Yes, My Child is a Christian. A Reformed Response to "Is Your Child a Christian?"

An article on the gospel coalition asks whether a parent can tell if her child is a Christian, and poses "5 Evidences" for a child's status as "Christian."  They are:

1. Growing affection and need for Jesus and the gospel.

2. Heightened understanding of the truths of Scripture.

3. Increased kindness and selflessness toward siblings.

4. Greater awareness of and distaste for sin.

5. Noticeable desire to obey parents.

Of course, every Christian parent wants their child to express these things.  My response to this article is that it misses what Baptist theology needs to encounter, and that is the objective reality of the covenant God makes with believers and their children.  For the OT, readers can take a look at the promises to Abraham (Genesis 17:9, for example), and for David, Psalm 89:29-30ff, for all of Israel "baptized into Moses" see 1 Cor. 10.  This covenantal principle is found throughout the whole of Scripture. 

Re: the article and the "5 points of Parentism" there is everything in it about looking inward to the inner realms of a child's soul, which no one can do.  As far as the outward manifestations of "devotion" (Scripture reading, remorse for sin, etc.), how does the parent know the child isn't--due to her sinful nature--"acting it out" and not being genuine?  This seems like Puritanical naval gazing, except one is trying to look into someone else's soul. 

The parent has NO WAY of knowing the status of a child's relationship with the Lord based upon these five points. This is the failure of Baptist theology, and why the Reformed understanding of the covenant the Lord makes with children is the biblical answer: it is an objective covenant. Parents should never doubt the election and salvation of their children, unless they commit apostasy and deny the Lord that bought them.

On the Baptist view, a child is converted.  Oh?  This is why I am no longer a Baptist. The Internet Monk once asked some good questions about the curious theology of children in Baptist settings:

The child is "saved" from infancy and the child's election is not doubted i.e. if the child were to pass away, that child's salvation is never doubted.   But then, when the child gets older, she needs to "make a decision" to "get saved," and follow Christ or--be converted.

So, the child was saved, and then was converted? Or, the child was saved, and got to a point of neutrality where salvation was at the "tipping point" of being lost or gained based upon the contingency of converting? Or, the child is saved, lost that salvation, and then got saved again?

Rather, on the Reformed view, parents should treat their children as "saved" (1 Cor.7:14)-as sanctified, and in covenant with God, presuming neither regeneration or unregenerate status, but taking on faith, the good Father's will to make promises to believers and their children (Acts 2:38). This is why the Apostle Paul can instruct children in the Lord to obey their parents in Eph. 6:1ff.

The covenant is objective and real, and parents should be encouraged to embrace that covenant, and therefore nurture their children in the Lord, not fretting about a conversion experience, but entrusting children to the Lord teaching them that they belong to Jesus, and that the proper response on the child's part is to "trust and obey, for there's no other way to be happy and free in Jesus.

Theological Questions Children Ask, Pt. 2

Out of the blue the question came, my reaction to it is slow and easy like mountain molasses.  I'm used to my daughter asking me profound questions.  Often I begin with, "That's a good question, honey.  I don't really know...."  She had asked, "Dad, what is sin?  Is it a thing?" By "thing," she means something tangible. 

Brynne, at eight years old (nine in October) is asking an ontological question, wondering about the essence or being of a thing.  She knows from her catechetical training that "Sin is any want of conformity unto, or transgression of, the law of God" (Westminster Shorter Catechism, Q.14).  She knows, more simply, that sin is breaking God's law, even simpler, that sin is something "bad" that a person does.  Her question however, was the follow-up of what type of thing sin is.  "Sin isn't like a gas, like the air, right?" she inquires.  

Breathing out a drawn breath, I begin with an example of a sin.  "You know, when someone steals something, they take something that doesn't rightly belong to them, and this is an action that is a sin.  At the same time, though, the person who stole the thing decided in his heart and mind to steal first.  So, sin is more than the action of stealing; it's something that is in the heart first of all, which makes it really hard to explain exactly what that is."  

Lying on the love seat after a meal, I threw my legs over the side and stared at the ceiling, trying to think of ways to explain it to her.  She sits on the couch with her knees to her chest, staring at the ground, thinking.  

Let's take her back to the beginning and try to do theology with the story of Scripture.  "You know, think of Adam and Eve (she wasn't named "Eve" yet, but that's not all that important at this point).  It was Eve that took the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and then gave it to Adam.  So, as the Apostle Paul says, it was Eve that was the transgressor--" (1 Timothy 2:12-14).  

"But wasn't it Satan that caused them to sin?" 

"Yes, well, the deceiver.  He lied to Adam and Eve, telling them that they could be like God if they ate of the tree, so yes, the sin is imputed to the devil, even before Adam and Eve sinned.  So the devil had some kind of sin going on in him before Adam and Eve sinned."

"They told me in school (years ago) that Satan fell from heaven and had a different name--" 

"Lucifer, right." 

"Yeah, but we know that that's not necessarily true." 

"Right.  Some people think the Bible tells us about the fall of the devil (in Isaiah 14:3-21; Ezekiel 28: 1-19), but we know less about that than what people say.  What we do know is what Jesus said about him, that he is a liar and a deceiver and that when he tells a lie he speaks his native language," (John 8:44) [1].

"But we don't believe that." 

"Not really, no.  So, the deal with sin is that it's this thing that is a mystery.  People have a hard time understanding what it really is." 

"Is it like gas?  Because I have gas, and I could let out a toot right now."  

"Ummm...." 

She chuckles. "Like the air?"

"No, it's not like gas.  It's like this thing that exists within our hearts and minds.  

"So, if Adam and Eve hadn't sinned, the baby birds wouldn't have died in our chimney.  And when Jesus makes the new heavens and the new earth, there won't be death." 

"That's right." 

"What would have happened if Eve had sinned, but Adam hadn't?"  

"Well, I don't know.  God could have destroyed Eve and given him a new wife, or he could have redeemed her.  But the sin Adam committed is the reason why we have death.  Adam is what we call the covenant head--he bore the responsibility for he and his wife, and the sin and death in the world isn't the fault of the devil or of the woman, but of Adam (Romans 5:12)." [2]

"So, if God hadn't created, sin wouldn't exist?"

"That's right."
"So, God created everything, and he created sin too?"

"Ah yeah.  Great question.  No, God didn't create sin, because God is good and there is no evil or darkness in him.  And this is why people for 1,000's of years have been trying to figure out your question of what sin actually is.  It didn't come from God, because he's good and not sinful, and sin doesn't exist in him.  So, he's not the author of sin.  That's why sin is a mystery, honey.  It's hard to figure out."  

"It is. Can I have a popsicle?"

"Sure."  

1. "You are of your father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him. Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies."

2. 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—for until the Law sin was in the world, but sin is not imputed when there is no law.  Nevertheless death reigned from Adam until Moses, even over those who had not sinned in the likeness of the offense of Adam, who is a type of Him who was to come.

Theological Questions Kids Ask

Theological Questions Kids Ask Pt. 1

Here are some of the questions my oldest daughter has asked me over the years, most of which have come recently. She's eight years old. Children ask a lot of profound questions, and sometimes, I have to tell her "I don't know." It's amazing the questions children ask, because theologians, philosophers, and just all-around-type folks ask these questions all the time, as they have done for thousands of years. Here's a short list of some questions my oldest daughter has asked me. I'll just focus on my response to the first one here.

1. If God knows what I’m going to ask for, why should I pray?

2. If God is good and wants to save everyone, why does David pray that God would destroy his enemies?

3. How do we know we are worshipping the right god?

4. How come what's his name doesn’t believe in God?

5. If everyone knows God exists, why doesn’t everyone believe in him?

6. How do I know God is real when I can’t see him?

7. How come people haven’t baptized their children?

8. Daddy, are Baptists saved?

9. What’s the difference between us and the Mormons next door?

10.  Daddy, what does this (holds up middle finger) mean?  I saw it on the bus.
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#1: We had been talking about praying for our enemies, and this includes those who are hostile to Christian people in countries like Nigeria. We also prayed for our intellectual enemies like evolutionary biologist and militant atheist Richard Dawkins (We'll have more to say about Dawkins's disdain for teaching theology to children later. Say with snobbish British accent: I do hope it's not outlawed here in the good ol' U.S. any time soon. 'Twould be a pity).  

Out of the blue, Brynne asks question #1. My first reply was that this is a great question! I always encourage our children to ask hard questions, and I've let them know that no question is out-of-bounds in our house. I told her that some people will deny that God knows everything about the future, so that our prayer requests for things aren't "against" (in contradiction to) the knowledge of God.  

She has a puzzled look. I said, "But it seems to me that the Bible teaches that God knows everything," and I read Psalm 139 to her, and Matthew 6:8 "Therefore do not be like them (hypocrites in the synagogues and babbling pagans), for your Father knows the things you need of before you ask him." Of course, I was quick to note that Matthew 6:8 doesn't necessarily teach that God knows what we are going to ask for, but that he knows what we need. There's a difference. But then there's Psalm 139:4: "For there is not a word on my tongue, but behold O Lord (YHWH), you know it altogether."

The question of divine action in explaining omniscience and human activity is of course, as deep as the ocean. So, how do you explain this mind-bending question to a small child with integrity?  

I explained to my children that first of all, I don't really know how to understand that God knows the future and that we ask for things, and yet somehow, our asking for things doesn't mean that we shouldn't. In adult terms, it doesn't render prayer meaningless. The reason for this, I said to my family, was that the Bible tells us to pray for things, and Jesus, for example, told us to ask for our daily bread. That's the bottom line: Jesus tells us to pray for things, so we do. The other part of the bottom line is, when teaching small children (and adults, of course!), it's ok to say, "You know: that's a good question, and I really don't know the answer--and I'm not sure I ever will. There are people who write books on the question and when you get older you can explore these questions in a much deeper way." In fact, Daddy has a number of books in his library that talk about that topic at great length. 

The good in all of this is that my children are asking deep questions, and they feel free to do so. I hope I'm providing decent answers. The next question was about the "imprecatory" Psalms, where David asks the Lord to crush his enemies. How does this square with what Jesus taught?