If you believe the true gospel, you
have to have had this thought.
Before we get going on this, please know
that if this question is personal for you, you may be offended by my “callous”
or “heartless” approach. Know that I feel deeply for you and weep with you.
It’s personal for me to. But in this post, I am trying to give the most clear
and logical answer that I can from the biblical text, and that may mean saying
things that you don’t want to hear.
Here’s
the Dilemma
1. Everyone is born sinful. All have
sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, and it’s something all of humanity
did, “in Adam” (Romans 1-8 [5:12], 1 Corinthians 15). Everyone, from before the
moment of conception, has a sin nature ready to be imparted to them. (Some
would argue it is passed down through the man, which is why the immaculate
conception is so essential to Christ’s sinlessness, but I digress.)
2. All sinners die (and go to hell). The
wages of sin is death. Theologically speaking, some would say it’s eternal spiritual death, a
continuation of the spiritual death into which we were all born, as sinners.
You’ve been dying since before the day you were born. You can’t do anything
about it. Revelation 19-20 promises us that if our name is not in the book of
life, written before the foundations of the earth, then we will be sent into
“the lake of fire,” where we will be tormented forever and ever. (That’s what
I’m talking about when I say “hell.”)
3. Faith in Jesus is the only way to be saved.
He is the way of salvation. By believing that Jesus is the Christ, the son of
God, you may have life in his name. Only those drawn toward the father by the
son may respond with repentant faith. They must call on the name of the Lord,
and how can they call if they haven’t believed? And how can they believe if
they haven’t heard? And how can they hear if it hasn’t been preached?
4. Babies can’t hear the gospel, which means
they can’t believe which means they can’t be saved, which means they’re going
to hell because they are sinners.
I didn’t downplay it too much, did
I?
It’s definitely a big question. It’s
definitely a question that causes people to question their theology (which is
good). It’s also a question that causes people despair (which is not good).
I’m going to tackle this question as
systematically as I can and then give you my answer to the yes or no question
at the end. (spoiler: I say more than “yes” or “no.”) First, I’ll look at some
commonly proposed answers, second I’ll double check the theology and logic of
the dilemma, and finally I’ll give you my answer and give my reasoning why I
think it is the case.
Commonly
Proposed Answers
1)
Yes. Babies Go to Hell.
Some simply say yes.
I start with this one to get it out
of the way, because it is the easiest answer to the question. Do babies go to
hell? Yes. The logic holds, the theology holds, and that means that yes, babies
go to Hell.
…
…
…
It’s just so hard to believe
that.
Something deep inside of humans
screams against this conclusion. It seems
so unjust that God would send innocent babies to Hell to be tormented forever
without giving them an opportunity to trust in Jesus. It’s just not fair.
The Calvinist in me says that this
objection is misguided. It’s absolutely fair. (A common by-product of our
sinful nature is that we humans say we want fairness, but really we want
unfairness in our favor… but again, I digress.)
Humanity sinned against God; God didn’t sin
against humanity. God is not responsible for the sin of Adam, Adam is. God
doesn’t have ANY obligation to save ANYONE. It is completely fair for God to
leave us with our one-way train ticket to Hell that we all purchased “in Adam.”
He doesn’t have to get involved. That’s what makes grace so spectacular. He
boarded the train willingly, but he didn’t have
to.
God is not required by any higher
authority (there isn’t one) to spare anyone from eternal torment in Hell. Humanity
collectively chose to go to Hell on day eight. It’s his grace that saves us.
So really we’re asking the wrong
question. It’s not, “Why didn’t he save all of us?” It’s, “Why did he save any
of us?” Those of us who have experienced His grace should respond appropriately
with praise and worship and thanks for saving anyone. Ideally, we would not
question why he didn’t save everyone.
I know, that’s hard to accept. And I
know, it doesn’t satisfy that feeling of injustice, but the question to ask
yourself is, “Is it true?” Truth trumps feelings every time.
However, that’s not the only answer
out there.
2)
No, Babies don’t go to Hell because of the age of accountability.
Some say that it’s not until some
specific age that God begins to require faith as the means of salvation. It
seems to make sense logically. The bible speaks often of parent’s being
responsible for their children until they are grown, and we Americans all know
that when a man leaves his father and mother and clings to his wife, then
he’s truly a man.
*wink
The oft-proposed ages are 13
(because that’s when Jewish children are officially “adults” in Judaism), 18
(because that’s when Americans and most of the world have decided people are
legally “adults” in the 20th century), 7 (because that’s a holy
number and seven year olds usually have the cognitive abilities to understand
the gospel), and 20 (because that’s the age limit God put on the Israelites
being allowed to enter Canaan in Num 14:29).
The problems with this are that it
doesn’t say that there’s an “age of accountability” anywhere in the Bible.
The apostle didn’t write, “If you
are over the age of seven and believe in the Lord Jesus you shall be saved, but
if you’re under the age of seven it doesn’t matter, you’re gonna get spared
eternal torment either way.”
Again, it’s the Calvinist in me who
sits here screaming, “How dare you add so much to God’s written word!” I tend
to agree with him.
3)
No, Babies don’t go to Hell, because David said he’d see his child again.
Some say there is biblical support
to say categorically that babies will be saved because of one and only one
specific verse.
2 Samuel 12 is David’s comeuppance
for his pride, murder, lust and adultery. You know the story. David gets
Uriah’s wife, Bathsheba, pregnant and kills Uriah to cover it up then marries
her. (I’m paraphrasing. That’s the gist of it.)
After his illegitimate son dies,
David stands up and says, “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.”
“See,” they say, “He’s going to go
to him, and obviously David’s going to heaven, so that means the baby’s in
heaven waiting for him, and that means all babies go to heaven!” As much as I
sympathize with the sentiment, (and as much as I dislike the idea that we’re
all gonna “go to heaven” because we’ll actually be going to a New Jerusalem,
just read the end of your Bible…but yet again I digress.) I have to play
devil’s advocate and point out the myriad flaws in logic and language.
1.
“I shall go to him” is not the same as, “I shall
meet him in heaven.” Were it the latter, the argument would be much stronger.
However, “go to him” could easily mean only “going to death.” He could be
merely speaking of the permanence and eventuality of his own death, thus
joining his son.
2.
Descriptive, not prescriptive. Even if he does mean “I’ll meet him in
heaven,” that does not mean David is right in this assertion, it only means
he asserted it. The text doesn’t say, “And God spoke to David saying, ‘You’ll
meet him in heaven.’” If it did, the argument would be much, much stronger
because God doesn’t lie. As it is, David might
have his facts wrong.
3.
More descriptive, not prescriptive. Even if he’s right in his assertion,
that doesn’t mean this happens in every case. This is telling a story that
occurred, and just because it happened once, doesn’t mean it happens every time.
The text doesn’t say, “And God said, ‘You shall meet him in heaven, because all
infants go to heaven, every time.’” If it did, the argument would be much,
much, much stronger. As it is, David’s baby
might have been an exception to the rule.
People also try to throw out Jesus’s
words about letting the little children come to him , for to such belong the
kingdom of heaven. (Matt 19) but these arguments are weaker than a vegan on a
fast. (Sorry, couldn’t pass it up.)
In reality, there is no Bible verse
that guarantees that Babies don’t go to hell. That’s why it’s such a big
question. If there were a knock out verse, I wouldn’t need to write this post!
You all would have found such a verse the first time you had the thought, “Do babies
go to hell?” and then you typed it into google to find a Bible verse on the
subject!
Double
Check the Theology and Logic of the Dilemma
The theology and logic of the four-point
dilemma above is pretty darn sound. Pelagianism (the idea that you take on a
sin nature only after the first time you commit a sin) was condemned in 431 at
the Council of Ephesus. Humans are sinful, inherently (literally, it’s
inherited). If you show me a human, I’ll show you a sinner. As Augustine put it
in Confessions, “the only innocent
feature in babies is the weakness of their frames; the minds of infants are far
from innocent.” [1]
There’s an implicit extra argument at
the end of the logical argument. It goes like this:
5. But if God were good he wouldn’t send
babies to hell.
6. Therefore, if babies go to hell, God isn’t
good.
This line of argumentation, while it
seems good on the surface, is unfounded theologically (because it really
doesn’t hold to the doctrine of the sinfulness of man) and unfounded logically (because
it presumes to know “good” apart from God). Let’s take them one at a time.
First, the whole “good” thing. “Good”
as an objective idea comes only from God. There is no source for good except
for Him. Morality is not self-existent; it only exists within the character of
God. For us to presume to tell God what’s “good” with our limited experience of
it, would be like a child telling a carpenter how to build a table, “because I
eat my cereal on one every morning!” We have a very limited grasp of true
goodness, and the way to get a better grasp is to get to know the source of
good, namely God. We don’t tell him what’s good, he tells us. Don’t believe me?
Read Job.
Second, if we have our definition of
“good” straight, we would understand that “justice” is wrapped up in it. God is
the source and definition of both goodness and justice. If we have justice
straight, we would understand that sending babies to hell is exactly just. It’s
exactly what babies deserve because they are sinful. If they don’t deserve it,
then babies aren’t inherently sinful and you have a beef with 2,000 years of
orthodox anthropology.
Unless of course, grace factors in…
My
Answer and Reasoning
A curious, glorious, mysterious, and
awe-inspiring fact is that God is gracious beyond anything we can imagine. He
often treats us detestable humans far better than we deserve. His image in us
seems worth redeeming from its disfigured and tarnished state.
But He gets to decide when to
dispense that glorious grace.
The following is the carefully
worded answer that I give anytime I get the question of “What about so-and-so who can’t believe the gospel?” What about
the man in deepest darkest Africa? What about the unborn aborted baby? What my
miscarried sibling or my living brother Paul who has down syndrome without the
cognitive skill to fully grasp the gospel? Yes, this question is personal for
me as well.
Here it is:
“Every person in every age is
responsible for responding to the revelation that they have been given with an
appropriate faith in the revealer.”
If you have nothing but creation to
testify of a creator, you are responsible for worshiping that creator
faithfully. This is more applicable to the man in deepest darkest Africa, and
less to the infant, but it is still slightly so. Whatever cognitive ability a
child has he must use to respond to whatever revelation of God he can perceive
in whatever way he is able.
Biblically speaking there is a
caveat to clarify this further: Romans 1:18ff. All the unrighteous know God and
suppress the truth of God in unrighteousness, exchanging the image of the
incorruptible God for other images. The point? No one chooses God when they see
creation; they follow their sinful lusts. God has to open their eyes and allow
them to believe, so God is still ultimately the one responsible for the saving
action. If He weren’t part of the equation, no one could be saved. (This is why
Deism is so unbiblical… but I digress again.)
“But Stephen,” you say, “That’s too
confusing and convoluted! Gimme a simple yes or no answer!”
Okay, fine, here’s the simplest
answer I can give: I don’t know.
I simply don’t know whether babies
go to hell when they die.
I don’t have enough clear biblical
evidence to say that babies necessarily will be spared from hell. I simply
can’t draw that conclusion.
While I have enough biblical
evidence to say that babies do go to hell, something still seems wrong, and
there is a logical recourse available to me. The character of God is such that
he gives grace.
Ultimately I have to sit somewhere
in the middle and be comfortable not knowing.
I cannot say that babies will be
spared, because God is just and it is just for babies to go to hell. But I
cannot say that babies won’t be spared, because God is merciful, and it would
be perfectly within His merciful character to spare them.
I
believe God is merciful enough to save anyone including babies, however he
wants to, but I also trust God enough that if babies do go to hell, He’s still
right in the end.
A
Final Thought
If babies will be saved, which I
think is a perfectly reasonable possibility, why wouldn’t God make it clearer?
Why wouldn’t he assuage the tension and tell us all clearly, “Yes. Babies will
be spared. Fear not.”
A possibility that my dad pointed
out to me (I don’t know where he got it) is that humans would twist it. Humans
are capable of all kinds of perversion, wickedness, and twisting. If God made
it that clear, I think it likely that humans would start killing their babies
in order to save them. If there were a clear age of accountability, no one
would reach it, because we humans are so sinful we’d have ceremonial beheadings
to make sure all are saved.
The reality is that we are fallen in
need of a savior. Thankfully, God provided one. All we must do to be saved is
believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Then and only then can we sinful humans be
saved. (See what I did there. “Only then.” Doesn’t my contradiction grind your
gears? … but I digress again…)
No comments:
Post a Comment