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John Calvin was influenced by Martin Luther's idea of baptism as God's promises to the baptized person attached to the outward sign of washing with water. Calvin maintained Zwingli's idea of baptism as a public pledge, but insisted that it was secondary to baptism's meaning as a sign of God's promise to forgive sin. [11]
By contrast, Anabaptist and Evangelical Protestants recognize baptism as an outward sign of an inward reality following on an individual believer's experience of forgiving grace. Reformed and Methodist Protestants maintain a link between baptism and regeneration, but insist that it is not automatic or mechanical, and that regeneration may occur ...
Only the elect receive the sacramental sign and the grace. This is because faith—which is a gift only the elect are given—unites the outward sign and the inward grace and makes the sacrament effective. This position was in agreement with the Reformed churches but was opposed to the Roman Catholic and Lutheran views. [11]
The confessions teach that baptism is an external sign of an inward reality (regeneration and cleansing from sin), and that baptism actually confers the inward reality which it signifies. [68] This viewpoint is distinct from the traditional definition of baptismal regeneration in that the power of baptism resides in the Holy Spirit rather than ...
Westminster speaks of "a sacramental relation, or a sacramental union, between the sign and the thing signified; whence it comes to pass that the names and effects of the one are attributed to the other". [71] Baptism is for infant children of believers as well as believers, as it is for all the Reformed except Baptists and some Congregationalists.
For the Lutherans, baptism is a "means of grace" through which God creates and strengthens "saving faith" as the "washing of regeneration" [63] [64] in which infants and adults are reborn. [ 65 ] [ non-primary source needed ] Since the creation of faith is exclusively God's work, it does not depend on the actions of the one baptized, whether ...
Reformed theology characteristically views baptism as an outward sign of God's internal work, as John Calvin stated: “all who are clothed with the righteousness of Christ are at the same time regenerated by the Spirit, and that we have an earnest of this regeneration in baptism.” [21] Regeneration is further described as the "secret ...
Some Anglican churches now view baptism as sufficient for accessing the grace of all the sacraments, since it is the means of initiation into the faith. Many who have been baptised as adults still present themselves for confirmation as a way of completing the ancient rite of initiation, or because they have been received into the Communion from ...