It may sound strange to some, but my husband and I never prayed about whether or not to homeschool our children. It was just so obvious to us that this was the only option. We based our decision on God’s commands and advice throughout the Bible and also considered the worldview, philosophy and atmosphere of the government schools today.
There are some things you just don’t need to pray about. If the Bible is clear on something, it would be wrong to pray about it because God will never contradict his own words. Our Christianity is not a mystical thing but is based upon the word of God which is our ultimate authority, compass and guide.

If we happened to watch the news at night or read a newspaper our decision was confirmed again. How could we send our children to be trained and discipled by anyone else when God has told us to teach them? How could we expect our children to grow up prepared and strong in the Lord, if we sent them off to an institution which does not share in these Biblical values and will almost always undermine them.

Some parents we’ve come into contact with have expressed that the Bible does not address homeschooling. Because of this, they will just “pray about it” and see if the Lord gives them peace or not. Some even ask the Lord to “open the door” if it is to be. Although it is true that the Bible does not speak of homeschooling since school had not come into fashion yet, the Bible does have much to say about training and teaching children, and it clearly tells us what is important and what we should prioritize. When we considered the following scriptures we came to the conclusion that homeschooling was the only way to go.

Luke 6:40 states that “A student is not above his teacher, and that everyone who is fully trained will be like his teacher.”  Do you want your christian child to emulate their secular humanist teacher?
We all know Proverbs 22:6 “Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it.  How are you supposed to train your child when you only have about an hour a day to do so?

Duet 6 & 7 states, “These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, and when you lie down…So we need to talk a lot about God’s commands….morning, noon, and night.

Psalm 1 reminds us to not walk in the counsel of the ungodly. So…we should not receive counsel from non-believers.

Proverbs 1:7 tells us that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge and verse 8 says “Listen my son to your Father’s instruction and do not forsake your Mother’s teaching.” Do you think the schools will teach them to fear the Lord? I think they used to at one time, but not anymore. They do not allow God in their classrooms.

Paul reminds us in Romans 12 to be transformed by the renewing of our minds and II Cor 10:5 commands us to demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God and to take captive every thought and make it obedient to Christ.  Will the government schools choose curriculum that will do this?

Paul told Timothy to turn away from godless chatter and opposing ideas of what is falsely called knowledge. Maybe we should turn away from opposing ideas and godless chatter?

It is astonishing to me and humbling that the Lord would allow us to have this huge responsibility. It is impossible to do without His help. I need His help every single hour of my day…even more than I realize.  Even though homeschoolers have much more time with their children than public school families do….it seems like there are not enough years to do it. My prayer is for wisdom and that the Lord will multiply our efforts.

I know there are folks who believe that they can follow these commands and still have their children in a classroom…but I find this hard to believe. There are just not enough hours left in a day after school, homework, meals, baths, paperwork, television etc. are completed to teach and mentor our children.  In addition, we have to try to deprogram and reverse the damage done each day. The chipping away at the christian worldview is often very subtle and nothing that our children can even put into words when asked, “What did you learn in school today?”

For the believer, the Bible is really clear. In order to obey these scriptures we have to put in the time with our children. This time is just not available when they are gone from us all day.
In Voddie Baucham’s lecture “Whoever controls the Schools, controls the World” he boldly cries ”  I am raising an army of intercontinental ballistic missiles and one day the silo is going to open over my home and when it does, there will be missiles launched to impact this world who have been trained, armed and honed in my home and not by Caesar.” Amen Voddie!!! Amen!!!

Thanks for reading my ramblings.

~Anne