Then there goes one of the apologetics that Anbaptists/Baptists use: "All the cases of baptism that just happen to be recorded in the Bible are of those FIRST who attained the age of X, FIRST chose Jesus as their personal savior and gave adequate public proof of such, FIRST wept an adequate number of buckets of tears in repentance, FIRST expressed their will and desire to be baptized and FIRST publicly stated that baptism does nothing." It's not true, is it? Even if any Anabaptist/Baptist actually thought that apologetic was in ANY sense valid (which none due but use it anyway). There goes the whole ANTI-PAEDObaptism dogma.
As I previously (often) stated, of course, none can know if ANY in those households was under the age of X (even if Anabaptists/Baptists would tell us what age that is, which they won't). But then those who differ with them don't use the rubric that we all reject - that we can only do what is clearly and consistently illustrated as done in the examples of things that happen to be recorded in the Bible.' That's the rubric that Anabaptists/Baptists use (but regard as silly) - not the one paedobaptists use.
Understood, I just don't know of any verse that says, "Thou canst NOT teach and baptize people until it can be ascertained by people whether said receiver consents to it." Would you take your child to church if they'd rather go to a movie? Would you tell your child he's going to Sunday School in the same way as you would that he's going to secular day school? I wonder too because of the FEW things parents in the OT were COMMANDED to do vis-a-vis children is to circumcise their boys. When they are babies. Have you ever witnessed that? I have.... and I was more than a bit taken-aback: it hurts, there's blood, there's LOUD crying... it is NOT (I repeat, NOT) the desire of the baby boy. But in the Old Covenant, God MANDATED it. To babies. How does that "jibe" with the thought that God cant use something if the human doesn't consent, that we are forbidden to do things for our little children if they don't articulate consent in a way we can understand? I wonder about your whole premise, my friend.
Being a monergist, I believe that NO ONE EVER consents to anything of God prior to God using His means to convert them.... God ALWAYS works against human will in justification. In Calvinist theology, how does natural man (DEAD and in TOTAL DEPRAVITY) first consent and express his will BEFORE God can bless him and do anything for him? I constantly read things Reformed Baptists write and say and wonder how in the world they reconcile these views SO opposite.
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