Babylonian Babies - Hope in the Loss of a Baby

This is an excerpt from an upcoming book, Hope in the Loss of a Baby: A Deeper Dive into what the Bible says about Miscarriage, Stillbirth, and Infant Death. 

Babylonian Babies

The worst aspect of all conflicts is that those who had no voice in starting the fire are the very ones consumed by its flames. ~ Charles Spurgeon

We’ve seen from Jonah that God saved Ninevite babies alive along with their parents, king, and city. And we’ve seen that Judean babies who were murdered were guaranteed their part in the resurrection by verses like Jeremiah 31:15-17. But can we extrapolate these to all babies?

We could argue that those babies would inherit heaven because of their repentance (in the case of Ninevah) or their covenant favor (in the case of Judah). But where does that leave babies who were not given the opportunity to repent or whose parents had willfully rebelled against the God of heaven? Are they counted amongst the cursed whose father’s sins will be visited on their children and their children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation (Exodus 34:7)? Did they need to do something or have something done for them to receive favor from God?

The Bible identifies several pagan nations whose babies were murdered: Babylon (Isaiah 13:16), Thebes (Nahum 3:10, which implies the same will happen to Assyria), Canaan (Deuteronomy 12:31, Psalm 106:35-39), and the Moabites (2 Kings 3:27). We must recognize that these babies were purposefully killed, rather than an unfortunately consequence of war. While it is all evil, I think we would all agree that is one thing for a school to accidentally be bombed or fields to be ransacked so that villages slowly starve and entirely another for a soldier to pick up a tiny child by the ankles and dash them against a rock.

Those who oppose the Bible often claim that Psalm 137 is a command or concession from God to murder infants in this way. While I will show that there is comfort in it, truly this is a hard Psalm:

Blessed shall he be who takes your little ones and dashes them against the rock. ~ Psalm 137:9

How do we interpret impossible passages like that? Should we, like C. S. Lewis, condemn the Psalmist, “The reaction to the Psalmist to injury, though profoundly natural, is profoundly wrong”? Or should we explain it away as descriptive rather than prescriptive? After all, it’s just describing the event, not condoning it. Or do we deeply consider why it’s in the Bible and pray that God would give us wisdom and hope through it all? The Apostle Paul said,

All scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work. ~ 2 Timothy 3:16-17

Psalm 137 is part of scripture, and is therefore profitable for a deeper consideration. A deeper consideration will help us know God better, be able to reprove those in sin, and show the world a better way as we seek to make Christ know and look more like him every day.

To understand this text and know what happened to these babies, we need to know the context.

Lex Talionis

Psalm 137 is a lament of Judeans exiled in Babylon (also known as Chaldea). The past tense of the Psalm implies that the exile is nearing its end, though the Psalm works at any point during the exile. We should note that Babylon fell very quickly and there was no indication of the impending fall (Daniel 5:30). The Psalm recounts the long years of waiting, the forced mirth (happiness) from their captors, their resistance to assimilation (vv.5-6), and the pain for what they lost (vv.7-8).

The fall of Babylon had been prophesied over a century earlier when Isaiah had declared, “Fallen, fallen is Babylon; and all the carved images of her gods he has shattered to the ground” (Isaiah 21:9, see also Isaiah 13:17-22, 47:1-3, Jeremiah 25:12-14, 51:1-26ff)! Babylon was God’s chosen instrument to reprove Judah (Habakkuk 1:12, Jeremiah 51:20, 2 Chronicles 36:15-17).

While Judah desperately needed God’s reproof, the chosen instrument of Babylon went beyond what was appointed and “furthered the disaster” (Zechariah 1:14-15).

God speaks of his anger towards them most clearly with,

I was angry with my people;
I profaned my heritage;
I gave them into your hand;
you showed them no mercy;
on the aged you made your yoke exceedingly heavy…

These two things shall come to you
in a moment, on one day;
the loss of children and widowhood
shall come upon you in full measure… ~ Isaiah 47:6,9

God is punishing Babylon with the same measure by which they punished Judah. The formal term for this is Lex Talionis, or “The Law of Retaliation.” We love God’s justice in theory, but when it is fulfilled this poignantly it often proves shocking. Part of understanding God’s grace is knowing how fearsome his vengeance is. God has never overlooked even a single sin, and while we are blessed to know that the wrath for our sins was poured out on Jesus, we often don’t grasp how horrible that wrath was or how much we deserved it. Sin requires punishment.

It is a lex talionis—the law of retaliation. The destruction of Babylon must be to her what her destruction was to Jerusalem: she had utterly broken down the walls of Jerusalem, and burned the houses; and so shall hers be broken down and burned. She had slain their infants without mercy, and so shall her infants be served. ~ Matthew Henry

You might recognize the cadence from the Law of Moses when it says, “If there is harm, then you shall pay life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe” (Exodus 21:23-25, compare Leviticus 24:19-20, Deuteronomy 19:21). The law was strict that life, limb, and eyesight was valuable and that taking it required payment.

The original legislation was given in order to limit retribution. Left to himself, man’s tendency is always to demand far more than an eye for an eye. If someone knocks out a man’s tooth, that man wants to kill him…the lex talionis was introduced by God though Moses in order to keep that terrible spirit of uncontrolled vengeance in check. ~ Martin Lloyd Jones

As shocking as the destruction of Babylon and its babies is, what is more shocking is that this is not more prevalent. Sin brings forth death, and Babylon’s greatest danger was not the Mede-Persian empire than was used by God to conquer it; it was God’s justice and wrath pointed at his enemies. Truly God is angry with the wicked every day, if a man does not repent, God will whet his sword; he has bent and readied his bow (Psalm 7:11-12). The wicked shall return to Sheol, all the nations that forget God (Psalm 9:17).

So if Babylon is being punished for their sins, and we rejoice in that (Psalm 58:10-11, Nahum 3:19), then how can it be said that the Medes are blessed for the same action? Here we need to spend a little time parsing the sentence. It does not say that they are blessed for dashing Babylon’s babies against the rock. It says they are blessed. God has appointed them as the chosen instrument to punish Babylon. It does not say that they have full immunity for how they treat Babylon, in fact they will be held accountable for their same actions.

Though God can bring light out of darkness, and turn the greatest calamities of his people into their greatest gain, yet that does not lessen the guilt of those that are the instruments of their trouble. ~ Matthew Henry

The Lex Talionis is entirely fair, but there is no blessing in it. Babylon wickedly murdered Judah’s babies. Now the Medes and the Persians are going to do the same to Babylon’s babies. Later someone (Greece) will have to do the same to the Mede-Persian babies. And so on, and so on, and so on. There is no grace or love or forgiveness in Lex Talionis, despite how fair it is. We don’t want fair, we want grace, we want love and blessing in spite of our sin.

It is fitting then that Jesus does not do away with Lex Talionis, but fulfills it and introduces a better way,

Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished… You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I say to you, ‘Do not resist the one who is evil. But if anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if anyone would sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. And if anyone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles. Give to the one who begs from you, and do not refuse the one who would borrow from you. ~ Matthew 5:17-18,38-42

Jesus died to perfectly fulfill this blessing. He brought goodness and love when we brought evil and wickedness. He fulfilled the requirements of Lex Talionis in his own body on the cross. We sinned against heaven; Jesus paid the cost. We crucified God’s own Son and yet he does not require retribution from us, he gives us life and life abundantly (John 10:10). Our debt was paid on the cross, our sins against God were perfectly atoned for. The war between heaven and earth was settled when Christ made peace by the blood of his cross (Colossians 1:20). The law that required bloodshed has been satisfied by the blood of Christ (Ephesians 2:13, Hebrews 9:22).

Instead of fearing the death that was required in retribution we can now say, “Where sin increases, grace abounds all the more.”

Today we would say that he is blessed who takes the gospel to Babylon, who adopts her orphans, who loves them not as an enemy, but as a friend. It is such a better way than Lex Talionis, but it’s only possible because Christ died to bring about that better way. After Elisabeth Elliot’s husband Jim, and Rachel Saint’s brother Nate were brutally murdered by Waorani warriors in Ecuador, they went to the very tribe that had perpetuated so much grief and harm to their family. Yet they did not go with guns and death, they went with love and medicine and hope and eternal life through the power of the gospel and won many to Christ and inspired a generation in love and forgiveness.

Love knows no limits to its endurance, no end to its trust, no fading to its hope; it can outlast anything. It is, in fact, the one thing that stands when all else has fallen. ~ Elisabeth Elliot

I have not come to take vengeance for the blood of my brother. I have come only to tell you of God’s Son, who died so that we might not die forever. ~ Rachel Saint

The Children of God’s Enemies

Now that we’ve considered why Psalm 137 could say that the Medes were blessed in their retribution, let’s ask a much more important question. What happened to those babies who died such a brutal death?

Jeremiah was a witness to the atrocities of the Babylonians. He was forbidden to have a wife or children because of the horrible disasters coming upon the land of Judah (Jeremiah 16:1-9). This was a partial fulfillment of Isaiah 13:16, “Their infants will be dashed in pieces before their eyes; their houses will be plundered and their wives ravished.” I mention this because the exact thing that happened to these Judean babies was what was going to happen to the Babylonian babies.

Were the sins of the Babylonians more grievous than that of the Judeans? No, we’ve seen from the chapter on Babies in Heaven that we have all gone astray. We’ve seen in the chapter on Rachel’s Weeping that the Judean babies were safe in heaven waiting for the Resurrection and the Life.

There are some in Christendom that would say that an unbaptized baby won’t be saved. There are others who believe that only the children of the elect or children of the covenant will be saved. I see nothing of the sort in the way the Bible is written, rather I would agree with Spurgeon:

We ground our conviction about infant salvation very much upon the goodness of the nature of God. We say that the opposite doctrine that some infants perish and are lost, is altogether repugnant to the idea which we have of him whose name is Love. ~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon

If Abijah could be saved, then what is different about Babylon? Didn’t they live in an almost identical situation?

He lived in a wicked home, under a wicked father, in a wicked court… Yet in him was found ‘some good thing toward the Lord.’ ~ J. C. Ryle

It wasn’t that the nation was so reprobate or lost that God could not find favor on the littlest ones who were perishing through no fault of their own. After all, God says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion” (Romans 9:15). Judah was as sinful as Babylon, indeed sometimes the supposed godly nation shocks the world with its sin (compare 1 Corinthians 5:1), yet we are confident that Judean babies who died are secure in waiting for the resurrection.

In America the estimate is that seventy-million babies have been murdered through Abortion since 1973. The vast majority of these babies were murdered by evil men and families that had no fear of God before their eyes. We can’t change God’s plans just by believing differently, but if it requires a faithful parent or country to earn God’s favor, then millions of babies died without hope.

If God doesn’t punish America, he’ll have to apologize to Sodom and Gomorrah. ~ Ruth Bell Graham

But grace and mercy don’t depend on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy (Romans 9:16). Peter, when speaking to Romans, declared the gospel openly that God is no respecter of persons (Acts 10:34). Paul tells us that in Christ there is “not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all and in all” (Colossians 3:11). This is possible because in heaven we will sing to Jesus, “For you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation” (Revelation 5:9).

Even Babylonians? Even Babylonians. Nebuchadnezzar will be there and a whole host of tiny Babylonian babies.

Jesus wants the rose!

Matt Chandler, in his most powerful sermon tells of a sermon illustration about a trampled, broken, abused, wasted rose and how nobody could possibly want it. But then he declares of that broken and despised people, “Jesus wants the rose!” Who could want these Babylonian babies, with their horrible pedigree and warmongering tendencies? “Jesus wants the Babylonian babies!”

We might look at the biblical data and conclude that when God takes the life of a little one, it is actually an act of mercy keeping that child from being hardened by a life of exposure to evil and a life of deliberate rebellion against God. ~ John MacArthur

Why Not Do Evil that Good May Come?

There is a natural question that arises from this biblical conclusion. It is an exceedingly hard question, but it must be asked because chances are you’ve already wondered it yourself.

If babies who are aborted, dashed against the rock, or killed in war are guaranteed heaven, when why are we fighting to keep them alive so they can grow up?

If a Babylonian baby survived the Mede invasion to rebel against God, then that person would face God in his wrath, rather than in his mercy. If an American baby is saved from abortion to grow up in poverty and addiction and to arrive in hell after a life of sorrow and destruction, then why fight for their life at all?

There are three main reasons. God’s law, the ends do not justify the means, and to make Christ known.

God’s Law

God could not be more clear, “You shall not murder” (Exodus 20:13). In another place it says God hates the hands that shed innocent blood (Proverbs 6:16-17).

The Bible tells us plainly,

Open your mouth for the mute,
for the rights of all who are destitute.
Open your mouth, judge righteously,
defend the rights of the poor and needy. ~ Proverbs 31:8-9

And,

Rescue those who are being taken away to death; hold back those who are stumbling to the slaughter. ~ Proverbs 24:11

We cannot put ourselves in the place of God and ignore his commands just because we think good will come about. And we miss the work that God is doing in us through the ministry of plucking life from the fire.

Ruth Bell Graham, who grew up in China under the medical mission of her father Nelson Bell, would often find abandoned babies, usually girls, dying far from anyone. From the book, A Doctor in the Land of the Lion: The Biography of Dr. Nelson Bell of China, we have this impossible scene,

The girls could never grow accustomed to the sight of baby girls abandoned along the canal banks and on the levees. More than once Ruth or Rosa would come running home, carrying a tiny bundle of rags containing a half-frozen, abandoned baby girl they had found by the side of the path, pleading through their tears, ‘Look, Daddy, can’t we save this one? Please, Daddy, don’t let it die!’

Ruth would later say that hearing the cries and seeing babies dead from hypothermia, starvation, or animal attack permanently shaped her understanding of human depravity and the desperate need for the sanctity of life and Christian compassion in a pagan land. Though many of those babies did die, many were kept alive, and Ruth went on to shine the light of Christ for many years in China and America. She knew there was no mercy in the early death of those precious baby girls.

When an abortionist kills a baby, or an ancient army dashes infants against stones, they are not acting as ministers of mercy sending souls to paradise—they are committing brutal, unmitigated murder. That God in his infinite, overflowing grace intercepts that tragedy and ushers that little soul into His presence does not sanitize the act; it magnifies God’s ability to triumph over human atrocity. ~ John MacArthur

So beloved, your call in God’s sovereignty is not to ensure as many people go to heaven as possible. It is to be found faithful in your stewardship. Go and have mercy on those who doubt; save others by snatching them out of the fire; to others show mercy with fear, hating even the garment stained by the flesh (Jude 23). Let it do for you like it did for Ruth, “To see the misery of a people without Christ—it tore away any illusions you might have about human nature. It made you realize early what the world was like without the gospel.”

The Ends Do Not Justify the Means

Joseph did not excuse his brothers for how they treated him, despite the fact that “God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today” (Genesis 50:20). Instead, he said plainly, “You meant evil against me.” It was only by the grace of God that his brothers did not face the devastating consequences of their sins and that God kept them and their families alive.

Even what is meant for good can bring about horrendous results. I was in London some years after the War on Terror found its way to Iraq. Iraqi protestors held signs showing slaughtered infants and babies with horrendous birth defects that they declared were linked to Depleted Uranium and other war-borne chemicals. It was a shocking revelation that a war fought with precision weapons and clear intelligence reports could rain such destruction on the littlest and most innocent of Iraqis.

General Douglas MacArthur—who did so much to stop warmongers—later lamented,

War contains no elements for the regeneration of mankind. Its destructiveness has torn apart both victor and vanquished, leaving behind orphaned children, destroyed generations, and ruined lands.

Even just wars that were meant to ease suffering and save lives wrought horror upon horror upon the world. Despite the good that was done, the sins of the individual will require an account. John Calvin captured this distinction when he wrote, “The wickedness of men is not excused because God turns it to a good end. For the action of men must be judged by their own purpose, and not by the secret counsel of God.”

It is tempting to think that to send a Babylonian baby straight to heaven through murder would be a mercy. But God has clearly ordained both the end and the means. But to do so would require us deciding who lives and who dies. And it would require us to sin in light of God’s clear commands. Love and mercy must be our weapons—not violence and destruction—as we seek to spread life and light in the world.

The duty of the Christian is plain and unmistakable: we are to love life, protect life, and stand between the oppressor and the oppressed. To look upon the destruction of the helpless and say, ‘It is well, for they go to a better place,’ is not faith; it is callousness disguised as theology. The Christian heart weeps where Christ wept, and resists cruelty wherever it lifts its head. ~ J. C. Ryle

In this we protect the innocent, make Christ known, and hope that all will come to know that “while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8).

To Make Christ Known

Tim Tebow came into the world through grave danger because of a serious illness his mother had contracted. A doctor insisted he be aborted to save his mother’s life. His parents chose life and he has since shone the light of Christ throughout the world and is actively rescuing children out of despair. He gave this account of how God is using him,

It’s funny how God brings things full circle. In the same country where a doctor told my mom to abort me because I had no future, God allowed us years later to build a hospital that heals children who have been told they have no hope. You never know what God can do with a life if you just give that life a chance. ~ Tim Tebow

God brings hope out of hopelessness. In the Hebrew we were “Lo-Ammi”, not his people, and “Lo-Ruhama”, without mercy. But after Christ gets ahold of us, he says,

You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. ~ 1 Peter 2:9-10

In God’s secret will, certainly there are thousands, if not millions, of Babylonian descendants who have worshipped Christ and done great things for his holy nation. Many of our Iraqi, Kurdish, Persian/Iranian, Aramean/Syrian, and Arabic brothers and sisters in Christ today are publishing his peace to the world; if the DNA technology were better, I’m sure they could trace their lineage straight back to Babylon. Take a moment to pray for their faithfulness and ministries and thank God that he has preserved them on the earth.

To kill a Tim Tebow in the womb—or any other person created in the image of God—would be a horrible sin. Not only would you be extinguishing a life before it started, but you would be quenching every bit of potential for good that God had planned from them. A redeemed saint brings forth fruit, some thirty-fold, some sixty, and some one-hundred, but all who abide in Christ and him in them will bear much fruit (John 15:5).

Would you rob God of a soldier in His army, a voice in His choir, a laborer in His vineyard, under the wicked plea that the child might otherwise perish? We do not preserve the life of a child merely that he may escape hell; we preserve him that he may know the Lord, walk in holiness, show forth the praises of Him who called us out of darkness, and bring honor to the name of Jesus upon the earth. ~ Charles Spurgeon

Benjamin Franklin knew the destruction that war and conflict brought, and declared that he would rather see children “saved to serve their country instead of being slaughtered in its pride.” If it’s better for children to live to serve their country, how much better is it for them to live to serve the cause of Christ and win an eternal inheritance?

But the ultimate answer in why we don’t do evil so that good may come comes from the golden rule, the clear command of Christ.

Do Unto Others

The Babylonians knew it was wrong to murder Judean babies. They also knew it was wrong when the Medes and the Persians would do likewise to their babies. Notice that the Jews were not the ones dashing these babies against the rock. When Amaziah had the opportunity to do likewise to his Ammonite and Moabite enemies, he did not, and his reasoning was because it was against God’s law.

He did not put their children to death, according to what is written in the Law, in the Book of Moses, where the Lord commanded “Fathers shall not die because of their children, nor children die because of their fathers, but each one shall die for his own sin.” ~ 2 Chronicles 25:4

The Babylonians and the Mede-Persians did not have this clear command from Deuteronomy 24:16, but they certainly knew that it was wrong to murder babies. The whole law is summed up in this one phrase, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Romans 13:9, Galatians 5:14, James 2:8). In knowing that the death of their own babies at the hands of an enemy nation was so vile, they should have treated their neighbors as themselves. They proved what Paul said about the conscience:

They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus. ~ Romans 2:15-16

Whose Children?

Conscience comes from two Greek words which mean with-knowledge. Sinners cannot make the excuse that they didn’t know it was wrong. Perhaps a soldier tries to say, “I was just following orders.” Their conscience accuses them with that twinge of guilt. For this reason God will not acquit the wicked who kill the innocent (Exodus 23:7).

And he does something more amazing than just punish those that murder children. He rescues those children and calls them his own.

And you took your sons and your daughters, whom you had borne to me, and these you sacrificed to them to be devoured. Were your whorings so small a matter that you slaughtered my children and delivered them up as an offering by fire to them? ~ Ezekiel 16:20-21 (emphasis mine)

This adds a dimension to when Job said, “The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away” (Job 1:21). He has revoked their ownership of these children.

Parents are but trustees for God; their children are his property, and they are accountable to him for them. What an aggravated wickedness was it, then, to take the children that were born unto God and make them meat for the devil! ~ Matthew Henry

God calls believers “his” in multiple places, all possible because the Son of God “loved me and gave himself for me” (Galatians 2:20). Yes, he loved the world, yes, he loves the church, yes, he loves all who call upon his name. But he loved each specific saint specifically, and gave himself for each individual saint individually. Among these are babies from every nation, tribe, people, and tongue.

I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. ~ 2 Corinthians 6:16

Nephilim Babies

If Babylonian, Moabite, and Assyrian babies who die go to heaven, then what of Nephilim babies who die? Had I not been asked this question during the writing of this book I don’t know that I would have even thought about it. But it is worth a brief consideration since the question does touch on our topic.

Let’s start with a definition: The most prominent theory on the Nephilim (also known as the Anakim and Rephaim) is that they are a hybrid race of half-man, half-fallen-angel (see Genesis 6:1-4) defined by their extreme stature and strength (Numbers 13:33). Their appearance in history was the final straw that triggered the flood (Genesis 6:5-6). There is no indication that any Nephilim ever sought God’s favor or forgiveness (2 Peter 2:4); rather, they are constantly seen as at war with the people of God until they were ultimately eradicated by David and his men (1 Chronicles 20:4-8). If there will be people from every nation, tribe, and tongue in heaven worshipping Jesus (Revelation 7:9), then I believe we’d have to say Rephaim, Anakim, and Nephilim are not men because there is no indication they’ll be there.

This question is worth considering because if a Babylonian baby dies—who otherwise would have grown up to defile himself and war against heaven—then God’s favor will welcome him into heaven as his own son. What happens then if a Nephilim baby dies? Will this half-man, half-demon inherit heaven on the same principle?

First, there is no indication in the Bible (or any other ancient book) that a Nephilim baby ever died. This isn’t just an oversight; it appears purposeful. In the context of the destruction of Og, the Rephaim king of Bashan, Moses specifically says that when they destroyed the neighboring human kingdom of Heshbon, they devoted to destruction, “every city; men, women, and children” (Deuteronomy 3:6). Yet of the Rephaim dead it only says “people” (which I would translate “kin”) and that they left “no survivor” with no mention of children (Deuteronomy 3:3). Was this God’s providence that there were no Nephilim babies at the time of their defeat? Did Nephilim grow up faster than humans? I don’t believe there is a clear answer, but if Moses had eradicated giant babies, he would not have been shy to tell us.

Second, assuming this view of the Nephilim is correct, then they are wearing human bodies but have demon souls. In this case there is no redemption available, as it is only human babies who die that are saved by the blood of Christ. Remember, “it is not angels that he helps, but he helps the offspring of Abraham” (Hebrews 2:16). A fallen angel, even a baby Nephilim, would have no hope of redemption.

Third, and this is largely speculation, but if the thief comes only to steal, kill, and destroy (John 10:10), the devil is prowling around seeking someone to devour (1 Peter 5:8), and Satan does not war against his own kingdom (Luke 11:17-18), then he would not be actively seeking to destroy his own demons even as babies, especially while there are so many human babies created in the image of God for him to devour (Revelation 12:4-5). Never forget that Satan hates all human babies.

While it first appears as a complicated question without a clear answer, I can say with reasonable certainty that there will be no Nephilim babies in heaven because they never died as infants, they have no redeemer, and their place is prepared with Satan in hell (Matthew 25:41).

Then he will say to those on his left, “Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.” ~ Matthew 25:41

Here’s a question I bet you’ve never thought of: Is Goliath in hell as a man or as a demon? Here’s the definitive answer,

What is that to you? You follow me. ~ Jesus

Conclusion

The murder of Babylonian babies is wrong on every level. The murder of any baby is wrong. Despite the evil of it, God is able to bring life and salvation from the actions of men. Those babies, who would have grown up to reject God, war against his kingdom, and face the eternal consequences were instantly and mercifully ushered into the kingdom without end.

We can take solace in this, that God is obeying his own command to care for the poor and the needy. His love is perfect and his ways are right.

Our duty is to love the innocent and care for the needy, to do everything within our power to take the gospel of peace to a lost and dying world. The temptation is to step back so these littles ones can go to heaven as soon as possible. But our commission is to speak up for them, to seek to save their lives, and to teach them the words of eternal life.

If you need motivation to preach the gospel of peace to a war-torn world, look no further than these little ones being taken away to death.

If they perish, know that they perish not with the title of Babylonian or Assyrian or American or belonging to any other earthly nation, but belonging to God.

Until the Prince of Peace reigns, the weak and the young will continue to bear the bitterest fruit of man’s ambition. ~ J. C. Ryle

Safety or Stewardship

God just wants me to be safe. I hear this almost daily, sometimes multiple times a day, and my response is almost always some version of, “Which verse is that?” God wants you to be a lot of things, but safe is not one of them. If you are a follower of Christ, the odds are good that you’ll be thrown to lions, sawn in half, burnt at the stake, reviled, maligned, hated, your property plundered, your blood spilled, etc. (compare Hebrews 11).

If my response is not “Which verse is that?” then I’m probably asking when they’re flying to Nigeria to proclaim this message to our brothers and sisters there. Certainly, a people who are being actively hunted by terrorists and holding weekly mass funerals need to know that God just wants them to be safe.

Why does it flow so naturally from our lips that God wants us to be safe? We certainly can’t back that up from scripture or history. It’s because it scratches our itching ears, because our flesh wants to be safe and comfortable so we extrapolate that God must want us to be likewise. Your body doesn’t get to go to heaven, so it cares nothing for holiness. It doesn’t have to go to hell, so it fears none of the danger. The problem is your flesh has no interest in your soul's ultimate safety.

When Paul was commissioned, he was told right from the start how much he would have to suffer for Christ’s sake (Acts 9:16). Just a few years later he gives a list of things he had already suffered that included time in prison, five brutal lashings, three additional beatings, dangerous river crossings, waylaid in the wilderness, shipwrecks, exposure to the cold, and constantly opposed by men who said they loved him and men who said they hated him (compare 2 Corinthians 11:23-29). In another place it’s recorded that he was stoned so severely that his attackers were sure they had killed him (Acts 14:19), which is probably when he got to see heaven (2 Corinthians 12:2-4). Not a moment of Paul’s life was safe, right up until he was beheaded. Compare the other Apostles and you’ll see similar lists with equally violent ends.

Jesus told us “Whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it” (Matthew 16:25). Safety is not just the wrong choice, here Jesus tells us it’s an idol that cannot save. Safety is a sin, and it will cost your life.

Consider for a moment Jesus in the safety of heaven surrounded by hundreds of thousands of guardian angels when it was time to step out of heaven to fulfill his purpose (John 18:37). If God just wanted him to be safe, he would have gone all helicopter dad and said, “Jesus, I don’t want you going down there, it’s not safe! Have you seen what they’ve done to the prophets? Have you seen what they do to each other?” Instead, God the Father prepared a body for Jesus, one that could bleed, one that could hurt, one that could shed tears. One that could die. The only person who would suffer more than Paul would be Jesus. Jesus said, “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you” (John 15:18).

When Peter chose his own safety over faithfulness, Jesus told him he needed to repent so he could be restored (Luke 22:32). Was Jesus being overly harsh in telling Peter that he needed to turn? Didn’t Jesus understand that Peter’s very life was at stake? How can he find fault?

Soldiers of Christ are in a war. War is the opposite of safety. The universal phobia is someone trying to kill you, and yet the Christian lives here with an enemy who would and will devour him in an instant if given the opportunity. If God wanted you to be safe, then Satan would be a caged, declawed, defanged pussy cat that you could hold on your lap. But he’s not, he’s actively stealing, killing, and destroying.

The Lord gets his best soldiers out of the highlands of affliction. ~ Charles Spurgeon

For this reason, Paul tells us that “Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted” (2 Timothy 3:11). That comes right after he said we are following his teaching, his conduct, his aim in life, his faith, his patience, his love, his steadfastness (2 Timothy 3:10, compare 1 Corinthians 11:1). If we are following Jesus, Paul, Peter, Andrew, and multitudes of others, we must realize that Christianity is not safe.

Crucifixion on a Roman cross, crucifixion upside down, crucifixion on an X-shaped cross, beheading, prison, false accusations…these are all real possibilities. How Christlike can you be if no one has ever tried to crucify you? How much do you desire godliness if you’re chasing the comforts of this world? Are you really following Paul or Peter if your life is safe?

The only place the Christian will be safe is at the end of this life, as Paul said,

The Lord will rescue me from every evil deed and bring me safely into his heavenly kingdom. To him be the glory forever and ever, amen. ~ 2 Timothy 4:18

Or as Keith and Kristyn Getty so masterfully sing it,

Let this journey bring a blessing,
Let me rise on wings of faith,
And at the end of my heart’s testing,
With your likeness let me wake.

So if God is not concerned about our safety, then why do we put on seatbelts, or carry bear-spray, or lock our doors at night? The godly reason is stewardship; the ungodly reason is fear. Paul said he was rescued out of the lion’s mouth so that the message might be fully proclaimed and all the Gentiles might hear it (2 Timothy 4:17). It wasn’t so Paul wouldn’t have teeth marks or shed blood in the battle, it was so the Lamb who was slain might receive the reward of his suffering.

God puts us in difficult situations for the sake of the message. Paul said from prison, “I want you to know, brothers, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel, so that it has become known throughout the whole imperial guard and to all the rest that my imprisonment is for Christ. And most of the brothers, having become confident in the Lord by my imprisonment, are much more bold to speak the word without fear” (Philippians 1:12-14).

A shepherd prepares to defend the
flock he has been entrusted with,
to his own peril.

Listen for that message in this quote,

Let us stand fast in what is right and prepare our souls for trial. Let us be neither dogs that do not bark nor silent onlookers, nor paid servants who run away before the wolf. Instead, where the battle rages, let us find ourselves. Run towards the roar of the battle! That is where Christ’s most glorious victories shall be won. ~ Winfred Boniface

So beloved, God does not want you to be safe. If you’re safe you’re not in God’s will. If you’re not in God’s will, you’re not a good steward. And if you’re not a good steward, you’re in great danger of losing your life. And not just your life, but your soul, for cowards will have their place in the lake of fire (Revelation 21:8).

It is required of stewards that they be found faithful. ~ 1 Corinthians 4:2

Do Nephilim Babies Go to Heaven?

This is an excerpt from an upcoming book, Hope in the Loss of a Baby: A Deeper Dive into what the Bible says about Miscarriage, Stillbirth, and Infant Death.

Nephilim Babies

ChatGPT's interpretation of a baby Goliath

If Babylonian and Assyrian babies who die go to heaven, then what of Nephilim babies who die? Had I not been asked this question during the writing of this book I wouldn’t have even thought of it. But it is worth a brief consideration.

Let’s start with a definition: The most prominent theory on the Nephilim (also known as the Anakim and Rephaim) is that they are a hybrid race of half-man, half-fallen-angel (see Genesis 6:1-4) defined by their extreme stature and strength (Numbers 13:33). Their appearance in history was the final straw that triggered the flood (Genesis 6:5-6). There is no indication that any Nephilim ever sought God’s favor or forgiveness (2 Peter 2:4); rather, they are constantly seen as at war with the people of God until they were ultimately eradicated by David and his men (1 Chronicles 20:4-8). If there will be people from every nation, tribe, and tongue in heaven worshipping Jesus, then I believe we’d have to say Rephaim, Anakim, and Nephilim are not men because they won’t be there.

This question is worth considering because if a Babylonian baby dies—who would have otherwise grown up to defile himself and war against heaven—then God’s favor will welcome him into heaven as his own son. What happens then if a Nephilim baby dies? Will this half-man, half-demon inherit heaven on the same principle?

First, there is no indication in the Bible (or any other ancient book) that a Nephilim baby ever died. This isn’t just an oversight; it appears purposeful. When speaking of the destruction of Og, the Rephaim king of Bashan, Moses specifically says that when they destroyed the neighboring human kingdom of Heshbon, they devoted to destruction, “every city; men, women, and children” (Deuteronomy 3:6). Yet of the Rephaim dead it only says “people” (which I would translate “kin”) and that they left “no survivor” with no mention of children (Deuteronomy 3:3). Was this God’s providence that there were no Nephilim babies at the time of their defeat? Did Nephilim grow up faster than humans? I don’t believe there is a clear answer, but if Moses had eradicated giant babies, he would not have been shy to tell us about it.

Second, assuming this view of the Nephilim is correct, then they are wearing human bodies but have demon souls. In this case there is no redemption available, as it is only human babies who die that are saved by the blood of Christ. Remember, “it is not angels that he helps, but he helps the off-spring of Abraham” (Hebrews 2:16). A fallen angel, even a baby Nephilim, would have no hope of redemption.

Third, and this is largely speculation, but if the thief comes only to steal, kill, and destroy (John 10:10), the devil is prowling around seeking someone to devour (1 Peter 5:8), and Satan does not war against his own kingdom (Luke 11:17-18), then he would not be actively seeking to destroy his own demons even as babies, especially while there are so many human babies created in the image of God for him to devour (Revelation 12:4-5). Never forget that Satan hates all human babies.

While it first appears as a complicated question without a clear answer, I can say with reasonable certainty that there will be no Nephilim babies in heaven because they never died as infants, they have no redeemer, and their place is prepared with Satan in hell (Matthew 25:41).

Then he will say to those on his left, “Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.” ~ Matthew 25:41

Here’s a question I bet you’ve never thought of: Is Goliath in hell as a man or as a demon? Here’s the definitive answer,

What is that to you? You follow me. ~ Jesus

Rachel's Weeping - Hope in the Loss of a Baby

 This is a chapter from an upcoming book, Hope in the Loss of a Baby: A Deeper Dive into what the Bible says about Miscarriage, Stillbirth, and Infant Death.

Rachel's Weeping

If sadness was a sin,
Jesus never would’ve cried.
But that’s exactly what He did,
When his good friend Lazarus died.
And He knew that He could raise him up
Still the Lord was sad enough to grieve.
If you’ve ever been so overwhelmed that
you can barely breathe,
my friend, you’re in good company. ~ Ross King

Ask any theologian or pastor what Jeremiah chapter 31 is about, and the instant and correct answer is “The New Covenant!” It’s a wonderful section of scripture and is quoted in Hebrews 8 to reassure us that this better covenant saves based not on our efforts but on Christ’s efforts. Our hope is predicated not on our faithfulness to God but on God’s faithfulness to his promises.

Another title for the section spanning from Jeremiah chapter 30 to 34 is “The Book of Comfort,” or “The Book of Consolation.” While the majority of Jeremiah’s prophecies focus on destruction, exile, and violence, these four chapters are full of hope and an expectation of restoration. These aren’t the chapters you would look to if you needed a prooftext for weeping or sadness.

It’s strange then—based on that context—that we pick up here to read one of the saddest verses in all the Bible,

A voice is heard in Ramah,
    lamentation and bitter weeping.
Rachel is weeping for her children;
    she refuses to be comforted for her children,
    because they are no more. ~ Jeremiah 31:15

Weeping is not foreign to the Bible. Jesus wept (John 11:35). Jeremiah is the weeping prophet. Weeping is heard in Ramah. There is an entire book called Lamentations. Hannah wept when she could not have a child (1 Samuel 1:8). When a twelve-year-old girl got sick and died during Jesus’ day, there was great weeping and wailing outside of her house (Mark 5:38). David described his tears this way,

I am weary with my moaning;
    every night I flood my bed with tears;
I drench my couch with my weeping. ~ Psalm 6:6

All of this weeping recognizes that there is something horribly wrong in the world. If you’re reading this book, chances are that you know full well that the world is a broken place. Our tears are a valid and wonderful way to express to God our longing for his consolation of history.

If I can bring Him nothing but my tears, He will put them into His bottle, for He once wept; if I can bring Him nothing but my groans and sighs, He will accept these as an acceptable sacrifice, for He once was also a man of sorrows. ~ Charles Spurgeon

The promise of mourning is that it will lead to comfort (Matthew 5:4). Weeping may last for the night, but joy comes in the morning. But sometimes, there is bitter weeping in the night, and consolation seems impossible, and we refuse to be comforted. Is such deep and inconsolable sorrow a sin? Let’s look at Rachel and find out.

Who Was Rachel?

To understand the context, we need an introduction to Rachel, one of the wives of Jacob. This vignette on Rachel will be brief because despite it being her weeping, we’ll see that Jeremiah was speaking of a different event than her life.

Rachel, her sister Leah, and their husband Jacob had an awkward and complicated relationship, which was exacerbated by Rachel’s initial inability to have children. God did eventually open her womb and she had two sons and she died in childbirth (Genesis 30:23-24, 35:16-20). Her firstborn son was Joseph. As she lay dying she named her second son Benoni, the son of sorrow, but Jacob renamed him Benjamin, the son of promise. While this book is about the loss of babies, I would be remiss if I didn’t take a moment to mention that two women are recorded in the Bible as dying in childbirth, Rachel and Phinehas’ wife. When Phinehas’ wife was dying she named her son Ichabod, which means “The Glory has Departed” (1 Samuel 4:19-22). Both women saw their death in childbirth as ominous and hopeless, as evidenced by the naming of their sons. But God brings life out of death, and his glory still indwells the sons of men, and God is still fulfilling his promises through his Son.

The Bible doesn’t tell us exactly where Rachel was buried, but we know it was somewhere between Bethel and Bethlehem (Genesis 35:19-20). It seems to be close to Ramah, because it could be easily visited by Samuel who lived in Ramah (confer 1 Samuel 7:17, 1 Samuel 10:2). This fits with the idea that the voice of lamentation and bitter weeping is heard in Ramah. Charles Simeon postulates that the volume of her weeping reached not just from the grave, but could be heard miles away in Ramah.

Notice that the book of Genesis does not record Rachel weeping for Joseph or Benjamin, though Joseph would be sold into slavery in Egypt much later (Genesis 37:28), and Benjamin would dwell in Egypt after a famine drove the family out of the promised land (Genesis 43:1-15).

Rachel’s sons, and Leah’s sons, would go into Egypt and the danger to them was not that they would die in childhood—because they all survived to adulthood—the danger was that they would be no more because they would be assimilated into Egyptian society. Voddie Baucham said, “The danger for Joseph was not that he would die in prison. The danger for Joseph was that he would become an Egyptian.” If Rachel were weeping from the grave for her physical sons, it was for the very real possibility that they would walk away from the true and living God for the comfort and convenience of Egypt.

Pharaoh gives Joseph an Egyptian name…and he gives him Asenath, the daughter of Potipherah, priest of On. On was the center of the worship of the sun god, Ra. This is one of the two most powerful pagan priesthoods in all of Egypt. Joseph is married into the high-ranking, pagan, elite aristocracy of Egypt.

Now, he’s having children. Think about the temptation here. He has a pagan wife, he has the prestige, he has the wealth, and now he has a family. Everything in his life is screaming at him to just forget Canaan, forget his father’s house, drop his identity, and just become an Egyptian. It would have been so easy for him to look at his Egyptian wife and his position and say, ‘This is the payoff. I’ve made it.’ ~ Voddie Baucham

Exile was a powerful way to wipe out an enemy, even more efficient than warfare or genocide. There was a real chance that the sons of Rachel would become no more in Egypt. The fact that the line of Abraham did not end right there is a testament to God’s preserving power. Later, the exile into Assyria would end the Northern Kingdom when they were assimilated and were lost except to God (1 Chronicles 5:26, Jeremiah 31:31).

Jacob, who believed Joseph had perished, speaks what Rachel would have said had she been alive, “You have bereaved me of my children: Joseph is no more…and now you would take Benjamin. All this has come against me” (Genesis 42:36), and “as for me, if I am bereaved of my children, I am bereaved” (Genesis 43:14).

Why Was She Weeping?

Rachel’s weeping spans three major events in the Bible. The first, as we’ve just looked at, was the precarious exile of Joseph and Benjamin in Egypt.

In this context she would be weeping for spiritual reasons. While her sons were in real physical danger, the danger to their souls was far greater. It has been well pointed out that part of Eve’s curse in the pain of childbirth (Genesis 3:16) was not just physical pain, but the enduring pain of watching children rebel against God and stray as sheep without a shepherd. While this is not the intent of this book, to process Rachel’s weeping we must note that the most important part of raising children is not bringing them into the world; it’s bringing them to God.

To this Jesus said, “What will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul?” (Matthew 16:26). If you find yourself in this circumstance, remember, “They can run from you, they can run from their upbringing, they can run from the church, they can even run from God, but they can never run from your prayers.” God preserved Joseph and Benjamin in Egypt and they became a great nation. Joseph would say about the evil that befell him,

As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people would be kept alive, as they are today. So do not fear; I will provide for you and your little ones. ~ Genesis 50:20-21

The second event was the immediate context of Jeremiah 31. Here the Babylonian exile was in full effect and Judeans were being taken away into exile all over the Middle and Far East. Ramah, just a few miles north of Jerusalem, was the staging point for this journey. As they marched hundreds of miles away from the land of Israel, they practically ceased to exist as far as the land was concerned. The probability of them being lost like the Northern Kingdom was immense.

In this case the weeping was for spiritual and physical reasons. Not only was Judah in real danger of being assimilated into Babylon, the land of Israel was also deprived of its strongest, wisest, and most capable men (Isaiah 3:1-3). Lined up in Ramah was everyone from farmers to tradesmen to prophets to nobles to princes (Jeremiah 27:20, 40:1). It is very likely their mothers wept as their sons marched out of Ramah as good as dead.

The third occurrence of Rachel’s weeping is when Herod finds out he has been deceived by the wise men from the east and orders the slaughter of all of the children in Bethlehem two years old and younger in an effort to snuff out the infant king of the Jews (Jews is shorthand for Judeans). Matthew quotes Jeremiah 31:15 here to emphasize the gravity of the event (see Matthew 2:17-18). We’ll spend more time looking at this later when we understand how much hope Matthew was intending to convey.

This weeping was mostly confined to physical lamentation. The loss of probably fifty infants just in Bethlehem would have been shockingly grievous. To this Spurgeon would say,

Rachel is weeping, and she will not be comforted. You may try to hush her bitter cry, but you cannot; for her children are not. She looks into the empty cradle, she looks around the desolate hearth, and her soul refuses all consolation…

Weep With Those Who Weep

Two prominent places tell us not to weep or be grieved (Nehemiah 8:9-11 and Jeremiah 31:16 which we’ll examine in a moment). But many more tell us to “weep with those who weep” (Romans 12:15). It could seem that weeping and mourning would be an affront to God for all of his goodness. Shouldn’t we, like Job, buck up, worship God, and declare, “The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord” (Job 1:20-21)? Later Job would declare, “My face is flushed with weeping, and on my eyelids is the shadow of death” (Job 16:16).

And later Job, in defending his righteous actions, asked, “Did not I weep for him whose day was hard? Was not my soul grieved for the needy?” (Job 30:25). Our temptation is to instantly fix everything, meet their needs and correct their wrong. If we can, we should. One of my favorite questions when someone is having a hard day is, “What would make it better?” I’ve seen it bring beauty out of ashes more than a few times when reminded “Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness” (James 1:2-3). But in Rachel’s case, or Job’s case, there was nothing to fix, and they were inconsolable.

Anna Spafford was aboard the ship, Ville du Havre, when it sank in twelve minutes and took her four precious daughters with it. She sent her husband a telegraph that should rend our hearts in twain,

Saved Alone. What shall I do?

Horatio Spafford, her husband, rushed to be with her. While waiting for him she recalled that she had prayed not to be just be a fair-weather friend to God and she said, “God gave me four daughters. Now they have been taken from me. Someday I will understand why.” She would later say that in that moment she resolved to cling closer to her faith.

When we weep with those who weep we acknowledge their pain and suffering. The word “compassion” means to “suffer with.” It is to this effect that Paul tells the church to love one another, for “If one member suffers, all suffer together…” (1 Corinthians 12:26). To pretend that suffering doesn’t exist or that the bereaved is overreacting is a cruel response indeed, and Proverbs 25:20 describes them this way, “Whoever sings songs to a heavy heart is like one who takes off a garment on a cold day, and like vinegar on soda.”

It may be apocryphal, but Charles Darwin is reported as having walked up to the doors of the church after his ten-year-old daughter Annie died. Upon hearing happy hymns, he turned away never to return. While it may not be true, imagine how his eternity would be different if someone had gone and sat with him and cried with him instead of walking into a church that (possibly) did not seem to acknowledge the suffering that plagues the world. What certainly is true is when tragedy strikes next, you have the opportunity to weep with those who weep and share sad songs with those who have a heavy heart. Or—heaven forbid—if tragedy strikes you, may you have the courage to ask someone to sit and cry with you.

A song that has touched many grieving parents goes like this,

I have unanswered prayers
I have trouble I wish wasn’t there
And I have asked a thousand ways
That you would take my pain away.

When my world is shaking,
heaven stands
When my heart is breaking,
I never leave your hands. ~ J. J. Heller

In the military some of the deepest bonding happens during the most intense suffering. Get a group of military members together and they won’t tell stories of exotic locations; they’ll recount fixing fighter jets in the snow, being pinned down under enemy fire, or rucking miles across endless deserts or jungles. Their bonds were forged in shared suffering.

The bonds of Christianity are forged in the fire of adversity as well, as Peter says, “know that the same sufferings are experienced by your brotherhood in the world” (1 Peter 5:9), Paul invites, “share with me in the sufferings for the gospel according to the power of God” (2 Timothy 1:8), and look at the Apostles’ response after the Pharisees, “beat them and charged them not to speak in the name of Jesus, and let them go. Then they left the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the name” (Acts 5:40-41).

When we suffer with, when we put on compassionate hearts, we are transformed into the image of Jesus Christ who suffered for us. “Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows” (Isaiah 53:4)! He learned obedience through what he suffered (Hebrews 5:8), he surely knows that sorrow is not a sin and he understands what you are feeling (Hebrews 4:14-16). Instead of commanding you to stop weeping, he invites you to lay your burdens on him (Matthew 11:28).

God does not rebuke the natural sorrow, but He gives it an immortal cure. He tells the weeping mother that her tears are noticed, her travail remembered, and that her children are safe in a better land. ~ Charles Spurgeon

J. M. Barrie wrote Peter Pan from the perspective of boys who died, or as he said euphemistically, “fell out of the pram (stroller).” His thirteen-year-old brother’s death broke their mother’s heart and she was sure he would never grow up. In a haunting scene one of the Lost Boys tells Wendy, “I think I had a mother once.” Their bonding over the memory and joy of mothers brings hope into the story. While Barrie does not say so outright, there certainly is an expectation of the consolation of history in the growing up of the Lost Boys.

Weeping reminds us that the world is not as it should be. We know that no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him (1 Corinthians 2:9), but we are not living there yet. We know the brokenness, the sorrow, the pain, and the suffering wrought by sin. We understand why Rachel is weeping and why she is inconsolable. We want to believe like Habakkuk, but the pain is too much.

Though the fig tree should not blossom,
nor fruit be on the vines,
the produce of the olive fail
and the fields yield no food,
the flock be cut off from the fold
and there be no herd in the stalls,
yet I will rejoice in the Lord;
I will take joy in the God of my salvation.
God, the Lord, is my strength;
he makes my feet like the deer’s;
he makes me tread on my high places. ~ Habakkuk 3:17-19

We are caught between the joy of knowing God is in all the details and the pain that the details seem impossible and endless.

We live in a time saturated by Christianity and we know that we do “not grieve as others do who have no hope” (1 Thessalonians 4:13). We are able to sing wonderful songs that say

It is not death to die,
to leave this weary road,
and join the saints who dwell on high,
who’ve found their home with God.
It is not death to close,
the eyes long dimmed by tears,
and wake in joy before Your throne,
delivered from our fears. ~ Sovereign Grace Music

But we feel the hurt and death seems so final and so insurmountable. We believe in the resurrection, but we understand that inconsolability is a place we could live forever.

And worse, because we live in light of the resurrection, we forget that death is a bottomless pit for those without hope. Children carried off into exile, parents torn from their children, and children murdered in the streets are all horrible circumstances that are hopeless without a loving and sovereign God. Our culture has healed the wound lightly by declaring that nonviable babies are not yet people. They have hidden the pain by refusing to talk about it. They have satiated the appetite of the grave by focusing on the appetite of the flesh. They have dulled the sinfulness of sin by declaring that time heals all wounds and that it gets better.

It is the easiest thing in the world to give a man peace when he has no right to it. You may sing him a lullaby, and send him to sleep on the edge of the pit of hell; but what will he say to you when he wakes up in torments? To heal the hurt of the daughter of God’s people slightly is the work of a traitor to Christ. ~ Charles Spurgeon

The reality is that death brings grief and suffering. “Rivers of waters run down mine eyes, because they keep not thy law,” saith the Psalmist in the King James Version (Psalm 119:136).

Rachel refused to be comforted, and for good reason. Death and destruction throughout history has been horrendous and we do ourselves and our hearers a disservice when we fail to understand the gravity and pain of death. If death is just an inconvenience and destruction is just something that happens to other people, then we have nothing to fear or be saved from. But when it comes close to our house and we taste the bitterness of death, we learn what it means to pour out lamentations and weeping as we refuse to be comforted.

Rachel’s weeping, which originally seemed out of context to the comfort that God was offering, suddenly becomes purposefully placed as God dries her tears and restores her soul.

Le Massacre des Innocents - Leon Cogniet - 1824

The Consolation of Israel

Rachel’s weeping is mentioned two years after Christ was born when King Herod orchestrated what has come to be known as “the slaughter of the innocents.” Matthew quotes Jeremiah 31:15 “Then was fulfilled what was spoken by the prophet Jeremiah” (Matthew 2:17), but he deliberately does not quote verse 16 (Compare Matthew 2:17-18). While there is various debate on why he didn’t quote the entire passage, I believe strongly that he was masterfully making two points.

The first reason is that the infanticide of Herod is shockingly evil and just one more opportunity for the mothers of Israel to mourn for youth cut down far too young. Jesus has not stepped into history during a safe or convenient time. Sin and death are reigning as fully as ever. Satan still hates babies and will stop at nothing to bruise the heel of the promised seed of Eve. The thief is hard at work stealing, killing, and destroying. Weeping is tarrying long into the night, comfort seems impossible, and the Hero of History is needed more than ever.

The second reason is much more hopeful. Matthew—writing to prove that Jesus is the King of the Jews—expects his audience to know the context of Rachel’s weeping. Matthew knows that the original readers were looking forward to a day when the Messiah would restore the land of Israel and raise her children from the dead, and he knows that every reader in his day would be looking for the same hope.

Thus says the Lord: “Keep your voice from weeping, and your eyes from tears, for there is a reward for your work, declares the Lord, and they shall come back from the land of the enemy. There is hope for your future, declares the Lord, and your children shall come back to their own country. ~ Jeremiah 31:16-17

Simeon, a prophet in Jerusalem, had been promised that he would not die until he saw the Lord’s Christ, the consolation of Israel (Luke 2:25-26). The prophetess Anna, a daughter of the lost tribe of Asher, spent all her nights and days in fasting and prayer and looking for the redemption of Jerusalem (Luke 2:36-37). They, along with every faithful Jew, knew that their hope could only be fulfilled in God’s Messiah coming to rescue them. They would have understood why Jeremiah would put Rachel’s weeping in the middle of otherwise wonderful words of hope, because God had promised their reconciliation.

There is hope in the end, that though they are cut off in the bud, their sorrow shall turn to joy. ~ Matthew Henry

Rachel’s weeping, mentioned in Jeremiah’s “Book of Consolation” was not a promise of infinite sadness, but of unimaginable redemption. Joseph and Benjamin went off to Egypt and would have vanished without God’s intervention, but instead Moses would say to their children, “Your fathers went down to Egypt seventy persons, and now the Lord your God has made you as numerous as the stars of heaven” (Deuteronomy 10:22). The Judeans went into exile in Babylon as idol worshippers and yet returned faithful to their God’s promise,

When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will visit you, and I will fulfill to you my promise and bring you back to this place. For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope. ~ Jeremiah 29:10-11

When the little ones of Bethlehem were so cruelly murdered, Matthew doesn’t mention Rachel’s weeping as just a hopeless statement of fact, rather as the coming hope of Israel, the very King that Herod was trying to assassinate!

But hark! A voice breaks through the wailing from the eternal throne: ‘Refrain thy voice from weeping, and thine eyes from tears: for their work shall be rewarded, saith the Lord.’ ~ Charles Spurgeon

Matthew frames Rachel’s weeping as a sign of the dawn of hope, of the birth of the redeemer of Israel, of a promise of resurrection. Death is about to be swallowed up in victory! Rachel and her daughters, who have waited so long to recite Isaiah 25:8, are about to sing in victory,

He will swallow up death forever; and the Lord God will wipe away tears from all faces, and the reproach of his people he will take away from all the earth, for the Lord has spoken. It will be said on that day, “Behold, this is our God; we have waited for him, that he might save us. This is the Lord; we have waited for him; let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation.”

And declare from Hosea 13:14,

O Death, where are your plagues?
O Sheol, where is your sting?

Rachel’s weeping, which was inconsolable, found consolation in the Lord’s Messiah. Her little ones, who were no more, have been restored through the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Jesus had compassion on the widow of Nain as she was accompanying her deceased son to his final resting place. He said to her, “Do not weep” (Luke 7:13, compare Jeremiah 31:16!). Then he raised the young man from the dead and gave him back to his mother. Here and in many other places we see the prophecy fulfilled from Jeremiah 31:16-17.

All of the efforts of the world and the evil one to eradicate these precious babies failed to keep them from the joys of the Lord. Despite their short time on earth, their God had not forsaken them.

Yet God, who seemed to have forsaken them, in the midst of that extreme misery opened the door of redemption. ~ John Calvin

Weeping for God’s Own Son

To be faithful to the text and behold the glory of Christ we must see the continued weeping. When Jesus was nearing the cross—his scourging complete—a great multitude of women were following mourning and lamenting for him. He knew the intense suffering that was set before him. He knew he was about to drink to the dregs the wrath of God. Yet in this time of intense suffering, he did something we can’t ignore,

Turning to them Jesus said, “Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves and for your children. For behold, the days are coming when they will say, ‘Blessed are the barren and the wombs that never bore and the breasts that never nursed!’ Then they will begin to say to the mountains, ‘Fall on us,’ and to the hills, ‘Cover us!’ For if they do these things when the wood is green, what will happen when it is dry?” ~ Luke 23:28-31

God had expressly told Rachel to hold back from weeping. Jesus had told it to the widow of Nain. Matthew had said the prophecy was fulfilled. So why here does Jesus tell them to weep? Matthew Henry answers succinctly, “Let us weep for our own sins, the sins of our children, which caused His death; and weep for fear of the miseries we shall bring upon ourselves, if we slight His love, and reject His grace.”

Christ went willingly to the cross. He needs no pity. No one took his life from him; he laid it down of his own accord (John 10:18). He knew that captives needed to be set free, he knew that God’s wrath must be satisfied, and he knew that there was no other way for us to be saved. So it is not for him that we weep, but for our sins that made his death necessary.

Behold the man upon the cross,
my sin upon his shoulders,
ashamed I hear my mocking voice,
call out among the scoffers. ~ Stuart Townend

And,

Thus might I hide my blushing face,
while His dear cross appears.
Dissolve my heart in thankfulness,
and melt mine eyes to tears. ~ Isaac Watts

We weep for our sins that bereaved the Father of his only begotten Son. We are disgusted by the hatred of men towards God. We tremble that God’s hatred of sin caused him to crush his own Son.

In a glorious twist, we see here the daughters of Rachel weeping over Jesus who seems to be going the way of all mankind, taken by that great enemy death, never to be seen again. But, three days later he would come back from the land of the enemy. He would take his life back up again, and all who love him will come back to his country with him.

He ascended on high, leading a host of captives in his train (Psalm 68:18, Ephesians 4:8). Amongst that host of captives were all who died in Egypt, in Babylon, and the little ones who died in Herod’s slaughter of the innocents. Jesus always lives to make intercession for those who draw near to him (Hebrews 7:25), and beloved if you’ve trusted him, you’ll be brought back from the land of the enemy as well.

But unfortunately we see in Jesus’ speaking to the women that some will not seek his face or put their trust in him, and these will be the ones who later “hide themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains, calling to the mountains and rocks, ‘Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who is seated on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb, for the great day of their wrath has come, and who can stand?’” (Revelation 6:15-17).

If we won’t weep over our sins and call upon the Lamb now to save us, then weeping and gnashing of teeth will tarry forever.

So beloved, weep for a moment, weep for a night, but know that joy has dawned, and his favor comes in the morning.

Our little ones who have departed are not lost forever. They are held safe in the arms of God. The land of the enemy may have snatched them away, but Christ knows who are his and they shall come back to a better country (Hebrews 11:16).

Until we join them, we may still weep, but we do not weep without hope. Or we can keep our voices from weeping and our eyes from tears. Either or both is appropriate so long as we’re looking to Jesus who is making all things new. We know that as we mourn, he understands, and hears from heaven.

Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. ~ Matthew 5:4

There’s a Hole in the Forgiveness Bucket

The truest definition of poverty is the inability to fix relationships. Lesser poverty is the inability to fix things. Consider a broken vehicle, if you have the funds you can have it fixed or replaced, if you don’t, it remains broken and probably gets more and more broken.

For things, money is a great tool for restoration. A lack of money means things don’t get fixed. A lack of spiritual capital means relationships don’t get fixed and it’s much worse because they’ll get more and more broken.

We can have all of the resources in the world and refuse to use them. This is being materially rich but spiritually poor. That old song, “There’s a hole in the bucket” captures this idea perfectly. The song is framed as a conversation and starts out with a declaration that something is broken. The response is simple, “Fix it.” The excuse is, “How do I fix it?” The response is, “Use the resources you have.” To which we hear, “The resources aren’t right.” – “Then make them right.” – “How?” – “With the tools provided.” One of the tools needs to be sharpened, and the sharpener requires water. “How am I supposed to get water?” – “Use the bucket.” And there is a long triumphant pause before,

“There’s a hole in the bucket!”

The original song is longer and more drawn out; it’s purposefully exhausting. The problem is not with the bucket, the problem is with the lack of desire to do meaningful work. In the song and in God’s economy the problem is not the tools. We have great tools: forgiveness, love, long-suffering, repentance, bearing with one another, conversation, prayer, the church…they are all functional tools, and while they could use some sharpening in most of our lives, they’re valid and functional.

When the relationship is irrevocably broken, love, peace, joy, and forgiveness are the tools we have…but if the other party has not repented enough, or they have not asked for forgiveness, or they’ve shown their true colors, or they’re too difficult to fix, then the tools are supposedly insufficient. There’s a hole in the bucket!

God, what do you want me to do? His response is clear, “Love one another, be a one another Christian, forgive as I’ve forgiven you,” or in other words, “Fix the relationship.” We respond, “The tools you’ve given me are insufficient and some are just outright broken.” There’s a hole in the bucket!

Jesus went to a man at the pool of Bethesda who had been lame for thirty-eight years. Jesus asked him bluntly, “Do you want to be healed?” It’s the closest Jesus ever got to making an accusation against someone who was not actively sinning. The man responds that though there is supposedly a tool here that can heal him, he’s unable to use it. He might have said, “There’s a hole in the bucket, dear Jesus, dear Jesus, a hole!” Jesus tells him–not asks him–commands him to take up his bed and walk, and he does. In the follow-on conversation Jesus doesn’t warn him to be careful not to be lame again, he tells him to “Sin no more…” Jesus did not approach this man as a victim of his circumstances, but as a man who had tools of redemption and refused to use them. See John 5:1-17 for the whole story. Are you that man?

Is there a hole in your bucket? Figure out how to fix it. Is your relationship with God broken again? Repent and believe the gospel that he uses to restore and confirm and strengthen and establish! Are your relationships broken? Put love and forgiveness to work in fixing them. Are they too dull to do any good? Hone them through the reading and application of God’s word.

You’re as poor as your most broken relationship. Don’t pretend that God has not made you rich in Christ Jesus with the ability to fix relationships. Get to work. That hole in your bucket is not as big as you pretend it is, and Jesus says to you,

“See, you are well! Go and sin no more, that nothing worse may happen to you.”

The Age of Accountability - Hope in the Loss of a Baby

This is a chapter from an upcoming book, Hope in the Loss of a Baby: A Deeper Dive into what the Bible says about Miscarriage, Stillbirth, and Infant Death.

The Age of Accountability

How soon in life a child becomes responsible and accountable, is a difficult question to solve. Perhaps far sooner than many of us suppose. One thing, at all events, is clear–it is never too soon to strive and pray for the salvation of the souls of children–never too soon to speak to them as moral beings, and tell them of God, Christ, right and wrong. ~ J. C. Ryle

At what point does childlike faith fade and at what point does a new faith need to be acquired? This is a question that has been asked throughout the ages and one that is hard, but not impossible, to answer. While we cannot place an exact number on the age of accountability, we can get closer to determining a “level of accountability.” This level of spiritual maturity is generally more helpful, as an age would lead to a number of problems.

Problems with a Fixed Age of Accountability

If we’re talking about an exact age, then we would lose the importance of faith for a time. Imagine if we were given the exact date of Christ’s return, such as if we knew Jesus were returning two-hundred-fifty years from today, then where would our eager anticipation of his consummation go? There would be no need to hasten his return today and we could become lazy in our waiting (consider 2 Peter 3:11-12).

Then we could lose a sense of urgency with our younger children. One of my greatest joys was sitting on the floor with my then-six-year-old daughter one afternoon after VBS as she asked about why someone should be baptized and if she could be baptized. If there were a set age of accountability that was, say, two or three times her age, I would have been tempted to be complacent while thinking that we could just wait until she was older. Instead, we had a wonderful conversation and I baptized her four years later after I believe she was genuinely saved.

A mentor and dear friend–who has been serving Jesus for over six decades–came to Christ at five years old. He believes he was saved when he realized, “Jesus died for me, I’d better live for him.” If we thought five were too young to come to Christ, then we might quench that desire to seek the Lord by telling children they still had years to figure it out.

Another problem is that some children never grow in their cognitive and reasoning abilities to consciously receive or reject Jesus. Let’s take an example of a cognitively impaired forty-year-old who looks like an adult but thinks like a little child. He loves everyone and is full of joy, but he cannot have a lengthy conversation, he never learned to read, and he cannot express what it means to be born again or how to repent. What he does know about God he loves. If there were an “age of accountability” this person would be without hope, but if he has a childlike faith, having never passed that “level of accountability,” then we have great hope he will be saved by grace.

The last problem I see is that an age of accountability may provide a false safety net for children who have chosen to reject Jesus deliberately and early in their lives. Do you know any young children who seem to live in rebellion? I’ll use myself as an example, as my mother regularly reminded me that I was a “mean kid.” I don’t refute that one bit; regrettably in my younger years I did everything I could to prove “a foolish son is a sorrow to his mother” (Proverbs 10:1).

I haven’t found this to be a common occurrence, but I distinctly remember the moment when I first rebelled against God. As a child of five or six, I chose to steal a bag of marbles from our local store. It was inexpensive and could have easily been purchased, but I chose to steal it. The memory of that moment is as clear as if it happened this morning. Was that me deliberately declaring, “There is no God! And he doesn’t see!” (Psalm 14:1, 53:1, Psalm 94:7)? I believe so, and I believe after that moment the wrath of God began to abide upon me until I finally died to myself, repented of my sins, and trusted Christ at the age of twenty-four. Praise God for his patience and forbearance!

Augustine had a similar experience, though he was older than I. At the age of sixteen, along with his friends, he “carried off a huge load of pears.” They didn’t eat them, as they were not ripe and hence quite sour, so they gave them to the pigs. Augustine later lamented the action as possibly his greatest sin, as all other sins he felt he could in some way defend as temptation, mistakes, or perceived necessity, while that sin stemmed solely from rebellion and his love of rebellion,

I wanted to commit my theft, and I did it compelled by neither want nor poverty, but by a distaste of justice and a feast of iniquity…Behold my heart!...May my heart tell you what it sought there that I became freely and there was no cause of my evil except for evil. It was foul, and I loved it; I loved to be lost, I loved my rebellion…

Some fifteen years later Augustine was saved from his rioting and drunkenness, his sexual immorality and sensuality, and his quarrelling and jealously when he put on the Lord Jesus Christ (compare Romans 13:13-14, or as Augustine might say, “Take it up and read it!”).

For these reasons, many theologians reject the idea of an “age” of accountability, since the Bible speaks more clearly of a condition or level of accountability.

What is that age? That’s really not the question because we’re not talking an age of accountability–get this in your mind–we’re talking about a condition of accountability! Get the word ‘age’ out of this discussion. We’re talking about a condition of accountability, not an age. ~ John MacArthur

A Fixed Age of Accountability?

While I don’t believe in an actual age of accountability, that’s not to say that some people throughout history haven’t placed a fixed age on when a child becomes morally culpable.

The Council of Carthage (AD 418) would place the age of accountability at birth and require baptism to absolve infants of their guilt. It states clearly to expect no good thing for, “children who have left this life without baptism, without which they cannot enter the kingdom of heaven, that is, eternal life.” It’s important to note that almost all sects of Christianity have abandoned this belief.

Thomas Acquinas gives the earliest age after birth at which a child becomes responsible, that at seven they reach what he called the age of reason. At that point they must confess their sins and may receive communion. This is the official doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church’s Code of Canon Law.

The Mormon religion believes the age is eight, based on the writings of Joseph Smith. It should be noted that this supposedly stemmed from a confused angel about when or whether babies should be baptized. The same section also directly discourages children from repenting before the age of eight, as purportedly they have nothing to repent of until then.

The Jewish religion celebrates the transition between childhood and adulthood with a Bar Mitzvah for boys and a Bat Mitzvah for girls. These celebrations are generally held at age thirteen for boys and twelve for girls. The name of the ceremony is figuratively a coming-of-age event, but it literally means when they become a son or daughter of the law. Some Jewish fathers rejoice on this date because they feel they no longer must give an account for their children’s sin (consider Hebrews 13:17 for a refutation).

I’ve given you a lot of quotes, reasons, testimonies, and histories, but we’re here for the Bible, so let’s look at whether the scriptures give an age.

Moses led the Israelites out of Egypt and through the Red Sea and across the desert until they arrived on the borders of the promised land. After spying out the land faithlessness and cowardice struck all of the adults, save Joshua and Caleb. The people feared the inhabitants of the land, doubted God’s righteousness, hardened their hearts, and voted with their grumbling to reject God as their king and savior. For this reason, God swore to them that they would not enter his rest. And they all fell in the wilderness.

But God made provision for the children to enter in, speaking to our topic:

As for your little ones, who you said would become a prey, and your children, who today have no knowledge of good or evil, they shall go in there. And to them I will give it, and they shall possess it. ~ Deuteronomy 1:39

How old were these little ones? Not that little, actually; well not all of them, some were probably infants. Numbers 14:29 says that those who will fall are twenty years old and upward, implying that nineteen years old and younger would inherit the promised land.

The age of twenty is repeated several times across the Torah (the first five books of the Bible), including the cut-off for which children would enter the promised land (Numbers 14:29-31), when they must give the census tax (Exodus 30:13), when they were able to go to war (Numbers 1:2-3), and when they could help in the temple (1 Chronicles 23:24). Elsewhere, Zerubbabel the governor and Jeshua the high priest commissioned those twenty years old and upward to rebuild the temple (Ezra 3:8).

For the repetitive nature of twenty-years-old, it’s tempting to say that this is the age of accountability. Certainly, many more young people would be in heaven than we currently expect if the age were that high, and if the Bible allowed me to open the narrow gates a little wider I would. But, when we read all of the verses above, it becomes apparent that the age of twenty is more of a civic responsibility measure, such as the voting age when leadership roles can be assigned and when a person becomes morally responsible to the nation, than when a child will be held accountable by God.

It's easy to get our spiritual state mixed up with our civic responsibility. My wonderful oldest daughter thought that after her baptism she would be able to vote in church business meetings. I never have been able to get her to reveal why that was so important to her, but she was crushed when she learned the bylaws didn’t allow her to vote for another seven years, though she was saved at eleven and I baptized her shortly after her twelfth birthday. Her spiritual maturity was sufficient while her civic maturity was still in work.

The age of twenty definitely has some weight from the Bible. But we have to recognize that not everyone who was older than twenty was lost (Moses for example) and not everyone who was under twenty grew up to be godly (Achan for example).

Finally, we couldn’t be faithful to the Bible about an age of accountability without considering Elisha and the bears (2 Kings 2:23-24). We’ve previously looked at it from the stance that a child can commit a sin that leads to death, but a deeper look into their possible ages will benefit us.

The Hebrew word here for boy is “na’ar” which can be used to describe anyone from a baby all the way to Joseph and Absalom when they were well into adulthood (Genesis 41:12, 2 Samuel 18:32). If just the word “na’ar” were used then those that say this was a roving gang of twenty-something-year-old boys could be right, but they miss the fact that these boys are also described with the Hebrew word “qatan” which is a diminutive, making them small in stature and/or in age. When Ninevah repented, they did so from the greatest to the littlest. The word for littlest is translated as “least” (qatan, see Jonah 3:5) in the ESV and is the same word as described the little boys. Later in Jonah they are described as not knowing their right hand from their left (Jonah 4:11).

In the New Testament a twelve-year-old (Mark 5:42) is described as a “little” girl (Mark 5:23). Though using a Greek diminutive, there is a lot of similarity. While she’s not the point of this study, it is important that at twelve she could hear and obey the voice of God (Mark 5:41-42).

While these boys were little, they were old enough to scorn God through his prophet. Acting in a group, they had no restraint and no conscience, and they faced a terrible consequence. There is an important point here that we can’t miss: when we surround ourselves with wicked people, we’re likely to do wicked things we never dreamed of when walking with the righteous, or even walking alone (Proverbs 1:10-19, 1 Corinthians 15:33).

A group of people whose express goal is not to encourage each other to godliness may prove to be the very gates of hell. An ungodly group of children may be the clearest extrabiblical argument against an age of accountability. A group of children encouraging each other to sin has a way of showing the wickedness of the human heart earlier than we could imagine. Let them be a warning to us.

I am much afraid that the schools will prove the very gates of hell, unless they diligently labour in explaining the Holy Scriptures, and engraving them in the hearts of youth. I advise no one to place his child where the scriptures do not reign paramount. Every institution in which means are not unceasingly occupied with the Word of God must be corrupt. ~ Martin Luther

In the sin and death of these small boys we see that God will hold sin against sinners, no matter how little they are.

God must be glorified as a righteous God, that hates sin, and will reckon for it, even in young people. ~ Matthew Henry

Because these boys were enticed to sin, and because of how they are described, if we’re looking for an age, I believe it would be far younger than most of us would be comfortable admitting. Notice though that no age is given. I believe we do well to abandon the “age” of accountability, and focus on a “level” of accountability.

The Level of Accountability

For these reasons we should move away from an age. Many theologians have agreed and stated that a level of accountability is far better than a specific birthday. The focus should be on the heart’s ability for comprehension,

Some people call it the age of accountability; I prefer the term level of accountability because everybody’s age is different. When they go from not knowing their right hand from their left, not knowing the difference between right and wrong to knowing, ‘I’m sinning, but I’m going to do it anyway!’ These children, they are born totally depraved, there is no question about it. ~ Todd Friel

Friel speaks of children who had not yet reached the level where they understood good and evil. Elsewhere this is described as knowing how to refuse the evil and choose the good.

Before the boy knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good, the land whose two kings you dread will be deserted. ~ Isaiah 7:16

Some children might learn this earlier and some might learn it later. Some might understand it immediately and some might grow into it. The Author of Hebrews speaks of discernment as something we grow into. He says,

You need milk, not solid food, for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child. But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil. ~ Hebrews 5:12-14

Jesus, John, and Samuel grew in wisdom and stature before God and men (Luke 1:80, 2:40, 2:52, 1 Samuel 2:26). Conversely, a child can be caused to sin (Matthew 18:6), children can be provoked to anger (Ephesians 6:4), and passion can be awoken too early (Song of Solomon 2:7).

It is clear that the level of accountability can be drastically different in different children, even in the same culture, church, or family. For this reason, Paul encourages Christians not be childlike in our thinking, but to be “infants in evil” (1 Corinthians 14:20).

A child who is wise in doing evil (Jeremiah 4:22) and is sinning willfully may be well past the level of accountability living in direct sin. A brief internet search shows toddlers who know not just the gamut of curse words, but are adept at using them. A child who can’t do chores knows just how to find pornography. A child who doesn’t know a single Bible verse can sing verbatim a song about fornication and violence. The internet has helped to draw the level of accountability lower and lower every year, and it was never very high to begin with.

As we consider the eternal state of children who have died, I believe it is good to hope for the best. But while children are still alive, I know that it is good to prepare for the worst. No child should be guaranteed heaven just because they are a child. If a child approaches you because they’ve heard of God’s holiness and the horrors of hell and they’re afraid, do not assuage their fears by telling them that they are too little worry about it. That old song taught children to sing, “Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so.” I’d rather sing, “Jesus loves me this I know, and his long-suffering lovingkindness is meant to lead me to trust in his saving work on the cross and repent of my sins.” It needs some polishing, but the message is sound.

Children are in far more danger from their sins and the power of the evil one than we realize. They’ll potentially be held responsible for their sins far earlier than we or they are ready for. So, point them to the Lord Jesus Christ who loves little children and bids them come to him. Call them to repentance and share with them that hope can only be found in Jesus Christ.

How old should they be before you broach this topic? As soon as they can understand.

When Should Children Repent and Trust Christ?

As soon as you know right from wrong, you are old enough to begin taking the right way. As soon as you are old enough to be punished for doing wrong, you are old enough to give your heart to God, and to follow Christ. ~ J. C. Ryle

I was handing out gospel tracts at a major sporting event and gave one to a small boy with his father. The boy asked, “What is it?” Because of his age I simplified my answer, “It’s something about God.” He asked, “What about God?” at which point his father took the tract and flung it like a frisbee far far away. I responded to both of them by quoting George Whitefield,

Little children! If your parents will not come to Christ, come to Christ and go to heaven without them!

Understanding a level of accountability allows for such clear invitations. A child who can understand can respond. My then-three-year-old memorized James 1:19-20 (yes, the whole thing!) and loved to quote it to anyone who would listen. It was apparent from the beginning—and soon became more obvious—that he liked the attention more than the verse, but many adults were convicted that if a three-year-old could memorize God’s Word, so could they!

God spoke of the Ninevite children as not knowing their right hand from their left,

Should I not pity Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know their right hand from their left…? ~ Jonah 4:11

When the wrath of God was about to fall upon the entire city these little ones would not be spared, despite their lack of knowledge or accountability. Their smallness and youth would be no protection if the city were overthrown. And we see that they responded with their parents,

The people of Nineveh believed God. They called for a fast and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them to the least of them. ~ Jonah 3:5

Who was the greatest of them? According to the Ninevites it certainly would have been the king who decreed that the entire city should fast and repent, calling out mightily to God, repenting from evil ways and violence in hopes that God would relent and turn from his anger.

Who was the least of them? From earlier, it was the “qatan”, the littlest. Can a baby fast? Can a three-year-old memorize and understand a Bible verse? Can an infant fear God? Can a child seek God? The author of Jonah certainly thought so.

Imagine the cries of hunger from the babies. Imagine the fear of God emanating as tears from the toddlers. Is that not a mighty crying out? Was it not their version of “Be gracious to me, O Lord, for to you do I cry all the day!” (Psalm 86:3)?

Who was the greatest spiritually in Ninevah? Wouldn’t Jesus point at one of those little ones and say “Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest…” (Matthew 18:4)?

Whether it was the king or it was a baby, to be great in the kingdom of heaven every one of us needs to humble ourselves, to seek God’s face and favor. As we seek him, we’ll grow.

Grow in Grace

Every one of us started out as little babies with no understanding of our right hand or our left. We had no fear of God before our eyes. We had to learn to walk and talk and control ourselves. And we need to learn how to trust God.

Our great desire is that we will be infants in evil and mature in our thinking (1 Corinthians 14:20). Until Christ returns or calls us home we still have room to grow. By the grace of God by the time we get to heaven we will have matured significantly,

For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known. ~ 1 Corinthians 13:9-12

Until that day, help others grow. If a litt
le one has died not knowing the difference between good and evil we know they were received into the presence of God where they now know him better even than we know him. If there is any doubt as to whether your child had chosen to purposefully rebel against God or not, there is not an easy answer. Seek godly counsel and consider deeply.

Remember, David had two sons who died, an infant who he knew he would see again (2 Samuel 12:22), and his older son Absalom who was lost forever (2 Samuel 18:33). When did Absalom rebel against God? We can’t give a specific date or event, but we only know it happened.

God saves babies, and never has a baby eternally perished, even when they departed far sooner than we were ready for.

Remember when Jonah—petulant, quick-tempered Jonah—would have Nineveh perish, God gave as the reason why Nineveh should not be destroyed, that there were more than six-score thousand infants—persons who knew not their right hand from the left. ~ Charles Spurgeon