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DO CHILDREN HOLD OUT?

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The S.D.A. Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Apr 8, 1880

FromThe Signs of the Times, Vol. 6, No. 14

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DO CHILDREN HOLD OUT?

“It is well enough to teach children the gospel, but we should remember that they are not apt to hold out in religion.” Such are the sentiments we sometimes hear. But we believe them mistaken. Of a hundred converts among children, taking them just as they come, and with the spiritual care or neglect they on the average receive, we believe as large a per cent. of them continue as of a hundred adults taken in the same way.
Children need help in order to endure. Do not old sinners when converted need the same? Is a man any more apt to hold out in religion for having long held out in sin? Are disobedience and ingratitude and hardness of heart a good school for permanence in righteousness? Not if we understand human nature.
“But children are easily influenced.” We know it. And that is the very reason why they should be put under the full influence of Christianity at once. Do not leave them to be chilled by worldliness during all the formative years, and fondly hope they will thus learn to be strong in the right.—Church and School.