# Calvin and Baptismal Regeneration



## Grillsy

Some members of my church recently attended a seminar at a local Baptist church dealing with John Calvin.

There, much to the shock and dismay of my fellow Presbyterian churchmen, they claimed that Calvin believed in Baptismal regeneration. 

It is true that some of his statements do seem to lean toward a type of baptismal remission of sins.

What do you think, did John Calvin teach baptismal regeneration?


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## eqdj

That's too bad.
Calvin argues against this in his Institutes, Book 4, Chapter 15
Institutes of the Christian Religion | Christian Classics Ethereal Library

Please tell me it wasn't a Reformed Baptist church


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## Grillsy

eqdj said:


> That's too bad.
> Calvin argues against this in his Institutes, Book 4, Chapter 15
> Institutes of the Christian Religion | Christian Classics Ethereal Library
> 
> Please tell me it wasn't a Reformed Baptist church



Sadly it was. A very large one and very prestigious speaker. I'm sorry to have to report that.


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## eqdj

This is from the second paragraph


> Peter also says that “baptism also doth now save us” (1 Peter 3:21). For he did not mean to intimate that our ablution and salvation are perfected by water, or that water possesses in itself the virtue of purifying, regenerating, and renewing; nor does he mean that it is the cause of salvation, but only that the knowledge and certainty of such gifts are perceived in this sacrament.


and this is from the fourth paragraph


> I know it is a common belief that forgiveness, which at our first regeneration we receive by baptism alone, is after baptism procured by means of penitence and the keys (see chap. 19 sec. 17). *But those who entertain this fiction err* from not considering that the power of the keys, of which they speak, so depends on baptism, that it ought not on any account to be separated from it. The sinner receives forgiveness by the ministry of the Church; in other words, not without the preaching of the gospel. And of what nature is this preaching? That we are washed from our sins by the blood of Christ. And what is the sign and evidence of that washing if it be not baptism? We see, then, that that forgiveness has reference to baptism.


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## Grillsy

eqdj said:


> This is from the second paragraph
> 
> 
> 
> Peter also says that “baptism also doth now save us” (1 Peter 3:21). For he did not mean to intimate that our ablution and salvation are perfected by water, or that water possesses in itself the virtue of purifying, regenerating, and renewing; nor does he mean that it is the cause of salvation, but only that the knowledge and certainty of such gifts are perceived in this sacrament.
Click to expand...


Exactly. I think that the professor making the presentation may have been thinking of certain statements from Calvin's treatises on the Sacraments. But Institutes seem to really make it clear what Calvin's views are.


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## eqdj

Grillsy said:


> eqdj said:
> 
> 
> 
> That's too bad.
> Calvin argues against this in his Institutes, Book 4, Chapter 15
> Institutes of the Christian Religion | Christian Classics Ethereal Library
> 
> Please tell me it wasn't a Reformed Baptist church
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Sadly it was. A very large one and very prestigious speaker. I'm sorry to have to report that.
Click to expand...


lame
I apologise for their error
please don't hold it against all of us


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## eqdj

I noticed the "John Calvin Exposed" used Rich Lusk as it's source. That's too bad. Unfortunately there are some [-]Reformed[/-] Calvinistic Baptists who think the Federal Vision is just a logical (non-heretical) form of Covenant Theology.

There's also one who thinks no self-respecting Calvinist is Amil. 

I sincerely wish more of these new Reformed, New [-]Calvinists[/-] Amyralidans would subscribe to the White Horse Inn podcast and pick up some Church History


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## Grillsy

eqdj said:


> I noticed the "John Calvin Exposed" used Rich Lusk as it's source. That's too bad. Unfortunately there are some [-]Reformed[/-] Calvinistic Baptists who think the Federal Vision is just a logical (non-heretical) form of Covenant Theology.
> 
> There's also one who thinks no self-respecting Calvinist is Amil.
> 
> I sincerely wish more of these new Reformed, New [-]Calvinists[/-] Amyralidans would subscribe to the White Horse Inn podcast and pick up some Church History



Oh and don't think that since those links are to a Jack Hyleish Independent Baptist church goer's website that I am in any way associating them with Reformed Baptist


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## au5t1n

Baptismal regeneration usually means that baptism always regenerates those who receive it, but that said regeneration may be lost later. Calvin's view was that baptism has no effect on any but the elect, and that only by faith in the promise of God, not by some kind of magic. Some call his view "baptismal efficacy" rather than "baptismal regeneration".

This is one of the better articles I've read on the subject:

Stafford Carson : Presbyterian Pastor Calvin on Baptism


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## Poimen

“The schools of the Sophists have taught with remarkable agreement that the sacraments of the new law (those now used in the Christian church) justify and confer grace, provided we do not set up a barrier of mortal sin. How deadly and pestilential this notion is cannot be expressed — and the more so because for many centuries it has been a current claim in a good part of the world, to the great loss of the church. Of a certainty it is diabolical. For in promising a righteousness apart from faith, it hurls souls headlong to destruction... Hence, any man is deceived who thinks anything more is conferred upon him through the sacraments than what is offered by God’s Word and received by him in true faith. From this something else follows: assurance of salvation does not depend upon participation in the sacrament, as if justification consisted in it. For we know that justification is lodged in Christ alone, and that it is communicated to us no less by the preaching of the gospel than by the seal of the sacrament, and without the latter can stand unimpaired.” 
-John Calvin, Institutes Book IV Chapter 14

16. ALL WHO PARTAKE OF THE SACRAMENTS DO NOT PARTAKE OF THE REALITY.
Besides, we carefully teach that God does not exert his power indiscriminately in all who receive the sacraments, but only in the elect. For as he enlightens unto faith none but those whom he hath foreordained to life, so by the secret agency of his Spirit he makes the elect receive what the sacraments offer.
17. THE SACRAMENTS DO NOT CONFER GRACE.
By this doctrine is overthrown that fiction of the sophists which teaches that the sacraments confer grace on all who do not interpose the obstacle of mortal sin. For besides that in the sacraments nothing is received except by faith, we must also hold that the grace of God is by no means so annexed to them that whoso receives the sign also gains possession of the thing. For the signs are administered alike to reprobate and elect, but the reality reaches the latter only.
18. THE GIFTS OFFERED TO ALL, BUT RECEIVED BY BELIEVERS ONLY.
It is true indeed that Christ with his gifts is offered to all in common, and that the unbelief of man not overthrowing the truth of God, the sacraments always retain their efficacy; but all are not capable of receiving Christ and his gifts. Wherefore nothing is changed on the part of God, but in regard to man each receives according to the measure of his faith.
-John Calvin, Mutual Consent in Regard to the Sacraments


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## eqdj

Calvin on The Sacraments is great.
I wish more American Covenantal Baptists would read that chapter (unlike their British counterparts, they seem to be afraid of the term)


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