Permissible Solutions

So what do we do with the child who disturbs the worship service?

Generally, a child will fidget or cry or yell because of one of two reasons. The child is either uncomfortable or he is disobedient, neither of which are necessarily lasting conditions. A baby may simply be hungry, or the child may need to use the restroom.

In either case, if the child cannot be contained, he should be temporarily removed from the service, where he can usually be calmed down within a few minutes.

He should then be brought back into the public worship where he belongs. Keeping him out only serves to give the child leverage to use against the parents. In all cases, the parent should be in control, not the child.

It has been argued that by keeping a child in the service when he doesn’t want to be there, he learns to hate the worship service.

But do you teach him to love the service by keeping him out?

No, you can’t teach your child to appreciate the worship of God without giving him the discipline to witness and participate in it.

Would you teach him to like vegetables by giving him ice cream?

Appreciation comes in degrees. It takes time, patience, and skill. Too often, we opt for the easy answer and we fail in the objective.

The work that you, as a parent, put into teaching your child to love the ordinances of Christ is well worth the effort even if it means that you miss most of the sermon yourself. In the long run, after all, both he and those around him will hear more sermons and be given additional opportunities.

I don’t believe that it is a good idea for a church to have a nursery, since nurseries are designed to remove the children from the worship service, while the rule should be that the entire church worship together as a body.

Removing your child from the service temporarily is not the equivalent to having a nursery, as the first is an exception to the rule while the second is a substitution for the rule. The first is an emergency measure for the sake of keeping the rule, while the second establishes a pattern that is contrary to the rule. The first is temporary while the second is a permanent fixture. The first is permissible, while the second is unnecessary, detrimental, and prohibited.

Churches with active nurseries often lead to “junior church” because the children who have become accustomed to the nursery still haven’t learned how to conduct themselves in the worship service.

What happens when junior graduates from junior church? Do we continue to entertain them, or do we lose them altogether?

The promise is to you and to your children. It is not yours alone.