By Jeff Keaton
Jeff Keaton is the President and CEO of Renewanation, working across America to reach the world for Christ and to get involved in the great cause of giving children a biblical worldview.
More than twenty years ago, I had to choose who would have access to our oldest daughter’s heart and mind in the world of education. I remember the weight of that decision. One of our church board members was a county supervisor, and he assured me that the public schools in our county were mostly led by Christians. I went to our local public school with a genuinely open heart and mind and interviewed an administrator. I asked her many questions, and after less than thirty minutes, I was convinced that this lady, nor the school she was leading, shared our Christian beliefs and would never have access to our precious daughter’s mind. My wife and I have never regretted that decision as today, our daughter loves Christ and has a well-developed biblical worldview.
In the 1960s and 70s, the government demanded the removal of prayer and Bible reading from government schools. Long before these actions were taken, public education had abandoned many of the core tenants of a biblical worldview, but these two decisions were a tipping point. Millions of children either left public education during that time or since then. However, the vast majority of evangelical Christian parents never left public education.
Even though millions of church kids have left the faith, there still seems to be this lack of understanding that education plays a major role in the loss of faith in Christian young people. Many still blame the universities while failing to realize that what children are being taught in K-12 erodes their foundation and prepares them for the knockout punch once they enter a secularized college. It’s not even close when you compare the pure evil children are taught today in public schools to what they were taught in the 60s and 70s. And yet, there are still millions of well-meaning Christian parents who are allowing their children to be subjected to utter unrighteousness day after day in their local public school. The sexual revolution is front and center in public schools today. Children are the experiments of the radical sexual ideologues, and the public schools are the laboratories. Abortion, homosexuality, transgenderism, feminism, hatred for the God-ordained family, and on and on the onslaught goes. Why in the world would anyone want their children subjected to these lies?
Public education offers the wrong answer to ALL the major questions of life. Who are we as humans? Who is the authority of the universe? How did we get here? What is our purpose in life? Who defines morality? Who defines sexuality and gender? Again I ask, why would anyone want to send their child to a school for 16,000 hours where they are taught falsehood all day long? I want to believe it’s simply ignorance of what is actually happening and a lack of biblical worldview understanding in parents.
Don’t be afraid of what others say. You make the best choice for your child, and God will honor and bless your decision.