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Meditation for
Ashley Hope Barrett
John
Piper
October
28, 1995
Romans 14:7-9 For
none of us lives to himself alone and none of us dies to himself alone.
8) If we live, we live to the Lord; and if we die, we die to the Lord.
So, whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord.
9) For this very reason, Christ died and returned to life so that
he might be Lord of both the dead and the living.
Is Ashley hope included in this promise?
Notice the “we” in verse 8.
It is Christians – people who embrace and do not reject the
death and resurrection of Jesus as their ground of life and hope.
Does that include Ashley? Twelve hours old. Not
able with her mind to construe the gospel or anything else.
And so not able to mentally respond to the truth of Christ?
Key questions:
Is
it God’s way to execute judgment upon those who, while guilty in Adam
(Romans 5), do not yet have experiential access to the light of the
glory of God?
To
ask it another way: even
though we believe that all children come into the world with a sinful
nature and, in one sense, are under the curse of the law because of the
fall of humanity into sin, does God carry through the execution of his
judgment on persons apart from their own personal, experiential
rebellion against the revelation of his glory?
And I
have in mind of course little children who do not yet have the natural,
mental capacity to understand the revelation of God’s glory either in
the gospel or in nature.
My answer to the question is based on a biblical
principle found in several texts.
For example, Jesus says in John 9:41 to those who
were offended at his teaching and asked if he thought they were
blind—he said, “If you were blind, you would not have had sin; but
since you say, ‘We see,’ your sin remains.”
In other words, if a person lacks the natural
capacity to see the revelation of God’s will or God’s glory then
that person’s sin would not remain—God would not bring the person
into final judgment for not believing what he had no natural capacity to
see.
The other text is Romans 1:20 where Paul is dealing
with persons who have not heard the gospel and have no access to it, but
who do have access to the revelation of God’s glory in nature:
Romans 1:20 “Since
the creation of the world God’s invisible attributes, His eternal
power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood
through what has been made, so
that they are without excuse.”
In other words:
if a person did not have access to the revelation of God’s
glory – did not have the natural capacity to see it and understand it,
then Paul implies they would have an excuse at the judgment.
The point for us is that even though we human beings
are under the penalty of everlasting judgment and death because of the
fall of our race into sin and the sinful nature that we all have,
nevertheless God only executes this judgment on those who have the
natural capacity to see his glory and understand his will, and refuse to
embrace it as their treasure.
Infants like Ashley Hope, I believe, do not yet have
that capacity; and therefore, in God’s inscrutable way, he has brought
Ashley under the forgiving blood of his Son.
She is included in the “we” of Romans 14:8
Verse 8: “If we live,
we live to the Lord; and if we die, we die to the Lord.”
So Ashley died to the Lord. For
her that couldn’t mean, as it can for us, that she consciously
glorified the Lord by trusting and treasuring the Lord in her dying.
But it could mean, and did mean, that she died for the Lord’s
sake. IN her dying
something was experienced from the Lord which would otherwise not have
been experienced, and which causes us to thank the Lord and trust the
Lord and love the Lord more because of it. She did not die in vain.
She died to the Lord—her dying had to do with the Lord.
It was for the Lord’s sake.
She didn’t just die with reference to herself, or
with reference to us, though we wish that here life were in her still
and that she were with us still. But
we are not the main actors here. God
is. She died to the Lord.
Then Paul says (v. 8b-9),
“So, whether we live
or die, we belong to the Lord. 9)
For this very reason, Christ died and returned to life so that he might
be Lord of both the dead and the living.”
And so we learn that Ashley is the Lord’s.
She belongs to the Lord. “Whether
we live or die we belong to the Lord.”
As Paul says elsewhere, “We have been bought with a price and
we are not our own” (1 Cor. 6:19-20).
And the price was his own death and resurrection.
When we repeat the words from Job 1:21, “The Lord
gave, and the Lord has taken away,” we should remember that when the
Lord takes his children, he does not just take “away,” he takes to
himself. Do you hear that
in these verses?
So, whether we
live or die, we belong to the Lord.
9) For this very reason, Christ died and returned to life so that
he might be Lord of both the dead!
So these two things we may say: Ashley died not just
to herself, but to the Lord—for his sake—to bring something of him
into our experience that would not otherwise have been there—for us to
know and trust and love and treasure.
Secondly, Ashley belongs to the Lord first and not to
us. He died and lived again
that he might own her and be her Lord.
And he is.
Now I close with one other question.
Why a mere nine month life in the womb and a twelve hour life in
this world?
Let me give you the answer of Marshall Shelley.
On November 22, 1991 his son was born at 8:20 PM.
At 8:22 his son died—a chromasonal defect, Trisomy 13—no
known cause. “As far as I
was concerned, it was a design flaw and the Designer was directly
responsible.”
Three months after his son’s death, his daughter,
Mandy, who was severely retarded, died, two weeks short of her second
birthday.
He asked, Why did God design a child to live for two
minutes—and two years?
Answer: “Why
did God create a child to live two minutes?
He didn’t. He did
not create Mandy to live two years.
He did not create me to live 40 years…God created [my son] for
eternity. He created each
of us for eternity, where we may be surprised to find our true calling,
which always seemed just out of reach here on earth.”
James says, “You
do not know what your life will be like tomorrow. You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then
vanishes away.”
We see Ashley’s life as a vapor.
James says our lives are a vapor.
Because when measured against eternity—where we will all
live—the difference between her life and ours is infinitesimal.
When Marshall’s baby boy was born, they handed him
to Susan, and they watched him turn from pink to blue and stop
breathing. The nurse asked,
“Do you have a name for your baby?”
And Susan looked up and said, “Toby.
It’s short for Tobiah, which means, God is good.”
Sort of like the nurse saying on Thursday morning at
Children’s Medical Center, “What’s her name?” And Jan saying,
“Ashley HOPE.”
Marshall summed up his answer to the alumni:
Life is hard and God is good.
I would only add:
life is short—two minutes, twelve hours, two years, 50
years—it’s short. And
eternity is long. Let’s
get ready. Christ died and rose again that he might be Lord of the dead
and the living—forever. Let’s
trust him. And use our days
for his glory.
Let’s be little children; in many ways just like
Ashley Hope.
Copyright by John Piper 1995, Desiring
God Ministries.
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