Dr. Joel Beeke emphasizes the importance of including children in church prayer meetings, arguing that even if young children cannot understand everything, exposure to the church environment is crucial for their spiritual development. He criticizes the practice of segregating children until they are older, suggesting it limits their exposure to God-fearing role models and the church community. Dr. Beeke believes that the church acts as a lifeline for parents and children in spiritual growth, and that the Holy Spirit blesses children through their involvement in the church. He suggests that being part of the church helps children form lasting impressions and a desire to emulate the faithful believers around them.

I just don't understand families that don't bring their kids, for example, to the prayer meetings in the church. That doesn't mean a four-year-old can hear everything. I mean understand everything, hear everything, yes, but not understand everything. But that's okay. A four-year-old in a worship service won't understand every word, but that's okay.

There are impressions being made. You take that child out of the worship service, put him in some little children's church. What's going to happen? Well, some churches, they don't bring them in until like they're 10 years old, and then they want them to make confession of faith when they're 16, 17. Well, they've only been in the church for six years.

They need to grow up in the church. They need to be able to look around in the church and see this God-fearing man and that God-fearing mother and those God-fearing children sitting over there and say, I wanna be like that. So children need to thrive in the entire environment of the church. And the church therefore is like a lifeline for the parents in childbirth. Now of course the Holy Spirit has to bless all these things to their soul.

But how does the Holy Spirit bless all these things through their soul? He uses all these things. He uses means to bless their souls with the truth of God.