Children Born in the Covenant

covenent quote

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The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints

Or Sealed Later

"(Those born under the covenant,) being heirs, they have claim upon the blessings of the gospel beyond what those not so born are entitled to receive.  They may receive a greater guidance, a greater protection, a greater inspiration from the Spirit of the Lord; and then there is no power that can take them away from their parents.

"Those born under the covenant, throughout all eternity, are the children of their parents.  Nothing except the unpardonable sin, or sin unto death, can break this tie...parents may still feel after them and eventually bring them back near to them again."

Joseph Fielding Smith:


"The Holy One of Israel, who is the Mediator of the covenant, has promised that when a seal is placed upon a father and mother--a seal that comes through faithfulness to their eternal covenants--their children will be bound to them forever. 

Even if the children stray, the tentacles of the everlasting covenant will feel after them and they shall, either here or hereafter, return to the fold.   We do not fully understand all of the implications of this marvelous promise, but we trust in the ransoming and redeeming power of our Lord who is also our Savior."

From Robert Millet's book "When a Child Wanders."


"God has fulfilled his promises to us."   President Lorenzo Snow explained, 'and our prospects are grand and glorious. Yes, in the next life we will have our wives, and our sons and daughters.  If we do not get them all at once, we will have them some time, for every knee shall bow and every tongue shall confess that Jesus is the Christ. 

You that are mourning about your children straying away will have your sons and daughters.  If you succeed in passing through these trials and afflictions and receive a resurrection, you will, by the power of the Priesthood, work and labor, as the Son of God has, until you get all your sons and daughters in the path of exaltation and glory. 

This is just as sure as that the sun rose this morning in yonder mountains.  Therefore, mourn not because all your sons and daughters do not follow in the path that you have marked out to them, or give heed to your counsels. 

In as much as we succeed in securing eternal glory, and stand as saviors, and as kings and priests to our God, we will have our posterity... God will accomplish his purposes in the salvation of His sons and daughters... "     

Quoting Lorenzo Snow: (Address delivered 6 Oct. 1893 in Collected Discourses, 3:36-65.)


"You parents of the wilful and the wayward!  Don't give them up. Don't cast them off. They are not utterly lost.  The Shepherd will find his sheep. They were his before they were yours--long before he entrusted them to your care; and you cannot begin to love them as he loves them. 

They have but strayed in ignorance from the Path of Right, and God is merciful to ignorance.  Only the fulness of knowledge brings the fulness of accountability. 

Our Heavenly Father is far more merciful, infinitely more charitable, than even the best of his servants, and the Everlasting Gospel is mightier in power to save than our narrow finite minds can comprehend.

A Word For The Wayward  Orson F. Whitney, Conference Report, April 1929, p.110


A Precious Promise:

"The Prophet Joseph Smith declared--and he never taught more comforting doctrine--that the eternal sealings of faithful parents and the divine promises made to them for valiant service in the Cause of Truth, would save not only themselves, but likewise their posterity. 

Though some of the sheep may wander, the eye of the Shepherd is upon them, and sooner or later they will feel the tentacles of Divine Providence reaching out after them and drawing them back to the fold.  Either in this life or the life to come, they will return. 

They will have to pay their debt to justice; they will suffer for their sins; and may tread a thorny path; but if it leads them at last, like the penitent Prodigal, to a loving and forgiving father's heart and home, the painful experience will not have been in vain. 

Pray for your careless and disobedient children; hold on to them with your faith.  Hope on, trust on, till you see the salvation of God."   (Orson F. Whitney, CR Apr. 1929, pg. 110.)

"We cannot overemphasize the value of temple marriage, the binding tie of the sealing ordinance, and the standards of worthiness required of them.  When parents keep the covenants they have made at the altar of the temple, their children will be forever bound to them.

Orson R. Whitney, quoting the prophet Joseph Smith: May 1992 Ensign, pg. 68 by Elder Packer


President Brigham Young said:

'Let the father and mother, who are members of this Church and Kingdom, take a righteous course, and strive with all their might never to do a wrong, but to do good all their lives; if they have one child or one hundred children, if they conduct themselves towards them as they should, binding them to the Lord by their faith and prayers, I care not where those children go, they are bound up to their parents by an everlasting tie, and no power of earth or hell can separate them from their parents in eternity; they will return again to the fountain from whence they sprang.' (Discourse of Brigham Young, Compiled by John A. Widtsoe, pg. 208)"


"A successful parent is one who has loved, one who has sacrificed, and one who has cared for, taught, and ministered to the needs of a child. If you have done all of these and your child is still wayward or troublesome or worldly, it could well be that you are, nevertheless, a successful parent.

Perhaps there are children who have come into the world that would challenge any set of parents under any set of circumstances. Likewise, perhaps there are others who would bless the lives of, and be a joy to, almost any father or mother.

"My concern today is that there are parents who may be pronouncing harsh judgments upon themselves and may be allowing these feelings to destroy their lives, when in fact they have done their best and should continue in faith. That all who are parents might find joy in their efforts with their children is my prayer, in the name of Jesus Christ, amen."

"Parents' Concern for Children"  -   Howard W. Hunter  -  Ensign, Nov. 1983, pp. 63-65 also in April 1995 Ensign, p. 21


"There are some great spiritual promises which may help faithful parents in this church.  Children of eternal sealings may have visited upon them the divine promises made to their valiant forebears who nobly kept their covenants. 

Covenants remembered by parents will be remembered by God.  The children may thus become the beneficiaries and inheritors of these great covenants and promises.  This is because they are the children of the Covenant."

James E. Faust, "The Greatest Challenge in the World—Good Parenting," Ensign, Nov. 1990, 32


"Perhaps in this life we are not given to fully understand how enduring the sealing cords of righteous parents are to their children.  It may very well be that there are more helpful sources at work than we know.  I believe there is a strong familial pull as the influence of beloved ancestors continues with us from the other side of the veil."

President James E. Faust, "Dear are the Sheep that have Wandered", May 2003 Ensign


"This principle has to do with the hope that Latter-day Saints have as they honor the sacred gospel covenants they made at the marriage altar in the temple. They and their children born or sealed in the covenant have a right to spiritual help in this life.

Even those children who have for a time forsaken the gospel often speak of a recurring, troubling need to return to the fold. Perhaps these desires come to them because they are children of the covenant—children whose hearts, planted with patriarchal promises, "shall turn to their fathers." (D&C 2:2.)

"What hope does the gospel give to parents of errant youth?" - Harold C. Brown, "I Have a Question," Ensign, Mar. 1993, 53–54


"Some parents suffer greatly because they blame themselves unduly for having been poor parents. In this position they are likely to misapply President David O. McKay's wonderfully prophetic statement that "no other success can compensate for failure in the home" (in Conference Report, Apr. 1964, 5).

They seem to draw the unintended implication that since they have a child who is abusing drugs or alcohol, they must be failures as parents; hence, no matter how hard they have tried, no other good they have done or success they have achieved can compensate for their parental failure at home.

Because this statement was intended to inspire parents to become or stay involved with their children, it should not be taken to mean that parents who have indeed put great time, effort, and sacrifice into parenting, and yet who have still not reaped the desired rewards, have failed. A closer look at additional counsel and doctrines may provide much needed perspective."

John K. Carmack, "When Our Children Go Astray," Ensign, Feb. 1997, 7