Infants Are Conceived Already Sinful

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Are infants born qualified for heaven but then as they grow up, they become involved in sin and lose salvation? If so, it could be claimed that every person who crosses the supposed “line of accountability,” loses salvation. I do not believe infants can lose their salvation any more than adults. No one can be saved without being born again.

Original Sin is Highly Relevant To Infants and Adults Alike

The doctrine of original sin is that at the moment of conception, every human already has a sinful nature. Paul describes the Ephesians as having been children of wrath by nature like everyone else (Ephesians 2:1-3) so that their nature must be changed. A clean thing cannot be brought out of an unclean thing; infants born of women are unclean. David says:

Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.

Even from birth the wicked go astray; from the womb they are wayward, spreading lies.

Psalm 51:5, 58:3 NIV

These references are sufficient to prove that infants are not holy by birth. If they are by nature children of wrath, then, by nature, they are unfit for Heaven. Our Savior taught that none can see or enter the kingdom of God, except they be born again.

Some people might object: “Doesn’t God grant infants an exception?” Answer: No, because if adults are saved by being born again, and infants without it, then we have two ways of salvation — one for infants and one for adults — while the Bible speaks of but one way, Christ. The important reason why people must be born again is that their nature must be changed. It is not the change of conduct that results in salvation, but the change of nature.

Certainly, infants, as to nature, are like the parents and therefore need as great a change of nature as the parents. Christ came to save sinners; if infants need saving, they must start as sinners. “He shall save his people from their sins;” and if infants are a part of His people, they have sins, otherwise He could not “save them from their sins.” If they have sins and are sinners, they need to be “cleansed from all sin,” as much as you or I. As to anything we can see about them, they seem innocent, but they are “by nature children of wrath.”

For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God…
Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all people, because all sinned.

Romans 3:23, 5:12 NIV

Here we learn death to be a fruit of sin, and as infants are subjects of death, evidently, they are sinners, and as such need “washing,” “cleansing,” “purifying,” “being born again of incorruptible seed,” just as all others do who shall be saved. Therefore, if you can learn how any one person (descended from Adam) is saved, you will know how all people are saved.

The only difference between infants and adults is infants are not developed. If you could impart to infants your physical maturity, you would see that their nature is evil as fully as your own. The tender, smooth sprout of the thorn only needs age to manifest its nature. The same is true of children; age does not give them a different nature, it only develops the nature they have. I hope I have now said enough to show that infants are not, by natural birth, fit for Heaven. They need a spiritual birth. If there is any other way for Christ’s atonement to reach us, I have not learned that way.

Infants Can Become Born Again Because of Christ’s Atonement

God is able, because of Christ’s atonement, to prepare infants for His service as adults.

he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit,

Titus 3:5 NIV

John the Baptist praised God before birth, and certainly this is evidence that the Spirit can regenerate infants so they can love God. “He that loveth is born of God.” As we have before seen, it is by being born of God that the church is prepared to love and serve Him. Now if all infants are not born of God, then all infants are not fit for Heaven.

Nicodemus (and anyone else) needs to be born again. But if he had been born again in infancy, then he would have needed a third birth; and who ever read of such a thing as a third birth? If all infants were born again and afterward lose salvation, then it follows that every adult who experiences the new birth is born a third time. The idea of a third birth is nowhere hinted at in the bible; neither is there the shadow of testimony that all infants are born of the Spirit. Therefore, the claim that infants lose their salvation when they become adults has no support.

Let us consider the following things: Saints are spiritual, having been born of the Spirit. Have we any evidence that infants are so? He that loveth God is born of him. Saints do this; have we any evidence that infants do? “This is life eternal, that they might know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.” Saints do this, and there is no evidence that infants do.

The case of John the Baptist is recorded, not as an ordinary one, but as an extraordinary one, and therefore is no evidence that God deals so with all infants. But I may properly ask, did John lose his salvation? I see no evidence of it. And if all infants, as John was, are born of the Spirit, then universal salvation is the consequence; for that which is born of God, is born of incorruptible seed—so it cannot become corrupted again.

The whole notion of infant fitness for Heaven is based on the opinion that God has two methods of saving — one for adults, and one for infants. There is no foundation for such an opinion in the Bible. “One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one way,” and Christ that way. Regeneration and spiritual birth are that way. The result being, that in Heaven, all are to see and be like Christ. Christ is the pattern after which all are to be formed.

Remember that the atonement (reconciliation), and the receiving of it, are two things.

More than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.

Romans 5:11 ESV

This is spoken about our conversion, and says, “Now received;” showing that:

1. It is one thing for there to be an atonement, and another to receive it.
2. They had not received it earlier.

If they had received it in infancy the words would have been, “again received.” Apostasy and its advocates are hard-pressed when they attempt to sustain their system by such arguments as this. There isn’t one solitary passage that teaches us that infants are spiritual, or that they know God, or that they have been born again, or that they are believers; and in contradiction to many scriptures, that substantially tell us, that they are unfit for Heaven; and in contradiction to the Savior, who taught that all, who see or enter the kingdom, must be born again.

This is post 20 in a series; you can read the previous post. This post started as the public domain works of J. H. Oliphant. While sections are the same in many ways, I modernized the language and added my thoughts to provide greater clarity for my readers.
Image by Maksym Boiko from Pixabay