Romans 6:3-4 “Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? (4) Therefore, we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.”
Although all children that die go to heaven to be with the Lord, they are not part of the body of Christ. Only those that have been baptised into Christ are part of the body of Christ. And it is only those who have received Jesus Christ as their Lord and Saviour that have been baptized into His death and been raised together with Him in new life. This truth is revealed to us in the passage of scripture quoted above. In other words only those who have been born-again qualify to be part of the body of Christ.
Colossians 1:18 “And He is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things He may have the preeminence.”
In the passage of scripture quoted above we see that Jesus was the first one to be born-again, for He is the firstborn from the dead. And the church, which is His body, is made up of all who have been born-again through faith in Him. Children who die do not meet these requirements, for they have never died spiritually and thus can never be born-again. And so we see that children who die and go to heaven are not included in the church of Christ.
2 Corinthians 5:9-10 “Therefore we make it our aim, whether present or absent, to be well pleasing to Him. (10) For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive the things done in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad.”
There are two eternal judgements that will take place at the end of the age. The first, as revealed to us in the above quoted passage of scripture is the judgement of the Lord’s church. We will give an account to Him of our lives as born-again believers, and we will receive from Him eternal rewards, or incur loss, as a result of that judgement. All unbelievers will be judged by the church at the end of the age (1 Corinthians 6:2). It is at that judgement, when all unbelievers will be cast into the lake of fire for all eternity. Children who die and go to heaven however, will not be judged, either by the Lord or by the church, for as we have already seen, God does not hold them accountable for the brief lives that they lived on the earth.
1 Thessalonians 4:16 “For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first.”
At the coming of the Lord Jesus the first resurrection will take place. It is only the church that will be raised from the dead in that resurrection, for the scripture quoted above plainly tells us that it is the “dead in Christ” that will rise first. Children that have died are not in Christ, and so they will not partake of the first resurrection. So what will happen to children that are on the earth when the first resurrection takes place, i.e. children of Christian parents as well as children of unbelievers? Although they will not at that time, receive their resurrected bodies as the church does, each one of them will die and go to heaven. For when the church is taken out of the earth, the wrath of God will be poured out on the earth. And just as the church has not been appointed to wrath (1 Thessalonians 5:9), neither have any of God’s children been appointed to wrath.
Michael E.B. Maher
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