Public, Private, Online, Homeschool?
00:00:00.000 | Public school, private school, online school, homeschool.
00:00:10.600 | What are the pros and the cons of each of these options, and how do we decide on the
00:00:14.000 | right option for our kids?
00:00:16.080 | The question today comes in from a listener named Lauren.
00:00:18.320 | "Pastor John, hello.
00:00:19.320 | I highly respect you.
00:00:20.600 | I've searched for a while now to see if you've said anything about homeschool, and I can't
00:00:24.360 | seem to find anything.
00:00:25.400 | So would you please tell me what you think?
00:00:27.460 | Is homeschool now required for Christians in this age?
00:00:30.440 | Is it possible that public school be an option from God?
00:00:33.240 | Where are you at in considering local, public, local private, online Christian schools, homeschooling,
00:00:39.080 | and schools connected to a local church?
00:00:40.840 | Do you have any advice for how we would weigh each option and mix them together for each
00:00:45.140 | of the interests and needs of each child we are called to raise?"
00:00:48.800 | Wow.
00:00:49.800 | Pastor John, what would you say to Lauren?
00:00:51.120 | I'm glad for the question, because the longer I live, the more concerned I become about
00:00:56.440 | how we train our kids.
00:00:57.920 | So let me read four passages of scripture, and then draw out a principle, and then make
00:01:03.000 | some applications.
00:01:04.440 | Deuteronomy 6-4, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your
00:01:08.880 | soul, with all your might.
00:01:11.500 | And these words, which I command you today," that is a whole life love for God, "These
00:01:18.240 | commands that I give you today shall be on your heart.
00:01:21.300 | You shall teach them diligently to your children, and talk of them when you sit in your house,
00:01:27.060 | and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise up."
00:01:30.260 | Psalm 78-5, "He established a testimony in Jacob, and appointed instruction in Israel,
00:01:37.940 | which he commanded our fathers to teach to their children, that the next generation might
00:01:42.560 | know them, the children yet unborn, and arise and tell them to their children, so that they
00:01:47.780 | should set their hope in God, and not forget the works of God, but keep His commandments."
00:01:52.940 | Proverbs 4-1, "Hear, O sons, a father's instruction, and be attentive, that you might gain insight.
00:02:00.580 | For I give you good precepts.
00:02:02.660 | Do not forsake my teaching.
00:02:04.820 | When I was a son with my father, tender, the only one in the sight of my mother, he taught
00:02:09.700 | me and said to me, 'Let your heart hold fast my words, keep my commandments, and live.'"
00:02:15.620 | Ephesians 6-4, "Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up, nurture
00:02:22.140 | them, bring them up, train them up in the discipline and the instruction of the Lord."
00:02:27.340 | So here's the principle I'm going to draw out from those passages.
00:02:32.540 | God has designed families, and fathers in particular, to take responsibility for bringing
00:02:39.180 | up children in the knowledge and the skills they need to be mature and fruitful Christians
00:02:44.260 | in the home and the church and the world.
00:02:46.940 | That's my conclusion.
00:02:47.940 | Now here's some implications that I see.
00:02:52.860 | One, this implies fathers and mothers will make educational choices that strengthen a
00:03:01.740 | child's true understanding of God, true understanding of human nature, manhood, womanhood, history,
00:03:08.060 | the church, the world physically and socially, with the necessary abilities to learn a useful
00:03:14.700 | skill and vocation.
00:03:16.020 | In other words, it is the parent's responsibility, not first the church, not first the government,
00:03:23.780 | to shape a child's worldview according to Bible-saturated, Christ-exalting, God-centered
00:03:30.020 | truth.
00:03:32.020 | Second implication, the more complex and technological and diverse and global the world
00:03:40.140 | becomes, the more parents will need to partner with others to fulfill their responsibilities
00:03:48.820 | for their own children.
00:03:50.740 | The children will need knowledge and skills that parents may not be able to give them.
00:03:58.580 | Third, as America becomes more pervasively secular with commitments, not just ideas,
00:04:05.580 | but commitments that are not neutral, but anti-Christian both in worldview and on numerous
00:04:12.820 | moral issues and numerous faith issues, partnering with public school teachers to accomplish
00:04:20.500 | biblical goals for our children becomes year by year less feasible and indeed, in many
00:04:26.700 | cases, unthinkable.
00:04:29.260 | Fourth, more and more parents and more and more pastors, therefore, should give very
00:04:37.300 | serious consideration to starting academically excellent and affordable Christian schools.
00:04:45.680 | Money considerations is what makes public education popular with many Christians.
00:04:50.740 | It's free.
00:04:52.420 | If it cost as much to go to a public school as to an academically excellent Christian
00:04:59.620 | school, millions of Christian parents would choose excellent Christian schools.
00:05:04.940 | So, it's a money issue.
00:05:07.620 | Therefore, one implication of the biblical view of education is that teams of parents,
00:05:16.100 | together with their church leadership, should be creating thousands of excellent Christian
00:05:23.220 | schools along with creative alternatives like co-ops or online learning.
00:05:31.420 | Fifth, parents and churches need to think deeply and wisely about the principle of "apart
00:05:38.780 | from the world for the sake of the world."
00:05:41.420 | Let me say it again.
00:05:43.460 | Apart from the world for the sake of the world.
00:05:47.460 | This principle has always been true.
00:05:50.980 | It's always been our duty to various degrees of cultural connectedness.
00:05:56.140 | Jesus said in John 15, 19, "If you were of the world, the world would love you as
00:06:01.340 | its own, but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore
00:06:07.260 | the world hates you."
00:06:09.140 | Or John 17, 14, "They are not of the world, Father.
00:06:13.140 | My disciples are not of the world, just as I am not of the world.
00:06:16.260 | I do not ask you to take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one."
00:06:23.940 | In other words, in the world, but not of the world.
00:06:29.340 | And I don't think most Christians have awakened to the crisis of worldliness and weakness
00:06:37.260 | in the church.
00:06:39.680 | But part of it is the education of our children.
00:06:43.100 | Education is not evangelization.
00:06:45.100 | In other words, we shouldn't justify where we send our kids because we think they should
00:06:50.900 | be evangelists when they're eight.
00:06:53.460 | God does not intend for Christian children to be taught by unbelievers and to be surrounded
00:07:00.580 | most of the day by intense, worldly peer pressure.
00:07:06.340 | That's not what childhood is for.
00:07:09.780 | It's for being shaped and molded by wise, loving Christian adults.
00:07:16.140 | Now this is not escapism.
00:07:18.540 | Any more than West Point is escapism because the instructors are American soldiers, not
00:07:24.300 | ISIS soldiers.
00:07:26.020 | We prepare a pretty good military for engagement with the enemy, and we don't do it with the
00:07:29.420 | help of the enemy.
00:07:30.860 | We prepare for maximum faithfulness in the world, we Christians, prepare for maximum
00:07:36.620 | faithfulness in the world by coming out of the world for the education of our children.
00:07:42.820 | There will be time and ways for them to know the world and meet the world head on.
00:07:51.500 | Remember our own kids when I thought this through in K through eight with our kids,
00:07:55.900 | we sent them all to Christian school and we lived in the real world.
00:08:01.620 | And we didn't even have a television.
00:08:02.620 | People said, "How are your kids going to even know the world?"
00:08:05.340 | I said, "Just go outside.
00:08:08.140 | Just go into the inner city and have your bike taken away from you or watch a man beat
00:08:12.860 | up another guy or rip the spout off the side of the house and smash a man in the head with
00:08:18.620 | it."
00:08:19.620 | There's the real world out there.
00:08:20.620 | You don't have to bring the world into your house to teach your kids about knowing the
00:08:24.460 | world.
00:08:25.540 | We have our hands full.
00:08:26.540 | I know this.
00:08:27.540 | We have our hands full.
00:08:28.540 | There are no guarantees, neither positive or negative, that our children might be mighty
00:08:35.700 | in the Lord if we educate them at home.
00:08:38.660 | No guarantee of that.
00:08:40.820 | Nor that they will become compromising nominal Christians if they go to public school.
00:08:44.860 | No guarantee of that.
00:08:46.720 | We may lose or gain them either way.
00:08:49.740 | God decides that ultimately.
00:08:51.540 | So we pray earnestly, desperately, and then we do the best we can with their education.
00:08:58.900 | Amen.
00:08:59.900 | There's a level of desperation in any choice ahead.
00:09:02.620 | Thank you, Pastor John.
00:09:03.620 | Well, whether you're listening in the car, at the gym, doing chores, thanks for inviting
00:09:07.220 | us into your busy day.
00:09:08.500 | If you have not yet done so, you can subscribe to Ask Pastor John in your favorite podcast
00:09:11.820 | app, YouTube, or in Spotify.
00:09:14.100 | To find other episodes in our archive or to submit a question to us of your own, go online
00:09:18.200 | to DesiringGod.org/AskPastorJohn.
00:09:19.200 | Well, the last chapter of life is not retirement.
00:09:25.260 | It's not retirement.
00:09:27.140 | Something greater is to come.
00:09:28.620 | We need to start planning for something far beyond the reach of our 401ks.
00:09:33.340 | That's up next time on Wednesday.
00:09:34.660 | I'm your host, Tony Renke.
00:09:35.660 | We'll see you then.
00:09:36.300 | [BLANK_AUDIO]
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