Thursday, January 12, 2012

Children's church for adults


A pastor once said to the members of his congregation, “Children sometimes can be a distraction (loud, playful, uncontrollable, etc).  Do not get me wrong I love children, but they can get out of hand sometimes. One of the reason we have a children church is for parents and other members to focus on the sermon, not on controlling the children.  I do not want anyone to lose a blessing, so please take your children to children’s church”.
 Nevertheless, have you ever being at church listening to the sermon very attentively when suddenly one of the members (adult) starts yelling?
Does this sound familiar? Hallelujah!!!!  Preach!!!!  Preach pastor!!!!  I know what you are going to say!!!!! say it!!!! (The exclamation points are the level of loudness). They start talking directly to the pastor from their seats while the pastor is preaching. 
If you were going to be blessed by something the pastor was going to say at that particular moment, too bad, but you lost your blessing. You were not able to hear anything, because the person next to you started yelling from the top of his/her lungs.
It is normal for people to express their emotions, saying whatever they feel at any particular moment based on the preaching, “Amen!" Thank you Jesus!" etc.  Nevertheless, there is a different between that and shouting like if they were at circus.
I am sure sometimes people wish they could say to that person “shut your mouth!”, I know I do.   At times one wonders if all they want is to be noticed.  Can this be explained? It is like the child who cannot be quiet at school.  
Don’t you think this is equally distracting? Should the church also have a special place for noisy adults? Or do you think this is perfectly fine?

2 comments:

  1. Having spent 13 years on the worship team of a mildly charismatic church I've heard some of this. I have to admit to emitting a hearty "amen" when the message seemed particularly inspired but I know what you mean. Some people seem to want to be noticed no matter where they are - others claim that they are overcome by the "joy of the Lord". However in the words of Ecclesiastes there is a time for everything under the sun. This isn't in there but it might as well be - "a time to shout and a time to refrain from shouting." Yes, some adults are just as annoying as a noisy child.

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  2. Hehe... I actually like the "responders". lol They're like a bunch of friends sitting on a porch. The pastor is telling them a story they know and they're just agreeing with every other word. I see this on TV because I don't go to church. Try Catholicism. No unwanted responders there. :-P

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