Administrator
We
are told in scripture that if we “train up a child in the way he should go,
even when he is old he will not part from it.” (Proverbs 22:6) Training (or education) is the process of
molding the mind, heart, and character of a person. Just like a potter’s hands guide and direct
the final outcome of the piece of clay to be a pot or a vase or a cup, so a
child is molded by the various teachers in their lives as to how to think, act
and respond in and about the world. As
Christian parents, it is our greatest desire that our children understand and
know truth as revealed by God, be well trained in how to think like God thinks,
and act the way God desires His children to act.
However,
there is a problem with public education.
Proverbs 1:7 enlightens us that,
“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge.” And again in 9:10, “The fear of the Lord is
the beginning of wisdom.” God’s Word
makes it very clear that if we try to separate the knowledge and love of God
from the rest of what is commonly called truth, it is not truth, because our
understanding about God is critical to the understanding of the world. If reality about the world is that it
includes God, (and it does, He is the reason why everything exists both as the
sole cause and purpose) then anything called knowledge that is considered
separate from Him is not true knowledge.
One of the criticisms that has been leveled at Christian schools over
the years, is that they shelter children from the “real” world. Since Scripture defines true knowledge as being entirely
dependent on an understanding of God at the beginning, Christian schools do
anything but exclude reality. We teach
children to see the entire world along with the truth that God is Creator and
Sustainer. This criticism also assumes that we must expose our children
to the things they will encounter in their lives as adults in order to
adequately prepare them for the ideas, attitudes and wrong actions in the world. Sending our children to the Christian school
doesn’t prevent them from seeing and experiencing wrong thinking and evil
actions in their neighborhoods, communities and the world. There is plenty of contact with these without
giving them a daily immersion of it in the government schools. To be brutally honest, it
is the public schools that are sheltering children by not teaching them an
accurate view of the world because they must, by requirement, exclude God.
In the first blog of this June series, I made the case
that public schools harm our children (and us) by instilling within us a
worldview that is at best secular-humanist and most likely much worse. Our worldview is what shapes how we think
about everything and how we act and respond.
Those who were the founders of public schools knew that it was possible
to change a culture, to transform a nation by simply teaching the children to
think the way the founders wanted them to think. As the children grow up and become the movers
and shakers of the society in business, politics and life, they will
automatically instill the kind of worldview that was taught to them as
children. Many of the dramatic cultural
shifts that we have experienced in our society can at least be in large part
traced back to the worldviews that were established about one generation
ago. For example, those who hold the
most influence today are the ones who grew up in the generation of love and
peace we commonly connect with the hippy movement. “Free love” (sex),” make love not war”, were
some of the prominent sayings of the people of this decade. Is it any surprise then, that promiscuity,
divorce, and sexual extremism are some of the key things we are fighting losing
battles over in our society today? And why
do you think the choice drug of the hippies, marijuana, is becoming more and
more acceptable in today’s society? This
did not just happen accidentally. It
happened as a result of the worldview change of a generation.
However, if we desire our children to think like God
thinks, and act the way God desires us to act, then we are going to have to send
them somewhere else to be educated. Many
parents choose to teach their children at home, to make sure the worldview of
their children agrees with their own.
Others choose to send their children to Christian schools because they
know the teachers and the things taught are more in line with the things of
God.
What harm is public education for your
children? Plenty! As
parents we only get one shot at raising and educating our children. Once they have been taught and trained, it is
next to impossible to counter or change their worldview. If we send them to Caesar, they will be
Romans. Therefore we want to get it
right from the beginning. What will
you choose?
* “We cannot continue to
send our children to Caesar for their education and be surprised when they come
home as Romans.” ― Voddie T. Baucham Jr., Family
Driven Faith: Doing What It Takes to Raise Sons and Daughters Who Walk with God
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