 What are your thoughts on modern-day abortion being an unwitting or willful sacrifice to Malik? Would a miscarriage stillborn, aborted baby go to heaven, have it not been physically born into the world? To ask another way is the soul spirit imparted to the body at conception or upon physical birth? And does the Bible address the idea of a grace period for young children and their need for salvation in order to enter heaven? Would their fate fall upon the belief of their father or mother, or are they just out of luck? Is there any biblical merit to the idea of an age of innocence for children? Well, you know, let's take the the first part about abortion being an unwitting or You know versus a willful sacrifice to Molok I don't think there's I mean there might be somebody out there who goes in for an abortion thinking that oh This is my offering to Molok, you know or to a God I basically don't think that's gonna be the case, but you know, I'm not omniscient So maybe there's somebody out there that thinks that do I think that there's a sinister, you know evil supernatural mind Somehow at some place at some point or stage Propelling the abortion narrative. Yeah, I do I do think that there's a supernatural evil Element involved in this when I say that what I mean are things like, you know The people just being taught today that the contents of a woman's womb is not human You know and that's sort of this this trigger point of justifying, you know abortion even beyond, you know This whole notion that it's my body and the woman saying it's my body when it's actually not I mean if we're talking science here, okay, let's let's try to you know do some science here The contents of the womb are genetically distinct from the woman. So therefore it is not her body She's the host, but it's not her body that's being destroyed. It's someone else's body Genetically the contents of the womb are human. That's all that it ever can and will be it won't transform into something else Genetically it is human and it's alive if you put the contents of a woman's womb on a Mars rock You'd say you had discovered Martian life and win a Nobel Prize It's living it grows Okay, it is becoming what it was intended to be it's not the same as swabbing your cheek You know to get human cells there because they will die. They won't grow into anything else So it's different than that and these are all scientific statements. They're all very straightforward very provable very well known But nevertheless people are taught The opposite so I think that whole effort again to get people to dehumanize humanity is Something that that's very sinister and evil and I think supernatural evil does have a role to play in that whole process I don't think that's a stretch at all now the whole thing about the eternal destiny of The stillborn or the miscarried the aborted baby and we can add as well, you know Babies that are born with with severe mental incapacitation That they'll never actually be able to believe, you know that that sort of thing. I put them all in in one category The best answer to this is go up to the naked Bible blog. I did an extensive series of posts on Romans 5 12 and one of them and we'll provide the link to this on on this episodes page but one of them Delts specifically with the fate of the unborn infants and other human beings who cannot believe now I'm not going to go through that whole thing The whole series on Romans 5 12, but I'll I'll basically give you the highlights Romans 5 12 says Therefore just a sin came into the world through one man and death through sin And so death spread to all men because all sinned or all sin, you know, some translations will have There you go. Well, this verse has been taken for not centuries But millennia in the history of the Christian church and this goes back to the church fathers So I'm gonna lay this at their feet This verse is used to teach the idea that all every human being after Adam inherited Adam's guilt This is the the typical articulation of the doctrine of original sin The doctrine of original sin has become sort of transformed into the doctrine of the transmission of Adam's guilt to all people Okay, the verse never says that Adam's sin The guilt was transferred to other human beings. It never says that let me read it again Therefore just as sin it came into the world through one man, and we know who that one man is it's it's Adam Okay, his sin and death through sin So when there was sin, then we have you know now death as part of the picture And I would say it's human death because the rest of the verse is about humans not animals or microbes Okay, therefore or so death spread to all men. Did you catch that? Death is what spread to all men all humans not guilt death the text says death Romans 512 is about the transmission of mortality To all humans because once Adam and Eve sin they're driven from the garden They're they're cut off from the source of life the presence of God even all that stuff Again, they are now going to die Okay, that that's what God told them that it's about death It's not about the transmission of guilt moral guilt before God now that makes a huge difference because You know if you believe that every human being inherits guilt because of Adam well then a baby that gets aborted That you know isn't in the body of Christ or is is cut off from Christ from believing in Christ Either because of death or again their mental incapacitation. They're gonna go to hell now, you know pastors You know people who are sensitive to this will will invent pastoral responses you know to Not say that they'll say oh well God makes an exception. Well, there's no verse for that God loves cute babies. So therefore they're in heaven, you know, it's it's bluster. It's contrived It's made up or they'll say well God will make sure that that you don't remember You know the the death of your stillborn child and and you won't remember that it's in hell now Well, again, there's no verse for that But there are lots of verses that talk about or are evidence for the fact that we will remember You know our lives and relationships here in this life in the next life Again, these are contrived answers because people are trapped By a flawed view of Romans 5 12 I've also talked on the blog about how this really impacts Jesus. Jesus is a descendant of Adam He is the son of Adam. He's the son of David, you know who they were he's human So where does Jesus get off in not inheriting Adam's guilt everybody? Oh the virgin birth the virgin birth Well, I got news for you Mary was human Okay, she was a descendant from Adam to where is the verse that says the sin nature or Adamic guilt flows through Okay, only men There is no such verse. These are theological inventions Okay, it also doesn't work to say well, you know, Jesus, you know Was just kind of put into the womb by God plopped in there Well, that's nice then Paul gets to be wrong and Romans 1 3 where he says that Christ is Descended from David according to the flesh Okay, Jesus is either human a descendant of Adam or he's not either the genealogies are correct or they're not or their lies Okay, they're not lies. They are real. They mean something But if you're gonna take the traditional view of Romans 512 Jesus Inherited Adam's guilt now the Catholic Church saw this problem very clearly And so this is why they invented the doctrine that Mary was sinless There's no verse that says that But that gets Mary off the hook and therefore it gets Jesus off the hook in that thinking that that theological approach Again, these are contrivances because of the way the church fathers specifically You know, I guess Augustine, but he's he's not the only one But because of the way they influence the history of the church to think about Romans 512 what I'm saying is look at the verse It never refers to guilt at all It's a mortality problem now again my view and you can go read read the I'd say read the whole series of posts because you know, if I'm getting if I'm gonna get emails now Well, Mike, what about where it says that all have sinned and come sure the glory of God And what all those things are true Okay, the biblical view is that guilt isn't transmitted to people by what someone else does Including Adam. Okay, we become guilty before God when we sin and every human being is Going to sin. There is no avoidance of sinning Every human being will sin the only exception of this was Jesus because he also happened to be God Okay, not no other human being can say that so all humans if they're allowed to live Will sin against God and we'll become guilty before God. That's why every human being needs Christ Now again, if we think about this a little bit more we have situations, you know You have to define. Okay. Well, what what is sin, you know, does it involve? You know the the act of the human will you know, do you do you know have to knowingly rebel against God? I would say yeah, you do, you know People would would bring up sin language in the Old Testament like in Leviticus Hey, go listen to our Leviticus series on podcasts the quote-unquote sins there are about moral and you know Not moral impurity, but ritual impurity It's just you people get confused by the language of a lot of Old Testament verses that really don't apply to moral Transgressions at all to have a moral transgression. You have to have an act of the will and an infant That's two days old is not going is not morally willfully rebelling against the revelation of God in some area It's just not doing that. So there there is You know a biblical theological argument to be made for innocence Okay But the Aborted fetus never sinned And the child that's one or two days old and then dies doesn't sin You know the the the child again who is severely, you know, mentally incapacitated can't exercise You know the will to rebel knowingly against God. I'm saying they're innocent. There is that category Now they don't go to heaven because They're sinless or innocent as though they're good enough. Okay, that is no one goes to heaven on The basis of any merit of their own at all Period zero So what about the fate of the unborn? Well, we have to ask ourselves. Why do people go to hell? Why do they not have everlasting life and the answer to that is well, they've become guilty before God and Nothing has you know, they weren't able to participate in the means by which that they are forgiven and You know joined to Christ. Okay. Well Why do people need Christ? Well again that the answer is because they're guilty before God and we know that Christ is the only way of salvation Well, how do people again become guilty before God the answer is we sin of those who die Okay, those who die never having sinned They're in a different category. I think with me here again. I'm just summarizing a very long series of posts here Everyone at the last day will be raised Both the saved and the unsaved but and you read the end of the book of Revelation other passages This is crystal clear Everybody gets raised some, you know to eternal life some to damnation. Okay Everybody gets raised. Well of those that get get raised. Why do Certain again experienced damnation. They don't have everlasting life. The reason is because they were guilty before God They've committed some offense against God and that hasn't been taken care of okay. We understand that clearly But if that isn't the case if you're raised at the last day and You are not guilty before God By definition using biblical language here. You would do not suffer the second death Which is damnation You are taken to be With the presence of God not because you were good not because you earned anything You have eternal life because of Christ's resurrection. That is the only reason anyone is raised at all Again, these are I'm just throwing together a bunch of biblical statements here It's because of the resurrection. So, you know, when I Have met people I have met people who have people in their family Where a pastor told them the child you lost in stillbirth is in hell and it destroyed their faith I think that's abominable You know, I can honestly look somebody in the eye and say look your baby We had an abortion whatever you did your baby is with the Lord not because God makes exceptions Not because they're good enough not because they're cute not even because They never had the opportunity to sin they are there because yeah, they're not guilty before God But they are raised with Christ like everyone else It's just that when some are raised, you know, then they get you know revelation put in the lake of fire And others go to be with the Lord the only reason anybody's gonna wind up in the lake of fire is because their guilt has not been taken care of Okay, the innocent don't have guilt Therefore by definition they are raised with Christ to eternal life Okay, that's what happens to them. That is that's the fate of the unborn. So, yeah, there is this idea of innocence We aren't given a number and I don't think we can be given a number as far as the age You know, you have to examine what what does God view as rebellion against him that would incur guilt before him Again, there's no silver bullet answer to that all that I'm saying is that Romans 5 12 Which is the reason the question even comes up, you know that that this whole idea of Guilt being transmitted To every human being on the basis of Romans 5 12 that that is the proof text for the doctrine Then there are other verses and look don't you're not don't think you're gonna surprise me with them in email I know all of them. I've commented on all of them in the series on Romans 5 12 Either in the posts or comments to the posts. I'm not missing something here. Okay, this is this is something that I Again, it sounds crazy, but I think the church has fundamentally misunderstood and it really has some tragic consequences for People's life circumstances and not only that it gets you into real theological trouble with Jesus You know being a descendant of Adam You know other than those things it's it's okay. You know the traditional is okay You know, it's it's really it's not okay. It's a misunderstanding That that produces this this question and what I'm saying is You don't need to worry about Romans 5 12 Putting aborted babies in danger of damnation in hell. They are not guilty before God The verse never says they are Psalm 51 in sin my mother can you know concede me well? Yeah, we know that the act of intercourse isn't a sin But how about we we do the just like we do in Genesis 1 26 the bet of predication and we'll have a grime or spasm here How about we take the? predigatory view of the preposition bet there okay as Sin or better you could translate the same word in the verse as a sinner My mother can see me. That's absolutely true every human being Will sin if they if they're allowed to live they will sin Invariably inevitably they will sin So Psalm 51 is perfectly consistent with what I'm saying here again I've been down the road and back on all these verses If I get emails, I'm gonna I'm just gonna give you a link to the series on Romans 5 12 But it's an important issue. It's an important doctrine. These are important questions So that's the quick version of how I would approach that but to really again get a better Articulation of it read, you know the link that will provide and I would I would recommend reading the whole series