Tag: faith

Recently, Doug Wilson posted to his Blog and Mablog podcast this episode: “The Challenge of Child Communion” (listen here on Apple Podcasts or here on Spotify).

I would encourage you to listen to the entire episode before reading this response.

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If you have listened to the episode you know that “The Challenge of Child Communion” makes a general argument for paedocommunion (the practice of allowing infants to partake in communion) and against credocommunion (the belief that to partake in communion requires the a credible profession of faith).

In this response, I am not going to rehash the centuries old debate over the two viewpoints. Rather, I am going to respond directly to what Doug has to say only bringing up history where the point needs to be made.

The episode follows this general outline:

1. The Problem: There is a problem with the modern world, specifically the modern sexual revolution. The sexual revolution is childless, aka, fruitless. They require children to keep the revolution going. Where do they get these children? From the people who are actually making babies, the Christians. The proponents of the sexual revolution aren’t just walking in and kidnapping these children though, no, it’s worse than that. Christian parents, specifically evangelicals, and more specifically the winsome ones, are handing their children over to the transexuals, gays, and abortion advocates willingly. They do this by trying to fit in with culture, by trying to get along with culture, and by being refusing to teach their children to think like Christians.
   
2. The Solution: Feed the Christian children with Christian food to ensure they are strong, healthy, and ready to face the world.
   
3. The Application: Giving the Christian children food means giving them the sacrament of Communion whether or not they have professed faith.
   
4. Objections and Responses: Doug then brings up several objections to paedocommunion and responds:
   1. Inauthentic Faith
      Objection: Giving communion to children will result in an inauthentic faith.
      Response: Doug points out that not feeding our children leads to no faith at all. It is actually a requirement to train children in the faith.
   2. Profession of Faith
      Objection: Communion requires a profession of faith.
      Response: Communion is in and of itself a profession of faith.
   3. Self-Examination
      Objection: Can a 2 year old examine himself rightly? 2 Corinthians 13:5 “Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you fail to meet the test!” (ESV).
      Response: This verse is taken out of context. The problem in Corinth was not a failure to recognize the body of Christ, but rather a failure to recognize the body of Christ in each other. They were fueding amongst each other. They are meant to be “one loaf” (1 Corinthians 10, 16, and 17) but some parts of the loaf were excluding other parts. So who are we to exclude children who are covenantally in the body?
      
5. Examples: The episode then covers several examples of the issue:
   1. Strict Statement of Faith: Say a strict pastor in the URC requires the children in his congregation to memorize the first question of the Heidelberg Catechism. Once a child has memorized this they either actually believe it or they don’t. If they do believe it, why shouldn’t they come to the table? If they don’t, why make them say it?
   2. Baptists: Baptists take both the sacrament of baptism and communion together. As such, Doug actually states they are closer to the truth than many in the reformed camp would like to give them credit for.
   3. Reformed Presbyterians: These often baptize infants but do not give communion to them. Doug accuses them of bringing children in but then refusing to feed those same children.
   4. Reformed Baptists: These remove inconsistency by not allowing their children to either be baptized or take communion. Doug says it’s like making your children sleep in the yard and starve.
      
6. The Trap: The Credo-communion crowd falls into the same trap as the disciples who rebuked children for coming to Christ. Christ points out that in fact we must become like children to enter the kingdom (Mark 10:14, Luke 18:15-17). Doug acknowledges that Christ is not talking about he sacraments here, but his point is that Jesus desires children to come to Him.
   
7. Child Specific Examples: The episode covers a few more examples:
   1. Friend of Doug: Doug mentions a reformed baptist friend who’s unconverted children pray to the Lord but that this friend “does not discipline them for it.” Doug decries this view point of allowing children to go through the motions of faith without allowing them to partake.
   2. Dutch Reformed: A young girl who is 12 or 13 might be obviously a christian but for some reason the elders refuse to admit her to the table. Doug accuses these elders of using human traditions to bar actual lambs from joining the sheep of the flock.

The episode ends on that final note of the examples of children being barred before wrapping up.

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Now, to get into it. We will go through the arguments and examples in a step-by-step manner.

1. The Problem: This introduction is clear. Doug is right, there is a problem of young adults leaving the church. According to Lifeway Research as many as 70% of children raised in the church leave once they are over 18. So, yes, the problem is clear. Doug uses the bogeyman of the sexual revolution as the culprit. He doesn’t go far enough. The real culprit is of course Satan who will use whatever means he can to attack the Kingdom of God; usually our own sin. Today it’s the sexual revolution. Yesterday, it was the scientific revolution and Darwinist thinking. Tomorrow, it might be the false promises of AI to provide a veritable utopia. Whatever it is, the devil is prowling, seeking whom he may devour.
   
2. The Solution: Yes. We should feed our children with Christian food.
   
3. The Application: This is the crux of the issue. Is the food we should be feeding our children literally meant to be communion?
   
   Spoiler, here’s where we are going:
   
   Should we give communion to those who have not professed faith? No.
   Should we give communion to covenant children who have not professed faith? No.
   Should we give communion to children who have professed faith? Yes.
   
4. Objections and Responses: Let’s review his responses.
   1. Inauthentic Faith: By and large Doug’s response here is correct. The issue comes down to how he defines “feeding the Children.” If you are concerned about raising your child in an “inauthentic faith” you have fallen prey to the myth that we all need some kind of grand moment of coming to Christ. Doug’s general argument actually refutes this quite well. The issue is where he turns with the above application.
   2. Profession of Faith: This is the major point of difference between the paedocommunion viewpoint and the credocommunion viewpoint. Admittedly there are those in the credo camp who take it too far, requiring their children to memorize entire catechisms, suffer lengthy examinations, and be under constant scrutiny of their faith’s validity. This is wrong and falls into a place of promoting Pharisaism among the youth of the Church. However, swinging so far the other way as to require no profession whatsoever is outright wrong, but we’ll get to that later.
   3. Self-Examination: Doug jumps straight to 2 Corinthians 13:5 and states that the passage is actually a point in his favor. He is correct that the context has to do with the members of the body of Christ failing to discern the body. However, he completely leaves off the passage that a majority of credocommunion advocates use:
      
      1 Corinthians 11:27–32
      
      “[27] Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and blood of the Lord. [28] Let a person examine himself, then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. [29] For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. [30] That is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died. [31] But if we judged ourselves truly, we would not be judged. [32] But when we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined so that we may not be condemned along with the world. “(ESV)
      
      This passage cuts both ways – we are to discern the body of the Christ. So, yes we are to watch that we are not excluding those from the table who should be there within the body, but we also are to watch ourselves and examine ourselves. Doug’s entire argument is that this passage has nothing to do with the ability for someone to self-examine but is directed only at those who would protect the table.
      
      Now, what does “examine himself” actually mean? If Doug would go to the original Greek he would find some interesting things. The phrase in Greek requires an individual moral agent do the personal self-examination. This is not for me as the father of a child to do for my child. It is for the child to do for himself. No infant can do this. That infant is not ready for communion. And yes, Doug points out that those who cannot eat solids yet don’t partake at his church.
      
      Here’s a question though – what about the 3 or 4 year old who barely pays attention? What about the 6 year old who’s starting to ask his parents some questions? Is a 10 year old capable of self-examination?
      
      Think on that and then we’ll get back into this discussion of young children professing faith and self-examining in a moment, for now, let’s focus on working our way through the rest of Doug’s episode.
      
5. Examples:
   1. Strict Statement of Faith: This example is egregious and there are a relatively small number of reformed churches that go this far. Doug goes straight for the extreme examples. I do believe that the elders at these churches go too far, but addressing the minority when the problem to be solved is a majority issue is unproductive.
   2. Baptists: This seems to be thrown out more as a bone of good favor than as a real example to deal with. Besides, this article is not going to focus on the issue of paedo and credo baptism.
   3. Reformed Presbyterians: Doug accuses this group of not feeding their children. This of course depends on what you mean by feed. If you mean they won’t give communion to children who have not professed Christ, then he’s right. Within this camp there are those who are super strict (like the first example) and those who are more in the gray area (like myself).
   4. Reformed Baptists: Again, it’s not worth getting into a discussion on baptism at this time. We’ll save another article for that.
      
6. The Trap: Doug uses one of the oldest tricks in the book: “But what about the children?!?” He would be right to do so if he was critiquing churches excluding children from the service itself (as in some mega churches/lax evangelical churches). He’s probably right on this point when it comes to those churches that are overly strict (again, this is a minority). However, the argument falls flat when you look at the whole scope of what true covenant theology teaches. There is no ground to stand on here when those same churches that simply require a profession of faith are actively raising their children in the faith!
   
7. Child Specific Examples:
   1. Friend of Doug: These is, again, an extreme example, and Doug is right to call this person out.
   2. Dutch Reformed: This example is much the same as 5.a in the examples above. This crowd is likely being overly strict with their requirements to the detrement of their church.

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Now, to review and address the overall episode.

My main point is this: Doug uses straw men to support an all-or-nothing approach that supports his own view that is more geared toward addressing the fears of parents than at addressing the actual biblical doctrines.

Doug’s entire 20 minute episode starts with fear tactics: “If you don’t bring your unbelieving unrepentant child to the communion table then you are willingly giving that child over to be groomed by a tranny.” Then he uses the extreme examples of those churches that bar 12 year olds from the table or even from the worship service. He barely gives any mention to those who have a view of bringing the entire covenant community to the table but also take the warnings of scripture seriously. So in Doug’s view, you either are taking part in turning your kids into little trans terrors, or you are a good parent who (against the warnings scripture) allows their un-professing 1 year old to eat and drink at communion.

On top of that, Doug refuses to fairly address the scripture and the history at hand. He ignores the common credocommunion arguments that demonstrates the history of communion within the church (see this article). He further completely ignores the views of fellow postmillennial thinkers such as Dr. Francis Nigel Lee (see this article, especially pages 16-18 on John Calvin’s views).

Getting back to the issue at hand, the question is, at what age can my child take communion? At the earliest age that they make a profession. I can hear the ardent paedocommunion crowd and the strict credocommunion crowd both turning to yell at me.

If you want something else to read supporting this view, go check out this Greg Bahnsen and Ken Gentry article. This position is on the least strict side of the credocommunion viewpoint and balances guarding the table with also bringing our children into fellowship as quickly as possible.

Consider this:

What should I do when my 3 or 4 year old comes to me and says they love Jesus? That they believe Jesus died on the cross for his sins?

Is my child self-aware? Yes. Does he understand sin (even if it’s as simple as stealing a toy from his sister)? Yes. Does he truly love Jesus? Yes. How do I know this? Can I get into the head of my child? Well, obviously not, but anyone with a young child knows that they are much more aware of what is going on than we like to give them credit for. On top of that, I can see that he is attempting to follow in my steps as I work out my salvation with fear and trembling. This is the very thing that we are called to help our children do!

This holds especially true if I did not prompt that child to walk up to me and say these things on a random Tuesday. If, however, I was simply requiring my child to parrot back at me a phrase or a prayer in order to get access to the communion table, I believe I would be doing them a disservice.

That’s not to say we shouldn’t catechize or memorize scripture, but it’s not a magic bullet either. In fact, my child would not be coming to me with a profession of faith if I was not feeding them the Word of God. This means taking the whole family to church, doing family worship, let your kids see you studying your bible, and take opportunities to bring your kids to engage with the rest of the body at times of fellowship. Doing these things feeds your children!

Raising you children in the faith requires a tremendous amount of responsibility. Communion is not a “get out of jail free” card for your children. In fact, if you are trying to get them to take communion thinking that they need it to be right with God then you are leading them astray. Fathers, the responsibility for your household falls on your own head! Guard your children, guard your wife, and guard your heart.

So, be ready for that moment when your child asks why we do communion. Be a father who demonstrates the love of Christ. That child will come to you and openly profess their own love of Christ, then, wonderfully, you are required to bring that covenant child to the glorious feast of communion.

In Christ,

JJ