The Covenant and Seed

Now that was the meaning of circumcision, that’s the meaning of baptism. We return ourselves and we return our children to the Lord hoping that in His sovereign grace He will work that in them which will affect their regeneration. This is why in 1st Corinthians 7:14 Paul says that even the unbelieving partner, husband or wife of a believer, and their children are holy unto the Lord, they are not holy because they are redeemed they are holy because God sets them legally apart and gives them covenant protection until they depart in which case they are now outside the covenant protection and care. The covenant children must be taught the covenant faith. Thou shalt teach them diligently unto Thy children and shall talk of them when Thou sittest in thy house and when thou walkest on the way and when thou layest down and when thou risest up. So at the table when you are walking with your children you are to use every opportunity to instruct them in the righteousness, in the law of God. The children of covenant believers, their seed, are clearly important to God’s covenant. Abraham is told in Genesis 17:17 and elsewhere also we are told that the covenant is an everlasting covenant. Now children are essential to its continuity and to the continuity of the dominion mandate and so we can withhold nothing from the Lord, our children must be given to Him.

Not merely in a rite but at the table, when we walk, in our conversation, the overriding concern must be God’s requirements of all of us. Moreover this text tells us the life and the family must revolve around the faith. The commandments are to permeate the whole of our lives. We are told moreover in Deuteronomy 6:20:

“And when thy son asketh thee in time to come, saying, What mean the testimonies, and the statutes, and the judgments, which the Lord our God hath commanded you?”

What is the meaning of the law? They are to teach the meaning of the law saying God gave us this out of grace. He showed signs and wonders and the signs and wonders that he showed to Egypt were for their judgment, their reprobation, their destruction. But the signs and wonders He manifested to us were for our salvation. The Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and He brought us out from thence that He might bring us in to give us the land which He swear unto our forefathers. And why did God give us the law? This is what they are to teach our children. And the Lord commanded us to do all these statues, to fear the Lord our God for our good always. That He might preserve us alive as it is at this day. For our good always. That’s the purpose of God’s law. Moreover and it shall be for our righteousness. If we observe to do all these commandments before the Lord our God as He hath commanded us. If we observe to do all the commandments then we manifest that we hath the righteousness which is the mark of a covenant relationship with the Lord. The mark of faith, the mark of faithfulness. All these things therefore we must teach our children because we are not our own. We have been bought with a price and therefore we must yield ourselves and all that we are and all that we have unto the Lord. We must rear our children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.

He may accept or reject them but it is the Lord’s preogrotive to do what He wills with His vessels, it is our duty to give ourselves and our children to the Lord. Are there any questions now concerning our lesson in this first session, yes?

[Question] There are many books on child raising, I’ve probably read twenty of them or thereabouts, all of them talk about godly discipline and talk about memorizing scripture, none have said anything about teaching the child the purpose of the law, what being a member of the covenant means, what does baptism mean at an early age, are there any existence, books like that?

[Rushdoony] No…unfortunately, the problem with most of the churches that, for example, practice infant baptism, is that they have separated the doctrine from the doctrine of the covenant and as a result they develop all kinds of ideas about baptism which are really ungodly. I know a pastor, a very fine man, an outstanding man, but he believed and he taught that anyone who was baptized and his parents were faithful to the church and all was saved. That was it. Now I’ve heard of other instances of that, now that’s a perversion of the doctrine you see, a dramatic and fearful perversion. Well when you have that prevailing and it’s become a kind of a battle ground, those who are for it and those who are against it, so when you come to this matter of children and the covenant what do you have, all the arguments are on the pros and cons of infant baptism without any regard for its relationship to the covenant and the covenant meaning. This is why I believe Kingdon’s Children of the Covenant or Children of Abraham is so important.

I do disagree with it at certain points but what Kingdon has there done is to put the entire discussion back into its proper perspective, the covenant. And I think anyone who writes on baptism in the future without reference to Kingdon’s book and the doctrine of the covenant is doing the church a disservice and is missing the boat. Yes?

[Question Unintelligible]

[Rushdoony] I don’t like to say the subject is infant baptism because then you get into all the tired arguments. I happen to believe in infant baptism because I believe in the covenant, not because I believe what the champions of infant baptism teach. It’s the doctrine of the covenant and the total claim of the covenant over us and everything that we are and everything that we have. Nothing can be withheld from the Lord of the covenant and since He has not withheld his only begotten Son what He is saying to us as He did to Abraham is that we cannot withhold our children from Him.

[Question Unintelligible]

[Rushdoony] Yes. If we realize that’s what it is. Yes?

[Question Unintelligible]

[Rushdoony] Yes, a very good point. The fact of male baptism meant that the man was to be the governing head of a household and therefore had a responsibility for the instruction for all within the household. And the father was to be a teacher of the children and also of his wife, to guide her and instruct her and she was to be a helpmeet in the government which was his duty. So that the circumcision of the man stood for the circumcision of a household, that is, the dedication of a household. Now circumcision meant I said it was a symbolic castration, it meant the cutting off hope in generation and placing your confidence only in regeneration.

That’s what baptism should mean too so that we should say that our children are not regenerated by it but their only hope is in regeneration and that we will bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord because they belong to the Lord, they are His property and it is more important for them to get what the Lord has to say than what we have to say and to give. Any other questions or comments? Yes?

[Question Unintelligible]

[Rushdoony] Yes. Well, I’ve already had an entire series on Christian education but I will probably in this covenant series return also to the covenant and education so I will be touching on it again, yes?

[Question Unintelligible]

[Rushdoony] Well, it makes it impossible when you have such a view and virtually the same idea is present in many evangelical circles, it becomes impossible to have a doctrine of the covenant. How can you have a doctrine of the covenant if you do not see the federal character of mankind? The fact that all men are one in Adam or one in Christ? Then of course what happens is that you weaken the doctrine of atonement and this is why in Mormon circles there is no doctrine of atonement and wherever you have an excessive individualism in Protestant thought so that you for example undercut the nature of sin in men apart from Christ their inheritance in Adam you also undercut the atonement. And some of those who’ve been extreme in American evangelicalism and revivalism in their doctrine of individualism have also had problems with the doctrine of atonement; they really don’t know what it means. Finney is a good example of this.

Well if there are no further questions we’ll take a recess for about five or ten minutes before we continue with our next study.