One of the more difficult questions to settle--both from a biblical and historico-theological perspective--is that which concerns how we are to view the children of baptized, professing believers. On one hand, we can be quite sure that the children of professing believers are, no less than the children of unbelievers, "by nature, children of wrath" and heirs of the fallen Adamic nature--as the Apostle Paul affirms in Eph. 2:1-4, Rom. 3:9-20 and Rom. 5:12-19--under God's curse and thoroughly deserving of His wrath. However, on the other hand, we know from the same Apostle that the children of professing believers, who are nurtured in the pale of the church--whether Old or New Covenant--have unique privileges (e.g. see Rom. 3:1-6, Rom. 9:1-4 and Hebrews 3:1-6) and "would be unclean (lit. pagan) but are now holy" (i.e. set apart, in some sense) according to 1 Cor. 7:14.