Having recently completed a series of posts on educating options for Christians, I thought it might be useful write a single post with a summary of what is covered in each article.  Here is what we covered:

1. The Biblical Mandate This is where it starts – what God instructs us to do is what sets the agenda for our children’s education.

2. Educational Goals Who is setting the goals for our children’s education? What are those goals?

3. Educational Content What is being taught to our children? This stems from the goals of the educators

4. Children are not created equal God makes everyone different.  Formal education often doesn’t take this into account, but you should.

5. Relationships and peer pressure There are significant differences between children today and children of 80 years ago, and school has a lot to do with it. We need to define “childhood” thoughtfully.

6. The effects of segregating children How does the divide between parent and child happen and how can we avoid it?

7. Counting the costs It doesn’t matter which option you choose – education costs money.  But what are you getting for the price?

8. Conclusion The goal is to raise children in a way that seeks to instruct and nurture the relationship between the child and the Lord.  Think about your children’s education on the basis of growing godly adults rather than preparing them for college.

The Lord holds us as parents accountable for our children’s education – not the school system, not teachers and certainly not the government.  As Christians we need to manage that responsibility with purpose and prayer.

When our first child was ready for school, we put her into a public school.  We had reasons.  We wanted her to be in the world, learn how the world works and be prepared.  We wanted our family to be “light” in the world (for want of a clearer way of putting it) by teaching our children about the Lord and living that testimony with them before others.

But things came unstuck for us as we asked the children what they learned about at school.  The answers often concerned us.  Some of what the school taught as fact was not fact – it was philosophical or just plain opinion, and whatever it was, it was not in accordance with how the Bible says we should be raising our children.

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