Effects on our children:

• Most children under the age of 3 go through periods of separation anxiety, some more than others, and many children don't separate well from their parents, especially mothers, at all.  The existence of the nursery, and particularly the attitude that it's the "right" place for baby, prompts many parents to leave anxious children in the nursery.  Many nursery workers won't call mom to get a crying or otherwise stressed child because they believe it's their job to keep the child so mom can have a break.  Before we were convicted against using the nurseries, I had workers keep my crying baby after I had explicitly instructed them not to let her fuss, but to get me from the service.  I believe this is rather common.  Worse still, is the attitude many parents have toward their children's anxiety.  My last day of nursery duty was when I watched an otherwise playful child lay on the floor for an hour because she was going through a period of separation anxiety.  When her mother returned after service, she as indifferent to it, stating, "It's just a stage."  This attitude of forcing separation on little children is not good for them.  The nursery perpetrates this stress in many babie's lives.
• Nursing moms will often leave a baby in the nursery with a supplemental bottle.  This is unacceptable as it breaches God's design for breastfeeding.  (See my article Breastfeeding By Design.)
• Spending years in nurseries and Children's Church gives children the wrong idea about church.  It teaches them that church time is play time rather than time to worship God.  They get watered down Bible stories, crafts, puppets, skits, games, coloring pictures and social time.  This sets them up for a real attitude problem when, around the age of 10 or 12, they are expected to attend "adult" service.  If you don't think so, take a look around the congregations and see how many young teens are sitting with their arms crossed, staring into space during service on Sunday.  PRO 22:6 says, "Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old he will not depart from it."  Are you training your children to worship God or look at church as playtime?
• Many parents believe the children's programs are sufficient spiritual training for their children, thus these children are not getting the strong spiritual training they need.
• Children's program workers may expose our children to values that we don't approve of.  Just because a church has chosen and approved a worker for the children's program doesn't mean s/he is someone who should be teaching our children.  I have had the experience where a children's program worker was showing videos that were questionable to many Christian parents.
• Childhood is a time when the mind and heart are open to spiritual things.  Putting children into "children's programs" instead of teaching them to worship and learn in the fellowship of believers gives them the impression that they don't have to take God seriously, that it's for adults.  You miss a crucial time in their development and risk instilling in them a lazy attitude toward the true Christian life.
• Children's programs separate children from the fellowship of believers and give them the impression that they don't belong.  In her article Bringing Children to Worship Rev. Wendy S. Baily writes, "In worship children, even infants, experience love and begin to build a sense of belonging to a family of faith -- a community of believers."  Children cannot begin to build a sense of belonging if they aren't there.
• Utilizing the nurseries and children's church demeans our children's ability to listen and their ability to behave.  Most children can handle much more than most adults give them credit for.  We have found that with a bit of training, even very young children can sit still for an average length sermon and a 5 year old can get as much out of it as she would get from a watered-down children's lesson.

Effects on Parents:

• Setting children aside for worship and Bible study perpetrates a selfish "me first" attitude in parents.  It trains us to think that this is "our" time that we need to guard and elevates the status of adults as being more important than children.  This can easily carry over into other areas of our lives.  If our children aren't important enough in our lives to attend church with them, then it's easy to send them to baby-sitters, day care, and the like far more than is necessary or good for our families.
• Putting their children into the children's programs allows parents to shirk their responsibility to properly train their children, both spiritually and behavior-wise.  Parents are allowed to continue in thinking that children's capabilities are far more limited than reality would demonstrate and don't stretch themselves to be the parents their children need.  These parents will never experience the fullness of their parental roles.

Effects on the Family:

• Worshipping God and studying the Bible together is the foundation for a strong family.  By using children's church and nurseries, we fragment our families and do not learn to worship in one accord.
• On any given Sunday, members of the same family will be learning from different parts of the Bible.  They will not have the same Biblical principle to work through during the week.  They miss a key opportunity for growing together in the Lord and growing closer as a family.

Effects on the Church:

• Strong families are the basic building blocks of the church.  Without strong families our churches will not be a strong support to other believers or a strong witness to non-believers.
• Separating children from adults perpetrates the humanistic attitude that society belongs to adults and children can be dealt with when it's convenient for grown-ups.
• By providing and encouraging parents to use nurseries and children's church, the church allows others to continue in the attitude that children are burdens and hassles, rather than blessings.  It nurtures the idea that children are somehow "bad" or "naughty" and it's too much trouble to train them properly.
• On any given Sunday some members must be absent from the fellowship of believers and the worship service to staff the nurseries and children's churches.  This occurs again during Bible study, when typically the same people are involved with the children's program week after week.  They are being denied the benefits of the worship service and Bible study to support the artificial social structure of the church.
• Restructuring the family into peer groups denies other members of the church the privilege of ministering to families.  Yes, it creates rooms that need to be staffed, but this is not the same as a teenager ministering to a family that obviously needs another hand or an older couple giving some mentoring advice.
• When we place our children into nurseries and children's church programs, we deny ourselves of the example children are supposed to be for us.  Jesus, Himself, told us:
whoever humbles himself as this little child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.  MAT 18:4
In her article Bringing Children to Worship Rev. Wendy S. Baily writes, "Having Children in worship with them helps adults remember what it means to be a 'child' of God."
• When you meet someone without their children, you do not truly get to know them.  These friendships are not complete.  You cannot build an interconnected church with incomplete relationships and expect it to be strong and thrive.  This sort of artificiality in fellowship leads to a weak support system among Christians.

Effects on Society:

• Our society is in desperate trouble because the American family is falling apart.  As Christians, we could contribute strong families with wholesome values as well as the knowledge of how to build families up.  Instead, because we, too, are sending each family member his or her own way, we are contributing to the demise of the American family.  Our witness to and impact on the world is severely limited by following their lead in separating ourselves from our children.

• In chapter 16, God reviews the Feast of Weeks and the Feast of Tabernacles.  Again, He tells the Jews who should participate.
• You shall rejoice before the Lord you God, you and your son and your daughter, your manservant and your maidservant, the Levite who is within your gates, the stranger and the fatherless and the widow who are among you (vs. 11)
• and you shall rejoice in your feast, you and your son and your daughter, your manservant and your maidservant and the Levite, the stranger and the fatherless and the widow, who are within your gates. (vs.14)
 
• After Moses writes down the law, it is commanded to be read before all of Israel every seven years.
Gather the people together, men and women and little ones, and the stranger who is within your gates, that they may hear the word of the Lord your God and carefully observe all the words of this law (31:12)

Twice in Nehemiah chapter 8 (vs. 2 and 3) we see Ezra read the Law before "all who could hear with understanding."  This may appear like an endorsement for nurseries for the younger children, but I believe it falls into one of 2 circumstances, neither of which is a nursery.

1. Throughout the Bible we read of specific people, and even large groups of Israelites, disobeying God.  In one instance they made a golden calf and worshipped it.  In another, David committed adultery and had Urriah murdered.  Just because it's in the Bible, doesn't mean it's an example to follow.  I believe, that  if the Israelites truly left people out of the reading of the law, it was against the very law they were hearing.  Remember, Deuteronomy 31:21 says that even the little ones, taph, are to be present for the reading of the law.
2. Consider that most of the people had to travel long distances to gather for the reading of the law.  They would not have left their children at home.  They would have brought their children with them to the general assembly, and I do not think they would have been left in tents.

Besides, if "all who could hear with understanding" were listening, who would be left to watch those who couldn't?  Surely if they were too young to hear with understanding, they were too young to tend to themselves.

Further in Nehemiah 8 we read (vs. 7-8):

Also, Jeshua, Bani, Sherebiah, Jamin, Akkub, Shabbethai, Hodijah, Maaseiah, Kelita, Azariah, Jozabad, Hanan, Pelaiah, and the Levites, helped the people to understand the Law; and the people stood in their place.  So they read distinctly from the book, in the Laws of God;  and they gave the sense, and helped them to understand the reading.

Even the adults needed help understanding the reading. This raises the question of how much understanding is expected in order to attend a sermon.  One passage that interested me in thinking about this question is Exodus 12:26.  Here, God institutes Passover as the means of escape from the tenth plague, the death of the firstborn.  After explaining the how-to's, God tells the Israelites that they are to observe the Passover with their children forever.  Verse 26 reads:

And it shall be, when your children say to you, "What do you mean by this service?"

Essentially, God is looking for the children to ask the reason for the celebration.  They do not need to understand it.  I believe this same standard can be applied to children hearing a sermon.  Any child who can ask, "Why?" which is the essence of the question above, is old enough to attend a sermon and get something out of it.  I had this very experience with my son when he was 3 1/2 years old.  We were listening to a sermon about Jesus being the good shepherd.  The pastor had given a short children's talk about sheep and shepherds to prepare them.  During the sermon, Jonah said in a voice somewhat above a whisper, "He said shepherd."  Certainly, Jonah had heard enough of the sermon to ask "Why?"  After the service we were able to help him better understand the meaning of the sermon.

Another thought:  If we start applying the condition of a "certain level of understanding" to our children in order for them to attend a sermon, do we also apply it to adults who are mentally impaired in some way?  Should we offer them some sort of watered down alternative to the regular sermon?  I think we would agree that this would be an affront to their dignity.  How much more so, then, is it an affront to our children who have the capacity to grow past their current level of understanding if they are properly challenged.

So far we've been looking at the Old Testament.  Let us now move on to the New Testament and see how children and families are handled there.

In the gospels, children are present at least frequently when Jesus speaks.  Twice we read about Jesus miraculously feeding the multitudes who followed to hear him speak:

• MAT 14:21
Now those that had eaten were about five thousand men, besides women and children.
• MAT 15:38
Now those who ate were four thousand men, besides women and children.

These children were not left behind in some central child-care facility.  They were brought along on a long walk, in the heat, many without food to hear Jesus.  In our modern society, we get the comparative luxury of a quick car ride, climate controlled buildings, and services scheduled around mealtimes yet we don't expect our children to be able to handle it.
 

• MAR 9:36
Then He took a little child and set him in the midst of them.

Here, the disciples are arguing about which one of them is the greatest.  To illustrate His point, Jesus takes a child into His arms.  I do not think He went down the road to the nursery to find a child.  This child was right there, with his or her parents, listening to the Lord speak.

• MAR 10:13-14
Then they brought young children to Him, that He might touch them; but the disciples rebuked those who brought them.  But when Jesus saw it, He was greatly displeased and said to them, "Let the little children come to Me, and do not forbid them; for of such is the kingdom of God.

Here, the disciples try to send the children away because they believe children are a bother to Jesus.  Jesus is greatly displeased with this attitude, the very same attitude we deliberately perpetrate in our churches today!

Two examples of how children were treated in the early church occur in Paul's letters to the Ephesians and the Colossians.  This is less obvious than the others, but still important.  Bear in mind that Paul's letters were read in the weekly meetings of the early Christian church.