1 Corinthians 7:14

For the unbelieving husband is sanctified in the wife, and the unbelieving wife is sanctified in the brother: else were your children unclean; but now are they holy.

Sanctified ... "This verb cannot mean `holy in Christ before God,' because that kind of holiness cannot be predicated of an unbeliever."[24] Paul here uses such a term in a ceremonial sense, rather than in a sense suggesting the salvation either of the unbelieving partner or of the children. As Johnson said:

Paul simply means that the Old Testament principle of the communication of uncleanness does not hold. The union is lawful and confers privileges on the members, such as the protection of God and the opportunity of being in close contact with one in God's family.[25]

Those who seek to find here any authority for infant church membership are frustrated by the fact that nothing of the kind is even intimated. "There is not one word about baptism here, not one allusion to it; nor does the argument in the remotest degree bear upon it."[26] Furthermore, as Morris pointed out, the "holiness" here ascribed to children applies only "until the child is old enough to take responsibility upon himself."[27]

[24] Donald S. Metz, op. cit., p. 378.

[25] S. Lewis Johnson, Jr., Wycliffe Bible Commentary (Chicago: Moody Press, 1971), p. 608.

[26] Albert Barnes, op. cit., p. 117.

[27] Leon Morris, op. cit., p. 110.