It’s highly likely that you’ve heard this somewhere before, however just incase you haven’t:
]Most Christians* believe all babies who die are saved/*]
]Most Christians think that to be saved one must repent & believe/]
]All babies don’t repent & believe in this lifetime, therefore they must postmortem…/]
What do you think??
** I’ve been told even Catholics & Calvinists do now.
[size=85]whispers very quietly I don’t necessarily think **all **babies will be saved…[/size]
On the one hand, babies have little time and capacity to sin or do good works, and to reject or believe in Yeshua; but on the other hand if God is going to “benevolently” dictate the wills of children when they are accountable postmortem, I don’t see why He wouldn’t do so for all men. And a free-will theodicy is the only viable defense of ECT/Annihilationism I can maintain. So while they may have an opportunity to trust in Yeshua and repent (from what?!) postmortem, I don’t hold that all babies will take that opportunity (just as all men don’t now).
Lucky I only said “Most” 
I was speculating that God creates a space for them to grow up first, before they freely (by the Holy Spirit’s help) come to repentance & faith in Him.
Hypothetically though, if you did believe all babies were saved, does my logic work?
Well, yes, I suppose, but I think the premise is faulty.
Although most Christians would like to believe that **all **babies are saved, I don’t think any ECT/Annihilationist “biblical” Christian could believe that **all **babies are saved. As far as I understand it’s just too inconsistent with almost any theological postion (outside of UR) – for an Arminian, the premise that all will choose salvation is faulty (outside of UR); and for a Calvinist, the premise that all are elect is faulty (outside of UR). The Anabaptists traditionally believe that children are automatically kept by the power of Yeshua’s blood till the “age of accountability” – a sort of Baby-ultra-universalism, but I think its largely unbiblical and destroys any genuine sense of free will. I can understand why its been adopted by evangelicals though, but I don’t think its compatible with an ECT/Annihilationist theology.
But anyway, I think it would be cruel and dishonest to trap the average Christian on their sympathies for babies and on logic that has a faulty premise (according to their own theology – although it’s obviously compatible with yours). I think it would be better to disprove that all babies are automatically saved in one’s system, and if they think that makes God too unloving or impotent, then point them towards an alternative
I am not aware of any fundamentalists who do not believe that all babies and children who die before “the age of accountability” will automatically go to heaven. I believed it myself even when I was a Calvinist in my teens and early twenties. This belief did not alter after I became convinced of the eventual reconciliation of all people to God.
Even John MacArthur, a Calvinist, teaches that babies and mentally handicapped are automatically saved. 
He makes a rather convoluted argument to support that idea. See firedup2000’s post for more on that: Safe in The Arms of MacArthur?
But I guess automatic baby salvation can work better from a Calvinist standpoint than an Arminian one. Calvinists don’t really care if a person had a chance to choose, so they could say that God is merciful to them and takes them home before they have a chance to reject.
Arminians value “free will” so highly that if you appeal to the baby’s right to freely choose salvation or damnation, the argument might at least give them something to think on.
Sonia
Brilliant! 
Sonia
Have the fundamentalists really gotten that soft? I admittedly haven’t talked about it with fundamentalists (not sure what you mean by that exactly), although a Calvinist friend did mention he tentatively believed in baby-ultra-universalism, but I didn’t press it further. I don’t quite understand how he could though. What happened to John “there-are-babies-a-span-long-in-hell” Calvin? Paidon, I’m interested, how did you personally resolve this “age of accountability/age of universal election” in your mind as a Calvinist? Does God show elective partiality to those of younger ages?
If baby-ultra-universalism is true, and UR isn’t, wouldn’t it be charitable for us to practice infanticide? If that’s the only way for us to determine the choice/election of that person. If we do go by greater-good ethics, principles of double effect and so forth, it would be wicked not to – what’s 70 years of their life when we can secure their eternal life and evade their eternal conscious torment?
Hi Brother.
Good post.
I have ‘forummed’ with Calvinists who believe that only a small portion of elect babies would go to heaven. I have also suggested infanticide to the others. The response, thus far, has always been avoidance of the issue.
That’s pretty much why I posted this topic… An Atheist friend, when arguing about abortion, asked why we didn’t actually encourage it, as it sent people straight to heaven!!
Personally that’s why I speculate they don’t actually automatically go there without “growing up” in another world first… Universalists have an advantage here because we believe in postmortem salvation, we aren’t just condemning babies to hell (not very PC!) but neither are we giving them automatic entry.
It’s funny how the Apostle Paul took time to write about men having short hair and women remaining silent in the church but he never talked about Hell. He talked about judgment and punishment for sins but he never used the word Hell. It’s amazing the things we believe our loving God will do to those who reject Him. Does His love & mercy endure forever like the Scriptures teach or not?
This site is fantastic and I’m so glad I’ve found it!
Blessings,
Jackson
I think this is where universalists tend to fall apart though. They’re obliged to start speculating about all sorts of fanciful and non-biblical worlds to make post-mortem repentance fit. We find two events in Scripture, one of Judgement and the other of the universal indwelling of God (which URers and Annihilationists take to be in the only meaningful sense). There seems only ambiguous evidence for this transition (Matthew 3:11; 1 Corinthians 3:11-15, and Revelation 21). I’d be interested if anyone happened to know of any good articles on this subject …
I was first introduced to Restorationist universalism (universalism-proper) by the supremely wonderful Adin Ballou who also conceived of these extra worlds. He believed that we would move throughout the worlds, through the gates of death and birth, reaching higher and higher sanctified states, until we would finally be made perfect and absorbed into God. Although I can’t express my love for Ballou enough (I feel he really brought me to the Yeshua I follow today), I thought it was all so profoundly nonbiblical and I consequently ignored universalism for five years.
They do if you’re an Arminian
I always knew that the bible doesn’t say a lot about the fate of babies and small children who die and I didn’t like it much. I knew that some Christians believe that if babies aren’t baptized before they die they go to limbo forever (and thought that rather unkind). Ultimately, I guess I just put it on the shelf. Jesus said “. . . of such is the Kingdom of Heaven,” so I figured they’d be all right even if I didn’t understand the mechanics.
I think though, that God does call some to live here and go through the struggles, etc., while others don’t require this particular kind of training. I’m looking at a wall hanging I made a while back. It’s a piece of art, so I didn’t glaze fire it. I gold leafed it. This sculptural piece didn’t need to go through the kiln twice because that wasn’t necessary for its functioning. Other things will be fired at least twice and sometimes 3-4 times. God is making each of us according to His plan, babes who die in infancy and miscarried children included. Maybe we, who were denied the opportunity to hold and love and care for them, will have that chance later. Who knows? We just aren’t told.
Nice 
Well, I haven’t been a Calvinist for 40 years, and I had never been asked this question. But as I try to put my mind into a Calvinist mode, I think I would have answered the question as follows:
Let’s face it. God shows elective partiality IN GENERAL. There’s no rational explanation why He chooses some for eternal life and others for eternal damnation.
All events are orchestrated by God, including people’s deaths. So God predestined all of the children whom He knew were going to die prior to the age of accountability. Not that His foreknowledge dictated His elective decree, but rather his elective decree resulted in the death of those children. Otherwise, they would have rebelled against Christ, or committed the unpardonable sin, or been in some other situation or condition contrary to salvation. Of course, this would have been impossible since they were among the elect; in their case the fact of their death made it impossible.
I have difficulty writing such things since now Calvinism seems to me to be contrary to logic and common sense. I can’t get my mind around it.
Thanks for giving it a shot. I’m obviously not going to hold you to a hypothetical view, but I still can’t understand how it could work with classic-Calvinism. Perhaps I’ll ask a Calvinist friend and report back.
Speculation is fine, so long as we remember it is only speculation. I’m not sure exactly what transition you’re asking about … is it the transition from judgment to the indwelling of God? How those who die unsaved become saved in the next life?
Personally, I don’t speculate much on the details of that. I speculate that whatever comes after this life is probably not going to be comprehensible to us until we get there – it might be as incomprehensible to us as this world is to an unborn baby. The imagery in scripture I think is a way of communicating something beyond us in terms we can grasp, saying, "It’s like this … "
What I’m pretty clear on is that “salvation” is about reconciliation to God and all that entails, including desire on the part of the individual to be in fellowship with God, and that salvation will come to all and every knee will bow and confess. How the details of that plays out for the unborn dead or others who die apart from Christ is something I’m willing to leave in the realm of unrevealed mystery. I’m content that God is faithful to do his best for all his creatures and is able to accomplish all his desire.
Sonia
i come from a pick and mix tradition that sought to reconcile Calvinistic predestination with Arminian free-will by saying that God foreknew who would choose to follow Him, and simply predestined them
as for babies, it was assumed that below the Jewish age of accountability (13), all children went straight to heaven. no extra worlds, no space to grow up…just Heaven. i don’t have much of an issue with this! except when you hear about the odd monstrous child (there are some pretty awful examples of children murdering)…but if they were insane or had a defect, God would have mercy and heal it.
my simplistic view of post-mortem salvation is simply that God will resurrect everyone and every knee will bow and tongue confess. i’ve no idea if this all happens at once, or if it’s at a certain time for every individual. i’m not sure about periods of time in a “hell” type place, though Revelation’s lake of fire seems to indicate a temporary place for rebel nations before they repent and come through the gates into the new Jerusalem, eating the fruit on the way so they are healed.
doesn’t look like i’ve had to come up with any fanciful worlds there!
Thanks for all your thoughts.
Yes, you’re right, that’s exactly what I meant.
I can be a dunce at this stuff, but I cannot understand this Calvminianism at all. For me it doesn’t really make any sense at all, and ends up just doing both views a disservice. This particular pick and mix tradition seems to be purely sophistry – it maintains Calvinism because no one ever really exercised any meaningful choice in reality … 
i said i’d grown up with it…i didn’t say i agreed with it anymore
to be honest, it’s what i was used to. the idea that God could see the end, and therefore simply determine the beginning based on it was “simple” for me. the view that God purposefully predestined some to heaven and some to hell was a shock to me, and personally i find it repellent. so to me, this view needs no disservice to it, as it already lacks any Scriptural validity!!! that is unless we are ALL predestined, which i do accept.
Arminianism, ie the free-will aspect, was thought not to be contradicted due to the fact that God allowed us to choose “prior” to predestining us. however, this sets up all kinds of temporal paradoxes, so it logically doesn’t work.
anyway, i do personally believe that “free will” is an idol for Arminians, and capable of being rationally argued against (see Robin Parry’s great reasoning in TEU), and i think predestination is an idol to Calvinists. by idol, i simply mean that they’ve both elevated the relevant part of God’s character above another, with no Scriptural reason to do so.
but this is just me rambling…for the purpose of this thread, i don’t feel that the free will of an infant would even include the possibility of ECT/annihilation, and to take a soul like that and cast it straight into hell would be monstrous. whether or not the baby has to “grow up” somewhere outside of Heaven first…well i don’t see that happening in the Bible, though it’s possible. when it comes to the idea, however, of us ascending gradually through levels to some holy degree, it sounds dangerously like cultic beliefs (possibly Gnostic? which Paul was NOT a fan of), so i’d be cautious of that.
i don’t know why a baby would “need” any extra work, why would God not just welcome it home? growing up in heaven sounds ace for someone who’s life was cut short.
the only Philosophical problem i can see is that you might have a scenario similar to one we get on earth, where parents raise a child in a bubble, and then someone comes that gives that person a taste of life outside the bubble. for us humans, this is rather hard to resist, even if the person says “it’s no picnic out there, you’re better off here.” so it could be that a baby raised in Heaven might possibly find something to envy in those who have lived in the real world, with choices and risks and dangers. this is potentially a moot point, as one day all eyes will see that God is All in All, and is all-sufficient.
i guess what i’m saying is that i don’t see a need for postmortem salvation for infants…so i’m not convinced this is an argument, despite always believing in infant salvation.