Explore the historical debate between infant baptism and believers' baptism. Discover what the earliest Christians actually practiced and taught about this foundational sacrament of the faith.

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Course Content

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Lecture 1: What the Early Christians Believed about Infant Baptism and Believers Baptism
Lecture 2: What the Early Christians Believed about Infant Baptism and Believers Baptism.
Lecture 3: What the Early Christians Believed about Infant Baptism and Believers Baptism.
Lecture 4: What the Early Christians Believed about Infant Baptism and Believers Baptism.
Survey: Believers Baptism vs. Infant Baptism
Free Course Guide

What This Free Course Covers

This free four-part course follows David Bercot’s historical and biblical examination of infant baptism and believers baptism. Lecture 1 begins with Jesus, the New Testament baptism accounts, and the household passages. Lecture 2 examines New Testament baptismal meaning and then follows the second-century evidence through the Didache, Barnabas, Hermas, Justin Martyr, Theophilus, Clement, and Irenaeus.

Lecture 3 distinguishes emergency baptism, responsive child baptism, and infant baptism before examining inscriptions, Gregory of Nazianzus, Tertullian, the Apostolic Tradition, Origen, and Cyprian. Lecture 4 documents the continuing practice of believers baptism, the later change under Augustine, the rise of compulsory baptism through church-state power, and the Anabaptist recovery.

Every lecture includes its exact verified video, matching audio transcript, a six-question quiz, ten discussion questions, downloadable discussion material, and answer jumpstarters. A final survey helps students compare the two positions after completing the lectures.

Infant baptism Believers baptism New Testament baptism Household passages Early Christian evidence Emergency baptism Child baptism Original sin Chronological research Church and state

What You Will Study

  • The normal relationship between hearing, faith, repentance, discipleship, and baptism in the New Testament
  • What the household baptism passages do and do not establish about infants
  • How the Didache, Justin Martyr, and other early sources describe preparation for baptism
  • The difference between emergency baptism, responsive child baptism, and infant baptism
  • How evidence from Tertullian, the Apostolic Tradition, Origen, Cyprian, Gregory Nazianzen, and Augustine developed over time
  • How believers baptism continued alongside child and infant baptism in the third and fourth centuries
  • How Augustine, councils, and imperial law turned one baptismal position into a compulsory state-church norm
  • Why the Anabaptists restored believers baptism and a voluntary church at great cost

Questions This Course Helps Answer

  • Does the New Testament explicitly describe an infant being baptized?
  • Do the household baptisms in Acts prove that infants were present?
  • What did the earliest post-apostolic baptism instructions require of candidates?
  • Did Justin Martyr describe candidates who personally believed, repented, prayed, and fasted?
  • Does Irenaeus’s language about being reborn clearly refer to infant baptism?
  • What do emergency-baptism inscriptions reveal about the timing of baptism?
  • Did Tertullian discuss newborn baptism or the baptism of responsive little children?
  • When does the first clear pre-Nicene evidence for regularly baptizing infants appear?
  • How did Origen’s language differ from Augustine’s later doctrine of inherited guilt?
  • Did believers baptism disappear when child and infant baptism appeared?
  • How did Augustine and the state church make infant baptism compulsory?
  • Why did the Anabaptists reject territorial Christianity and restore believers baptism?

Lesson-by-Lesson Guide

Lecture 1: What the Early Christians Believed about Infant Baptism and Believers Baptism

Lecture 1 establishes the course’s research method, begins with Christ and the New Testament, and examines belief, repentance, discipleship, Acts 2, and the household baptism accounts before drawing conclusions from later history.

  • Why does the order of evidence matter when studying baptism?
  • What sequence appears in Mark 16 and Matthew 28?
  • How should Acts 2:39 be read in its full sentence?
  • Why does the word household not by itself prove that an infant was baptized?

Lecture 2: What the Early Christians Believed about Infant Baptism and Believers Baptism.

Lecture 2 surveys the New Testament’s teaching about baptism and then examines the Didache, Barnabas, Hermas, Justin Martyr, Theophilus, Clement, and Irenaeus for the second-century pattern of responsive candidates and childhood innocence.

  • What kind of response do New Testament baptism passages assume?
  • What preparation do the Didache and Justin Martyr describe?
  • Why is the Irenaeus passage disputed as infant-baptism evidence?
  • Why does the lecture find no concrete second-century testimony to routine infant baptism?

Lecture 3: What the Early Christians Believed about Infant Baptism and Believers Baptism.

Lecture 3 separates emergency baptism, responsive child baptism, and infant baptism, then uses inscriptions and the evidence from Gregory of Nazianzus, Tertullian, the Apostolic Tradition, Origen, and Cyprian to show when each practice becomes visible.

  • Which three historical baptism patterns must not be collapsed together?
  • What did Tertullian and the Apostolic Tradition expect from little children?
  • How do precise age words change the interpretation of Origen’s evidence?
  • Where does the first clear pre-Nicene reference to regularly baptizing infants appear?

Lecture 4: What the Early Christians Believed about Infant Baptism and Believers Baptism.

Lecture 4 shows believers baptism continuing through the third and fourth centuries, then traces Augustine’s doctrinal change, church-state coercion, the historical evidence pattern, and the Anabaptist recovery of a voluntary believers church.

  • What evidence shows believers baptism continued after child baptism appeared?
  • How did Augustine change the doctrine and consequences of infant baptism?
  • Why does the earthquake analogy point away from an apostolic infant-baptism norm?
  • How did state-church power and the Anabaptist response reshape the practice?

Survey: Believers Baptism vs. Infant Baptism

The closing survey asks students to compare believers baptism and infant baptism after working through the four lectures and their biblical and historical evidence.

  • Which position best accounts for the New Testament baptism narratives?
  • How should the early historical evidence affect the comparison?
  • Which arguments remain strongest or weakest after completing the course?

First student reviews

2 reviews so far
Glen D Yoder Aug 11, 2026
★★★★★
These further thoughts and proofs on early baptismal practices have sure cleaned up and swept down the cobwebs of my mind. These lessons greatly confirm the validity of simple apostolic obedience to the scripture, and show clear warnings of the end result of man's inventions and deviations. Even if you have studied the earlier full course on baptism, I would highly recommend this as a followup. It will be worth your time and understanding. Glen D Yoder
Omar Miller Aug 9, 2026
★★★★★
Well researched discussion concerning this important topic, comparing infant baptism versus believers baptism.
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Truth about Baptism: Infant or Believers

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Course Includes

  • 5 Lessons
  • 4 Quizzes
  • Course Certificate