Originally posted by Chemnitz:
[qb]
If I recall you claim to believe in Scripture Alone, if that is so how can you come up with such an extrabiblical belief. Are you so unwilling to admit that it is possible for an infant to have faith that you are willing to ignore all of the statements that plainly say that the only ones going to heaven are those that have faith?
Yes I believe in sola scriptura, but you are the one going outside of the Scriptures.
"Faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the Word of God." The word "hearing" implies listening and understanding, that which an infant cannot do. You have not correctly defined faith, but have an unbiblical definition of faith. An infant cannot have faith. Faith requires knowledge, and an understanding of knowledge that leads one to make a choice based on the understanding he has. What kind of knowledge must one have in order to put his faith in the gospel? The answer should be fairly simple. But an infant cannot have that faith. You have redefined faith.
Therefore, yes I am unwilling to admit that an infant can have faith. It is impossible. I have had four children. I know what infants are like. It is impossible for children to have faith.
You are forgetting that God is also a God of Righteousness, Justice, and cannot tolerate the presence of sin. You have already admitted that infants are guilty of sin, so how can you say a sinful person is going to stand in the presence of God? When the Bible is quite clear that any person guilty of sin would be destroyed if they were to stand in God's presence.
How many times must I answer this question.
I base my answer on the Bible.
I base my answer on the Biblical precedent of David's infant who died and went to a place where David was absolutely sure that he would see him. There are only two choices (unless you believe in the Catholic concept of Limbo), and that is Heaven or Hell. If the child went to Hell, as you suggest, then so did David. Is that what you suggest? Webdog thinks so. Otherwise babies, such as David's go to Heaven, as David did. That is the only rationale conclustion from that passage.
Secondly I believe that God in his mercy simply takes them to Heaven. One of the greatest attributes of God is His mercy.
Secondly, God has manifested his mercy only through His son Jesus Christ, in who faith is required for salvation.
We are going in circles here. There are some that are incapable of having faith because they have not reached an age where they understand or reason things things out. Is God so cruel to condemn these ones to Hell. No, I believe in his mercy that he takes them to Heaven. They have no faith. It is impossible for them to have faith. Therefore they don't fit the paradigm that you have set up.
Grammatically, that is the only way it can be taken."
Not quite, in this case it is not a figurative comparison. It is a conjunction that connects the death and resurrection. Unless you want to claim that we only experience a figurative resurrection it would not work in a figurative sense. Besides if Paul was speaking figuratively he would have prefaced it with something to the effect of "baptism is like", or "as if", or "likened unto."
I pointed out to you the words "like as" and "even so". These are words that indicate a similie, not a literal statement. The resurrection is symbolic. We may physically be resurrected from the water, but that is not what Paul is referrng to. Like as we are physically raised from the water, even so, we walk in newness of life. It is a picture of our walking in newness of life with Christ. There is no "sacrament" here. There is no imparting of grace. It simply gets you wet. It is a symbolic action of our burial to our old life of sin, and our resurrection to our new life in Christ. The baptism itself is physical; the symbolic meaning is given by Paul. There is nothing complicated there to see.
DHK