While I would classify myself as a High Church Anglican, I have always leaned to the Reformed/Protestant side of Anglicanism. I've always had a difficult time how baptismal regeneration operates in a Reformed/Protestant understanding of soteriology. Any fellow Reformed Anglicans care to help explain?
Im attending an Anglican church too. I love the incense and the how its used preparing for the Sacraments
I cant get what I wsnt at the moment however there is a thread on article 27 wich discussed baptism and the question of discernable difference.
interesting article from a reformed perspective: https://www.ligonier.org/learn/devotionals/the-washing-of-regeneration/
I'd venture to say that there is no one Reformed perspective on baptismal regeneration. And even Calvin has very intriguing passages in that direction. Although he makes some statements against baptism = regeneration, https://www.puritanboard.com/threads/calvin-and-baptismal-regeneration.54493/, He also has this famous passage in favor of it: And in his Geneva Catechism, he makes quite categorical statements that seem to equate baptism and regeneration: http://unsettledchristianity.com/john-calvin-on-baptismal-regeneration/ And in his Commentary on Deuteronomy: https://scriptureveracity.wordpress...sed-as-an-advocate-of-baptismal-regeneration/
I have wrestled some with this question in the past and after reading Hooker and Boultbee, this is what I came up with: http://prydain.wordpress.com/thoughts-on-baptism/ It may be that the efficacy of baptism depends on whether one is a member of the elect. But I explain that at more length in the post linked above.
The seminal work on infant and adult baptism within the reformed church perspective (written by a Calvinist, but none the worse for that), is: The Biblical Doctrine of Infant Baptism by Pierre Ch.Marcel / Translated by Philip Edgcumbe Huges. ISBN 0 227 6785 9. (1953) reprinted 1981. Publisher: James Clarke & Co. 7 All Saints Passage Cambridge. I thoroughly recommend it if it is still in print.
For what it may be worth, my studies in the scripture have convinced me that the efficacy of baptism is slightly different for adult Proselytes and infant children. For adults coming to baptism, after hearing and understanding the promises of the gospel, and receiving them in faith, all the benefits of baptism are immediately efficacious. For the infants or children of at least one believing parent of a Christian family, the full efficacy of baptism probably is linked to confirmation rather than baptism. Though baptism is fully efficacious concerning forgiveness of sin, past, present and future, (since that aspect is 'ALL provided by God', 2 Cor.5:18-19), and the gifts and indwelling of the Holy Spirit are bestowed in infancy, (possibly regardless of baptism), and regeneration may be therefore assumed by faith in God's promises, to have taken place, there is still the possibility, until the individual 'closes with the covenant on his or her own behalf, in confirmation, or personal faith and commitment to Christ and his teaching', that 'Such a great salvation' could in later life, be neglected. Heb.2:3. Also it should be noted that 'baptism' both adult and infant, is also efficacious to The Church, since it denotes an increase of the 'Kingdom of God' on earth and another person 'drawn to Christ' and therefore gifted to His Church. That is why baptisms should be in the presence of the church whenever possible.
It occurs to me that a caveat needs to be added to my above statement, in that anyone incapable of accepting their own Covenant responsibilities before God, is also incapable, for the same reasons, of rejecting the salvation conferred upon them. Thus children who die before the age of accountability and those who will never be truly accountable are in no danger whatever of 'neglecting such great salvation'.