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Where can we find that those who die as children will be resurrected as children?

Dear Gramps, What is the reference for the teaching that those who die in childhood will be resurrected to be children and will be raised by their worthy parents in the Millennium? Heather, from Dublin, Ohio

Dear Heather,

The prime scriptural reference for your subject is found in Doctrine and Covenants 45 :58-59–

And the earth shall be given unto them for an inheritance; and they shall multiply and wax strong, and their children shall grow up without sin unto salvation.

For the Lord shall be in their midst, and his glory shall be upon them, and he will be their king and their lawgiver.

This scripture is referring to events associated with the First Resurrection, and the statement that their children shall grow up, implies that they who die as children will be resurrected as children.

This concept has been enlarged up by President Joseph Fielding Smith,, who stated the following–

When President Smith declares that "the body will come forth as it is laid to rest, for there is no growth in the grave," he has in mind this: Infants and children do not grow in the grave, but when they come forth, they will come forth with the same body and in the same size in which the body was when it was laid away. After the resurrection the body will grow until it has reached the full stature of manhood or womanhood. He did not intend to teach that the adult who loses a leg will come forth without that leg until it can be grafted on after the resurrection. Rather, his body will come forth complete in every part. Deformities and the like will be corrected, if not immediately at the time of the uniting of the spirit and body, so soon thereafter that it will make no difference. We may be sure that every man will receive his body in its perfect frame in the resurrection. ( Doctrines of Salvation, edited by Bruce R. McConkie, 2:, p.294)

Gramps