Posted here:

1. We affirm that a Christian may “be certainly assured that they are in the state of grace” (C 18.1).
2. We affirm that this assurance is not a bare and conjectural persuasion grounded upon a fallible hope but an “infallible assurance of faith” (C 18.2-3).
3. a. We affirm that the following are grounds for assurance: the promises of salvation (C 18.2), the inward evidence of grace (C 18.2), the testimony of the Holy Spirit of adoption (C 18.2), the doctrine of election (C 3.8), the presence of true faith (L 80), and the endeavor to walk in all good conscience before God (L 80).
3. b. We deny that baptism is the sole or primary means of assurance.

At this point I’m not sure what to say. 3.a. somehow fails to affirm that baptism is a means of assurance at all! Is baptism or is it not “not only for the solemn admission of the party baptized into the visible church; but also, to be unto him a sign and seal of the covenant of grace, of his ingrafting into Christ, of regeneration, of remission of sins, and of his giving up unto God, through Jesus Christ, to walk in newness of life”? Is baptism as a sacrament given “to represent Christ, and his benefits; and to confirm our interest in him” or is it not? Affirmations about assurance in the Westminster Confession are authoritative for office holders even if they are found in a chapter without the word “assurance” in the chapter heading.

Given the importance of a seal to true faith as a confirmation of one’s interest in Christ, and the high importance of being ingrafted into Christ, of which baptism, particularly, is a seal to the part baptized, I fail to see how a person who claimed baptism was the primary means of assurance could be ruled outside the system of doctrine (which is plainly the intent of this paper, see below). Remember, one could affirm this without denying anything in the list in 3.a.

However, I don’t think anyone says that baptism is the primary means of assurance. More likely there are people (including me) who simply haven’t developed a rating system but believe that baptism in the Bible and the Westminster documents is more important than it is in American Evangelical culture, including conservative Presbyterian culture. Simply reading what the catechisms say about the sacraments as effectual means of salvation for the elect or the Larger on improving one’s baptism should demonstrate this and show that, if the “Federal Vision” didn’t exist, then faithful Presbyterians would need to invent it.

As to the implication that anyone thinks “that baptism is the sole … means of assurance,” that is simply a fiction. There is no one who claims this.