Third Category of God’s Creations
- Michael E.B. Maher
- Feb 19
- 5 min read
But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, to an innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly and church of the firstborn who are registered in heaven, to God the Judge of all, to the spirits of just men made perfect, to Jesus the Mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling that speaks better things than that of Abel.
(Hebrews 12:22-24)
Heaven is presently populated by three distinct classes of God’s creations. One class consists of the angels of God, and another consists of the saints of God, who together make up the church. However, there is also a third class of God’s creations in heaven today: children.
In the passage quoted above, the Holy Spirit identifies these three classes. He first mentions the angels, then the saints, whom He refers to as “the general assembly and church of the firstborn who are registered in heaven.” He then introduces the third class, described as “the spirits of just men made perfect.” This phrase can also be translated as “the spirits of the innocent made perfect.” Since Scripture teaches that God regards children as innocent (Psalm 106:38), this expression refers to the children of God.
Since the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, both saints and children who die go directly to heaven. At present, they rest together in that part of heaven which our Lord called Paradise (Luke 23:43), also known as Eden, the garden of God. They are there in spirit only, however, as neither the saints nor the children have yet received their physical bodies.
Events Prior to Resurrection of Children
It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and such sexual immorality as is not even named among the Gentiles--that a man has his father's wife! And you are puffed up, and have not rather mourned, that he who has done this deed might be taken away from among you. For I indeed, as absent in body but present in spirit, have already judged (as though I were present) him who has so done this deed. In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when you are gathered together, along with my spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.
(1 Corinthians 5:1-5)
I have quoted the passage above to explain an important biblical truth. The context is that a particular saint had begun practicing the sin of sexual immorality. The apostle Paul understood that if the church did not intervene, continued sin would harden this man’s heart to the point where he would eventually commit the sin unto death and thus lose his salvation (1 John 5:16).
To prevent this outcome, Paul pronounced a sentence of early physical death upon the individual before he could commit the sin that leads to spiritual death, thereby preserving his salvation in the day of the Lord Jesus.
The principle is therefore clear: because God is concerned above all with our eternal future, if He sees His saints pursuing a path that will jeopardize that future, He will sooner judge them with early physical death than allow them to lose their eternal salvation.
That same principle applies to children. God has predestined all children who die to reside for all eternity on the new earth. For this reason, He allows them to die before they reach the age of accountability, knowing that after that age they would be condemned to eternal punishment. In light of this principle, we can now consider what God will do with all children at the end of the age.
At the close of the present dispensation, when the church is finally caught away from the earth, all children under the age of thirteen will die at that same time.
Some may object and ask, “Why would God be so cruel as to kill all the children on the earth at that time?” The answer is that it is not the cruelty of God that removes the children, but His mercy. God will not allow children to be exposed to His wrath poured out upon the earth after the church is raptured. Therefore, He will remove them from the earth to be with the Lord Jesus in heaven.
God acted in a similar manner when He judged the earth with the flood in the days of Noah, and again when He judged Sodom and Gomorrah. In both instances, the children perished alongside their parents. The difference, however, is that the parents went to hell, while the children went to heaven.
From the time of the rapture until God the Father creates the new heavens and the new earth, no more children will be born on the earth. The saints will no longer have children, for our Lord taught that they neither marry nor are given in marriage (Luke 20:35). Likewise, the unbelievers left behind on the earth after the rapture will also no longer have children.
Some have mistakenly assumed that unbelievers will continue to have children during the Lord’s millennial reign. If that were the case, however, God would be unjust, because all children born during that period would inevitably be condemned to the second death.
The reason for this is that they would be born into bodies still contaminated by the sin nature inherited from Adam (Romans 7:23). Since sin will still be present on the earth during the millennium, when such children reached the age of accountability, their spirits would die upon committing sin, resulting in separation from God (Romans 7:9).
In order for anyone to be born again, they must be baptized into Christ and thereby become part of the bride of Christ. However, by that time the bride will already be complete. No further individuals will be able to be baptized into Christ, and thus there would be no means by which they could be born again.
Consequently, children born during that period would be condemned to the second death, just as their unbelieving parents would be. God is not unjust, however, and therefore He will not allow any more children to be born until He creates the new heavens and the new earth, in which only righteousness dwells (2 Peter 3:13).
When the Lord Jesus returns to the earth after God’s wrath has been completed, He will return with His saints alone—that is, the Lord’s martyrs. All children who have died from the time of Adam until the rapture will remain in heaven and will not return to the earth during the period of the Lord’s millennial reign.
As previously noted, it is estimated that there are approximately thirty billion children in heaven today. Most are no longer children in appearance, having grown and matured just as they would have had they remained on the earth for the full number of their days.
Nevertheless, although many are now adults in heaven, they are not part of the bride of Christ. As such, they will remain in heaven, awaiting the new earth that God the Father will create at the end of the present age. It is then that they will live again by receiving their resurrected bodies, and it is then that they will leave heaven to take up residence on God’s new earth.
Michael E.B. Maher
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