People are always asking the question, “Should we have our children with us in public worship?”

Let the little children come into big church.

I know they’re loud. I’m a pastor and a father; I know their cries well. The struggle is real for any parent with young children in church. I know it’s hard. They’re distracting, they make it difficult to hear the sermon. Sometimes it’s awkward, and they make you feel awkward during the service. It’s not fun when a child is choking in the middle of the service. (That happened to us once, I kid you not.) It’s embarrassing when your child has a blowout during the sermon, and you have to get up in the middle of everyone there. Or people around you begin to smell something big coming from a little diaper.

But that’s also real life. And church should be the one place on this earth where God’s people can be real with one another. God wants us to be real with him in prayer, and we should be ourselves in the presence of him and his people. If we have to hide what it’s like to be human in church, then we’ve forgotten the reality of Jesus as being both truly God and truly human. Jesus came not as a bodiless soul, but with body and soul—he came to us with bones, muscle tissue, blood, sweat, body odor, spit-up, poo-poo and pee-pee.

So let's start saying this refrain together in all of our churches, not with our lips but with our lives as God calls all of us—men, women, and children—together to worship him from Sunday to Sunday.

I didn't expect so many people to resonate with this one, but am excited to see so many sharing it around with church leaders and friends. I answer why you should let the little children come into big church over at Core Christianity. You can read the original full-length article here.