It is tough getting a family ready for worship, especially when you have two or three little ones. It may be especially hard to try to get them ready a second time for Sunday night. Thoughts may even go through our mind like, “They don’t really learn anything from it any way.” But is that really true?

Let me suggest a few very important things that even younger children gain from worship. First, they do learn bits and pieces. The more they hear, the more they will learn even if the majority of the lesson is over their heads. The truth is that in the typical sermon there are many things that even a younger child can understand. It might surprise us what they actually hear as they are coloring in their coloring books!

Attending worship is also the formulation of a very important habit. Obviously it is more than a habit, but yet it is a habit. After we attend consistently for a while our children learn that this is simply what we do. There is seldom an argument or even a whimper of disapproval about going. This good habit will likely become their own habit some day.

We will struggle with our children’s attitude toward worship when we are not regular in attendance. Surely they must reason, “We didn’t go last time, why should we go now?”

In attending worship services our children also learn what is important to us. We must understand that our values usually become their values. In contrast to this, what do we teach our children when we skip worship from time to time? They learn that worship and God are simply not as important as the things that we skip them for.

Children certainly do profit from being in the worship assembly. May we always allow our little children to come unto Him (cf. Mt. 19:14).

Daren Scroeder