Why We Baptize Believers, Not Infants

[PENDING — Anton decision (AB-2): EXTRACT the paedobaptism-vs-credobaptism treatment from the live MinistryGrid Baptism course IF it exists; ELSE greenlight Bloom to author this lesson in full. The drafted opening below shows the register and may seed the draft. The closing argument waits on Anton's call.]

Many people reading this were baptized as babies. A priest or minister sprinkled water on you before you could remember it. Your parents meant it sincerely, and we honor that. So why does Mayflower ask you to be baptized again as a believer?

The short answer is that in the New Testament, baptism always follows faith. People heard the gospel, believed, and were then baptized. The order never reverses.

So those who received his word were baptized, and there were added that day about three thousand souls. (Acts 2:41)

Baptism is a picture of something that has already happened in you: you have died to your old life and been raised to a new one. An infant cannot yet have that reality to picture. We do not say your parents did wrong by their lights. We say that baptism, as the Bible describes it, is for those who have themselves trusted Christ. Being baptized now is not erasing what your family did. It is you, with your own faith, doing what Jesus asked.