inspecting Homeschooling - Reasons to Avoid Government Homeschooling Like the Plague
Are you tempted to join government homeschooling (a rent school or group school independent study program) or do you know someone who is?
inspecting Homeschooling - Reasons to Avoid Government Homeschooling Like the Plague
These days, Christian parents who are mental about homeschooling are often unaware that you can homeschool in most states without group school control. And those who do know are often tempted to join government homeschooling for the supposed goodies. The bait of free materials or the perception of getting help from "real teachers" seems inviting, but having group school employees overseeing your homeschool dramatically alters the spiritual dynamic of the home.
You need to know that there is someone else form of homeschooling; one that is scriptural. Underground biblical homeschooling strengthens God's manufacture for the house and helps ensure the time to come right of our children and grandchildren to freely homeschool in a Christ-centered manner.
Homeschooling has all the time existed in this country -- from the native Americans to the first Europeans to form colonies in the New World. Yet it was mostly forgotten as state funded schooling, the purpose of which is to generate obedient productive citizens, pervaded the land in the 19th century. But in the late 1970's and 1980's, a resurgence in homeschooling began among parents who were mostly Christians. These "pioneer" families often resisted the idea that the state was supposed to operate the schooling of their children. They blazed a path few dared to supervene - with parents at the head of their children's learning.
More than that, they discovered that biblical homeschooling changed everybody in the family, bringing them through God's refining fire and helping enlarge their connection with Jesus, and with each other.
Those who hated God were incensed at the idea that bible-believing parents were taking back the headship of their homes. Not only that, but the behemoth of group schooling was taking a financial hit whenever a child was withdrawn from group school or never entered in the first place. Strategies to stop homeschooling failed, and homeschooling was proven to be legal in all fifty states. As the fruit of raising children in the love of the Lord became evident, more and more families started doing it.
But Satan is clever and whenever Christians have fruit, he delivers a strong counter-punch. He was not going to sit back and watch generations of children being brought up in the Lord Jesus. We believe his counter-punch to homeschooling was to lure Christian parents back into the group school fold via government homeschooling. When a house goes that route, not only is the group school still financially supported, but that house is put under the operate of an institution that denies the lordship of Jesus Christ. Spiritual revival of the Christian house is not likely to come out of this humanist matrix.
While we do not inquire the walk of those believers who enroll in government homeschooling -- any more than we inquire the walk of the Christians who have their children enrolled in quarterly group school -- we urge them to reconsider the spiritual fruit of their decision. We urge bible-believing Christians to refrain from becoming yoked with government homeschool programs for many reasons, and to instead contemplate the blessings of a non-government biblical home education:
Usurping Headship
In government homeschooling, you place those who hate God over your homeschool. God is the head of the husband who is the head of the wife. The divine lines of authority established by God are disrupted when you insert the group school ideas into this holy order. The group school and group school mentor you are assigned in government homeschooling setup themselves in the headship position -- that is where the buck stops. They become the provider, director and accountability of that homeschool instead of the husband and God.
There is no free lunch -- when you take group school money for homeschooling, you are according to allow the state be the head of your children's education. schooling is not a neutral endeavor, but a extremely spiritual matter, and one that is not separable from discipleship. God sets up "governments" in the Bible -- individual, family, church and civil government -- and gives responsibilities to each. Fantasize the government being in fee of serving you communion or giving baptisms. Ridiculous, you would say! Those are spiritual matters God clearly gave to the church. Well, no where in scripture does God give the civil government authority over the raising of children. When God speaks of training up children -- for example Proverbs 22:6 "Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it." He is speaking to parents, not bureaucrats.
In Underground homeschooling done biblically, the buck stops with the dad (or mom if there is no dad in that family). If the dad decides he doesn't want his kids taking a distinct standardized test, does he have the greatest authority? If he picks out the textbooks and decides they are to all be Biblical, is he able to do this? If he decides he wants a child of his to skip a distinct subject this year to concentrate on another, does he have the power to make that call? Only in Underground biblical homeschooling does the father have this authority.
Government homeschooling puts the mum under the counsel of humanists. Even if she happens to be assigned a group school mentor who is a Christian, the curriculum, methods, and goals of group schooling are designed to produce a carnal man of the world. Psalm 1 says, "Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked."
A house on the educational dole undergoes a spiritual convert in authority as government homeschooling has no use for the husband. Homeschooling becomes "her thing" -- something Mom and the group school mentor implement. He is under them. Just like in the welfare system, a dad who realizes that he is not the victualer and protector soon zones out. It may seem like a subtlety to women, but this undermining of a man's role is a noteworthy "dis". When Dad checks out, Mom is left with all the work in the homeschool. If you want your husband to be actively complex in the homeschooling, don't emasculate him by choosing government homeschooling.
In contrast, biblical homeschooling is about fathers being restored to their rightful role as heads of the homes.
Supporting a Corrupt System
We implore believers in Jesus to totally leave the group school system, which is responsible for devastating the minds and hearts of millions, which has brought untold numbers of minors to abortion clinics while school hours, which is currently the main tool of homosexual indoctrination in this country. Statistics from some ministries show that the majority of Christian kids who are sent to brick-and-mortar group schools will renounce their faith in Christ and quit going to church after high school graduation. The group school has long proven itself a producer of the most rotten fruit we see in community today -- so why would a Believer want to prop up a ideas that is so obviously of the kingdom of darkness?
When you enroll in government homeschooling, your child is legally carefully a group school student. Even though you are doing all the work, thousands of tax dollars are diverted into the group school ideas on profit of your child. A bit is kicked back to parents for secular materials. Christians are inadvertently ensuring the survival of a blatantly anti-God system.
In contrast, a house that chooses Underground Christian homeschooling can tell their neighbors they are a blessing to taxpayers -- and they do not have to feel guilty about contributing to the delinquency of America.
We need to stop viewing group school as neutral, and assuming we will have no consequences from aligning ourselves with a demonic system. As Jesus says in Matthew 7:18: "A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit."
Promoting Humanist Curriculum
When you take group money for homeschooling, you are not supposed to use Christian curriculum or teach from a Christian worldview while school hours. This is true even if you bought the religious materials yourself! Federal and state laws prohibit the use of sectarian curriculum while school hours. You are according to run a non-religious group school in your home while set hours when you take their freebies.
There are many who tell us "we'll just do what we want in our home" but once you put yourself under the government, you are a sitting duck for addition control. For example, in 2004 a rent school in North Monterey County, California lost its license to operate. One of the reasons cited was that parents were using religious texts while school hours. Parents were told that, "any religious schooling while class time for which the school received state money is against the law regardless of the source of funds used to purchase materials." (The Monterey County Herald, March 27, 2004)
In Canada, the same thing happened -- parents opinion that since they were at home, they could do what they wanted and teach while the day from the religious books they purchased themselves. That was true until someone decided to impose the law. Read the story here.
Many Christian parents just settle for using the secular texts. But nothing is neutral -- secular texts assuredly present a worldview that says truth has nothing to do with Jesus Christ, or the books are blatantly pro-evolution or full of other prevarications.
Christians joining government homeschooling are promoting someone else unintended result. Since government homeschooling vouchers are only supposed to go for non-sectarian materials, the homeschool marketplace is experiencing pressure for more secular texts, even from Christian households that otherwise would purchase decidedly Christian materials. Many of the openly Christian materials produced while the recent upsurge in Christian homeschooling are being bypassed by parents in favor of non-Christian materials -- which can be approved for inclusion in the portfolios that government homeschoolers must turn in to get the continued approval of the state.
Everything you present to your children influences them. When you continually introduce conflicting worldviews in the main subject matter, this gets into the heart of mind of your child. This ad says it all when it comes to why Christians should not let their children be discipled by non-Christian curriculum. This Bob Jones University advertisement very clearly illustrates this point.
At the founding of this country, books were scarce. Often families only had the Bible to teach their children to read from. And a look at the writings of children in those days shows they were more educated than contemporary children who have bountiful fancy equipment and curriculum.
Yoking with the Unsaved
With government homeschooling, you become unequally yoked with the unsaved. Not just in the task of educating your children by being guided by a humanist system, but in the other associations you and your children make. There are meetings and activities sponsored by the government homeschooling programs. These expose your house to ungodly peers -- both for Mom, and for the children.
2 Corinthians 6: 14-17 says, "Do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers. For what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness? And what communion has light with darkness? And what accord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has a believer with an unbeliever? And what bargain has the temple of God with idols?" Therefore, "come out from among them and be separate, says the Lord."
Some Christians are under the mistaken belief that since they are homeschooling and since unbelievers are homeschooling, that they are doing the same thing. But shouldn't what we are doing be radically dissimilar from what the unsaved homeschooler next door is doing? Is this about homeschooling or is homeschooling a means to an end (in our case, raising up a child in the Lord Jesus?) Educating children cannot be severed from discipleship. Everything we teach should be in light of the lordship of Jesus Christ. Studying mathematics, for example, should be done for the purpose of being a blessing to others through our ability to say, build good bridges. And in the wonder of mathematical rules, children should see the glory of God. But unbelievers are homeschooling for very dissimilar reasons -- to generate what the group school is creating -- a worldly child.
When you look into the eyes of your children, what do you see? An eternal being who is fearfully and wonderfully made. What does the unsaved mom sitting next to you in the government homeschooling group see in a child's eyes? A stock of evolution who lives only for this world?
When you are meeting with a group school instructor or have unsaved homeschooling friends, it makes you less likely to supervene your Christian convictions. For example, you might eschew biblical discipline, knowing those in your government homeschooling schedule disapprove.
Some Christian families think they need government oversight for "accountability". Since most of us are grown up group school children, we cannot fathom a situation where the government does not have its hands all over our lives. But we need to think about this biblically -- no where in the Word does it say the civil government is to be responsible for keeping believers "accountable" in raising their children. Rather, the wife is to be accountable to the husband, who is to be accountable to God.
As government homeschooling becomes important in an area, the Christian groups often disappear. The biggest threat to the survival of the Underground biblical homeschooling movement, by far, is government homeschooling. Why? Christians in government homeschooling have other activities they must attend, and when they do attend Underground biblical homeschooling groups, there often is tension. In a homeschool sustain group, Mom tends to talk about her head, her goals, the activities they do and the curriculum they use. The spiritual disparity in the middle of the freedom of Underground biblical homeschoolers versus the bondage of the government homeschoolers becomes obvious and can assuredly explode a good sustain group.
Also, Christians who join government homeschooling usually stop supporting the Christian homeschooling movement and Christian homeschooling conventions. If a group school worker picks out and pays for your curriculum, and they have their own group activities -- why connect with other Christians at conventions and sustain groups?
Focusing on Worldly Standards
If you enroll in government homeschooling, you are according to supervene the schedule of a ideas that does not identify Jesus as Lord. In Underground biblical homeschooling, you supervene God's standards. The first set of standards strives to raise up a child loyal to the state, who views all of life from an evolutionary worldview. The other seeks to raise up a child loyal to Jesus, who views all of life from a biblical worldview.
Some Christian parents claim they will act like the are following the government standards, but try to outwit them by conspiratorially teaching God's standards and getting the government goodies at the same time. But standards are conveyed in many ways -- by the curriculum, by the teaching methods, by the teacher, and by the head of the homeschool.
Jesus made it clear that we cannot supervene two masters. What kind of blurring does it foist upon a child to see the friction of pretending to supervene one system, but assuredly attempting to supervene another? Why not be openly Christian in all you do in your homeschooling? Why not just reject the world system?
Why does a Christian need government homeschooling, anyway? The pioneering generations of homeschoolers who came before you did it on a shoestring and without government oversight. Many were poor, had lots of children to homeschool, and had to make their own curriculum as most textbook companies would not sell to them back then. Underground biblical homeschooling has a record of superior scholastic and spiritual results -- we urge families not to "go back to Egypt."
Burning Out and Giving Up
When you first hear about government homeschooling, it might seem like it would make homeschooling easier -- someone guides you and pays for stuff. But the pressure of humanists regulating your homeschool changes what you do while the day. And perhaps running afoul of the government in your homeschooling can generate great anxiety. Shadowed by required paperwork, diverted into doing lessons that she would never do if not for a secular institution finding over her shoulder... Mom starts to feel like an worker of the group school.
In government homeschooling, when Mom is feeling stressed about accomplishing her goals, it is Big Brother, not Dad or God, whom she is afraid of disappointing. When she has those distinct days of feeling overwhelmed, whom does she go to for support? When she says she cannot do it, when she goes to her head for help, does she get prayed for and directed to Jesus? Or, does the group school mentor advise the next logical step for a government homeschooler -- the brick and mortar group school? Government homeschoolers are a very short step away from the physical group school, and many wind up there within a short time.
There exits a vast network of Christian homeschooling sustain groups in many areas of this country. If you cannot find a Christian homeschool sustain group near you -- start one, or find one on-line. Or find a church that has Underground Christian homeschoolers. Pray that God will contribute at least one other house to come alongside you.
Handing over Parental Rights
Currently, there is no greater threat to the biblical homeschooling movement than Christians enrolling in government homeschooling programs. The hard-fought parental rights won by the "pioneers" of the homeschool movement are at risk from Christians who are being lured into group school homeschooling programs. Satan hates independent Christian homeschoolers assuredly because they are raising up a godly generation of young citizen who are serving Jesus with their whole hearts and minds. Since he who controls the curriculum controls the hearts and minds of the children, there is a deliberate push to get all homeschoolers under the operate of the group school system.
Government homeschooling weakens our parental rights by drastically reducing the whole of homeschoolers willing to put up a fight politically. When parents are on the educational dole, they become concerned with getting more plunder, not defending freedoms. Those who voluntarily put themselves under bondage do not understand the threat of greater government intrusion. Government homeschoolers often say things like, "Why shouldn't all homeschoolers be required to take all the standardized tests? I'm required to. Why shouldn't all homeschoolers be evaluated by a group school teacher? I am."
Once there is a "critical mass" of government homeschoolers, there will be no one left to hold back the onerous regulations that all homeschoolers will be subject to.
The politicians know that government homeschoolers pose no threat to their humanist agenda. Once you accept government money, you give up your rights -- dependents have no motivation to fight the ideas that feeds them. You have agreed to homeschooling on their terms. Anti-homeschooling liberals have made it plain they will want all homeschoolers under their authority. God never gave that authority to the civil government, only to parents. We do not have a right to delegate away the accountability God has bestowed on parents alone.
Getting a foresight to Restore the Christian Family
We see biblical homeschooling as a Christian house rehabilitation movement. The Christian family, and thus the nation, is in disarray, largely due to parents allowing the government to raise their children. A spiritual revival of the Christian house can only come through God and His divine order for the family, not through an anti-God system.
Earlier generations made such great sacrifices -- they were hauled into court, practically had their children taken away -- they fought for your right to be free of the group school bureaucrats. You need to look beyond the bait of government money and your fear of being an independent homeschooler. Look at the spiritual state of your house and reconsider the long-term consequences for time to come generations of Christian homeschoolers.
Commit yourself and the success of your homeschool to the Lord Jesus Christ. Allow your husband his rightful role as head of the home and homeschool. Instead of becoming a dependent on government educational handouts, become an advocate of protecting our God-given rights to give our children a biblical education, free from government control.
Families who have never experienced homeschooling in the Lord without answering to the government need to know that God will contribute -- whether it is materials, hope, courage, or wisdom. Jesus says in Matthew 6:33, "but seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you."
The good news is that we have found that most Christian parents who homeschool will Not go into group school homeschooling If they are educated on the biblical reasons not to before they get into it. Once parents are under the operate of the group school ideas -- whether it be in a brick and mortar school or a government homeschooling schedule -- they are often fearful to leave even when they see the problems with it.
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