Revisiting the Family Context of the Gospel Covenant

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And Jesus said unto him, This day is salvation come to this house,

forasmuch as he also is a son of Abraham.

Luke 19:9

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For the promise is unto you, and to your children, and to all who are afar off,

even as many as the Lord our God shall call.

Acts 2:39

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Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved, and thy house.

Acts 16:31

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An Unprecedented Movement and an Incredible Challenge

Militant efforts to redefine nature itself in terms of marriage and family relationships are  engulfing America.  It is critically important for Christians to revisit the major recorded apostolic presentations of the gospel, carefully noting the scope of the gospel promise itself and of the baptism which followed.  While subject to God’s election, [1] definitive gospel presentations in the New Testament, not unlike so many Old Testament prophecies that preceded them, [2] exhibit a family orientation common to every major biblical covenant: Adamic; [3] Noahic; [4] Abrahamic; [5] Mosaic; [6] and Davidic [7] ; and extending to the youngest infant. [8]

The New Testament’s perspective on Noah is particularly instructive:

By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house; by the which he condemned the world, and became heir of the righteousness which is by faith. [9]

Peter described this saving of Noah’s household “by water” as “the like figure whereunto even baptism doth also now save us (not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God,) by the resurrection of Jesus Christ.” [10]  This Noahic type of new covenant baptism (as Peter represented it) resembled the baptism of Saul of Tarsus–a salvation event with an intimate connection between the water and the Spirit. [11]  And yet, it must be acknowledged, that the baptism of Noah’s family even more closely foreshadowed the intergenerational model of baptism administered at Pentecost, [12] at the house of Cornelius, [13] in the case of Lydia, [14] and in the house of the Philippian jailor. [15]  In each instance, in addition to being a salvation event, baptism was a household event!  And, as Peter further reminds us, it was also an eschatological event! [16]  Paul wrote of “the household of Stephanos” being the “first converts in Achaia,” [17] and of numerous other local expressions of the church in the homes of his acquaintances. [18]  

The Covenant-Keeping God and the Prodigal Son

New covenant baptism, consistent with Noah’s baptism, honored the marriage and family covenant instituted in Eden [19] and later associated with the marriages of Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebekah, and Jacob and Rachel.  “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved, and thy house” [20] –that is the family-oriented New Testament gospel invitation!  As the Bridegroom’s wedding invitation is trumpeted by gospel preachers, earthly espousals are honored and enhanced in the same motion.  This family context of gospel faith was honored by the pilgrim fathers of the Plymouth Plantation and those Congregational settlers of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, not to mention the continental Protestant Reformers who preceded them!  God is a covenant-keeping God, [21] and his gracious covenant is likened to a marriage. [22]  These early colonists, flawed though they were, consciously strove to be faithful to God’s covenant like the patriarchs and faithful Jews of ancient biblical times.  By contrast, this generation of Americans is floundering in a whimsical pool of ever-increasing individual rights without moral restraint.

But what about the prodigal son?  One thing is certain–while the prodigal could declare his independence and remove himself from his father’s house, he could not eradicate the memory of the blessings experienced in his father’s house. [23]  The bond between father and son drew the prodigal home.  The prodigal and the stay-at-home brother both had non-physical bonds with their father within which to work out their salvation “with fear and trembling.” [24]  And this is the problem of withholding the covenant sign from the children of credible professing believing parents–it disregards the significance of Christian parenting and of the family bond instituted by the Creator. [25]  

Jonathan Edwards and the Seal of God’s Promises

Jonathan Edwards was the eighteenth-century pastor-theologian whose preaching sparked the revival which was a precursor to America’s Great Awakening.  Edwards viewed the Christian family as a converting institution.  While there were no “promises of God’s word given to the seed of men who were morally sincere but only half Christians,” he believed there were “promises made to the seed of the righteous,” i.e. the offspring of those who could personally attest to the saving operation of God’s grace in their hearts.  And he believed the “baptism of infants” was the appropriate biblical “seal of these promises made to the seed of the righteous.” [26] In the aftermath of the revival, Edwards observed a careless disregard for “external order” on the pretext that “God does not look at the outward form,” but “looks at the heart.”

On this foundation, also, an orderly attending on the stated worship of God in families, has been made too light of; and it has been in some places too much a common and customary thing to be absent from family-worship. . . . . . But we should take heed that it do not become a custom or common practice; if so, we shall soon find the consequences to be very ill. [27]

Emphasizing personal salvation to the neglect of the family covenant puts us at risk of  trivializing Paul’s metaphor of the church as the “bride of Christ” and the “household of God;” [28] of dismissing Peter’s appeal to Sarah as an example of how Christian wives are to relate to their husbands; [29] of overlooking the awesome directions for husbands and fathers; [30] and of neglecting  the importance of children obeying their parents and the promise associated with that obedience. [31]  Applying the outward gospel sign or “seal” [32] to all the family members answers to the critical importance of the gospel to the proper functioning of the family.  Since the family was never intended to function on a strictly egalitarian basis, the father and/or mother, by God’s covenant design, must make the decision on behalf of minority children. [33]

By withholding the “seal” of new covenant baptism from infants or other minor children of Christian parents, we demonstrate either that we do not understand, or do not take seriously, the application of the new covenant to the youngest and weakest members of the family.  Nor do we appreciate Jesus’ willingness to take up the cause of the little ones against those who do not take them seriously. [34]  Like the sign of the rainbow [35] or circumcision, [36] baptism is an outward “seal” signifying to family members the blessing of the new covenant and their obligations, as defined by Holy Scripture, concerning the way they relate to their Creator, one another, fellow Christians, governing authority in the church and society, and even their enemies. [37]

Noah, it is reported, is currently the most common name given to newborn sons in America.  Could this reflect the desire of many young parents to be obedient to God and the family covenant? [38]

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Endnotes

[1]. Acts 2:39; Rom. 9:1-33: Gal. 1:15-16

[2]. Gen. 17:7; Deut. 30:6; Isa. 44:3; Joel 2:28-29

[3]. Rom. 5:12-21; Heb. 11:7; Gen. 17:7; Exod. 20:5-6; Luke 18:15-17; Josh. 24:15; Acts 2:17, 38-39; 10:24; 16:15,         31; 2 Tim. 1:5-7

[4]. Gen. 6:18; 2 Pet. 2:7

[5]. Gen. 15:4-6; 17:7, 15-21

[6]. Exod. 2:24; 3:6; 4:5, 14-15, 18-20, 24-30; 12:4; Exod. 20:5-6

[7]. 2 Sam. 7:1-29

[8]. This accounts for Jewish parents’ bringing the smallest of infants for the blessing of their Messiah in Luke 18:15-17. Note the Greek word rendered “infants” in the ESV is the very word used of John the Baptizer within his mother’s womb! (Luke 1:41)

[9]. Heb. 11:7

[10]. 1 Pet. 3:21

[11]. Acts 22:16

[12]. Acts 2:38-39

[13]. Acts 10:24, 33, 44; 11:13-17

[14]. Acts 16:14-15

[15]. Acts 16:30-34

[16]. Acts 2:40; 2 Pet. 3:1-13

[17]. 1 Cor. 16:15

[18]. Rom. 16:1-16, 23; 1Cor.16:1-10,19; Col. 4:16

[19]. Gen. 2:20-25

[20]. Acts 16:31

[21]. Exod. 20:5-6

[22]. Jer. 2:1-3; 2 Cor. 11:2

[23]. Luke 15:17-20

[24]. Phil. 2:12-13

[25]. Gen. 4:1-2, 9, 14-16

[26]. Jonathan Edwards, Answer to Solomon Williams, Works, 1:524. Note that Edwards’s reference to “half Christians” was obviously a reference to the Half-Way Covenant adopted by the churches of Massachusetts Bay on October 8, 1662, whereby adults, having been baptized as children of the covenant (i.e., as infants) but unable to present a narrative of grace attesting to spiritual conversion, were permitted to have their children baptized so long as they were orthodox in their theology and free from scandalous behavior, although they themselves were not admitted to the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper.  Edwards was fired by the Northampton church after writing and preaching on Qualifications for Holy Communion whereby he set forth his conviction that, not only was his grandfather and pastor predecessor wrong in admitting to the Lord’s Table those who were unable to present a narrative of grace, but that the Half-Way Covenant itself was unbiblical in allowing such adults to have their children baptized. Adults who were unable personally to attest to their own conversion, in Edwards’s view, were not only to be barred from the Lord’s Table, but they were not permitted to have their minor children baptized.  Their children themselves could be baptized and admitted to the Lord’s Table only upon their own credible profession of faith.

[27]. Edwards, Some thoughts Concerning the Present Revival of Religion in New England, Works, 1:409-410

[28]. Ephes. 5:22-6:4; 1 Tim. 3:15

[29]. 1 Peter 3:1-6

[30]. Eph. 5:25-33; 1 Pet. 3:8; Ephes. 6:4

[31]. Eph. 6:1-3

[32]. John 3:33; cf. Rom. 4:11; 2 Cor. 1:22; Eph. 1:13 Note the covenantal or contractual “seal” on the part of God and man, as new covenant baptism replaces the outward “seal” of physical circumcision and which man applies in answer to, or anticipation of, the gift of the Spirit in keeping with Numbers 19, Ezekiel 36:25, Isaiah 52:15, and Acts 22:16.  See Colossians 2:11-12.

[33]. Ephes. 6:1-4

[34]. Matt. 18:5-6, 10

[35]. Gen. 9:8-17

[36]. Gen. 9:8-17; 17:7-14; Rom. 4:11

[38]. Deut. 4:9-10, 23; 8:11-20; 11:18-32; Josh. 24:15

[39]. Heb. 11:7

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Sources

Brand, David C. 1991. Profile of the Last Puritan: Jonathan Edwards, Self-Love, and the Dawn of the Beatific. American Academy of Religion. Academy Series. Atlanta: Scholars Press.

Christenson, Larry.  1970. The Christian Family. Bethany House Publishers: Minneapolis, MN

Christenson, Larry. 1982. The Wonderful Way that Babies are Made. Bethany House Publishers; Minneapolis, MN

Clark, Stephen B. 1980. Man and Woman in Christ: An Examination of the Roles of Men and Women in Light of  Scripture and the Social Sciences. Servant Books: Ann Arbor, Michigan

Deen, Edith. 1963. Family Living in the Bible. Fleming H. Revell Company: Old Tappan, NJ

Dobbins, Richard, Ph.D.. 1973. Train Up a Child: How to Tell Your Child About God. Creative Communication: Stow, OH

Dodds, Elisabeth D. 1971. Marriage to a Difficult Man: The “Uncommon Union” of Jonathan and Sarah Edwards. The Westminster Press: Philadelphia

Edwards, Jonathan. 1879. The Works of Jonathan Edwards, A.M., rev. & ed., Edward Hickman, 2 vols. 12th edition. London: William Tegg & Co.

Evans, Louis H. 1962. Your Marriage–Duel or Duet? Fleming H. Revell Company: Old Tappan, NJ

Hyder, O. Quentin, M.D. 1975. The People You Live With. Fleming H. Revell Company: Old Tappan, NJ.

Gerstner, John H. 1991. The Rational Biblical Theology of Jonathan Edwards. In Three Volumes. Powhatan,

Virginia: Berea Publications/Orlando, Florida: Ligonier Ministries.

LaHaye, Tim. 1968. How To Be Happy Though Married.  Tyndale House: Wheaton, IL

Martin, Ralph. 1978. Husbands, Wives, Parents, Children: Foundations for the Christian Family. Servant Books: Ann Arbor, Michigan

Morgan, Edmund S. The Puritan Family: Religion and Domestic Relations in Seventeenth-Century New England. Harper and Row, Publishers: New York

Ortland, Anne. 1977. Disciplines of the Beautiful Woman. Word: Waco, Texas

Shedd, Charlie W.  1968. Letters to Karen: On Keeping Love in Marriage. Avon Books: New York

Shedd, Charlie W. 1969. Letters to Phillip: On How to Treat a Woman. Fleming H. Revell Company, Old Tappan, NJ

Shedd, Charlie. 1970. Promises to Peter: Building a Bridge from Parent to Child. Word Books: Waco, Texas

Thielicke, Helmut. 1964. The Ethics of Sex.  Translated by John W. Doberstein. Harper and Row, Publishers: New York

About the Writer

David Clark Brand is a retired pastor and educator with missionary experience

in Korea and Arizona. He and his wife reside in Ohio. They have four grown children

and seven grandchildren. With a B.A. in the Liberal Arts, an M. Div., and a Th.M. in

Church History, Dave continues to enjoy study and writing. One of his books, a

contextual study of the life and thought of Jonathan Edwards, was published by the

American Academy of Religion via Scholars Press in Atlanta.