​​​What happens to children after they die?
​
Will we see and recognize them after our own death?
The love of infants is a most powerful love. Every parent knows this from experience. There is scarcely one parent in a thousand who has not felt utterly possessed by the tender innocence and affection of their little ones. The sun rises and sets in the welfare and progress of their helpless babies. Nor is there any true parent who would not give their all, even to life itself, so their children might live. And everyone, whether a parent or not, knows the power of that love from the rousing of their own inmost feelings in the presence of little children, and from the universal condemnation of all those who would deliberately harm a child.

For millions the love of their children brings the first mature realization of what it means to love others more than one’s self. And from that love there flows forth with them a genuine love of society and of the human race. The love of infants is, as it were, the fountainhead of the love of the neighbor. The nations of the earth are soon brought back to a realization of this fact, if they should ever forget it; for the continuation and the welfare of the nation depends entirely upon the strength and exercise of the love of infants within it.

What is it in a little child to move so strongly the hearts of men? It is not just because a little child appears to be one’s own that one loves it; for there are millions who have never had children of their own who yet love them with all their hearts. It is the innocence of a child that causes them to love and be loved. This innocence is the willingness to be led, the willingness to be instructed, to be raised up out of ignorance and helplessness, to be led to what is good and true, to what is just and fair. Every man born into the world is so conditioned that his existence depends upon this innocence, so much so that, if there were with him no willingness to be led, he would perish. And what is wonderful is that every sincere and genuine thought and affection which comes into existence with man during his whole life takes its origin from that same innocence in which we are providentially placed during infancy and childhood. That willingness to be led is what leads us to learn, to become wise, to seek the true and the good of life, to seek God and to live according to His will. There is not one good thing in any man or  woman that does not have its rise in us from that deeply implanted innocence.

The Lord Jesus Christ, who is the God of heaven and earth, said to His disciples, “Suffer little children to come unto me, and forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom of God. Verily, I say unto you, Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child shall in no wise enter therein.” (Luke 18:16.) The Lord said this because the kingdom of heaven is a kingdom of what is good and true, and all that is good and true in us is from that little child, the innocence which God gives to us in infancy. When that same innocence matures in us, and fills us with the desire to be led by the Lord, the kingdom of God is in us, and we are in it.

There can be no parent who has lost a child who does not ask this question in his heart. To have one’s child die from accident or from disease is a suffering beyond the use of words to describe. For those who know nothing of the answer to this question it is not merely a personal loss from the apparent severing of that tender love, nor is it merely the sense of futility from the apparent end of all one’s labor and care. It goes deeper than this, involving one’s faith in God, that harm and death can overtake and destroy that in which there is nothing but good and life. It is therefore of importance to our faith as well as to our wounded hearts that we should ask what becomes of those who die as children. And perhaps in our searching into this question many other things of the Providence of God for the good of our spirits may be revealed to us.

That little children do not perish at death, and that we shall see them again is taught both in the Old and New Testaments. When the servants of King David questioned him that he should weep while his son was ailing and cease to weep when his son died, David replied,

“While the child was yet alive, I fasted and wept: for I said, Who can tell whether God will be gracious to me, that the child may live? But now he is dead, wherefore should I fast? Can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me.” (II Samuel, 12: 22, 23.) 

"I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me."  Here briefly is expressed the innate perception of man that he will again see those whom he has loved.

The contents of this page are from a lecture by a Lord's New Church minister, the late Rev. Philip Odhner.   It was inspired by the book, "Heaven and Hell". There is a chapter titled “Little Children in Heaven ,” (numbers 329-345), which we urge you to read.
Top of page

Seek Truth