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Chapter 3: Of the Covenant with Abraham,<br />
<strong>and</strong> its Supposed Connection with Baptism<br />
Old Testament, <strong>and</strong> still more so how we add<br />
to the words of Jesus by baptizing children,<br />
while he has only comm<strong>and</strong>ed the disciples, or<br />
those who believe, to be baptized, Matt. 28:19;<br />
Mark 16:15, 16.<br />
But it is said, we must consider how the<br />
apostles, to whom the commission was<br />
originally delivered, would underst<strong>and</strong> it. From<br />
their habits, it is thought they would take it for<br />
granted, that children were to be baptized with<br />
their parents, <strong>and</strong> therefore a particular precept<br />
was not necessary. This assumption is<br />
gratuitous. After the day of Pentecost, the<br />
apostles were no more guided by their former<br />
habits, which had so often misled them. They<br />
had learned that the kingdom of God, the laws<br />
of which they were to publish, was very<br />
different from the worldly kingdom established<br />
in Israel. 2 The subjects of the latter enjoyed that<br />
privilege by birth; the subjects of the former<br />
2 See Col. 2:20 where the apostle calls the kingdom of<br />
Israel the world. It is so called as contrasted with the<br />
kingdom of God. When no such contrast is made, it is<br />
called the kingdom of God. Matt. 21:43 for he was the<br />
King of the nation of Israel under the theocracy.<br />
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