As we see the wholesale destruction of our young people’s minds and hearts through inferior education, indoctrination. This has escalated to the literal altercation of their physical bodies. The end result is a malformed, distorted and immoral mental understanding of reality. As a result, this is forced or led our youth to a lack of spiritual understanding and stability.
This leads us to ask the simple question as to where to these young people stand with God? The concept of “age of accountability” is that children up until some point in life are not held accountable by God for their sins until they reach a certain age. If a child dies before reaching the “age of accountability,” that child will be by the grace and mercy of God, be granted entrance into heaven. This leads us to ask: Is the concept of an age of accountability biblical? If such a thing exists, what is that age or age range? The BIble does not directly address an age of accountability but some verses do so indirectly.
GotQuestions.Com notes that Romans 1:20 says, “Since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualitatives-his eternal power and divine nature-have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse”. According to this, mankind’s guilt before God is based, in part, on a rejection of WAHT can be “clearly seen” of God’s existence, externality, and power. So what about children who have no faculty for “clearly seeing” or reasoning about God-wouldn’t their natural incapacity to observe and reason excuse them from judgement? https://www.gotquestions.org/age-of-accountability.html
The age of 13 is the most commonly suggested for the age of accountability, based on the Jewish custom that child becomes an adult at the age of 13. In the Catholic religion, they have “Confirmation” which is very much the same thing. But the Bible gives no support as to the age of 13 as the set age for accountability. My advisor, the late Dr. Norman Geisler said that depending on the child, it’s more like the age of 8 years of age.
Deuteronomy also provides us some idea as to how God holds young people accountable for their sin. In Deuteronomy 1:39 we find a clear illustration of God’s grace on children up to the age of 20 coming out of the wilderness. Please keep in mind that their parents and grandparents all died in the desert while wondering in the wilderness for 40 years-leaving only their children to inherit the promise land. In-part, this is due to the fact that the parents and grandparents were overwhelmingly disobedient to God. In response, God used their children to fulfill His promise of the Promise Land to the Israelites. Let’s take a deeper look:
In Deuteronomy 1:39, God says through Moses, “…your little ones and your children” in terms of their being held accountable to God for their sin as was the case with their parents and grandparents who, outside a few, never made it out of thr desert into the Promise Land. Again, most all of the Israelit's who wandered in the desert for those 40 years perished in the desert-again, leaving their children to inherit the promise land.
“…your little ones and your children”. The most outrageous of the Israelites complaints against God was that He wanted their children to die (Numbers 14:31). But the Lord demonstrates His love and faithfulness to His people in this passage by protecting those younger than twenty so that they could and would inherit the land. The “age of accountability” for a human being is certainly much younger than twenty years of age, but God made an exception in this specific case in His grace, love and promise to the Israelites in granting grace to those-up to the age of twenty.
I want to now take home the central point of today’s devotion regarding “THE AGE OF ACCOUNTABILITY” through the words, "NO KNOWLEDGE OF GOOD AND EVIL”: Isaiah wrote (at that time), that children less than a few years old were considered to be not yet fully responsible (Isaiah 7:15). By EXTENDING the age limit to twenty (in this special exception re: God’s plans plan for having the Israelites wander in the desert for 40 years-leading to the deaths of most all of the adult generation), that the Lord also, again, showed God’s compassion on their children to go into the Promise Land (Numbers 14:18).
As we witness the modern day wholesale destruction of our young people through poor and misdirected education, indoctrination, and now literal altercations of their physical bodies, mental understanding of reality, and spiritual stability, this leads us to ask the simple question as to where to these young people stand with God?
I want to better attempt to answer that question focussed on the passage most often cited in support of an age of accountability, which is 2 Samuel 12:21-23. The context of this passage is that King David committed adultery with Bathsheba, resulting in an unplanned pregnancy. David mourned and fasted to a point that caused concern among his household and his cabinet. When the child died, David stopped fasting and asked, “Can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he will not return to me.” David’s words seem to indicate that infants who die are safe in the presence of the Lord.
I believe, generally speaking (as all children are different in their physical, mental and spiritual development), that the general age of accountability is around 8 years of age-generally speaking. I don’t believe that at five years of age that a child has developed the ability to think rational enough to be held accountable. Their brain and child in whole is still vastly underdeveloped.
In short, in answering this question, lets keep in mind that God left us with the responsibility of protecting the culture, political climate, church and family: We are called to protect and guide/lead our children and all young people into the age of accountability through the arms of Jesus Christ. This is why Reason For Truth and Equipped Academy was created-to help adults affectively impact their world for Jesus Christ, and young people in particular to grow solid in their faith by the time of accountability. Thank you for being part of that. If you want to be part of that and support our efforts, please check out www.ReasonForTruth.Org/donate. I pray you will consider dong that. Let's now get out there and fulfill what the Lord has called each one of us to do in helping this next generation rightfully enter the age of accountability.
-Steven Garofalo
