Education is a vital component for life. We learn in Luke 2:52 that Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, clearly demonstrating that the Master Teacher set the ultimate example. But what we put in our minds is just as important as how much. When we place proper value on the souls of our children, we should understand that what they learn, how they learn, where they learn, and under whom they learn are all of utmost importance and must be approached from a Biblical worldview. Dr. R.C. Sproul, Jr. has written a book entitled When You Rise Up on this topic in which he brings many thought-provoking words, challenging our view of parenting, children, and schooling. Sproul’s assessment of education and the importance of the parent’s role was so radically different from what is commonly accepted as “the norm” and so Biblically centered that we wanted to sit down with him and ask him a few questions about schooling, its history, and its relation to the Bible.
FP: Most people tend to think of “school” as an event, a scheduled time to learn. In When You Rise Up, you argue that this is a misunderstanding of schooling, correct?
R.S.: Because the Bible sees education as discipleship, it is not something we do for a time and then finish. Rather all of us, not just our children, are constantly to be taught the things of God. This is why we talk of these things, as Deuteronomy 6 puts it, “when we lie down and when we rise up.” This too is why we cannot delegate this task. God calls parents to teach as much for what it does for parents as for what it does for children. We who talk of these things are as changed as those to whom we talk.
FP: Can there be education without some form of religious philosophy?
R.S.: All education is inherently religious, because education is the passing along of our most sacred beliefs. Those beliefs may be naturalistic. They may be nihilistic. They may be Muslim. They may be Christian. But there is no sphere of reality where our foundational beliefs do not intrude. For the Christian, we affirm that 2+2=4 because it is Jesus’ 2 and Jesus’ 2 and Jesus’ 4. He is Lord over all reality, and reality cannot be understood without Him. To try to take Jesus out of the equation is to make the 2’s and the 4 meaningless. The reason we have constant education wars is because we have parents with different religions being forced to pay to the teaching of only one. This is also why we do not solve the problem by “re-Christianizing” the state schools. We Christians are called to do unto others. We object when we are taxed to teach children a worldview we abhor. We would be hypocrites to tax our unbelieving neighbors to teach their children a worldview they abhor.
FP: The last two generations of those raised in Bible-based congregations have left in droves. To what extent is education responsible for this?
R.S.: Ultimately parents are responsible for this. When we send our children to a place where Jesus is irrelevant, where His Lordship is worse than denied––not even mentioned, when we tell our children that you can live a good life in a place where Jesus’ name cannot be mentioned 7 hours a day, is it any wonder they find Him irrelevant the remaining hours of the day? Christians have fought so long and hard for crumbs from the government school system––fighting immoral sexual curricula, fighting for advent songs for the chorus, that we have missed the one real issue––Jesus is not mentioned day in and day out. His Lordship is never acknowledged.
FP: In your mind, what have been the most significant changes in the education system in the last 50 years?
R.S.: Two things, rather tightly related. First, the mask has come off the government school system. That is, the schools have aggressively sought to undermine the beliefs of Christian parents from the beginning. They had, prior to the last fifty years, to keep this under wraps, to present a nice, wholesome, Norman Rockwell civil religion kind of atmosphere. Now, the open hostility to the Christian faith is clear and obvious. Sexual morality that runs directly in the face of Scripture is taught to terribly young children. The exclusive claims of the Christian faith are presented as prima facie evidence that we Christians are wicked, bigoted monsters.
Second, the rise of homeschooling has been nothing short of astonishing. As the state schools began to look less neutral and more hostile to the Christian faith, in God’s grace millions of parents have woken up to what their children were being taught and brought them home. This movement has not only broken the stranglehold on the state schools, but has broken the stranglehold on what we expect from our children. That is, it is breaking down and pushing against the profoundly anti-social practice of age segregation. Out of that flows greater familial identity and loyalty, which profoundly impacts the souls of our children.
FP: What challenges do Christian educators face in teaching in the public schools?
R.S.: They, for all their godly hopes and aspirations, face this impossible challenge––they cannot teach their students the Truth. They cannot, day in and day out, speak of the Lordship of Christ over all reality, over all that they are teaching. If they do so, they will lose their jobs. And if they don’t lose their jobs, they are still evangelizing their students in a faith alien to their families. That is, they are not doing unto others because they are taxing unbelievers to teach the children of unbelievers doctrines they don’t agree with. These Christians teachers are left then with trying to be a positive influence, trying to shine light into the darkness. The trouble is the entire system is one giant bushel. What they end up teaching these children, including the children of believers in their classes, is that the Lordship of Christ is not so important that it has to be talked about all the time.
FP: Why are so many people scared to consider alternative educational programs today?
R.S.: Because taking responsibility for the education and training of our children is hard work, and it exposes our sin. Perhaps worse, it makes us look weird to our neighbors. The reason the Bible over and again warns us about being men pleasers, about being loved by the world, the reason the Bible tells us that we, if we are in Him, will be hated like Him, is because we are so given to seek the approval of the world, so given to want to look just like them. In short, we fear men because we do not fear God.
Bio: Dr. R.C. Sproul, Jr. teaches at Reformation Bible College in Sanford, Florida, where he also serves as a teaching fellow for Ligonier Ministries. He is the founder of Highlands Ministries and former editor of Tabletalk magazine.
