And when she and her household were baptized, she begged us, saying, "If you have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come to my house and stay." So she persuaded us. Acts 16:15

This verse, along with Acts 16:40 in which the household of the Philippian jailer was baptized, are cited as biblical support for baptizing children and infants because their parents are believers. But do these passages say anything about children and infants? They do not. Before getting into that, let’s start with a first order of business regarding the formulation of doctrine.

Rule #1: Do not base doctrine on narratives. The Bible recounts events accurately, but that does not mean that everything that was done and recorded was right. It is accurately recorded that Peter denied Jesus, but that is not biblical proof that we too should deny Jesus. The only way we dare cite narratives to support doctrine is if the action in the narrative is taught in a “didactic” (that is, teaching) portion of scripture. In such cases, the narratives that agree with the didactic serve as illustrations of what the Bible teaches.

This is an important rule of interpretation to remember. In the case of child or infant baptism, what is more important than what is recorded about whole households being baptized is, what does the Bible teach about what baptism means and who should be baptized?

More on that next time…