OF BAPTISM.
CONCERNING baptism we believe and confess that it is the institution, word, ordinance and command of the Lord; and therefore a holy, divine sacrament or sign by which faith and its powers, fruits and mysteries are gloriously represented and portrayed when rightly administered according to the ordinance of God and not after our own choice, namely: To the believing, and not to infants.
We teach and administer baptism upon the confession of faith, for these reasons: First, because Christ himself has commanded so, for he says, "Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature; he that believeth and is baptized, shall be saved," Mark 16:15; Matt. 28:19.
Secondly, because the holy apostles have taught and administered it upon the confession of faith, according to the commandment of God, and not to infants, Acts 2:38; 8:37; 10:47; 16:15; 18:8; 19:5. Thirdly, because the effect, or the signification, that is, that which is represented by baptism, is found with the believing and not with infants, Rom. 6:4; Col. 2:12; 1 Cor. 12:13; Eph. 4:4; 1 Pet. 3:21; Gal. 3:27.
Inasmuch as the Wisdom and Truth himself has commanded that we should baptize the believing; and as his faithful witnesses, the holy apostles, have not otherwise taught and administered it than according to the commandment of their Lord; and as the signification is only applicable to the believing and not to infants as remarked; and as, by the grace of the Lord, we acknowledge from the Scriptures that Moses and the prophets, yea, the Father himself, point us to Christ, that we shall hear him; and as, according to the doctrine of Paul, there can be laid no other foundation, nor other gospel preached but that preached to us by the apostles - behold - therefore it is that we teach, receive, assert and maintain baptism upon the confession of faith, at the cost of so much misery, even at the peril of property and life; for we truly confess, and that in accordance with the Scripture, which is the true light of our feet, that it is the institution, word, ordinance and command of the Lord, Jer. 23:33; Matt. 17:5; Mark 9:6; Luke 9:30; 1 Cor. 3:11; Ps. 119:105.