A hot item in the news lately is the topic of who is ultimately responsible for public education. The U.S. has a checkered and inconsistent history on this matter, going back to revolutionary times. The founding fathers felt that for democracy to work well, the country needed an educated citizenry, but the nation struggled for about fifty years to implement universal, tax-supported, free education, and even then, the results were mixed. So the struggle is not new. Whatever the history, many Christians now are up in arms over the liberal perspectives being foisted on their children, and parents who speak out are increasingly seen as agitators and ignorant. Alarms are going off all over the place, it seems.

The bigger problem is that dissenting voices are being treated as though their non-mainstream opinions should be suppressed and sacrificed on the altar of progressive liberal crowd-think. Many are worried that “thought-control” is moving the U.S. toward a totalitarian state, where government dictates not only how you should live but how you should think. What do we do with all this? Social historians, political scientists, and cultural researchers have a lot to say, and many Christians believe the battle is political. But is that the primary battlefield for the minds of our children?

Some Christians have opted out of the public school system for homeschooling. As any homeschooling parent knows, this has its challenges, especially for those who do not have the gift of teaching. Christian schooling is another option that protects children from competing ideologies and worldviews at their tender and formative age. Still, secular worldviews can creep in even there, and not all students come from families with the same values. Some advocate for keeping their children in the public school system, where they can make a difference as ambassadors for Christ. This sounds noble and certainly is less expensive than the other options, but parents must be careful that their idealism doesn’t turn out like the Israelites sending their children to the school of the false-god-worshiping Canaanites. Still others use charter schools or otherwise private schools with more freedom from government overreach and more parental involvement.

The answers are not easy, there is no slam dunk, and I am not smart enough to answer definitively what is best in each situation. But Christian leaders and Christian sociologists are aware of the extraordinarily high dropout rate from church and from the walk of faith among young people who grew up in the church but have jettisoned their faith beginning at college age. Parents are rightly concerned (except those who are overconfident in themselves, thinking, “It will never happen to my children”).

I would assert that God’s plan for the Israelites reflects that the most significant influence on our children’s education is in the home. If we want to capture our children’s hearts and minds for Christ, it begins with intentional home education. By that, I mean parents teaching their children the Word of God (not abdicating this responsibility to the church or Christian schools). This responsibility involves not just what we say but how we live. Children will not learn God’s ways or develop a Christian worldview unless they are immersed in it from an early age.

Listen to God’s terse instructions to Israel as they were about to enter the Promised Land:

“Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord is one! You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. These words, which I am commanding you today, shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your sons and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise up. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand and they shall be as frontals on your forehead. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.” (Deut. 6:4–9)

No matter what school system parents use, the most important thing for their children is to see and learn God’s ways in all the aspects of daily life. Children need to see their parents devoted to reading God’s Word, praying, trusting what God says, and acting in faith. They need to see authenticity, not hypocrisy, even to the point of parents confessing and apologizing when they treat their children wrongly. In other words, our children need total immersion at home in the Christian life. It begins here. Whatever happens to the public school system and its curriculum, home life has a greater influence. Without the godly teaching and faith-life of the parents, our children will be sitting ducks for the worldviews out there, whether in public schools, home schools, or private schools. This is true, regardless of one’s country of residence.

Lord, help all the parents (and grandparents) reading this to live the life of Christ in faith before the generations that come after us, beginning with the little children in our households.