Who here thinks babies go to heaven ?

If this be so, then I shall try to be more charitable toward those who disagree with me on the Baptist Board. </font>[/QUOTE]It is so, pipedude, and do be more charitable.

 

I too believe that babies go to heaven. There is a book by Jack W. Hayford, which some here might find useful:

I'll Hold You in Heaven: Healing and Hope for the Parent Who Has Lost a Child Through Miscarriage, Still Birth, Abortion or Early Infant Death

It is available at www.amazon.co.uk

Blessings

followinghim

 

Now, I have another question to put to Helen, and those who may be interested enough to answer, and I certainly think this is somehow connected to the topics' original question.

We have the case of Enoch and Elijah in the Old Testament.

Enoch was taken by God into heaven, and the Bible says He walked with God, and Elijah ? Not only did he know God was going to take him to heaven, the sons of the prophets knew it, too.

Now, according to Arminians, one is saved by accepting Christ as Savior, and according to the Calvinists, one is elected unto salvation, but that salvation comes by faith, and faith cometh by hearing, so the word must first be preached.
Both these camps will aver that the sinner MUST know the name of Christ, because there is no other name under heaven whereby men must be saved.

If the above premises of both camps be so, then on what basis did God take both Enoch and Elijah to heaven ? Are they not covered by the necessity of the shedding of blood for the remission of sins ? Are they exempt from all men have sinned, and come short of the glory of God ? Do they not have to confess the name of Christ in order to be saved ?

How is this question related to that of the babies ?

Enoch, Elijah, and the babies have not heard the gospel, by which faith must come, according to the Calvinists.

This, of course, leading to the premise that the gospel saves.

 

I'm inclined to agree. No accountability, no rejection.

 

The Gospel, pinoybaptist, has been available to all men from all time one way or another. To believe in 'the name' of Christ is something we, in our Western society, seem to associate with a spelled word. That is not what it means. Name indicates character.

Eve was given the Promise of a Messiah. Jesus was/is the fulfillment of that Promise. But on the 'before' side of the Cross, to believe in the character of God as Savior, as Job did ("I know my Redeemer lives...") and to believe in the Promise of God and that God would keep His Promise was just as efficacious as us believing in that fulfilled Promise, Jesus Christ, today.

Men have always had a choice. Predestination applies to the fate which is sure AFTER the choice is made. Those who choose to believe God and know Christ as their Messiah are all predestined to be conformed to His likeness through the power of the Holy Spirit. Those who refuse, and prefer the Lie, are predestined to be apart from our Lord for all eternity. One cannot choose one thing, in other words, and escape the consequences of that choice. That is how 'predestination' is used throughout the NT.

Hebrews 11 tells us that those who were believers before the Cross had to wait until the Cross, or until 'us', to have the Promise fulfilled and their faith thus fulfilled. But they were saved via that faith just as we are saved via ours.

As Romans 1 reminds us, it is what we do with the truth we are aware of in each of our lives which makes all the difference. Those who want the truth, and follow that which they are aware of, will be led by the Father to the Son, who will not turn away any who come to Him.

This has had to do with all adult, sentient humans since Adam and Eve. God has loved us all. We can accept that or refuse it when the time comes for us to wrestle with God ourselves. But Hebrews 11, in particular, leaves no doubt that people were just as saved before the Cross as after, and that through faith in the character, or 'name', of God, and the Promise He made so long ago to rescue us from ourselves.

 

Views of R. Albert Mohler, Jr. , President of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary on the Death of Infants. The links express my viewpoint.

http://www.crosswalk.com/special/tsunami/1305866.html

http://www.crosswalk.com/news/weblogs/mohler/?cal=go&adate=1%2F5%2F2005

 

Whether that's true or not, that doesn't mean that all have heard the Gospel or had the opportunity to reject the Gospel. There are many who were prevented from hearing the knock at the door through no fault of their own, even though Jesus stands at the door knocking. Who those are, and how God reveals Himself to them are a matter of specualtion for us, since that's strictly between that person and God.

In regards to the OP, babies are certainly prevented from comprehending the knock at the door, yet I think we're in agreement that they're likely saved by God.

 

Where do you get this? </font>[/QUOTE]First, we've lost a child through miscarriage ourselves. So, no, this doesn't come from a lack of experience.

Do you really think that the spirit of an infant is "crawling" or crying or cooing like an infant? Or that when I greet my dearly departed great grandmother in Heaven that she will still look like the 93-year-old woman that died Christmas Day, 1995? Or that our third child will be raised a premature infant? (Our youngest, the one we call our third, is actually our fourth.)

If so, why?

When it comes right down to it, aren't the notions that most people carry around in their heads about the shapes and appearances and mentality of spirits formed by the superstitious ghost stories they've heard from their childhood up? How is it that the ghost of Samuel was seen as an old man (1 Sam 28:3ff)? It was the trick of Satan, for a witch has no more power to disturb the rest of saints than the man in the moon.

And, when it comes right down to it, aren't the thoughts we have of the judgment of "infants" based on outward appearances? With our natural eyes we see a helpless innocent. Is the spirit, once it is separated from the body, really limited by the weaknesses of an underdeveloped peurile body?

But God does not look upon the outward appearance. He does not see as man sees. (1 Sam. 16:7) He looks upon the heart. And the heart has a cognizance of its own quite independent of the abilities of a fleshy brain.

You will ask for some evidence. Here it is:

You can rest, as we do, in the fact that God judges righteously. He is not limited by our notions of fair play or "age of accountability", and he is a wiser judge than we are. The spirits that have been separated from infant bodies, or imbecilic brains (which is part of the body), are bowing the "knee" and confessing that Jesus Christ is King of Kings and Lord of Lords. If they are being judged, they are not bewildered about it as infants or toddlers who are being abused or bullied. Neither do they think it unjust.

Once one learns to see things the way God sees things, and it is a learned thing and quite unnatural, for His ways are not our ways, questions like this are no longer cause for sorrow or dispair. Once an individual has cast down imaginations, like our unbiblical imaginations of what spirits must be like, and has imprisoned every thought to the obedience of Christ, He does not weep for the condition of departed spirits. He is ready to revenge all disobedience. (2 Cor. 10:6) Even the disobedience of the heart.

TSK* references: 2Cr 13:2,10; Num 16:26-30; Act 5:3-11; Act 13:10,11; 1Cr 4:21; 1Cr 5:3-5; 1Ti 1:20; 3Jo 1:10 2Cr 2:9; 2Cr 7:15

As the psalmist said, The righteous shall rejoice when he seeth the vengeance: he shall wash his feet in the blood of the wicked. Psalm 58:10

When one can learn to praise God for His justice as well as His mercy, he is becoming somewhat of a true theologian. His rest is in the assurance that God is truly in control, and that He is a righteous Judge. Our children neither die nor suffer without His knowledge or consent.

The fact of the matter is, that those infants who were of the Elect, go to Heaven. Those who weren't, go to Hell. How do we know whether a particular infant was Elect or not? We can't. We must rest in knowledge that God knows what He is doing.

The sentiments summarized in Helen's post are fundamentally flawed in that they confrom God to our image, and not the other way around. Instead of casting down imaginations, they make God a servant of our feelings and fancies. Many things must be arbitrarily read into the passages used to draw the sentiments expressed out of them. Tell me, do any of those passages really settle it for you? Don't they leave you wishing there were more straightforward verses that conformed to what you wish were true?

(I've been there. I understand the feeling.)

But the most serious flaw, is the notion of partial atonement, that the orignal sin of an infant is forgiven, but willful sin is not. This isn't even remotely biblical or Christian. If it isn't heretical, it's wishful thinking at its worst.

*Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

 

No, actually he didn't. That's an interpretation.

"But now he 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)

What did David mean by "go to him"? There's at least two options: (1) David would go to heaven as his child did, or (2) David would go to the grave (Sheol) as his child did. I don't see anything in the text that would indicate which of those two readings is correct.

However, there's a similar passage that sheds more light on this. When Jacob is confronted with Joseph's bloodied robe, he says something very similar to what David would later say:

"All his sons and all his daughters rose up to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted and said, 'No, I shall go down to Sheol to my son, mourning.' Thus his father wept for him." (Genesis 37:35)

Based on this and other Old Testament references to Sheol, I don't think 2 Samuel 12:23 supports the idea that all babies go to heaven. David was most likely referring to the fact that eventually he would also go to the grave just as his son did, rather than revealing an insight about the fate of babies.

To answer the opening post, I think the fate of babies is in God's hands. God will do what is just and merciful.

 

Where do you get this? </font>[/QUOTE]First, we've lost a child through miscarriage ourselves. So, no, this doesn't come from a lack of experience. </font>[/QUOTE]Amen Aaron. Your tragic loss has strengthened your wisdom. John says we don’t know what we will be or look like, but we will see Christ Jesus as He is, and we will be like Him. Christ is perfect, and we are evidently made perfect, and ageless in Him. Christian faith, ituttut

 

Check out Genesis 12. God sent plagues on the Egyptians even though Abram and Sarai were the ones who lied. Ignorance does not provide an excuse from punishment for sin.

 

BURN, BABY, BURN!

 

No, actually he didn't. That's an interpretation.

"But now he 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)

What did David mean by "go to him"? There's at least two options: (1) David would go to heaven as his child did, or (2) David would go to the grave (Sheol) as his child did. I don't see anything in the text that would indicate which of those two readings is correct.

However, there's a similar passage that sheds more light on this. When Jacob is confronted with Joseph's bloodied robe, he says something very similar to what David would later say:

"All his sons and all his daughters rose up to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted and said, 'No, I shall go down to Sheol to my son, mourning.' Thus his father wept for him." (Genesis 37:35)

Based on this and other Old Testament references to Sheol, I don't think 2 Samuel 12:23 supports the idea that all babies go to heaven. David was most likely referring to the fact that eventually he would also go to the grave just as his son did, rather than revealing an insight about the fate of babies.

To answer the opening post, I think the fate of babies is in God's hands. God will do what is just and merciful. </font>[/QUOTE]I think you read too much into tho option of David going to the grave. It says David will go to where his son is. Sheol, besides the grave, is also translated as hell. I don't believe God would allow a confusing scenario of David and his son going to either Heaven, the grave, or hell. We know David was the apple of God's eye, and if God's Word says he is going to be with his son, we have to assume it is Heaven by the context.

 

BURN, BABY, BURN! </font>[/QUOTE]What a sad, hopeless scene calvinism and reformed theology paints.

 

Aaron,

THank you for your response to my question. My condolences to you and your wife ono your loss, as well.

I too have found that Ive had to grow to the point where I leave these sorts of answers in God's hands, this is why I can participate in the discussion.

Thank you again.