Church, Baptism, and Faith in the Reformed Tradition

Do Reformed Christians believe in baptismal regeneration? How do Reformed Christians classically relate baptism to the Church and to faith, and is faith required for baptism?

Today's Greystone Conversations episode is the last study in a series featured at Greystone Connect called We Distinguish: Scholastic Distinctions in Reformed Theology and Ministry. This is a series led by Dr. Mark Jones, a Greystone Fellow in Theology and History who is also pastor of Faith Vancouver (PCA) in Vancouver Canada, and who is a specialist in post-reformation Reformed theology. This gives rise to his special contribution in this series. Dr. Jones' experience in academic scholarship includes having edited, with Michael Haykin, A New Divinity: Transatlantic Reformed Evangelical Debates during the Long Eighteenth Century, writing with Joel Beeke A Puritan Theology: Doctrine for Life, and his own book, Why Heaven Kissed Earth: The Christology of the Puritan Reformed Orthodox Theologian, Thomas Goodwin (1600-1680). He is also the editor,  with Dr. Haykin, of Drawn into Controversie: Reformed Theological Diversity and Debates Within Seventeenth-century British Puritanism.

In this series, again called We Distinguish, Dr. Jones takes to task the often confusing uses of the word Calvinism today. In the opening talk of this series, Jones explains how "Calvinism" is popular today in certain Evangelical circles, but there is a great deal of uncertainty as to what we mean or should mean by the term. Arguably, the term has lost its usefulness altogether. And yet, even that is a complicated story. There are certainly some misunderstandings about Reformed theology that need to be corrected, and the use of the word "Calvinism" has made this need quite clear. And so this short course explores how the scholastic method used by several generations of Reformers and their diverse followers can still help students and practitioners of theology today in our quest to know and to promote theological truth, as well as to better understand what we mean by "Reformed."

The final lecture of this series, the one featured in today's Greystone Conversations episode, is Dr. Jones' explanation of the relation of covenant, Church, baptism, and faith. How have the Reformed classically understood the relationship of covenant, regeneration, faith, the Church, the sanctification of Christ himself, and the status of children? The answers may surprise you. Understanding why these answers are in fact not only surprising but also quite diverse may go a very long way in helping us better understand the nature of differences--today and historically--among those who claim the name Reformed but have different understandings of the relationship of baptism to faith and to the Church.

This series of lectures is available now on Greystone Connect for free for Greystone Members and is also an optional resource for Group Study. Become a Greystone Member today to gain access to this series and the growing library of Greystone modules.