Let me say this. Keep your Bibles
handy. If you don't have one, you've
got access to one. You'll need a Bible this morning. Romans,
chapter 5. What the Apostle Paul is proving
in these verses is that when Adam sinned, their
sin passed on to all their prosperity, to all their children, to all
their descendants. And he says that here in verse
12. And then in some other verses
that we'll look at in just a minute, he proves that sin has passed
on to Adam's prosperity by proving the effects that sin has. Look
what he says here in verse 12. Wherefore, as by one man sin
entered into the world, and death by sin, so death passed upon
all men. For in him, in Adam, all have
sinned, in whom all have sinned." Now, he gives three effects here
in this chapter of sin, Adam's sin, and leaves no doubt about
If we won't receive the divine testimony of the Word of God,
that is, that sin has actually passed, his sin passed to you,
then Paul gives us three effects of this sin. Look here in verse
18. This sin, this imputed sin to
all of Adam's descendants, it affected their standing before
God. It affected our condition before
God. It reached all the way to our
soul, the effects of this sin. Look what he says in verse 18,
"...therefore, as by the offense of one, judgment came upon all
men to condemnation." Guilt! Guilt passed upon all of Adam's
descendants. What is the effects of sin? Guilt. God would never charge a man
with guilt if he had no sin. Condemnation is a result of sin
being judged. And he gives another effect here
in verse 19. Here is another effect. Here
is the way Adam's sin has affected us all. Look what it's done to
our very nature. Look in verse 19. For as by one
man's disobedience many were made sinners. When were you made a sinner? That's what he said, wasn't it?
You know the Apostle Paul was writing here. We know that he
was writing here by divine revelation. The Lord was teaching him this,
the revelation of Jesus Christ. No man taught Paul this. But
if we could just set aside the Apostle's epistle here, we can
prove this by the Old Testament Paul never wrote anything that
was contrary to the scriptures. Let's trace this effect of sin
and see if we can find where it began. Look here with me.
Now, this is not my subject, but it has to lead up to my subject. Look in Genesis 8. This was read
to us just the other night. Look in Genesis 8, what the Old
Testament says. We can trace this sin back to
a person's youth. It ain't just something that
he was condemned and made a sinner when he was an old man. But we
can trace it back to his youth. Look here in Genesis 8, verse
21. And the Lord smelled a sweet
savor, and the Lord said in his heart, I will not again curse
the ground any more for man's sake. For the imagination of
man's heart is evil from his youth. Now, you can find a youth,
and you can positively say this about that young man, that the
imaginations of his heart is evil. No doubt about it. Youth, childhood and youth is
vanity. You can call it a man's nature.
You can call it his heart. You can call it his soul. I don't
care what you call it, but when you find it, it's evil. It's
correct. But we can trace it back further
than this. Look here in Psalms 58. Look in Psalm 58, verse 3.
Trace it back further than you. Look here in Psalm 58, verse
3. David said this, are restrained from the womb. They go astray as soon as they
be born, speaking lies." A man has a bad nature when he
comes out from his mother's womb. He is born already ruined, already
dead. That's what Paul is talking about.
But you know we can trace it back further than this. Look
in chapter 51, and look in verse 5. Look what David says here, "'Behold,
I was shapen in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive
me.' David's mother was no adulteress. She was a child of God, as far
as we know. But David is saying, I inherited
this sinful, fallen, corrupt nature. And where did he get
it? Paul said, by one man's disobedience, by one man's sin. That's the
effect of Adam's sin. It condemned us. We're guilty. A
man can receive the divine testimony or not. But that's all we've
got to go by, and that's enough. Here's another effect. Look back
over in Romans again, Romans chapter 5. Here's the third effect. It condemns us, Adam's sin was
passed on to us, the guilt of it, the condemnation, the nature
His fallen nature, sin, has corrupted and ruined us all. And Paul tells
us here in verse 14 that it has another effect, and that's death,
physical death. Look what he says in verse 14.
He said, "'Death reigned from Adam to Moses, even them who
had not sinned after Adam's likeness, after the likeness of his sin.'"
How did Adam sin? He sinned willfully. He sinned
knowingly. Now, who is it in all this world
that hasn't sinned willfully and knowingly and actually? Everybody
that I've ever read, verse 14 says, this can be nobody but
infants. It has to be infants. And this brings me to my subject.
And before I get on my subject, let me say these two things. And I don't know that I've ever
begun a subject by making this statement, but I've never dealt with this. I don't say that everything I'm
going to show you today is right, but it's according to my understanding.
It's according to my understanding. And there I could count on one
or two fingers the places that I'd say what I'm going to tell
you today. The reason I come here today and am willing in
my heart to deal with what I'm going to deal with today is because
most of you, I know you. I don't know all your names,
but I know you when I see you and I remember you in my heart.
And you may leave here today, and you may say, Boy, Bruce missed
it today, but I love that old hillbilly so much, I'm going
to forgive him. And he may have missed it today,
but next time I see him, Lord, have him straighten out, and
he's found a head again. That's the only reason I'm going
to say some things I say today. This is according to my understanding,
and this is a subject that I've been concerned about for years
and years and years. I haven't found too much regarding
them in the scriptures, but I'm going to show you what I have.
What happens to infants when they die? Have you ever thought
about that? Paul said, Death reigned from
Adam to Moses, death reigned from Moses to Christ, death reigning
over our infants now. I started thinking one day about
the infants, the babies, the young people, the youth that
I've lost in my family, several of them, several of them. And
I was taking a shower the last time just a few days ago, I lost
the last one, and all these scriptures began to pummel into my mind,
and I want to give you some of them. with our little infants,
our little youths, who die. How is it? Now, take your Bibles
and turn to some scriptures with me. First of all, look in 2 Kings,
chapter 4. You remember the story, Elijah,
2 Kings, chapter 4. Elijah was the Lord's traveling
prophet. He traveled and preached. There
was this young woman, she was a Shunammite woman. She had married
an old man who had no children. She had built this prophet a
little house on the wall for him to stay in when he came down
there to preach, and he often stayed there. He asked her one
day, he said, Why don't you do this for me?" Well, his servant
says, she has no children. She has no children. And this
prophet said, this time next year you're going to have a child,
you're going to have a baby. And boy, she did. She rejoiced
over that child. I don't know how old this child
was. The scriptures tell us that when the child was grown, he
was a child. He wasn't a man, he wasn't an
adult, he was a child. He wasn't an infant, but he was
a child. He was so little that he went out one day with his
father. in the fields, and he had a son stroke. And his father
got one of the youth to carry the little lad back to his mother. So he was a child that another
child could carry. And he went back home, and he
sat on his mother's lap, and she rocked him, and he died.
He died. Oh, and her heart was broken.
Her heart was dreamed. And she saddled up the old ass,
told her servant to saddle him up, said, You make haste, we're
going to that prophet. We're going to that prophet. And the
prophet saw her coming, and he sent out his servant to speak
to her and said, Is it well? Look in chapter 4, verse 26. This prophet sent his servant,
and here's what he said to say, Run now, I pray thee, to meet
her, and say unto her, Is it well with thee? Is it well with
thy husband? Is it well with a child? And she said, It is well. He
did, but she said, It is well. Now, I know that I could say
that she knew it was going to be well because she believed
in her heart that this prophet was going to raise her child
up from the dead. Well, she may have, but that never happened
before. I'll say this, if he did, that's fine, it's well with
the child. But if he don't, it's still well
with my child. Look in Job 3, and look in verse 11. What's the condition of an infant
who dies in its infancy? Look in Job 3. Here's what Job
says. Look in Job 3 and begin here
in verse 11. Job, bless his heart, you know
all the things that come up on him. He begins to curse the day
that he was born and wishes he had never been born. He says,
Here is the condition I'd love to be in right now. Look where
he begins in verse 11. Why died I not from the womb?
Why did I not give up the ghost when I came out of the belly?
Why did the knees prevent me, or why the breast that I should
suck? For now should I have lain still
and been quiet, I should have slept, then had I been at rest,
with kings and counsellors of the earth, which build desolate
places for themselves, or with princes that have gold, who fill
their houses with silver, or as in a hidden, untimely birth,
a premature birth, I had not been, as infamous, which never
saw the There the wicked cease from troubling, and there the
weary be at rest. There the prisoners rest together,
and they hear not the voice of depression." Judges seems to
tell us that when these infants die, they are at rest. This is
the same word that we often quote, this rest. Blessed are the dead
who die in the Lord, that they may rest. Job said, I wish I'd
have been like a little infant that died and I'd have been at
rest from the oppressor. How is it with a child? He's
at rest. Look here at another scripture.
Look here at 2 Samuel. Where does a child go when he
dies? Where does our little infants go when they die? Look at 2 Samuel,
chapter 12. Second Samuel, chapter 12. You remember this story. David
and Bathsheba had had their first child. The Lord had judged David
for the wickedness of his ways, and he said, I'm going to take
the child, he's going to die, just a small child. David began
to fast. He went in, laid on the ground,
laid on the dirt, wouldn't eat, wouldn't drink water. His servants
were even afraid to come in. They said, Would you come in,
David, and eat with us? No. He was grieved, praying that
the Lord would spare his child. And the child died. The child
died. And they said, Well, we're not
going to say anything to him about this. If he was this grieved
when the child was suffering, oh, he's going to die now that
the child's dead. And David saw them whispering
one with another. And he perceived the child had
died. So he got up and shaved himself and took a bath and put
on clean clothes and said, Set the table. I'm going to eat something
now. They said, David, we don't understand
you. While the child was suffering, you were grieved and prayed.
But now the child is dead and you seem to be relieved. You
seem to be happy. Why? And here's what David said
in verse 23. Look in verse 22, David said,
For the child was yet alive, I fasted and wept. For I said,
Who can tell whether God will be gracious to me that the child
may live? But now he is dead, wherefore
shall I fast? Can I bring him back again? No. But I shall go to him. I shall
go to him. I wonder where David is this
morning. I wonder where David is. He's
wherever this child is. I don't think he was talking
about the grave. He was talking about something that sort of
cheered him, sort of relieved him. I'll go to see him again. I'll be with him. But he's where
David is. He's where David is. But that brings us to this question,
don't it? youths and these infants are
condemned in Adam, if they are corrupt by nature, how can we expect them to be
at rest? How can we expect that it would
be well with them in their death? How can we expect them to go
to heaven when they die? What hope would we have? How do you expect to go there? By one man's obedience, many
are made righteous. If David's little boy is with
him, it's not because he was David's little boy. If David's little boy is in heaven
with him, it's not because he was innocent and guiltless. If these infants really go there
to be with the Lord, they go there the same way we go there.
They have this righteousness to clothe them, bludge them,
to wash them from all their sins. But you say, what about faith?
What about knowledge? Boy, I tell you, that's battling. Some lady told me one time, she
said, You're putting too much stock in faith. Oh, my goodness! He that believeth hath eternal
life. He that believeth not shall not
see life. He that believeth in the Son
is not condemned. These things have I written unto
you that believe on the name of the Son of God, that ye may
know." All faith is vital. What about knowing him? Boy,
it's vital, ain't it? I know whom I have believed.
All shall know me from the least to the greatest. But I'll tell
you something that's more vital than knowing him, for him to
know you. That's vital, too, ain't it?
I know my sheep. I've got sheep that haven't even
been barned yet. I know them. I've known them
much longer than they've known me, and their coming to know
me is just the fruit of my knowing them. I think that's pretty vital. The Lord knew me and loved me
long before I knew and loved him. Now, in the light of that, look
over here in Jeremiah 1. You remember what those fellows
said on the Day of Judgment when they stood and argued with the
Lord? They said, Lord, we know you. We've preached in your name. We've cast out devils in your
name. We've done many wonderful works in your name. We know you.
But he said, I never knew you. I never knew you. Look here what he told this man
here, this Jeremiah. Look what he says here in verse
5. He told this very timid prophet,
he said in verse 5, "'Before I farmed thee in the womb,' in
the belly, I knew thee. And before thou comest forth
out of the womb, I sanctified thee, I separated thee, I ordained
a prophet unto the nations. He knew him, knew this man when
he was in the world and before he was in the world. He knew
him. And he said, I've separated you, I've set you apart, I'm
going to put my Spirit in you, and you're going to preach to
this people. If the Lord could do that to
this prophet, could he not set all infants aside, and washed
them, and clothed them in the same blood and righteousness
that all believers are washed in clothing." Could he not, if
he wanted to? Could he not secretly do that? Could he not see the prevail
of the soul of the Lord Jesus and be satisfied on behalf of
these dying infants? When he sees me, he sees the
blood of the Lamb. He views me as perfect and not
as I am. Could he not view them the same
way? You know, the Lord does a lot
of secret things that you and I don't know about. We'd have never known that he
knew Jeremiah in the womb unless he had told us. I was reading
in the science part of our newspaper. You probably didn't know I read
science, would you? I was reading in the science
part of our newspaper a couple of weeks ago. They've got out
Sephora out in space now with these telescopes and cameras
and all that, and they're seeing farther out than they've ever
seen before. And they have these, they call them quasars, you've
probably heard of them. They're universes. We live in the Milky Way galaxy,
and all these are galaxies. They call them quasars, and to
be qualified as a quasar, It's got to have a sun, a bright spot
like our sun, and it shines one trillion times brighter than
our sun. Can you imagine a galaxy like
that? They have documented and charted 13,000 quasars. And one scientist said, we have
just never seen this before. There are a lot of things out
there they've never seen. Our Lord didn't create it for
their eyesight. There are a lot of things he
secretly does he don't do it for man's sake. He does it for
his own pleasure, his own satisfaction. Boy, this is a beautiful day.
I thought this morning as I got up, I went out and looked into
the sky, and it looked like you could just keep on looking at
this blue sky. And don't you imagine there's
a landscape somewhere, there's a mountain, or there's a valley,
or there's someplace out on the ocean. Tonight will be one of
the most beautiful sunsets that I will never see in that location. Those views that if a man could
get to it, it would be one of the most beautiful places, but
nobody has ever seen it. Those fish swimming in streams
that none of us here will ever drop a hook in. Those flowers,
I'm certain, blooming somewhere on the desert that you'll never
stick onto your nose and smell. It's not there for you. The Lord
has done it for his glory and his pleasure. He is always doing
secret things that you and I don't know anything about. If he is
pleased to come to a dying infant, a little child, and wash him
secretly in the blood of our dear Lord Jesus, and clothe that
infant with the righteousness that he has clothed you with,
he can do that. He does a lot secretly. Now,
if I'm wrong about this, if I'm wrong, do you hope I'm wrong or right?
Which way are you hoping this morning? I've run into a fellow,
too, that hoped I was wrong, you'd think, by their attitude.
But if I'm wrong, all the Lord is going to condemn me of, just
thinking too highly of his goodness. I just think he is so good, without
any obligation. He is so good, he is so gracious
and so tender that he saves the most vulnerable and the weakest
among us, our little infants. I rejoice to think that about
him, don't you? But if you say, well, I just don't believe he
does that secretly without them knowing, without them hearing.
Let me show you two or three more scriptures there. Look over
here with me in Luke. Look in Luke 1. What capacity
does a little infant have? To hear, to know, to believe. Look here in Luke 1. Here is another man who had desired
a child, he and his wife. In Luke 1, verse 13, the angel
said unto him, Fear not, Zacharias, for thy prayer is heard. Thy
wife of Isbeth shall bear thee a son, and thou shalt call his
name John. And thou shalt have joy and gladness,
and many shall rejoice at his birth. For he shall be great
in the sight of the Lord, and shall drink neither wine nor
strong He shall be filled with the Holy Ghost, even from his
mother's womb." Look over here in chapter 1, and look here in
verse 39. What capacity does an infant
have to hear and believe and feel? Mary here was with child herself,
and she arose in those days, and went into the hill country
with haste into the city of Judah, and entered into the house of
Zacharias, and saluted Elizabeth. And it came to pass, when Elizabeth
heard the salutation of Mary, the babe leaped in her womb,
and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Ghost." Why did this
baby leap? This baby leaped apart from its mother. It wasn't her
leaping, it was the baby leaping. Why did he leap? Why did he leap? He was six months in the womb.
What is that? What trimester is that? The third
trimester? Is that what that is? And the baby leaped! He leaped! And that's not all he tells us
why he leaped. Look in verse 43, which is this
to me, that the mother of my Lord should come unto me, for
lo, as soon as the boys of thy salutation sounded in my ears. The babe leaped And he is filled with so much
joy. Do you know what joy is the result of? Knowing. Knowing, knowledge. This is my
mother's, Lord, he's coming, he's coming, and he's late. That's quite a bit of capacity,
ain't it? Ain't got just as much capacity,
I guess, as we have if the Lord gives it to us. One thing's been a burden to
me all my Christian life, and I don't have a member of my family
that knows the Lord. I've looked and searched, and
I can't find one member of my family, my relatives, that knows
the Lord. My grandfather was a freewill
Baptist preacher, and what my dad tells me about him, if he
goes to heaven, I don't know if it'll be a safe place or not.
Some of the things my dad told me about him. I began to think one day, I've
got two little sisters, one's buried back up in Kentucky somewhere,
ten days old. I have another one over here
in the cemetery, she's four days old. And I thought, oh my, I may have
some relatives. And if they are, I can't believe
they're just floating around up there, like little Casper They're leaping, they're worshiping,
they're praising Him who set them apart in the womb and washed
them and clothed them and tucked them to be with Him. I'll tell you one thing that
makes me believe that. Look over here in Matthew Chapter
21. Look in Matthew Chapter 21. Some of us preachers went down
to Mexico back in the late winter. We went down to the Mayan ruins, and we walked up on a wall there,
and we found this where they carved it out, way back somewhere
around 1,000 or 1,200. And they carved several of these
out. There was an eagle there with
an infant's heart in his hand, carved out. And they said what
they often did, those Mayan Indians, they killed their little infants.
They killed their little infants. And sometimes they gave their
hearts to animals, and they burnt their bodies. And Brother Don
Faulkner, he was a few steps ahead of me. And you know how
boisterous Don gets sometimes. Somebody said something about
all these little infants, and Don said, He said the Lord is going to
get his elect out of these bunch of heathens if he has to get
them out of the entrance. All I can do is say, Amen, brother. Look at what our Master says
here. He had been here in the temple
to worship and heal. And it said in verse 14, the
blind and the lame came to him in the temple, Matthew 21, verse
14, and he healed them. And when the chief priests and
the scribes saw the wonderful things that he did, and the children
crying in the temple and saying, Hosanna to the Son of David,
they were sore displeased. And he said unto them, And Jesus
said unto him, Yea, have you never read out of the mouths
of babes and sucklings thou hast perfected praise? I don't know
how old you could be and be classified as a babe, but a suckling is
one that is still on the breast. And the Lord said, These sucklings
are praising him. What capacity do I have to worship
him? Whatever capacity he please,
forgive him. Now, do you think that he's going to have babes
and sucklings worship him here on this earth and not in heaven?
I think heaven is going to be full of them. They're going to
be leaping and praising and worshiping. Hosanna to the Lamb! They're
going to be there with angels, those mighty angels, saying, Where is that lamb? You know this world, there's
so many in this world, always has been that hates our babies.
Harry tried his best to wipe them all out. Killed a bunch
of them, didn't he? Two years old and under. Menacia
worshipped the devil, put his children in the fire. The devil
hates our youth. He hates our children. There was a man that came to
our master one day, and he said, have mercy on my son. The devil's
taking him, throwing him in the fire, throwing him in the water,
trying to kill him. Have mercy on him. It's been
this way ever since he's just a little bitty fellow, the devil
trying to kill him. Ain't it wonderful to know that
they have a protector? You read this verse over in Psalms
8 sometime, where our Lord quoted it from, and he goes ahead to
say, out of the mouths of babes and sucklings he's perfected
praise, ordained praise because of the enemy! I'll praise him for saving our
infants who die. They'll praise him for it, and
the devil is going to be so frustrated. Well, God bless you. You've been a
good people to preach to.