Both Scott Brown and Voddie Baucham incorporate a rejection of nurseries for children during church services into their program of family-integrated ministry in the church. Voddie remarks: “I believe one of the greatest crutches in the church is the nursery. Parents who have neglected to train their children have very little encouragement to do so when there is a place to hide them. The father who should be up in arms by the time he gets home from church because of the embarrassment to which his child has subjected him ends up going with a clear conscience while the nursery worker takes a handful of aspirin.” (145) Scott counsels: “Bring the children into the worship service; eliminate youth programs; cancel Sunday School, children’s church, and the nursery.” (258).
Let me make clear what I am and am not arguing for in this blog post. I am arguing that having nurseries for babies during the worship of the church is permissible. I am not arguing that it is mandatory. I do believe that it is prudent and wise, but that is quite a different thing than saying that it is biblically commanded. I know of no biblical command to have nurseries.
As I noted last time, that last admission of mine is fatal for me from Scott’s perspective. One needs warrant from Scripture to have nurseries. Otherwise one violates the regulative principle. In that blog I argued in response to this use of the regulative principle that the regulative principle only applies to the parts or elements of the church’s worship and not its circumstances. This is the explicit teaching of the 1689 Baptist Confession. Nurseries in my view are not an element of worship, but quite obviously, I think, a circumstance of the church’s worship “common to human actions and societies.”
A Weed in the Church also argues that there is biblical evidence for bringing children into the worship of the church. I agree that such evidence exists (Neh. 8:2; Eph. 6:1; Col. 3:20). All who could understand came to the meeting in Nehemiah 8. Children are addressed in Paul’s letters to the Ephesians and Colossians. Thus, it is clear that children who could understand were present. I grant that they should be present in the worship of the church.
But this does not prove that children too young to understand and too young to be taught not to be a disruption to the ministry of the Word should be present. In fact, the priority of the ministry of the Word actually suggests that such children should be removed from the meeting of the church lest they be a tool of the devil to distract people from the ministry of the Word.
Let me also note that A Weed in the Church cites Jeremy Walker (a contemporary Reformed Baptist) and Matthew Henry (the well-known Puritan) in support of his anti-nursery thesis. Neither the quotation from Jeremy Walker (165) nor the one from Matthew Henry (166-67) necessarily or clearly support Scott’s argument. The one from Walker actually appears to contradict it. (He speaks of the “intelligent presence” of children.)
A Weed in the Church attempts to argue that even babies in arms should be brought to church from Joel 2:15-16: “Blow a trumpet in Zion, Consecrate a fast, proclaim a solemn assembly, Gather the people, sanctify the congregation, Assemble the elders, Gather the children and the nursing infants. Let the bridegroom come out of his room And the bride out of her bridal chamber.” A lengthy exegesis of this passage is not necessary to see that that this is no ordinary solemn assembly. The occasion is one of the judgment of the locust plague and, hence, unusual mourning, a fast, and even the suspension of normal wedding activities is commanded.
All of this does not amount to a command to have nurseries. But let me say that having nurseries qualifies (at least in many cases) as what the Confessions calls a circumstance of corporate worship dictated by “the light of nature and Christian prudence.” One of my sons is an officer in the Air Force. On the basis of some counsel he and his wife visited a Reformed church near the base where they were stationed. At the time they had an infant (our grandson) who less than 6 months old. He was not one of those quiet babies! Nor was he ready to be trained to sit still and quiet in church. While I suspect that this church was influenced by the kind of polemic against nurseries launched by Scott and Voddie, I do not know for sure. Whatever the case may be, this church provided no nursery services for such infants. While my children might have seriously considered this church on other grounds, the lack of a nursery would have meant that they could never worship together as a family. They felt it could not be an option for them for this reason.
Dr. Sam Waldron is the Academic Dean of CBTS and professor of Systematic Theology. He is also one of the pastors of Grace Reformed Baptist Church in Owensboro, KY. Dr. Waldron received a B.A. from Cornerstone University, an M.Div. from Trinity Ministerial Academy, a Th.M. from Grand Rapids Theological Seminary, and a Ph.D. from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. From 1977 to 2001 he was a pastor of the Reformed Baptist Church of Grand Rapids, MI. Dr. Waldron is the author of numerous books including A Modern Exposition of the 1689 Baptist Confession of Faith, The End Times Made Simple, Baptist Roots in America, To Be Continued?, and MacArthur’s Millennial Manifesto: A Friendly Response.
