“I could never homeschool my children. I couldn’t stand to have them around me that much!” Have you ever heard that line? What about: “I can’t wait for the school year to start! It will be such a relief to have the children back in school. They are driving me crazy!”
I can’t tell you how often I’ve heard these sentiments expressed. Many parents even say such things within earshot of their children.
Whenever a parent says something like that to me, my immediate response is, “Well, I guess that you, even more than other parents, REALLY NEED to homeschool your children!” This always results in dropped jaws and incredulous stares.
There are two main reasons that God wants you to homeschool your children. The first reason has nothing to do with your children. That’s right! As counter intuitive as it sounds, God wants you to homeschool your children for a purpose that doesn’t relate to them and their needs.
You see, whether we like to admit it, we have issues. Not just teensy-tiny issues; we have really, really big character flaws! God is merciful and He will not allow us to remain the selfish people that we have always been. If you belong to Him, He will discipline and train you (Hebrews 12) to become conformed into the image of His Son (Romans 8:29).
One of the primary means by which God works out the selfishness and carnality in our lives is by creating customized little button-pushers, who are strategically designed to bring out the worst in us. They intuitively know how to rub us the wrong way. Have you ever wondered how on earth your children can be so effective in driving your crazy? Sometimes it seems they were custom made for the purpose of annoying you…and they love their job!
When we were new parents, I remember coming home from work one day to find my frazzled wife at her wit’s end. Our two-year-old had stretched her to her limit. “He is SO disobedient!” she lamented.
“Did you expect something different?” I asked. “Of course he is disobedient. He is two years old. Our job is to train him how to become something other than who he is. He doesn’t know how to do anything different unless we teach him. That teaching process is a marathon, not a sprint. It’s not going to happen in one day, or one month, or one year. We’re in this for the long haul.”
She breathed a long sigh and admitted, “I’m not sure that I’m up for this!” I reminded her, “Of course we’re up to this! God wouldn’t have given us this child if He didn’t know that we were up to the challenge.” You see, God is doing the same thing to us that we are trying to do with our children. He is teaching us that life is not about us. The quicker we learn this lesson, the sooner we can start passing it on to our children. You can only give to someone else what you possess yourself.
That is why Deut. 6 says, “This law which I give you this day shall be on YOUR heart.” That is the starting point. God turns the hearts of the fathers FIRST to the children, and only then does He turn the children’s hearts to the fathers (Mal. 4:6). God wants the hearts of the parents, and He knows that if you are sub-contracting your children off to outside agencies to spare you the effort of the 24/7/365 parenting process, you are missing out on perhaps the primary means that God has established for your sanctification.
I recently heard a homeschooling mother lament the fact that she had much more time for Bible reading and prayer before she had children. I can certainly relate to that feeling! It seems like the more children you have, the more the pressures and responsibilities of life crowd out the things that we consider luxuries, such as taking naps, exercising, having a social life or developing our spiritual disciplines. It could seem that unmarried people (or at least people without children) have a much greater chance of being truly spiritual, since they are not distracted by the hectic pace of life brought on by child-rearing.
The reality is, however, that all that external pressure is the MEANS by which God is sanctifying and conforming us into His image. It is in the forge of everyday life: the laundry, the meals, the bills, teaching academics, etc., that God is hammering us into a tool fit for His purpose.
Once God has fully captured your heart and will, He then turns His focus to your children and uses you as an agent of His grace in their lives. Your parenting will be far more effective when you can teach your children, by your own example (rather than your mere words), how you are overcoming your own sinful nature and self-consumed worldview. Yes, your children need to be homeschooled so they can be trained in the way they should go, but you need it more. When a student is fully trained, he will be similar to his teacher (Luke 6:40).
Israel Wayne is an author and conference speaker and Director of Family Renewal. He and his wife, Brook, live in SW Michigan and are homeschooling parents of 11 children. www.FamilyRenewal.org
Israel is author of the books, Raising Them Up: Parenting for Christians and Answers for Homeschooling: Top 25 Questions Critics Ask.
