Allowing children to seek the Holy Ghost?

[deltaguitar]

I have two young children. My daughter is 6 and my son is 3. It amazes me to think that they will never grow up knowing the fear and anxiety that I experienced while trying to seek the baptism of the Holy Ghost. This was such a huge part of my life and experience growing up and they will never know it.

Before I left the UPC I didn't know that I felt this way. Even after I left over doctrinal issues I still held to the belief in the initial evidence doctrine and still sought after the power of the Holy Ghost.

After we left our pastor didn't do much of the pentecostal stuff anymore. Over time we came to not long for it anymore. It wasn't until I had been out for maybe a year that I was watching a youtube clip that someone had posted of a child seeking the baptism of the Holy Ghost that the emotion and relief that I would never have to go through that again began to flood over me.

Then it hit me, my children will never have to go through that! See, I never really thought it was that bad until I thought of having to put my own children through a pentecostal altar service. They deserve my protection and to put them in the middle of that really scares me.

If I had not left the UPC how would I have handled it when they went to youth camp or even in our own church where the pressure to come to the altar is huge. Would I have had the ability to walk up to a hysterical altar scene and remove my child from that situation? Would I have protected my child from those people who would lay hands on them and tell them to "hold on hold on" in one ear and "let go, yield to God" in the other ear.

I am not trying to offend even though I know this may offend some. It just scares me to know that I might have allowed this to happen to my children. Second, I wonder why my parents didn't keep me from this as a child? I know they believe it and consider it a great experience. I still remember as an eight year old child my mother praying with me for hours at youth camp and all I wanted to do was make her happy and get the Holy Ghost. I felt comfortable with her but there were tons of other people around screaming and hollering in my ear.

Looking back, this was an overall terrible experience. I wonder sometimes how much damage this caused me over my lifetime. I have struggled a lot with confidence issues and with anxiety and I wonder if maybe I would have turned out different had I not been subjected to that torture at the altar call.

I even have this issue with some baptist that I have fellowshiped. They would always want to have an altar call after church and it really gave me a lot of anxiety. There is so much performance anxiety from my early years that I still have a very hard time praying in public or allowing people to pray for me.

So my questions;
Will you allow your children to seek after the Holy Ghost at a young age and if so,will you be defensive and protect them from a lot of the folks who surround them in the altar? I have seen preachers push down on people's heads and there is a lot of clapping and loud praying going on. There is a lot of emotion and things can get out of hand. My sister, who is still very pentecostal, rolled on the floor because the preacher said God wanted our sacrifice and to do something outrageous and a big lady fell on her. She was not injured, probably because of adrenaline, but she claimed at the time that she thought she was going to die but that God healed her instantly.

Also, if you will allow this seeking to happen, did you go through the same thing as a child or were you converted as an adult? See, my parents came to the apostolic faith in their late teen years so they would not have had the trauma of dealing with the altar call as a child. I don't think they were aware of how much this could damage their child. I didn't even know myself until years later when I started really thinking about this.