Do Babies Go to Heaven?

Do babies who die before they have the capacity to make rational decisions go to heaven? 

Every person is born with two natures: the old sin nature, one is often called the Adamic nature, or the fallen nature. As they grow and reach what is called the age of accountability they are responsible for their personal sins. This is the point at which they have the ability of discernment, the capacity to reason and make logical choices. Some religious groups set the age at 10 and others 12. However, that age varies from person to person depending on their pattern of growth.  At the point of reasoning they are accountable for their personal sins.

Scripture records that people are judged on the basis of sins committed voluntary and consciously in the body (see 2 Cor. 5:10; 1 Cor. 6:9–10; Rev. 20:11–12). In other words, eternal judgment is always based on conscious rejection of divine revelation and willful disobedience. Infants are not capable of either. There is no explicit account in Scripture of any other judgment based on any other grounds. Infants do not come under these conditions and hence are unaccountable.

Before an infant reaches the age of accountability they don’t know good or evil and hence lack the capacity to make morally informed—and thus responsible—choices. According to Deuteronomy 1:39 they are said to “have no knowledge of good or evil.”

This same principle relates to those who live beyond infancy but, because of mental disability or some other handicap, are incapable of moral discernment, deliberation, or volition.

Jesus was born of the virgin, thus He had no old sin nature. He lived a sinless life and was free of personal sin. When He died on Calvary He saved us from all sins, those of our old sin nature and the repentant of all personal sins.

Thus, He died for the infants old sin nature. At that stage the infant has no personal sin. Not being accountable for either the old sin nature and having no personal sin for which they are accountable, the child is free of sin and goes to heaven.

Critics who question Jesus’ virgin birth and say it is irrelevant overlook this vital factor. On the basis of the virgin birth rests the eternal destiny of the baby. It is worth noting that includes those aborted also.

An aside question relates to how old will babies be in heaven, and not only they, but all people. Eternity is a timeless sphere and hence all heavenly bodies will be ageless. Our new body will indeed be new chronologically and in composition. That is just one of the many miracles we are unequipped to fully answer.