“School days, school days, dear ole happy school days!” For a large portion of the country, school has already started. For the rest, it is right around the corner!
Christian parents are often conflicted on what to do when it comes to educating their children. They instinctively know that shipping their kids off to a godless, leftist, progressive, and government-controlled institution for seven to eight hours a day is probably not a good idea, even if it is in the name of education. However, many Christian parents feel an enormous amount of pressure and societal expectation to do so.
This article is written to the Christian parents who are sincerely contemplating other educational options for their children. It will only scratch the surface of what has been written on this subject. The goal is to encourage you in your thinking critically about public education and to realize there are options.
Where to begin? Let’s start here. God gave children to parents. He did not give children to the State. Since God gave children to parents and not the State, then it is the parents’ responsibility to oversee their education and not the State. So, to be crystal clear, overseeing the education of children belongs to parents and not the government or its departments.
Parents can delegate the role of education to another, such as a tutor, school, or church, etc., but the parents are responsible for overseeing what their children are being taught. A basic principle is that Christian children should not learn the ways of the pagans or non-believers. Whether you want to admit it or not, the public school system is teaching the ways of the pagans. Evolution, global warming, sexual deviancy, relativism, Marxism, and so on are promoted, protected and expected in the majority of public school systems in America. The government-run schools are more interested in promoting their anti-Christian worldview than they are in actually educating children.
I can hear the howls of protest right now. “You don’t know my school, it is great.” “You don’t know my kid’s teacher, she is a godly woman” “You have never met the principal of the school where my child attends, he is a Christian.” On and on they go. You are right. I have probably never met your child’s teacher, principal, or any of the school board members. They might be wonderful Christian people. I also realize that many teachers are believers. They go into the noble profession of teaching because they genuinely wish to educate and help children. However, we must admit that teachers today in the modern educational arena are working in a system that has been hijacked by leftists, socialists, communists, atheists, and secular humanists who wish to destroy Christian America. In other words, in today’s world, teachers are working in a system that is by and large antithetical to a robust evangelical worldview.
History reveals that our founding fathers’ clearly intended for Christianity to be the foundation of our educational system. For example, Noah Webster said, “In my view, the Christian religion is the most important and one of the first things in which all children, under a free government, ought to be instructed… No truth is more evident to my mind than that Christian religion must be the basis of any government intended to secure the rights and privileges of a free people.”
What went wrong? What happened to education? The education of America’s youth that primarily took place in the home, or oversight of the church, was highjacked by progressives with an anti-Christian worldview and motive to change the culture by controlling the minds of the youth. It happened and is happening in progressive stages. Consider the following two examples.
Horace Mann, who lived from 1796-1859, was the promoter of the Common School. He and many others planned to use the common school, under government control as an instrument to create a new public philosophy. He abandoned the idea of changing society by affecting adults and decided to go after the hearts and minds of children. He said and I quote, “Men are cast-iron, but children are wax” (carm.org/Christian issues/homeschooling)
Then, there is John Dewey (1859-1952) who is referred to as, “The father of modern education”. Listen to these quotes by John Dewey found in his book, “My Pedagogic Creed”:
“I believe the true center of correlation on the school subjects is not science, nor literature, nor history, nor geography, but the child's social activities.”
“I believe that the only true education comes through the stimulation of the child's power by the demands of the social situation in which he finds himself. Through these demands he is stimulated to act as a member of a unity, to emerge from his original narrowness of action and feeling and to conceive himself from the standpoint of the welfare of the group...”
“I believe finally, that the teacher is engaged, not simply in the training of individuals, but in the formation of the proper social life.”
“There is no God and no soul. Hence, there are no needs for the props of traditional religion. With dogma and creed excluded, then immutable truth is also dead and buried. There is no room for fixed, natural law, or permanent moral absolutes.”
Dewey went to Russia in 1928 to study and implement the Karl Marx (e.g. socialism and communism) way of education. He then came back to America to teach it at Columbia University as the head of the department of education. He was also an honorary President of the National Education Association. John Dewey also helped to start the American Communist Leftist Union, which is now known as the American Civil Liberties Union. (Brannon Howse, “Grave Influencers: 21 Radicals and Their Worldviews That Rule America From the Grave.”)
It should be painfully obvious just by looking at these two examples that those who were instrumental in promoting public, government-run education wished to do away with Christianity as being the guiding principle of education in our Republic. They used the educational arena to destroy the influence of Christianity on children and ultimately society.
We must admit that the progressive hostile take-over of America’s education for the purpose of changing America is working. If not, then how does one explain the violence, hate, socialism, Marxism, LGBTQ+ agenda, evolution, global warming, and so on, being taught, promoted, and protected as honorable values for a free and educated society? Explain how young Americans possess a general disdain for Christianity, the absolute truth claims in the Bible, the founding fathers, and the U.S. Constitution? I can explain it. It is the fruit of the modern public educational system. Jesus pointed out that if the tree is bad, then the fruit will be bad.
Luke 6:43-45 (ESV) – “For no good tree bears bad fruit, nor again does a bad tree bear good fruit, 44 for each tree is known by its own fruit. For figs are not gathered from thornbushes, nor are grapes picked from a bramble bush. 45 The good person out of the good treasure of his heart produces good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure produces evil, for out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks.”
Have you ever thought about pulling out of the public-school system? If so, do it! Do it now!
Have you ever thought about pulling out of the public-school system? If so, do it! Do it now! There are numerous options to educate your children. Homeschooling is a great option. There are numerous Christian organizations that you can use to educate your children. You can utilize these tools via the internet, DVD’s, cottage schools, and co-ops. The list goes on and on. Ask around, or send us an email. I am sure we can point you in the right direction. If you can afford it, Christian schools are a great option. Just make sure they are actually Christian, and they focus on teaching every subject from a Christian worldview.
So, have you ever thought about pulling out of the public-school system? A better question might be, “What are you waiting for?”.
Σχόλια