The Lambs in the Fold

The Relation of Children to the Church and their Proper Christian Nurture

The following chapters do not profess to be a full and formal discussion of the themes embraced, but rather a practical exhibition and enforcement of certain great lines of duty. And yet, the whole subject of “The Relation of Children and of Families to the Church”: “The Culture and Training of the Young”: “Home-Life and Family Religion,” etc., is carefully discussed, and what we deem to be Scriptural positions on these important points are laid down.

From long acquaintance with certain tendencies of thought, and currents of modern Christian life, it is our deep conviction that there is much unscriptural teaching and serious danger ahead, and that the earnest attention of fathers and mothers, of Sabbath school teachers and trainers of the young, must be directed afresh to these subjects. The Church is in danger of drifting away from her moorings on this whole question, and even many who are right in theory are wrong in their practice. And every error in the things of God is dangerous, and especially here, where the spiritual interests of the young are concerned.

On the subject of Christian culture and the growth in grace of the young, there is much misunderstanding and confusion. We have broken up organic relations and individualized, taking what is true, only in certain instances and under certain conditions, to be the normal type of Christian experience and life in all instances and under every condition, and much practical error is the consequence, even on the part of those who ought to know better.

It was not because we imagined that we had anything new to say, or any startling disclosure to make, that has led us to write. And yet, had we not supposed that we had something of importance to say, and something, moreover, that the Church needs to hear at this particular time, we would not have written at all. For most certainly it was not the mere desire of authorship that has led us to give this volume to the public. We have all along felt we were dealing only with plain, Scriptural truths; insisting on what the Church has always professed, in theory, to believe; giving little children and the young the place in the Church that Christ gave them; and have simply claimed for them the culture and training that He designed them to have. But, probably, in this age of new theologies higher criticisms, and novel methods, nothing could be a greater novelty or a more urgent necessity than an old truth newly stated, and, enforced by old considerations, set in new lights. This is all we have attempted to do, and, in fact, it was all that was necessary to be done. We believe most earnestly in Evolution,—the bringing of the new things out of the old; new and fresh duties from old principles; never breaking away from, but maintaining the connection with, all the past.