Tim Maas Retired Quality Assurance Specialist with the U.S. Army

The Bible teaches (in addition to the verse cited in the question) that, as a result of original sin, all humans (even infants) are born in a state of sin (Psalm 51:5), and in need of the salvation that only faith in Christ can provide. (As a parent, I would say from experience that children do not need to be "taught" attributes such as selfishness and resistance to authority that (if left uncorrected) characterize an unsaved state, but possess them innately. That is why they must be disciplined and trained, which is a primary responsibility of Christian parents.)

At the same time, however, Jesus characterized the state of a little child (in terms of capacity for change as a result of such training and discipline, and the faith that they place in those who care for them) as the orientation that people of any age must possess in order to enter the Kingdom of God and be saved.

Children should be exposed to godly living and the Bible at home even prior to the beginning of any formal religious instruction, and then introduced to the church and its further teaching at the earliest possible age (even from infancy (2 Timothy 3:15)). In my opinion, even the smallest amount of faith acquired through such experience will be credited to them as righteousness toward salvation, even prior to them being able to make their own mature confession of their personal beliefs.

August 07 2017 • 6 responses • Vote Up • Share • Report

James Kraft 74 year old retired pipeline worker

I believe all children are saved until they come to the age of accountability. When King David's baby he had with Bathsheba died, He said he can not come to me, but I will go to him. 

What the age of accountability is, may differ for different children. The bible is not clear on a certain age. I was led to Christ by my mother when I was only 5.I did not know much, but believed John 3:16 that Jesus loved me even though I was a sinner, and if I believed in Him, I would not perish and have eternal life. I still believe it today that He paid my sin debt in full and know I will be in heaven based on what He did for me. Not on anything I could ever do. Jesus paid it all and I paid 0. AMAZING GRACE

October 20 2017 • 2 responses • Vote Up • Share • Report

Myrtle Linder I am 86 years old and retired but not from workning for GOD!

Let the little children come unto me Matthew, 1914, Luke 18:16, JESUS loved/loves little children. They are precious gifts from GOD, not Satan, only GOD can make a child!

August 07 2017 • 0 responses • Vote Up • Share • Report

Myron Robertson Seeking God's heart

Someone else already provided you with Ps 51:5 which gives a general principle for how this works. Paul discussed it in a bit more detail in Rom 5:12.

Properly translated, Rom 5:12 says, "Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all people, causing all to sin." Adam's sin made all of his descendants mortal based on the law of restitution. This law cannot be seen by looking at a single passage or statute because pieces of it are scattered throughout the Torah and other portions of the Bible. The most complete exposition of this law is in Ex 22.

In short, anyone incurring any debt, whether by theft or by a loan they are not able to pay off on time, is to have their property confiscated and sold to repay the debt. If that is not enough to pay off the debt they are to be sold as bondservants (not slaves, there is a big difference between these two things in God's law, although Israel and Judah rarely, if ever, acknowledged this difference, and for the most part the church still does not.) 

Ex 21 tells us that if a man went into this bondage with a wife, he and his wife and children left the bondage together, but if his master gave him a wife she and her children remained in the master's household when the bond was fully paid off. This is a prophecy of what happened to us.

Adam sinned, and all he had (the whole earth) was taken from him and sold, but was not enough to pay his debt; therefore, he was sold into bondage and his wife went with him. All his descendants were born into that bondage and under the same death penalty as our father, thus we are all born mortal, thus dead already.

There is also the matter of how God defines life. He uses many different definitions as we do, but the primary definition requires body, soul, and spirit to all be together. The soul, usually mistranslated as life, is in the blood (Lev 17:11, 14; Dt 12:23). Both soul and spirit have a consciousness, thus Paul's Old Man of Sin and New Man of the Spirit, and these are constantly warring against each other (Rom 7).

Furthermore, scripture speaks of two kinds of spirit. Ruach is breath, wind, and spirit, neshamah is breath, intellect, and spirit, and it is this latter word that Genesis uses when we are told God breathed into him the breath of life. Everyone is born with intellectual potential, but none of us is born with any greater intellect than the lower animals, so we are born "dead". This is what Jesus speaks of when he tells us he came to give us life more abundantly. It is the learning of God and his ways that bring us this abundant life.

I cannot find the specific law that says touching a dead body defiles you for seven days (prophetically 7,000 years), but there are numerous mentions through out the law that speak in general terms of this defilement. Since we are all born "dead" spiritually due to our bodies being mortal, and the defilement this brings to us even infants who have never sinned from our perspective are still sinful in God's eyes. 

Do abortions and miscarriages occur? Yes. This means we are all conceived mortal and can be killed before birth, whether by natural causes or by the hand of man. 

We are born mortal, thus enabling us to sin; we are born without the glory of God (neshamah spirit) already in us, thus must learn God's glory. Nothing else matters really. God provides the means for all to learn this glory and become like him, whether by the first Passover (Ex 12) or the Second Passover (Numbers 9). Either way we will be restored from this defilement by our own dead body by the Jubilee.

August 12 2017 • 0 responses • Vote Up • Share • Report

Jack Gutknecht ABC/DTS graduate, guitar music ministry Baptist church

Salvation is desperately needed by all, for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23). Salvation comes about by grace through faith in the sacrifice of Christ (Romans 3:22, 24-25). I believe God in His grace gives babies who don’t yet know of the sacrifice of Christ a break. He saves them, them and imbeciles, both.

David uttered these words: "But now he [my baby boy who just died] is dead; why should I fast? Can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he will not return to me" (2 Samuel 12:23). He knew he couldn’t have his little one back in the household.

But 1 day, he believed, they would be reunited. So he relinquished his child to God and began to look to the future.

David knew he would see his son again. This brought him comfort.

David knew that his infant son would spend eternity with the Lord and with him.

This knowledge helped David deal with the death of his baby son.

November 23 2020 • 0 responses • Vote Up • Share • Report