Featured How does your Church deal with Child professions of Faith?

One cannot know Jesus without first inviting Him in. There is a difference between the TBN 'just say this prayer' false Gospel and thoroughly explaining to a child their condition, the punishment, the solution, and the result.

 

And trus thtat the holy spirit opens their hearts/minds to receive christ!

 

I wonder if this form of conversion taught to little children is just a way of getting a child to behave by telling them the boogie man will get them if they don't mind. You said, thoroughly explain to them the punishment. Which is burning in hell. All this amounts to is scaring a child into a profession. A true repentance of sin is not about the penalty. A Godly sorrow worketh repentance in the heart of the sinner unto salvation, 11 Cor 7:10. A Godly sorrow is a regret, a grief that you have offended a Holy God. A true conviction of sin brings on love toward the one you have offended. A burning up in hell religion is conceived out of fear, and when a person fears someone long enough they will began to hate the person they once feared. Can a three, four, five year old understand this ?

 

What I said was the very gospel message! "This form of conversion" is what the great commission is! Where did I say anything about only burning in hell without anything else accompanied with it?

I'll tell you, on Oct 7, 1979 I heard the sermon on hell that brought me to my knees! You better believe I was scared of the punishment, who isn't that has their eyes opened to eternal ramifications for temporal choices? Judas had regret...where did that leave him? Hanging by a tree and in hell today. Repentance is not regret, maybe this is where you are getting everything wrong.

 

There was a mystical magic age of 12 post a page or two back.

 

Spurgeon didn't preach this message, it was Jonathan Edwards. I wonder if these three, four, five year old children after they made a profession, were placed in another home because of a car accident or something where the parents didn't go to church. I wonder if these same children after several years would even remember making that profession ?

 

Look up the word sorrow and see if don't say regret. A Godly sorrow worketh repentence. Judas had a sorrow (regret) but not a Godly sorrow.

 

No, the age of 12 by Old Union was dealing with salvation. Its not that I was being vague, I don't feel like going back through the thread. We can all do our own homework here. Nobody said "somewhere", btw. A page or 2 back is quite explanatory.

Just because you forgot what you did on your fifth birthday doesn't mean what you were doing wasn't sincere at that time. Using this reasoning the saved person with dementia never had a salvation experience because they cannot remember it.

John MacArthur cannot pinpoint a time in his life. Are you alluding to the fact he is not a believer.

We need to stop using human reasoning to understand what a child's heart can and cannot discern

 

I used the age of 12 . as being the time my church allows one to get water baptized , as that is the 'age of accountibility" we see in the biblical pattern...

One can get saved by god at ANY time, but we have to be very cautious to just take them as really converted because they say so! many want to please mom/dad/pastor, others join their friends, some really confused on what it means, others really are saved!

 

You were one of those to mention age 12, but I see no biblical pattern. There is no asterisk inserted into the text in "go and make disciples of all nations, *baptizing them in the Nam..."

*12 years old is the intended age not given by Jesus

 

That's nice and all, but...

- Does it count if it was salt water (appears to be) and not fresh? Which was Jesus baptized in?

- Was the water temp correct at the actual time of the baptism? Was it Jordon-like enough?

- And the clothing, don't forget that, shouldn't the administrators be wearing proper mid-eastern-period garb? Those men look to be dressed in overly modern-western.

- And how do we know the child simply didn't want a trip to the beach? You know children, they're LIKE THAT!!!

But seriously and begging your indulgence and forgiveness (if necessary). All my points above are absurdity meant to parrot and mock earlier posts in this thread.

What a wonderful picture. Praise God for children seeking the Lord so young and following His will, in obedience and love. And sorry again, for using your lovely post to demonstrate my sarcasm relating to some of the prior ridiculous posts. The juxtaposition of the legalism presented by some and the beauty in the picture you've posted is just too much to let pass.

I wish I had pictures of my own down-in-floor baptism from ages ago. It was a memorable experience. Ironically, I was twelve at the time, but saved at five.

 

The point is not can God save a child? yes he can and does, but are there MANY who look back to a child profession of faith as means to be right with god, yet never showed real evidence of being saved by God?

 

Watch this video, many of these little children know far more about Jesus than the adults that are shown.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WKo4Hsbti1E

Webdog, congratulations on your daughter receiving Jesus Christ as her Saviour. Praise God!