Causing children to sin

“But if anyone causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to sin, it would be better for him to have a large millstone hung around his neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.” Matthew 18:6
Children are extremely impressionable. If you tell them something, they will believe it – and they will usually take it literally. (There’s the story about the boy who was terrified about ‘asking Jesus into his heart’ because he thought it meant he had to have his heart cut open so Jesus could get inside...)
This goes for both teaching children the truths of the Bible, and also when they are taught falsehoods. We need to be very careful if we are in a position where we are teaching children, because their minds are so malleable. If we are teaching them the Bible, we need to teach it faithfully.
We’ve also heard stories of people using their children to help them shoplift. Jesus says here that it would be better for those people to have a millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the sea. We have a responsibility to train our children in righteousness. If we train them to sin and tell them it’s ok, the chance of them finding the Lord is made much, much smaller. The same goes for what children are taught in schools, regarding evolution and ecumenicalism. Let us not be guilty of teaching children to sin. They have a sin nature already – we don’t need to encourage it.