LET THE CHILDREN COME TO ME...my thoughts on Luke 18:15-17

A question has come to me involving the meaning Jesus' words in this passage. Is this, as Calvin says, a promotion of infant baptism (1) or is Jesus simply using the children as a illustration in His teaching? There are many today who have taken this to mean that we should baptize children because they are safe in God's hands.

In his commentary on the Harmony of the Gospels, Calvin states; "Infants are renewed by the Spirit of God, according to the capacity of their age, till that power which was concealed within them grows by degrees, and becomes fully manifest at the proper time"(2). It seems, according to Calvin, that Christ is implying an underlying age of accountability where children are protected by God until they are able to comprehend such matters as sin, repentance, Christ's substitutionary death, etc... But is Calvin making too much out of this passage...I believe so.

Now, I do believe that children are saved until a certain age when God will hold them accountable, and as far as what that age is...i have no idea, and in fact, believe that nobody knows exactly what that age is except God Himself. This is a subject that the Bible is not extremely explicit on. To show my hand, I hold onto the teaching underlying the narrative of 2 Samuel 12:23 where David says that he will someday go to his son who had recently died. I believe that this subtly shows that children are in God's care until a certain age. Again...what is that age? Alvin Reid says "there is no set age of accountability", nor "there is no singular biblical passage that clearly elaborates this concept" (3).

So...what is Jesus talking about in Luke 18? I believe to answer this question, we must study the passage in the larger scope of the chapter. If we believe that scripture is truly divinely inspired (2 Tim. 3), then we must also believe that God had His hand in the placement of biblical books, chapters, and passages. Therefore, in studying the Word, we must be quick to not isolate a specific text for study. For example, many, many people do this with the Parable of the Lost Son, yet as Al Mohler remarkably demonstrated in a sermon on Luke 15, the Parable is not to be read on its own, but as a continual response of Christ to the Pharisees and their hardness of heart as seen in verses 1-3. In the same way, look at what our passage of study is surrounded by.

Luke 18:1-8 God's mercy shown to a poor widow

Luke 18:9-14 God's mercy shown to a repentant tax collector

Luke 18:15-17 (our passage) God's mercy shown to infants

Luke 18:18-30 God's mercy refused to one in great power/ wealth. (please don't read too much into this)

Do you see the similarities? The majority of this chapter shows that the mercy of our Lord is given to the low, the humble, and the utterly helpless! William Hendriksen agrees, stating; "The meaning is: the only possible way to enter the kingdom is by receiving it readily and trustfully as a chlld accepts a gift. A child is not too proud to accept a gift! (4). What a wonderful testimony to the Sovereignty of our Lord, who chooses not the proud, arrogant, or powerful, or super-religious, but the ones that are not designated as the "cream of the crop." A child, especially an infant, is totally, 100% dependant on their parents for everything. In means of salvation, we are likewise 100% dependant on our Heavenly Father, who gives grace to the humble.

In conclusion, it is my belief that this passage should not be used as a means infant baptism, for it is a very shallow one at that, but instead as Jesus' teaching through demonstration on His goodness and control of Salvation!

Footnotes:

(1) John Calvin. Calvin's Commentaries- Vol. XVI p. 390.
(2) Ibid.
(3) Alvin Reid. Introduction to Evangelism. p.245.
(4)William Hendriksen. New Testament Commentary- Luke. p.830.

I've been punked...

Sooo....i am usually pretty up on the April fool's jokes. One of my roommates at Clemson was a large prankster. And regardless of the occasion, whether it was April 1st or not, the rubber band used to find its way onto the kitchen sink sprayer more times than desired. A few years (and a few change of shirts later) i learned to pick up on a coming prank pretty quickly.

That was until today. As i opened my email to check today's messages after class, i noticed that Google was introducing some new email tools, one of which was called Google Custom Time. To my suprise, this feature allowed you to post-date your emails, as if you wrote them a day or a few years ago. You could even select an option that placed the email in the recepients box having already "been read" by the recepient. They would think that they just glanced over your email, and that you did send it to them when you said you would.

This came with a variety of testimonials from users who had "cheated the system" by winning contests, getting out of missing an appointment, or etc...Not looking at the fine print too closely, i immediately began to lay out just how i was going to use this as a teachable moment with the 3 of you who read my blog. You would have learned just how this is related to the decline of morality in America, and the need for the truth of the Gospel to penetrate every aspect of our society once again as it did a few centuries ago.

Upon doing some more research for the Google-bashing blog post, i began to notice a few things. First, one of the main ingredients that allows Google to post date emails is what they call an e-flux capacitor. Now...this may slip past many of you, but not by someone who's favorite movie trilogy series is Back To The Future! The Flux Capacitor is what allowed the time machine to go back in time. It was somewhere around this point in my studies that i realized the excellent April fools prank that the entire staff at Google had just laid hard on me (and hopefully 1/2 of America as well).

All i can say is this: Well done, Google...well done.