Should Christians Bother to Take

Action to Improve Public Schools?

By Buddy Hanson

We live in an age that is marked by massive ignorance of how to apply the biblical principles in which we believe to our daily circumstances and situations. We say that we should be “salt and light,” yet for the most part, churches aren’t providing explicit instructions on how we are supposed to go about it. Public (or more accurately, government) education is a perfect example of the confusion that exists among Christians. Many sincere Christians are teaching in government schools and they, along with many sincere Christian parents, are working very hard at trying to improve the schools.

By every imaginable Christian standard, public schools are failing. But the point is; they aren’t Christian and don’t want to be. By their standard, they’re succeeding! Government education, by its very definition, is ungodly. Therefore, no matter how many improvements are proposed, the schools will still be ungodly. The only solution to better education is Christian schooling (whether done in the home or in a solid, biblically based Christian day school).

Biblical principles

Parents are to teach their children from the Scriptures (Isa. 28:10) and always in “the nurture and admonition of the Lord.” (Eph. 6:4) To have them subjected to any other principles is ungodly. (2 Cor. 6:14; 1 Tim. 6:3-53) Parental authority is not a “right” conveyed by the state, it is a duty given by God. (Ex. 20:12; Col. 3:20-24) Those who would deny or interfere with the godly relationship of parent and child will find it “better that a millstone were hanged about his neck.” (Mat. 18:6)

The true purpose of education is to “Study to show yourself approved to God, a workman that needs not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.” (2 Tim. 2:15) Ungodly government schools contradict biblical truths, promote atheism (the religion of secular humanism), challenge the authority of parents, promote evolution and situation ethics.

It is no secret that the primary concern of government schools is to socialize the students to live according to the currently acceptable norms of society. “I am convinced that the battle for humankind’s future must be waged and won in the public school classroom by teachers who correctly perceive their roles as the proselytizers of a new faith: a religion of humanity … regardless of the educational level – preschool, day care or large state university.” (John Dunphy, A New Religion for a New Age, The Humanist, Jan./Feb., 1983, p.25)

The parents’ intimate knowledge of their children far outweighs any lack of teaching credentials earned from an ungodly university (e.g., there is no need to know how to manage groups, or of providing busy work, or to be trained in how to keep a large number of students orderly).

God gives children to parents and commands us to train them up according to His Word. (Deut. 6:6-9; 11:18-21; Prov. 4:1-27; 22:6; 23:12-13; Gal. 4:1-2; Heb. 12:9-11) Children (and adults!) are to be “sanctified (improved) through God’s truth, for His Word is truth.” (John 17:16-17) The reason for this is that each of us has been chosen by God to fulfill His cultural mandate and Great Commission. (Gen. 1:26-28; Mat. 28:18-20)

To suppose that facts can be taught independent of ethics is to attempt to have teaching without meaning. For example, how much meaning would the following fact-filled sportscast have for you: “Here are the scores: 10 to 9, 17 to 15, 30 to 13.” Are these today’s scores? Are they high scoring baseball games or low scoring basketball or football games? And who is playing whom? Hopefully the silliness of this example will point up the futility of the prospect of teaching facts without meaning in state-mandated schools.

If parents say that they are correcting at home what their children learn about in school, ask them how effective they expect to be when the school has their children from six to seven hours a day. It is long past time that Christians heeded God’s command in Proverbs 19:27 to “Cease, my son, to hear the instruction that causes to err from the words of knowledge.” Our reply to those who would advocate attempts to improve public schools should be: “To the law and to the testimony! If they do not speak according to this Word, they have no light of dawn.” (Isa. 8:20)

Buddy Hanson is the President of the Christian Policy Network, the State of Alabama director of Exodus Mandate, has written four books and is a popular speaker on developing a Christian worldview as well as Church and State issues.