This article is a summary from the following episodes: Part One: Credobaptism or Paedobaptism? Pt. 1 Adriel Sanchez and Theocast Discuss Baptism & Covenant Theology
Part Two: Credobaptism or Paedobaptism? - Part 2 (w/ Adriel Sanchez from Sola Media)
A Conversation Among Brothers
We love conversations like this one—not because they’re easy, but because they matter. In a two-part video exchange between us (Jon and Justin) and our brother Adriel Sanchez, pastor in the PCA and host of Core Christianity, we got to sit down and talk through the long-standing differences between the Reformed Paedobaptist and Reformed Credobaptist positions.
It’s rare for this conversation to happen with mutual respect, clarity, and warmth. But that’s exactly what we experienced. We’re grateful for Adriel and the work he’s doing, and we’re also grateful to be able to clearly lay out why we remain confessional Baptists.
This article isn’t trying to settle a 300-year-old debate. It’s not a point-by-point rebuttal or a call to arms. It’s a summary of a pastoral, theological conversation between friends. And our prayer is that it helps weary Christians find clarity—not just about baptism, but about the gospel and the covenant promises of God in Christ.
What Do We Agree On?
Before we dive into the differences, let’s be clear about where we agree. The three of us are confessional. We believe in covenant theology. We’re reformed. We believe in the ordinary means of grace. And most importantly, we’re preaching the same Christ for sinners.
We all agree that baptism isn’t just a public testimony. It’s a sign and seal of the covenant of grace. It signifies union with Christ, the forgiveness of sins, and being buried and raised with Jesus. And we all want to push back against the shallow, symbolic-only views of baptism that dominate much of modern evangelicalism.
We agree that children of believers are to be raised in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. That they are holy—not “vipers in diapers,” but set apart in the context of the covenant community. And we agree that God works through means—through the preached word, through the sacraments, through the community of the church.
Where we begin to differ is in who should receive the sign of the covenant—and what exactly that sign signifies in terms of covenant participation and union with Christ.
The Covenant Framework: One or Two Administrations?
For Adriel, the theological shift came when he began to see baptism as primarily something God does. It’s a work of grace, not just a work of man. That shift opened the door to seeing continuity between circumcision in the Old Covenant and baptism in the New—and led him to embrace infant baptism within the framework of covenant theology.
From our perspective, we affirm one covenant of grace throughout redemptive history. But we see it unfolding progressively through distinct, successive covenants—Abrahamic, Mosaic, Davidic—until it’s formally established in the New Covenant in Christ. This means we see more discontinuity than our Paedobaptist brothers do.
For us, the Abrahamic covenant isn’t the covenant of grace per se—it’s a typological covenant that includes both earthly and spiritual promises. Circumcision, then, was a sign of that typological covenant, applied to Abraham’s offspring according to the flesh. It pointed forward to something greater—regeneration, the circumcision of the heart—not unlike the way the land, the temple, and the priesthood pointed to Christ.
The fulfillment of circumcision, then, is not baptism. It’s regeneration. The true circumcision is made without hands. That’s why we give the sign of the covenant only to those who show evidence of the new birth—those who have been united to Christ by faith.
Visible Church and Covenant Participation
Adriel argues that children of believers belong to the visible church and should receive the sign of the covenant, just as they did under the Old Covenant. He sees continuity in language like “household,” “holy,” and even in the warning passages of Hebrews, which speak of people sanctified by the blood of the covenant who fall away.
We agree that there’s a kind of external participation in the life of the covenant community. There are those in our churches—our children included—who are under the preached word, surrounded by the people of God, and are “holy” in the sense of being set apart. But for us, that doesn’t mean they are in the New Covenant.
Jeremiah 31 describes a New Covenant where all its members “know the Lord,” have the law written on their hearts, and have their sins forgiven. That’s not true of everyone in the visible church. And so we make a distinction between visible church membership and New Covenant membership. Baptism, in our view, is given to those who are in union with Christ and part of the New Covenant. Not just externally, but truly.
To baptize someone into the New Covenant is to say that the blessings of Christ are theirs. If that person later walks away, we’re left with either an over-realized sacrament or the implication that Christ fails to save some of those he mediates for.
Household Baptisms and Covenant Language
Adriel rightly points out that New Testament baptisms often involve households, and he sees that as a continuation of covenantal patterns from the Old Testament. He argues that Luke’s use of “household” language would be misleading if children were now excluded from covenant signs.
We hear that. But we also note that the text never explicitly says infants were present or baptized. And in many cases, the household is said to have rejoiced or believed along with the head of the house. That suggests conscious participation.
More than that, baptism in the New Testament is consistently tied to faith, union with Christ, and regeneration. Romans 6, Galatians 3, Colossians 2—all describe baptism as being buried with Christ, clothed in Christ, raised with Christ, joined to Christ. There’s no category in the New Testament for someone receiving the sign of baptism without being united to the one it signifies.
That’s where the rubber meets the road for us. The sign is tied so closely to the thing signified that to give it without evidence of the reality is, in our view, inconsistent with New Testament practice.
Warning Passages and Covenant Holiness
Adriel brings up Hebrews 10 and other texts that speak of people who were “sanctified by the blood of the covenant” and yet fall away. He sees this as evidence that people can participate in the New Covenant externally without having vital union with Christ.
We agree that the warnings are real and serious. And we don’t deny that people can be in the church, receive the means of grace, and even look like Christians, yet not be truly converted.
But for us, those people are not in the New Covenant. They’re part of the visible church. They’re participants in the life of the covenant community. But they’re not in vital union with Christ, and they haven’t received the reality signified by baptism.
We think that distinction matters—not just theologically, but pastorally. Because if we say someone is in the New Covenant and united to Christ, and then that person walks away, what are we left with? Either Jesus fails to save, or our categories need adjustment.
Pastoral Encouragement and Gospel Comfort
This is where we land the plane. What matters most is not how much water or when it was applied. What matters most is Jesus. The comfort of baptism is not found in our profession, or in the sincerity of our parents, or in our theological precision. It’s found in Christ and his promises.
We encourage people to remember their baptism—not because it proves their faith, but because it points them to Jesus. To his finished work. To his faithfulness. To his gospel.
We love our Paedobaptist brothers. We know we haven’t resolved every difference. But we also know this: we’re preaching the same Christ. We’re pointing to the same grace. And we’re looking to the same promise.
Let’s keep pointing people there.
