ràdio Questions answered vitti Dr. Samuel H. Sutherland and Dr. Charles L. Feinberg
Q. Orting, Washington — “What do you call 'the age of accountability?’ We have family devotions and attend Sun day school and church.” A. It is good to hear of a family which follows such an important prac tice. “The age of accountability” is generally recognized as that period in a child’s life when he comes to a real ization of the fact that he is a sinner and that he needs a Saviour. At that point he is held accountable for the decision of acceptance or rejection of the Lord Jesus Christ. Up to that time his soul is covered by the blood of Jesus. Some have arbitrarily placed this age between 11 and 13. We be lieve, however, that a specific age cannot be given. We know of children much earlier than that coming to a personal relationship with the Lord. Whatever the age is when a little child gives evidence of the fact that he knows he is a sinner, it is then that he is in line to accept the Lord Jesus Christ. He needs all of_the en couragement possible to receive the Saviour. One of our students testified on a broadcast the other day that when she was young she and her brother liked to play church. When she was six and her brother eight, she gave her heart to Christ after he had preached the sermon. The altar call was as important in that moment as though it had been given in a regular church. The assurance of sins forgiven has never diminished through the inter vening years, and now she is graduat ing from Biola. Q. Los Angeles, California — ‘‘How is one to use the g ift of ‘discerning the spirits’ in the church?”
A. In I Corinthians 12:10 we read, “To another the working of miracles; to another prophecy; to another dis cerning of spirits; to another divers kinds on tongues; to another the in terpretation of tongues.” Perhaps a better way to answer this is how we are not to use this gift in the church. The spirit of God certainly never meant for an individual to set himself up as a self-appointed judge or critic of others. This is not the way God has constituted authority in the church for the discipline of the body of Christ. The Lord does want to .give us a keen sense of judgment or in sight. It is really supernatural and that is why it is called a gift. Revela tion 2:2 gives us a good instance of this as we read, “I know thy works, and thy labour, and thy patience, and how thou can’st not bear them which are evil: and thou has tried them which say they are apostles, and are not, and hast found them liars.” This is a tremendous use of the discerning of spirits. Liberalism would never have gotten such a hold in our major denominations if more people, who had been endowed with this gift, had utilized it in a humble, reverent man ner under the direction of the Holy Spirit. Q . Canon City, Colorado — “What about the men who crucified the Lord Jesus? Were they forgiven? When Peter preached after Pentecost he said, ‘You crucified Christ,’ and the people cried out, ‘What milst we do to be saved?” ’ A. This is given to us in Acts 2:23. Peter states, “Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and fore knowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and 15
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