference to certain differences that had surfaced between Christians with a Jewish and those with a Gentile background: "We believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved, even as they" (vs.11). The centrality of grace is crucial!

That is why I and many other paedobaptists, although convinced we have the correct view on the questions at issue here, nevertheless feel a basic spiritual unity, especially with Reformed Baptists who hold to the doc­trines of grace. This has been especially so in English speaking countries where there have always been good relations between the Puritans, most of whom were paedobaptists, and their brothers in the Baptist camp. Men like John Bunyan and Spurgeon, Lloyd-Jones and more recently Jerry Bridges, Walter Chantry, John McArthur and others, are esteemed in many paedobaptist circles just as Calvin, Owen, Edwards, Sproul, Godfrey and Ferguson are among Baptists. Why? Because the common ground is love for the Reformed faith with its glorious doctrines of grace — doctrines which must not only be believed with the mind, but also experienced in the heart by all of us, parents as well as children.