Loving Enough to Teach the Best Way
People are such picky creatures. We love to pick and choose. A little child can fall apart in a moment because little brother got the red straw and she had to take the yellow one.
From childhood, we also like to pick and choose about much more important issues. We want to pick which of God’s commands are important and which ones we can let slide. Our pickiness has powerful implications when it comes to education. I have great respect for the many godly teachers I have known and those whom I still know — a couple of whom I had lunch with yesterday. When you read what I have written below, please know that I am not lumping every educator into one category.
One of the reasons we pulled our children out of public school to homeschool them was because of the teaching already prevalent in the 1980s that there are no absolutes — a teaching that is absolutely wrong. One time while Ray and I were attending a regularly scheduled once-a-semester teacher conference to learn how one of our children was doing in her class, the teacher made this statement: “Should . . . that’s a funny word,” meaning we really shouldn’t put a “should” responsibility on a child. I disagree. There are many things a child should do.
On another occasion, I attended a debate between an educator who believed education should be values-free and another speaker (whose credentials I have forgotten after almost three decades) who believed adults have a responsibility to teach children values. “What’s an absolute?” the educator asked rhetorically. I am guessing that if someone slashed that educator’s tires five minutes before he needed to race to the hospital with a wife in labor, he would think those actions were absolutely wrong. About that same time, the daughter of some of our friends graduated from junior high. “You are questioning your parents’ values,” the commencement speaker said and added, “That is what you should be doing.”
The Barna Group is a research company in Ventura, California, that researches where faith and culture meet. A study they conducted in 2015 revealed that 80% of American adults from across a broad spectrum of ages, socioeconomic status, and political beliefs were concerned about America’s moral condition. However, that same study revealed that 57% of American adults strongly agreed or somewhat agreed that “whatever is right for your life or works best for you is the only truth you can know.” Among millennials, 74% strongly or somewhat agreed with that statement.*
I am grateful for God’s absolutes. I am thankful to have a Father Who loves me enough to teach me the best way. In His wisdom, He gave mamas and daddies the responsibility to love their children enough to do that, too.
Therefore, prepare your minds for action,
keep sober in spirit,
fix your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you
at the revelation of Jesus Christ.
As obedient children,
do not be conformed to the former lusts
which were yours in your ignorance,
but like the Holy One who called you,
be holy yourselves also in all your behavior;
because it is written,
“You shall be holy, for I am holy.”
1 Peter 1:13-16
*Statistics are from the May 25, 2016 article “The End of Absolutes: America’s New Moral Code” by the Barna Group. https://www.barna.com/research/the-end-of-absolutes-americas-new-moral-code/