This sermon was delivered by Charles Haddon Spurgeon at a Prayer Meeting for Sabbath Schools in 1877 at the Metropolitan Tabernacle in Newington.

We who know what is due to children will be far more guilty than others if we sin against their souls….and we shall be doubly criminal if now we bring evil upon the little ones.

O, ye parents do not follow trades which will ruin your children;…do not bring depraved persons within your doors to defile them! For a man to lead others like himself into temptation is bad enough; but to sow the vile seed of vice in hearts that are as yet untainted by any gross, actual sin, is a hideous piece of vile wickedness.  Do not commit spiritual infanticide!

According to the story of Joseph, there are three ways of sinning against a child.  The first was contained in the proposition of the envious brothers: “Let us slay him…and we shall see what shall become of his dreams.”

No one among us would wish to do so, but it is continually done by bad example. Those who gave them birth give them their death. They brought them into the world of sin and seem intent to bring them into the world of punishment, and will succeed in the fearful attempt unless the grace of God shall intervene. Many are doing all they can, by their own conduct at home and abroad, to educate their children into pests of society and plagues of their country.

But there is a second way of sinning against the child: Reuben said, “Cast him into this pit that is in the wilderness, and lay no hand upon him.” The idea of many is to leave the child as a child, and then look him up in the after days, and seek to deliver him from destruction. Do not kill him, but leave him alone till the riper years. Do not kill him, that will be wicked murder; but leave him in the wilderness until a more convenient season, when you hope to come to his rescue. Many Christians ignore the multitudes of children around them, and act as if there were no such living beings. They may go to Sunday School or not; we do not know and do not care. At any rate, these good people cannot trouble themselves with teaching children.  I say to them “Do not sin against the child by such neglect.”

Let not such a charge lie against any of us.Our design and object should be that our children, while they are yet children, should be brought to Christ; and I ask those dear brothers and sisters present here who love the Lord not to doubt the conversion of their little ones, but to seek it at once with all their hearts.

There is yet a third way to sin against the child: they sold him to the Midianite merchantmen. I am afraid that some are half inclined to do the same now.  It is imagined that, with school boards, we shall not want Sunday Schools so much; but give over the young to the secularists. Because the children are taught the multiplication table, they will not need to be taught the fear of the Lord. Strange reasoning, this! Can Arithmetic remove their countless sins?  The more of secular knowledge our children acquire, the more they will need to be taught in the fear of the Lord. We who love the gospel must not allow our children to slip through our hands into the power of those who would enslave their minds by superstitious dogmas.  We sin against the child if we hand him over to the teachers of error.

Sometimes, a child may be sinned against because he is disliked.  The excuse for the unusual severity and harshness is, “He is such a strange child.” You have heard of the cygnet who was hatched in a duck’s nest.  Neither duck nor ducklings could make anything out of the ugly bird; and yet, in truth, he was superior to all the rest.  Joseph was the swan in Jacob’s nest, and his brothers and his father did not understand him. His father rebuked him.  I should fancy he was an uncomfortable boy to live with, for, when his brothers transgressed, he felt compelled to bring to their father ‘their evil report.” I do not doubt that they called him “the little sneak,’ though in truth, he was a gracious child.

In many cases, the sin is of quite the opposite character. Contemptuous sneers have chilled many a good desire and ridicule has nipped in the bud many a sincere purpose. Beware of checking youthful enthusiasm for good things. God forbid that you or I should quench a tiny spark of God’s grace in a child’s heart. We believe in the piety of children, let us never act, speak or look as though we despised it.

“Do not sin against the child,” whoever you may be. Whether you are a teacher or a parent, if there is any trace of Joseph in your child, even though it be but in his dreams, by attempting repress the noble flame which God may be kindling in his soul. If the Lord’s love should light upon your child, and he should grow up to be a distinguished servant of the Lord, your conscience will prick you, and a voice will say in your soul, ‘Said I not unto you, do not sin against the child?”

And if, on the other hand, your child should not become a Joseph but an Absalom, it will be a horrible thing to be compelled to mingle with your lamentations the overwhelming consciousness that you led your child into the sin by which he became the dishonor of your family. If I see  my child perish, and know that he became a reprobate through my ill teaching and example, I shall have to wring my hands with dread remorse and cry, “I slew my child! I slew my child! And when I did, I knew better, but I disregarded the voice that said to me “Do not sin against the child.”

Now, dear Sunday School teachers, do not sin against the child by coming to your class with a chilly heart.Why should you make your children cold toward divine things? Do not sin against them by coming too late, for that, will make them think that punctuality is not a virtue and the Sunday School is of no great importance. Do not sin against the child by coming to class irregularly or absenting yourself at the slightest pretense, for that is distinctly saying to the child, “You can neglect to serve God when you please, for you see that this is what I do.” Do not sin against the child by merely going through class routine, without really teaching and instructing. Do not sin against the child by telling him a number of stories without setting forth the Savior, for that will be giving him stone instead of bread.  Do not sin against the child by aiming at anything short of his conversion to God through Jesus Christ the Savior.

Seek wisdom of the Lord. Do not sin against the child. Train him in the way that he should go. Bring him to Jesus that He may bless him. Cease not to pray for the child until his young heart is given to Jesus. May the Holy Spirit make you wise to deal with these young immortals.They are clay upon the wheel.  Oh, that He would teach us in the way to mould and fashion their characters! Above all, may He put His own Hand into the work and then it shall be done, indeed!

Thanks to the compilation of sermons of Charles Haddon Spurgeon on  www.apibs.org.