Saved by...?

After reading Danny’s and Daniel’s post on (saving) faith in infants and started thinking: some questions are great philosophical questions, but less than helpful theological questions. For example, a great philosophical question is, "Can God create a rock bigger than He can lift?" No doubt an interesting discussion could ensue on the nature and power of God and so forth, but theologically, it's not the best question. The Bible would ask the question this way, "Has God created you and is He your rock?" The answer: "Yes, and you can't move Him, so trust Him and find refuge in Him."

Daniel, on www.allpossibleworlds.blogspot.com has asked a great philosophical question about (saving) faith in the context of infants (or mentally challenged individuals). He wondered if belief (in adults) might be the result of faith (understood as the giving of the Holy Spirit). So “belief” (our understanding and ability to believe) isn’t necessarily necessary for saving faith, the Spirit who gives Christ is. Here are my thoughts on the matter:

In regards to your faith and belief question, I think you might be getting close to a helpful distinction. Lutheran theological Arthur Carl Piepkorn says it this way, "To have faith in the context of infant baptism means to have become a person in whom God has initiated His work of sanctification and to whom he has given the Holy Spirit. As the individual matures, the Holy Spirit enables him so to see in the divine word God's revelation of His gracious self and of His saving purpose in Christ that the individual comes to know, trust, and worship Christ…" (The Church: Selected Writings of Arthur Carl Piepkorn, 230)

So we could phrase our philosophical problem this way:

1) Those who have the Holy Spirit are saved.

2) The Holy Spirit is given in Baptism (obviously rejected by Reformed churches today – Reformed being understood as non-Catholic and non-Lutheran)

3) Infants are baptized.

4) Therefore infants have the Holy Spirit and are saved.

So, our focus is turned away form "personal faith" (a phrase the Bible never uses anyway) to the Holy Spirit and the Sacraments (what the Bible emphasizes). Asking if infants can believe might just be the wrong question. Do they have the mental capacity to understand the Trinity? No, but who really does? Can they receive the Holy Spirit? Yes.

By the way, the emphasis on "personal faith" comes out of the Reformed (non-Lutheran and non-Catholic) tradition. If you can't look to any tangible means whereby God gives His Spirit and promises, you are forced to look inward and start asking questions like, "Do I believe enough?" (Also important in the Reformed tradition, “Am I one of the elect?” – for another post)

And when we speak of being saved by "faith alone," I think it's important to remember that it isn't our activity of believing that saves us, but the object of our faith – Christ who saves us.

So, I guess my point is starting with "personal faith" as our criteria for salvation isn't a helpful (or Biblical) question and it only leaves us with a "pretty fierce theological dilemma." And really, any time we start delving into the depths of what people believe / are capable of believing, we stray from Scripture's emphasis on the Spirit and promises of God in Christ. Only in Christ do we find any certainty. All other philosophical questions are interesting, but ultimately unanswerable.