Of course this is a debated issue in Reformed churches in terms of whether covenant children who die early in life are in heaven or not. While the Westminster Confession offers a theologically correct assessment that no Reformed believer will ever deny, “Elect infants, dying in infancy, are regenerated and saved by Christ through the Spirit, who worketh when, and where, and how he pleaseth” (10.3), we have to deal with things “below.” We do not know the eternal decree of God; we must judge things from within the covenant and visible church. The delegates to the Synod of Dort sought to provide an answer to this question from a pastoral point of view, in Canon 1.17:

“Since we are to judge of the will of God from His Word, which testifies that the children of believers are holy, not by nature, but in virtue of the covenant of grace, in which they together with the parents are comprehended, godly parents ought not to doubt the election and salvation of their children whom it pleases God to call out of this life in their infancy.”

The issue for those in churches that confess the Canons of Dort is whether the Canons describe certainty towards the children or only the attitude of the parents. An example of the former is Herman Bavinck (Reformed Dogmatics, 4:724–727; Saved by Grace, 69) while of the latter is Herman Hoeksema (Believers and their Seed, 149–158). Without getting into all the historical and theological debate here, let me offer several pastoral points before offering some further reading to prepare our hearts as ministers and students to face this tearful issue.

First, we need to base our pastoral comfort upon the Word. This is why it is so important to read passages such as Psalm 139 as well as the example of David and his son (2 Sam. 12).

Second, we believe that children of believers are members of the covenant of grace, therefore, we need to speak from within that rich and comforting status as the people of God.

Third, we need to offer strong encouragement to our people. They do not need to doubt where their lost child is at. They should be assured that they are in the arms of Jesus, who blessed covenant children during his earthly ministry.

Several excellent resources on this subject are the following:

• Cornelis P. Venema, “The Election and Salvation of the Children of Believers Who Die in Infancy: A Study of Article I/17 of the Canons of Dort,” Mid-America Journal of Theology 17 (2006): 57–100.
• N. H. Gootjes, “Can Parents Be Sure?” Clarion 44:20 (October 6, 1995) and Clarion 44:21 (October 20, 1995).
• W. Robert Godfrey, “Election and Covenant: The Synod of Dort and Children Dying in Infancy” (unpublished essay). [my apologies for the poor quality of the scan, it's the best I can do]
• John Calvin, “Letter CCCLXIV–To a Gentleman of Provence,” in Selected Works of John Calvin, Volume 6, 71–73.
• John Owen, “Letter 83: To Lady Elizabeth Hartopp,” in The Correspondence of John Owen, ed. Peter Toon, 157–158). [Below]

Deare Madam,

Every worke of God is good; the Holy One in the middest of us will do no iniquity. And all things shall work together for good unto them that love him, even those things which at present are not joyous, but grievous. Only his time is to be waited for, and his way submitted unto, that we seem not to be displeased in our hearts that he is Lord over us. Your dear infante is in the eternal enjoyment of the fruits of all our prayers; for the covenant of God is ordered in all things, and sure. We shall goe to her; she shall not returne to us. Happy she was in this above us, that she had so speedy an issue of sin and misery, being born only to exercise your faith and patience, and to glorify God’s grace in her eternal blessedness. My trouble would be great on the account of my absence at this time from you both, but that this also is the Lords doing; and I know my own uselessness wherever I am. But I will beg of God for you both, that you may not faint in this day of trial; that you may have a cleare view of those spirituall and temporall mercyes wherewith you are yet intrusted all undeserved, that sorrow of the world may not so overtake your hearts as to disenable to any duties, to grieve the Spirit, to prejudice your lives; for it tends to death. God in Christ will be better to you than ten children, and will so preserve your remnant, and so adde to them, as shall be for his glory and your comfort. Only consider that sorrow in this case is no duty; it is an effect of sin, whose cure by grace we should endeavour. Shall I say, Be cheerful? I know I may. God help you to honour grace and mercy in a compliance therewith. My heart is with you; my prayers shall be for you; and I would have seene you this day could I have borrowed a coach.

Dear Madam,

Your most affectionate and unworthy pastor,

John Owen

[May 1674?]

A question that has received some treatment in the secondary literature of late centers on whether the WCF is a supralapsarian or infralapsarian document.  Despite the recent work of Guy Richard, I remain persuaded that the Confession is non-committal, and therefore allows a spectrum of opinions.

There are many varieties of infra- and supralapsarianism; thus, it would be hard to pin the WCF down as either infra or supra.  This is an exceedingly complex debate.  Consider, for example, the position of Goodwin; and note that even in interpreting Goodwin two very good scholars (Carl Trueman and Michael Horton) come to different conclusions on his position.

The question over the order of decrees bears an interesting relation to Goodwin’s doctrine of the pactum salutis.  Besides Goodwin’s own natural prolixity and detail, his discussion of infralapsarianism and supralapsarianism borders on incomprehensibility.  Consequently, Horton and Trueman come to what appears to be different conclusions on Goodwin’s position on the order of God’s decrees.  Horton concludes that Goodwin ‘is an infralapsarian Calvinist’ and Trueman contrasts the infralapsarian Owen with the ‘more vigorously supralapsarian theology of … Goodwin.’[1]

Besides bringing into context the order of decrees in relation the pactum salutis, this post will show that the usual taxonomies, that is, the demarcation between an infralapsarian order and a supralapsarian order, are not without problems, especially in the case of Goodwin.  There is truth in what both Horton and Trueman say, but neither satisfies the full picture.

Ends and Means

Goodwin takes as ‘generally agreed upon’ the distinction between the ends and the means.  He argues for the position that God viewed man considered as unfallen in his election of him to the end, and fallen in his decrees to the means.[2] However, Goodwin recognizes that what is meant by the end and the means needs explication.  The end is either God’s glory, what Goodwin calls the ‘Supreme End of all’, or the ‘Ultimate End’, which refers to the glory God designed to bring the elect into.[3] The latter end – the ‘Ultimate End’ – has in view the perfection of Christ’s elect; this is what Goodwin has in mind when he affirms that the ‘Decree to this End was not after, or upon the consideration of the Fall.’[4] However, the means to the ‘Ultimate End’ consider man as fallen.  Just as the ends are distinguished so too are the means.  Goodwin identifies the position of the pure Supralapsarians: ‘The pure Superlapsarian he takes into the Means to this End, the Creation, and the Permission of the Fall, and calls them Means to bring about that Intention or Decree to that ultimate End or Glory specified.’[5] However, Goodwin argues that means refer to what Christ, as redeemer of God’s elect, performed for his people, such as calling, faith, and repentance.  These soteric benefits are ‘Preparations unto Glory’ (Rom. 9:23; Eph. 2:10).[6] These means which prepare God’s elect for glory ‘presuppose a Fall.’[7]

Adam, in his pre-Fall estate, possessed a natural, inherent holiness.  This holiness was not a means that prepared him for election glory because it lacked a Christological base.  Moreover, Adam’s sin was not a means, either, for the possession of glory, but rather ‘a meer … passage through which Election wrought itself into a new Enlargement … and Magnifying of the Grace … towards the Elect … considered as Sinners.’[8] Thus, fallen sinners receive redemptive grace in order to bring about the ultimate end, namely, their glorification.  However, there is a former grace whereby the elect are considered as unfallen.  This grace was a ‘meer Super-creation and Supernatural Grace through Christ, as a Mediator of Union.’[9] Goodwin is advancing the argument that the Creation and the Fall are acts of God’s providence, and not direct means to the ‘Ultimate End’.  Means, therefore, have reference to Christ’s redemptive work; they have an immediate influence in bringing the elect to glory.  Thus, Goodwin argues that in the decree to the end, God considered man as unfallen.  He cites the German Reformed orthodox theologian, Amandus Polanus:

God in his Decree of Election, did behold (or look upon) his Elect, as the End he predestinated them unto, so as men absolutely in common, without all consideration of Qualities in them.  But if we consider the Means leading to the End, so he looked upon men, not as in their upright Condition (afore the Fall) but as they would be corrupt, of and in themselves, by the Fall, and faln headlong by their own default into Eternal Death.[10]

The issue, notes Goodwin, is not whether election has reference to the means unto the end and vice versa.  Rather, the controversy is whether God’s decree unto both the means and end was pitched ‘either wholly upon Man considered in the Mass of Creability afore the Fall, or wholly upon the Mass of Mankind considered and viewed first as fallen into sin.’[11] Upon Goodwin’s reading of various authors, he recognizes that many ‘do judge it incompatible that both should stand.’[12] Regarding the compatibility of both views, Goodwin argues that both ‘Conditions were at once viewed by God, so that One was neither first nor second to the Other in time.’[13] In what appears to be a position that cannot be simply designated as supralapsarianism or infralapsarianism, Goodwin writes:

God having all afore him in his immense Understanding, had in his purpose of Election to the End, a respect unto Man considered as unfaln, but in that to these Means unto Man considered as faln, and decreed both, and all in one and the same determination of his Divine Will.

That there have been some eminent Divines that have gone about to reconcile those different Opinions, Whether Men faln or unfaln were the Object of Predestination, may be well known among them that are versed in this Controversie.[14]

Both the end and the means were in God’s mind at once; ‘neither had a Priority of a Posteriority.’[15] In the divine mind and will, however, Goodwin argues that the decree to the end, where man is considered as unfallen, is the initial starting point (terminus a quo).

Goodwin refers to the German Reformed scholastic, Bartholomäus Keckermann, who argues similarly that the decree to elect falls under a twofold consideration.  First, regarding the end (i.e. eternal life), ‘the Fall was not necessary, because the Fall was not a Means thereof, but rather an Impediment.’[16] Second, the decree to elect may also be understood with respect to man fallen, which God foresaw, as the means.  Election, with a view to redemption, ‘necessarily includes a respect and consideration of the Fall.’[17] A crucial distinction between election and predestination is made by Goodwin.  Election has reference to the end.  Thus, in election God decrees to give men eternal life without consideration of the Fall.  However, predestination falls under God’s decree of man considered in sin.  Predestination, then, involves the means to the end.  Therefore, the supra- infra- debates cannot only have predestination in view, and whether man is considered as fallen or unfallen.  To do that misses Goodwin’s nuance because election and predestination are not strictly synonymous in his schema.

There’s a lot more to say, but the above shows that the teaching of the Confession cannot tip the scales decisively in favor of either position.  Sometimes Goodwin sounds infralapsarian (hence, Horton); and sometimes he sounds supralapsarian (hence, Trueman); and sometimes he sounds both (hence, Jones ;) )

[2] Works, II, Of Election, 79.

[3] Works, II, Of Election, 79.

[4] Works, II, Of Election, 79.

[5] Works, II, Of Election, 80.  The choice of ’super’ rather than ’supra’ most likely reflects an editorial mistake.

[6] Works, II, Of Election, 80.

[7] Works, II, Of Election, 80.

[8] Works, II, Of Election, 80.

[9] Works, II, Of Election, 80.

[10] Works, II, Of Election, 80-81.  Goodwin quotes Polanus’ most significant work, Syntagma theologiae Christianae (Hanover, 1609), 249.  See also A treatise of Amandus Polanus, concerning Gods eternall predestination Wherein both this excellent doctrine is briefly and syncerely deliuered, and many hard places of Scripture are opened and maintained against the corrupt expositions of Bellarmine and other adversaries. Translated by Roger Gostwyke (Cambridge, 1599).

[11] Works, II, Of Election, 81.

[12] Works, II, Of Election, 81.

[13] Works, II, Of Election, 81.

[14] Works, II, Of Election, 81.

[15] Works, II, Of Election, 82.

[16] Works, II, Of Election, 81.

[17] Works, II, Of Election, 81.