I NEED YOUR HELP.

We had some sad situations on Sunday. Both services there were many families with babies in the worship center. It's one thing to have a child with mom and dad for the worship or a sleeper in their arms, but entirely another when that child starts making noise. This was a touchy subject for our ushers, and sadly some parents left offended and mad, I hate that.

Here is my perspective as a parent with a 3-month old little girl.

1. We have a superb world class children's ministry. I am 100% confident in our processes, procedures, curriculum and atmosphere we provide kids. For kids, it is better than the main church, and the people are qualified to handle your kids. Some times our policies are misunderstood, but no parent is allowed in our classrooms unless they've completed a back ground check. If that bothers you I'm sorry, but we take security very seriously, and we have an Infant Care Room with a broadcast of the service if you need to absolutely be with your baby. You can also sit in the foyer and watch the service live on TV.
2. When my baby starts making noise and crawling under the chairs IT IS A DISTRACTION to everyone around me. I guarantee it happened Sunday. It's not an option for 300 other people to be distracted because Seven wants to eat, or play, or fuss or whatever. If I found out that my baby's distracting caused a person to be interrupted from a message that could have changed their life I wouldn't be mad, I'd be sorry.
3. Hear me straight up. This is not about The Rock Church wanting to accommodate babies and families. I think all one has to do is walk the halls of this church to see the absolute love and priority we place on kids! There are parents of 150-175 kids per week that trust our team with their kids.
4. I heard about one parent who was mad standing in the foyer thinking they were kicked out of church. That is absurd. That would never happen. Our ushers don't kick people out, they ask them to move. Our ushers simply offered those families who insist on sitting with their noisy baby the foyer or the Infant Care Room. There was no kicking people out. Come on already, that accusation makes me mad.
5. Parent's like Melinda and I need to realize our noisy child is not the priority of singles, empty-nesters, parents with teens and every other person represented in the church. They do not need to deal with noisy kids when they come to church.
6. Sadly, we may have to go back to an old policy at The Rock Church. NO KIDS in the worship center...what do you think, do you have a solution, because I hate it that people were offended on Sunday. I hate it that they left service. In fact, one of them who left was a student from my youth ministry who I have been trying to get back in church for 9 years. I don't have the solution at present, but I will tell you this, USHERING THESE TYPES OF DISTRACTIONS IS TOUGH. Thank you ushers for doing your best to direct those with kids and protecting the atmosphere for those without. It a thankless job you do sometimes, and I got your back on this one, and I'm a parent of one of the noisy ones and I take responsibility to help fix it because every person should get a straight shot to hear the gospel message and not my baby!!!
7. I will publish your comments on this no matter how controversial. I don't have an easy solution. We are a family church in a baby boom, but we also have a ton of singles and people without kids, not to mention, a bunch of people seeking the Lord who need to hear the message without being interrupted by Seven or any other distracting child.
8. Help me on this one, because we need a solution that can work; lives, salvations, and healing are in the balance. Maybe you go to another church and have some ideas. let us know here.