What is perplexing and surprising to me is that you would insist that one could be in "covenant with God" according to the promise of God; aka: salvation and be able to "break covenant", i.e., to cut off their salvation.
Even a cursory reading of my posts bears out the fact that I have never suggested that one can lose his covenant position in Christ. You simply will not allow for the distinction between the establishment of the covenant (which is with the elect only), and the formal administration of it (to the elect and the reprobate).
Your whole defense of the issue of circumcised children breaking covenant under Abraham was that they fell away from the national covenant. Again, there was no view toward national covenant when God put forth the stipulations of the Abrahamic covenant; for this covenant was an everlasting covenant. Surely your biblical (Vosian) theology is much better than this. The simple solution is that when infants "break covenant" they fall away from the external status of elect.
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So, you tell you little Bobby that "Christ died for you and paid for all your sins." And then when he shows no fruit of the indwelling Spirit of God, you tell him what? "I guess Christ didn't die for your sins after all."? Or, do you resort to Arminian retorts, such as, "Well, Jesus did pay for all your sins on the cross, but you didn't make take advantage of that."?
The apostle Paul told the baptized community at Corinth that Christ died for "our sins." Yet some were not converted no doubt. Accordingly, when hypocrites manifest there unbelief the church should say with the apostle John that they went out from us because they were not truly of us. The church often times has to change its declarations. This is no surprise. If we aren’t willing to do this then the church can never say with Paul that Christ died for our sins – for the declaration will on occasion be incorrect.
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Tell me, brother, what is so important that we as believing parents tell our children, "Christ died for you"? Is that supposed to be some encouragementn to the child to believe on Christ? If so, then why not tell EVERYONE that Christ died for their sins? Of course, I am assuming you don't do that, do you?
Working backwards, of course I don't do that simply because there’s no biblical precedence for it. As for the encouragement to the covenant child, yes I do think it's an encouragement -- but more to the point, there's enormous biblical precedence in my estimation. As for the encouraging aspect, I can only imagine that God is giving his elect children the comfort of knowing this precious truth from birth. I can only wonder whether God on some occasions has ordained reprobation to covenant children by the means of also ordaining that they not be treated as Christ’s lambs by their parents from birth.
That's all I really have to say on the matter. My position is clear and you obviously reject it. I only hope that you would represent it in Christian charity.
