Our current sermon series, "Membership and Immersion: Baptized into One Body," has been all about how the church, membership, and baptism fit together. Last Sunday, we addressed the question, “What is baptism?” We touched briefly on one New Testament passage which indicates that baptism should be reserved for those who have consciously responded to the gospel in faith.
Colossians 2:11-12 reads, In him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ, having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead. This is one of a number of passages to which baptists might point to make the case for believer’s baptism. However, it is also referenced by those who hold to infant baptism. Time did not allow me to address this in the sermon. I’d like to take a moment now to show both why our paedobaptistic brothers and sisters like this passage and why it doesn’t actually help their case.
The argument for paedobaptism leans heavily on the parallel between circumcision and baptism as the signs of the old and new covenants, respectively. As circumcision was a sign given to all males in the covenant community of Israel, including infants, so also baptism should be given to all in the covenant community of the church, including the infants of the faithful. Colossians 2:11-12 is believed to be helpful to the paedobaptistic argument because it seems to make that parallel explicit—baptism is the new circumcision. However, if we look more closely and consider what the Bible explicitly teaches about the distinctives of the two covenants, we should conclude that these verses are no help at all to the paedobaptist argument.
Before we consider the words of these verses in Colossians, we should note that there is a biblical distinction between physical circumcision and heart circumcision. It is true that the community of the physically circumcised in Israel was composed of the saved and unsaved. All males were circumcised regardless of their faith or the faith of their parents. In that way the covenant community of Israel was a mixed community—believers and unbelievers.
Circumcision of the heart denotes a change of the heart that enables one to obey the Lord. It is enjoyed only by the believing. Deut 10:16 reads, Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no longer stubborn. There is also Deut 30:6 and Jer 4:4. Jeremiah 31:31-34 and Ezekiel 36:22-32 point to a distinctive feature of the new covenant—it is not a mixed community. That is, every one is a believer. Every one is circumcised in heart. Everyone has the Holy Spirit.
The uniform testimony of the Scriptures is that while the physically circumcised included believers and unbelievers, regenerate and unregenerate, the spiritually circumcised or circumcised of heart by definition includes only the believing, only the regenerate. One can be outside of Christ and be physically circumcised; however, one cannot be outside of Christ and be circumcised in the heart. The old covenant was a mixed community—believers and unbelievers. The new covenant is not—it is exclusive to believers as theirs is not a physical circumcision, but heart circumcision.
So as we turn our attention to Colossians 2:11-12, we must ask, which circumcision does the apostle make analogous to baptism—physical circumcision or heart circumcision? Look again:
In him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ, having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead.
Paul explicitly says that the circumcision he references is a circumcision made without hands. He further describes it as the circumcision of Christ. Parallel passages in Eph 2:11-12 and Rom 2:25-29 should make it clear Paul means heart circumcision. His reference to our being “raised with him through faith” is decisive. Not only is baptism for the faithful only, but there is not an analogy being drawn here between the circumcision of the old covenant and baptism. Rather, Paul’s point is that baptism is for those who have been circumcised without hands by the circumcision of Christ, that is, those who have been regenerated.
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