"Family driven faith is about more than just being a better parent.  This is a complete lifestyle and worldview overhaul.  If we believe that God calls us to worship Him without rivals, build our homes on a foundation of biblical love, adopt a biblical worldview, teach the Word in our homes, mark our homes as God’s territory, and keep our prosperity in check, then we must also believe that God intends for the church to aid and not hinder families in this process.  Unfortunately there are times when this is not the case.  I say unfortunately because we may be missing out on a tremendous revival.”                     -Voddie Baucham Jr.

I love the idea of family integrated church. But, I ponder how it works. Do the children all sit quietly while the pastor preaches? What about screaming babies? I think there is the idea at my church that people are unable to pay attention if there is a lot of noise or commotion. And that children under a certain age are unable to sit still. Personally I believe that if God wants you to hear something you will hear it even if you are in the midst of a tornado (or a room full of screaming wiggling little ones) but that is just me.

 I believe that families should worship together on the Lord’s Day. I believe that children (young and old) should sit with their parent’s during service. I even like the idea of no Sunday school and (I saw this on Baucham’s church website) lunch together on Sunday afternoon. I think this is how church used to be done and I have a feeling that it worked just fine. I have a feeling that because they did it that way they didn’t feel as rushed and worn out as we do today…I think if we had fewer commitments at church it would return to being a joyful time instead of feeling (as it often does) like work. I even believe that lunch after church would cure the problem that many married young adult Sunday school classes have of being unable to find time to socialize during the week or on Saturdays.

My problem is that this is not the way my church (which I dearly love) does church. Children are allowed in the worship service, but only if they can sit very quietly and never need to leave. If they do leave, they are technically not allowed back in. In fact no one is “allowed” to enter or leave the sanctuary after the service has started. The only way in or out is to go to the third floor and enter or exit that way. The doors aren’t locked but they are corded off. Sometimes I wonder how guests who are late to church react to this?

I remember when these measures went into place and how my heart dropped. At the time Caleb hadn’t started attending big church with us and I felt like the new “rules” were set up just to exclude little ones. But, I’m not going to talk about my church because as I said I dearly love it and I don’t want you to think badly of it. It is a wonderful Christ-centered church and things are run in a way that (I believe) is typical of large churches.

I am thinking about attempting to train my new little one and possibly Bess to sit through church from the beginning. (See the previous posts.) But, I’m wondering what I will do when they are potty training. I’m also wondering what I will do when my new little one (due in April) starts to howl…I guess I will be sitting in the lobby a lot or more than likely Mark will send him or both of them (Bess and the baby) off to the nursery. Mark told me yesterday that he simply can’t imagine Bess ever sitting still long enough (at this age) to make it through service. I guess I have a lot of work to do.

All of our older children including Caleb attend worship with us, but they also attend Sunday school (SS) first while we attend SS and I see no way to change this short of changing churches which isn’t going to happen unless we move.

In his book, Family Driven Faith Baucham suggests starting a family integrated SS class…which is a definite idea and would solve part of the problem.

In the meantime, I’ll just have to do the best I can do…

blessings,

dani

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. (Deuteronomy 6:5)