Posted on 09/26/2004 10:53:56 AM PDT by daybreakcoming
I have a question about something that has rocked me to my Baptist core. I am also going to address the question to our pastor next week. My eight-year old brought home a study guide for parents to assist us in the "nuturing the faith of your child". It states: "Children are sinners and the implications are eternal" - "Our children are helpless sinners who deserve God's wrath".
Whatever happened to "Except ye be converted, and BECOME AS LITTLE CHILDREN, ye shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven" (Matthew 18:3 ). And. "Suffer the little children to come unto Me, and forbid them not: for of such is the kingdom of God" (Mark 10:13-14).
How are children who die, say at the age of four, covered? Are they doomed to God's wrath?
I'll go along with Hegel and others on this. Children are incapable of possessing subjective will and so are incapable of sin. Same for lunatics and mental incompetents.
1. When God formed your spirit, did he create an evil, dead thing or a good, living thing?
2. If God created your spirit good and living, at what point did it go bad?
| Heidelberg Catechism LORD'S DAY 3 Question 6 : Did God then create man so wicked and perverse? Answer: By no means; but God created man good, and after His own image, in true righteousness and holiness, that he might rightly know God his Creator, heartily love Him and live with Him in eternal happiness to glorify and praise Him. Question 7: Whence then proceeds this depravity of human nature? Answer: From the fall and disobedience of our first parents, Adam and Eve, in Paradise; hence our nature is become so corrupt, that we are all conceived and born in sin. Question 8: Are we then so corrupt that we are wholly incapable of doing any good, and inclined to all wickedness? Answer: Indeed we are; except we are regenerated by the Spirit of God.
|
| SCRIPTURAL REFERENCES Gen. 1:31, And God saw every thing that He had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day. Gen. 1:26-27, And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. So God created man in His own image, in the image of God created He him; male and female created He them. Col. 3:10, And have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of Him that created him. Eph. 4:24, And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness. Eph. 1:6, To the praise of the glory of His grace, wherein He hath made us accepted in the beloved. 1 Cor. 6:20, For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's. Gen. 3:6, And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat. Rom. 5:12,8-19, Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned; Therefore as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the right- eousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life. For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous. Psa. 51:5, Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me. Gen. 5:3, And Adam lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat a son in his own likeness, after his image; and called his name Seth. Gen. 6:5, And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. Job 14:4, Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean? No one. Job 15:14, 16, What is man, that he should be clean? and he which is born of a woman, that he should be righteous?; How much more abominable and filthy is man, which drinketh iniquity like water? John 3:5, Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. Eph. 2:5, Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved). |
"I was once alive apart from the Law; but when the commandment came, sin became alive and I died; and this commandment, which was to result in life, proved to result in death for me; for sin, taking an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me."
Note the progression: alive | consciousness of law | death
Lest any use the argument, "What about those who never had a chance to hear the law?" please read Romans 1, which presents the case that none have any excuse, because all sin against whatever form of revelation which God has presented them (2:1), whether it is in written law (2:12-13), nature (1:20-21) or in the conscience of man (2:14-15).
Also, if anyone quotes Romans 5:12 to you, make sure they include the last 3 words: "Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned."
Your child is sinless and safe.
I believe man is tainted by original sin. This sin is passed on through mankind through the man dating all the way back to Adam. If one could be born apart from Adam's race, they would not be tainted by Adam's sin. It isn't an accident our Lord Jesus was born of a virgin. Our Lord Jesus' virgin birth was necessary for Him to be born uncorrupted by the sins of Adam.
Do I think our Lord Jesus was unrelated to His mother? No. Do I think Mary was tainted by the sins of Adam? Of course since she also was born of man. But our Lord Jesus' father was not Joseph.
It's not Dr. Phil.
This bridegroom chose His bride from before the foundation of the world.
My question is:
1. When God formed your spirit, did he create an evil, dead thing or a good, living thing?
2. If God created your spirit good and living, at what point did it go bad?
Also, please note again Eccl 12 - you didn't get your spirit from Adam, God formed it and gave it.
This is very true. In a lecture this weekend by Dr. Michael Horton he mentioned some of the pitfalls new people face coming into Reformed churches for the first time. He intimated a symbiotic benefit: The newcomer gets to hear Christ preached and partake in the rich heritage, and the congregation, often populated with families there for many generations, gets rejuvination and renewal from the newcomer's excitement and enthusiasm. It can and does work, though sometimes with a little friction which must be salted with patience and charity.
Do Baptists believe in Original Sin?
Our sin nature was passed down to us through Adam's seed. David's & Bathsheba's first son would not have went to heaven if he were guilty in the way you are implying. There is more to this discussion than your allowing.
When we can choose, if we don't choose the remedy that God reveals to us through the preaching of the Gospel message and the revelation of the Holy Spirit's testimony in that message, then we are judged by our works. Guilty!
Otherwise, the Bible would never teach that we can reject God for darkness. Rejecting God, despite the testimony of the Holy Spirit condemns us to eternal damnation. All other sin has been remedied by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
I read Part II of MacArthur yesterday and found it very comforting. Thanks for the links.
I've always liked Calvin's take on infant salvation. As a man who knew the pain of losing a child, he spoke from both conviction and experience.
While a definitive answer is not to be found in the Bible, I'm content to accept the notion that infants, like everyone else, can be saved by God's grace alone, according to His will. God's covenant extends to believers an added measure of assurance that their children will not be lost.
A Summary of John Calvin's Defense of Paedobaptism (and good instruction on infant salvation.)
http://www.forerunner.com/puritan/PS.Calvin_baptism.html
May it please the Lord to give us a spirit of humility and wisdom in this matter.
More precisely,
Rejecting Jesus Christ as our savior, despite the testimony of the Holy Spirit, condemns us to eternal damnation.
You have a very interesting point of view. I disagree with it, but you can believe as you wish. I do believe that God has our lives planned. We don't have a choice in the matter. He chooses whom he chooses and no one comes to him on their own. No one chooses God, God chooses his own.
If I'm not mistaken, he lost ALL of his children and his wife Idolette. This is to say nothing of his myriad of personal physical sufferings.
Everything that God creates (including the human spirit) is Good.
2. If God created your spirit good and living, at what point did it go bad?
At the point that the human spirit enters Adam's flesh (which I believe to be at Conception, not at some point thereafter), it inherits Adam's spiritual death.
When a Partner buys into a Contract, he buys into all terms of that Contract.
Also, please note again Eccl 12 - you didn't get your spirit from Adam, God formed it and gave it.
Ecclesiastes 12 does not in any way disallow mediate creation -- that God created our spirits through Adam. God implanted in Adam's flesh, all Human Flesh which would ever proceed from him (which is to say, all of us). However, the Breath of Life which god breathed into Adam made him both physically and spiritually alive at the same moment. Therefore, I have no difficulty believing that Adam has passed down this "Breath of Life" to his descendants as it was given to him, with both physical and spiritual conception occurring at the same moment. Certainly it is God alone who has knit together our human bodies and given us our human spirits; but He has done so mediately, through Adam's agency.
Regardless, though -- whether the origin of the human spirit is direct or mediate -- the same rule applies: When a Partner buys into a Contract, he buys into all terms of that Contract.
Best, OP
Five finger typist, here -- if you count both hands. ;-)
Sorry, neglected to flag you my #375 (concerning #366 in re: your #362)
How stands the house?
"There is the "age of accountability." For each child, from what I understand, this is different."
Where do you find this "age of accountability." idea in the Bible
Too bad that some theologies, more than others, lay Biblical teaching out across a Procrustean bed. Although the Bible isn't exhaustive in the truth it conveys about God and his relationship to his creation, it truly reveals God. However, just because that is so doesn't mean that all the truths it reveals about God will be able to be accommodated by a systematic theology. The more systematic, that is, the more rationalistic, the theology, the more it is guaranteed to distort these truths. Some will be overemphasized. Some will be minimized or redefined into meaninglessness. And in the end, the theology will edge aside the living God.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.