Portraits of God

A theological view of a distinctly Christian education

By Rev. Chris Baker

A jeweler given a gem to work with and to place in a setting in order to display its brilliance and qualities takes his work seriously. The material with which the Christian teacher works is considerably more valuable.

Our vision of the student will shape profoundly the work that we do, the goal toward which we are laboring, and the methods we will utilize to achieve the goal we have held before our eyes.

Listed below are several present and future qualities to the student committed to our charge:

Image bearer of God: The mere Divine declaration of Image-bearing alone suggests that the student is worthy of all appropriate respect regardless of age or ‘mental capacity.’ All students are portraits of God.

Vice regent over the creation: Found in creation ordinance, God bestowed upon man the charge to exercise dominion over the created order. Parents, teachers, and other mentors of young people are training up rulers, dominion-keepers of creation. They will act as sovereigns in the homes they establish, in the businesses they undertake, in the churches where they are members, and in the little patch of creation God gives them authority over.

Disciple of Christ: Discipleship means that the student has more to learn. It also means that the mentor/discipler is leading the student into a more mature, more whole, more accurate understanding of the Lord and of his life in the context of the Lord’s world.

Conformed to the image of Christ: To teach literature without the goal of conformity to Christ is wasted effort. To teach science without the goal of conformity to Christ is to throw away time and energy. All teaching in the school setting must keep this clearly in view.

Priest of the living God: A truly consistent Christian education must include prayer, devotion, worship, sacrifice, and service. These are not spiritual add-ons but are integral to a proper ‘whole-man’ discipleship.

Adult-becoming: Treating the student as an ‘adult-becoming’ means giving him both the privileges that adults are permitted and the responsibilities that adults are expected to carry. It also comes with the understanding that the student (not his parents) is responsible for his own failure, and that he is surrounded by those who love him and will not reject him and desire to help him when he does fail.

Vessel of the Holy Spirit: This may be perhaps the hardest part as well as the most freeing part of working with young people in a truly Christian setting: We cannot keep them holy. It is not within our power and it is not for us to decide how that will take place. Our responsibility is to faithfully point to the Cross of Jesus Christ as the only sufficiency for all of life and model that reliance upon the complete work of Christ.

Each of these appellations does not just describe what the Christian young person is becoming; it describes what the Christian young person is. How would our attitude and our care and our own preparation be different if we knew we were training kings?

Every watchful effort must be made to avoid all reductionist interpretations of the human being, including the student. The student is not merely one more producer in an economic machine, or something to be molded to fulfill another person’s dreams and wishes, or a guinea pig suitable for experimentation, or an instinctual creature that must be programmed through stimulus-response exercises.

All of the above qualities are how we must view the student who comes to our school. Will they fail? Yes. Will they sin? Yes. Are they immature? Of course. Have they learned bad theology and bad Christian practices? Yes. To take Romans 3 seriously is to expect all such complications. But if we understand the work of Christ and the work of the Holy Spirit properly (as well as the sovereign purposes of God) then we labor in faith that God’s purposes will not fail in that young person’s life. He has been given everything he needs for life and godliness (2 Peter 1:3-8). There will be nothing that can separate him from the Love of God given to him in Christ (Romans 8:37-39). That what Christ has begun in him He will complete unto the day of His return (Philippians 1:6).

Thus, 1 Corinthians 13 requires us to labor, believing all things, hoping all things, bearing all things, keeping no records of wrong and granting the judgment of charity in everything.

Rev. Chris Baker is the Headmaster of Wildwood Christian School which is a classical Christian school located at 4000 Alt Road in Wildwood, Missouri. For more information regarding Wildwood visit their website at www.wildwoodchristianschool.org or call (636) 938-8880.