# From Out of the Presumptive Thread



## JohnV (Jun 9, 2005)

DM: 

Here are a few posts in which we interacted on some of the primary issues concerning Presumptive Regeneration. Would you like to carry on your discussion here? If not, just say so 



> _Originally posted by D Battjes_
> 
> 
> > _Originally posted by JohnV_
> ...


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## D Battjes (Jun 9, 2005)

[Edited on 6-13-2005 by webmaster]


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## D Battjes (Jun 10, 2005)

John. 1Cor 7 in reference to holy, does nto equate regenerate. Paul means that they are to be set apart because of one believoing parent to instruct them in the Lord. THis is no grounds to presume regeneration.

Let me state John that I have no issue with raising them as Covenant children. Instructing them in the Lord that they will need to be born from above and pray for their salvation.


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## JohnV (Jun 10, 2005)

> _Originally posted by D Battjes_
> John: In charity for the Glory of God alone I would. But be patient. My time will be limited until tomorrow.
> 
> Elementary Band and Choir concert tonight for the kids.
> ...


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## JohnV (Jun 10, 2005)

DM:
I only have limited time per day at this, so we will likely be limited to a few posts per day. I we go slow, it will be fast enough for me. 



> _Originally posted by D Battjes_
> John. 1Cor 7 in reference to holy, does nto equate regenerate. Paul means that they are to be set apart because of one believoing parent to instruct them in the Lord. THis is no grounds to presume regeneration.



This is a good start. We are agreed on this. I deny that they are regenerate by virture of their birth as well. The problem we have here is not with that, but with the word, 'presume'. But until we get to that we need to stay on the topic of regeneration for a little bit. 

Christ instructs us concerning our children that they are 'set apart' because they have parents or a parent who believes, and who are or is therefore required (commanded) to instruct them in the fear of the Lord (or the LORD, the covenant-keeping God.)

That is, then, that they fall under both the auspices and authority of the parents as well as the church. Am I correct in this? 



> Let me state John that I have no issue with raising them as Covenant children. Instructing them in the Lord that they will need to be born from above and pray for their salvation.



We are still in agreement. I too believe that our children need to be 'born from above', and that we should pray for their salvation. There is no such thing as a "grandfather-in clause" when it comes to admittance to eternal life. There is a clause _like_ that in the Decalogue, though, but we will come to that later. We should keep it at this for now, that Christ died personally (I mean: for each of the persons whom God has called; Rom 8:29,30) for all those who would be saved; and the gifts of grace are faith, hope, and love (1 Cor. 13:13. ) These are gifts from God, not inheritances from parents. 

But now to progress from here, we must agree that children, then, do have a place in the covenant. They are not automatic believers, believing like their adult parents, but they are also not pagans, of those that must be and are excluded from the body for fear of courting God's wrath. They are accorded a place in the covenant community, the Church of our Lord Jesus Christ. They are each given a seat, so to speak, in the assembly. And that is granted them by virtue of their descent from godly parents. 

This is not to deny that God first gave these children to those parents. Indeed, that is what we are trying to uphold. It is not that the parents give them to God; it is God who first gave them to the parents. The parents are only recognizing this when they present their covenant-born children before God and before the Church for formal inclusion into the covenant. The Church conveys upon them the sign and seal that the Church has been granted in the keys of the kingdom, through the God-given offices of the Church, to display to all through the sacrament that God has commanded that these children ought to be recipients of this sign and seal. By commanding that all those who believe are engrafted into the covenant, so also those who are their children are to be included in this. 

We may differ on some terminology, but are we agreed so far?


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## D Battjes (Jun 10, 2005)

[Edited on 6-13-2005 by webmaster]


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## JohnV (Jun 10, 2005)

Then it is not a big step to say that the children of believing parents have some kind of status in the Church. The only ones who have status in the Church are those who have been accepted for their stated faith, they and their children. Am I correct so far? 

There are only two kinds of people, the regenerate and the reprobate. There is no in between. As we look at it, from our human limitations, there is a lot of in-between territory, because there are those who live a reprobate life now, but are really elect in the long run; but we don't know that yet, if we ever do at all. Also, we baptize some who really aren't elect, because they eventually fall away, and some even lead schisms and apostacies. We don't baptize some, or we excommunicate some, who really are of the faith (like Huss, Luther, and Calvin. ) But this is from our vantage point; from God's end there is no question as to who is elect and who is not: there are only those who are regenerate and those who are elect. 

That is to say, then, those who are accorded a place in the covenant must be viewed as possessing one of these states, even though it is beyond us to know God's predestinating plan for any one of them. What we have to work with is these things: namely, the credible testimony of the confessor, and the legitimacy of covenantal status under the headship of the parents, and the Biblical parameters of true confession and doctrine. It is repugnant to say that anyone accorded a place of covenantal status is called reprobate at the same time. We are not assuming that the are regenerate especially, as much as we assume a position in the Church which places them with the regenerate instead of the reprobate. They are, according the God's Word, placed in the covenant community, and therefore own a presumption of regeneracy, though we are not proclaiming them regenerate until they themselves have made their own statement of faith before God and His people. 

This is the bare-bones idea behind Presumptive Regeneration. Notice that it has nothing to do with, and is antithetical to, the Presumptive Regeneration that assumes that children are saved by virtue of believing parentage. It does not assume that; it opposes that idea directly. Instead, it believes strongly in the promises of God that He will indeed work in the lives of those who have faith, blessing the children to the thousandth generation of those who love Him and keep His commandments, (we're not even at a hundred yet since Jusus' time. ) There are definite promises that we believe, but we strongly discourage any circumvention of the basics of faith, namely that each person is responsible for his life and doctrine. 

We believe that God's promises mean something very comforting and very solidifying for the parents of children, who hope in God who alone is able to grant the gifts of faith, and the graces of salvation. These promises are not empty; they are more than meaningful to the parents of children, when they present them for baptism before God and His people. They are not automatic salvation by parentage, but they are commitments to the promises of God through His ordained covenantal way of dealing through families to propagate His Church. Notice the distinction; it is a clear departure from the Presumptive Regeneration that amounts to no more than baptismal regeneration. 

What we have done, in retrospect, if you will, is to take over that name because it was a poor use of doctrine and of language in the hands the post-Kuyperianists. They called it Presumptive Regeneration, but that is not what they meant. They only used that term, it seems, to justify their departure from it being Christ's Church to it being their church. There are many who practice this in our day, propagating their own peculiar 'perspective' of true faith. There will be no such lines of demarcation in eternity; nor will it be recognized in the judgment.


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## D Battjes (Jun 10, 2005)

[Edited on 6-13-2005 by webmaster]


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## JohnV (Jun 10, 2005)

> Again, I will add more later.
> 
> TOnight dance recital!!!!!






 (this is the quartet rehearsing)


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## JohnV (Jun 10, 2005)

(shhhhhh! don't tell them there are five of them. )


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## D Battjes (Jun 10, 2005)

[Edited on 6-13-2005 by webmaster]


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## JohnV (Jun 11, 2005)

> _Originally posted by D Battjes_
> John, thank you for succintly addressing the issue. I have read Kuypers understanding of this, well a translation of it because I do not know Dutch. I still see it as a big leap to go from Covenant member to presumption of regenerancy.


Actually, it is no step at all; if you mean the one, then you have to mean the other as well. 



> Gods promises DO mean something when taken in light of what has been revealed.
> 
> WHat I mean is presuming regenerancy is not implied in scripture. Presuming a child as a Covenant member is.


You see a wide margin between these two, and I see them as saying the same thing in different words. I am not trying to imply that they are elect, regenerate, or anything else other than that they have been granted membership in the covenant because their parents are believers. However, (and I suppose this is where the confusion comes in) there is fruit that normally comes from being recipients of the graces that come through hearing the Word preached, being raised in a godly home where the Bible is read every day, and prayers are said and taught, etc. That is how it was meant to be from the start: that's what we are saying about families in Christ. 



> My distinction lies in what I have been taught as far as the Covenant being made with Christ and not man. Yes he represents His sheep, but man has no conditions placed upon him. The conditions were placed and fulfilled on and by Christ Himself, for His elect.


The distinctions that we are observing, those of us who agree with PR or PE, lie in the Covenant being fulfilled on our behalf by Christ; so it must be a Covenant of God with man. Christ fulfilled all the requirements of the Covenant that man could not fulfil: Christ being the only one who was sinless, and whose worth for the sacrifice was sufficient to save man. He was made one of us, so that He was legally our representative. 

If Christ included children among those who were to freely come to Him, and this goes right back to the beginning of mankind, continues into the New Covenant, and is still in effect today, then we are forced to say something about these children. We have no place to say whether they are regenerate or not, for that is God's secret counsel. But we may say that they are accorded a place among the regenerate because their parents are regenerate, as is supposed by their confession and profession. We are not _assuming_ regeneration, we are _presuming_ regeneration, before the fact. We do so because they have a place in with the wheat instead of the tares, they are recipients of the means of grace, and they participate in the gifts of grace in the congregation of Christ's Church. If man were not so inwardly wicked on his own, all these things would normally lead to a regenerate life, because all these things are works of the Spirit, not of man. 

As a church, we must regard those who are members of the church as being regenerate, because we do not allow people who are not regenerate to be members. Christ has included children entrance, and a special place, in that group called 'regenerate' by the churches. They still need, in every way, to come to a knowledge of God, of Christ, and to come to faith as much as anyone else. But they alone have a place where they can do that from inside the community of the covenant, as is clearly shown in the OT, and continued in the NT. 



> Could you raise you child in the Lord without presuming him regenerate? OF course you can.
> 
> Plus is appears to prove God. Because if the child turns out to be a reprobate heathen, what would stop a person from calling God out on His promise?


But that is exactly the comfort that I have with my children: I am to treat them as if God loves them the way He loves all those that seek Him, the regenerate parents. Sure, a child may, and often does, take these graces for granted, and goes through a time from implicit trust in the parents to his own naive trust in himself as he begins to take the cares of life into his own hands. They are not automatically mature when they come of age. But if they do fall away for a time, the parents are also aware that even their own salvation does not depend on their own perseverance as it does on God's keeping them. This goes for their children just as much. If we train them in the way that they should go, then we also need to pray earnestly that God will keep them as He has kept us. It may take a lifetime for some of those children, and for some they may fall away and not come back. But this in no way negates God's purposes, His promises, His preserving of His saints, or the way He blesses the children of His saints. Man cannot thwart God's calling and electing. Grace is still irresistible, for one as for the other. It is God's doing from first to last. 

We, His people, are not just puppets on a string, though. Neither we nor our children. 

This is hard to understand. We still dispute many things about such a divine plan of salvation. But we do not doubt that God calls the children of His people holy, and that Christ calls them to Himself, and that the Holy Spirit works in the Church, even for the children. That means that they have the place of the regenerate even though we may not as yet have the means to tell if they are or not. We must suppose one or the other for them; and because God has given them such a place of honour among His people, we would rather presume them regenerate than reprobate. But we are also commanded to regard them as holy, and to treat them that way. Therefore we presume them the place of the regenerate; but also yet hold them accountable to become Christian in life and doctrine. 

So if there are children in your church, you have to respect them on the same level as the regenerate. You can't go around saying they are unholy. They are not treated as if they do not need to come to faith, but they are treated with the same respect as members that you respect as those who have come to faith. They do need to become regenerate, but until they do make a public profession of faith before God and the Church, they are presumed to have a place among the regenerate, and given the place and freedom to worship and adore their God, because of their parents, because of Christ.




> John. You are a pleasure to dialogue with. God has definately given you the fruit of Charity.


Thank you, DM. But is isn't me. I have nothing to lose, since I am Christ's child, guarded by His love. I have everything to gain, though, when I dialogue with godly people. For if I am wrong, then I will be corrected; and if I am right, it is only because I believed that God was right, not me. I won't gain anything by holding onto my own opinions; but Ill gain a lot by listening to yours. Its just common sense. 





[Edited on 6-11-2005 by JohnV]


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