Think Biblically But Speak Secularly to Unbelievers?

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Think Biblically But Speak Secularly to Unbelievers?

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When conversing with unbelievers, be it sharing the Gospel or explaining why we home school, shouldn’t  we endeavour to think Biblically but to speak secularly?

There is a strong current of thought among Christians that we need to modify the way we present the Gospel (or any other Biblically based principle by which we live) to the unbelieving and mostly unchurched people around us. If the public is to comprehend what we are saying as Christians we need to use language free from Christian jargon. We all probably agree with this sentiment.

But this is not the issue in the “think Biblically/speak secularly” debate. We told that our presentation of Biblical truths must not be too overtly Christian or else 1) we will get branded as Bible bashers and fundamentalists, 2) our unbelieving friends and family will switch off when we try to share with them, and 3) we will lose credibility and influence. Instead we must present Biblical principles in a way that does not immediately give away where we are coming from , is simple and appeals to the typical non-Christian NZer’s sense of righteousness, justice, fair-play, reasonableness and innate conservative sense of traditional family values. This is the way to win friends and influence people.

There are, however, many things terribly wrong with this mode of thinking. It denies the Lordship of Christ. It actually offers nothing at all distinctively Christian. It fails to grasp the work involved in thinking Biblically. The motivation behind this approach is to gain popularity, influence and mana in the eyes of men rather than to bring glory and increased faithfulness to God. It assumes that unbelievers have virtues which they do not possess. It causes us to abandon our Biblical stance and to argue from the unbeliever’s point of view. It also works against one of the main reasons many of us have for home schooling in the first place: surrounding our children with consistent standards.

First let us ask, ”Who’s in charge here, anyway?” Is it the risen glorified awesome and majestic Lord Jesus Christ to Whom has been granted all authority in heaven and on earth, or is it the intimidation of our friends and family that controls the way we think, speak and act in their presence? Is Jesus Lord of all or only Lord of some? What is it we Christians are called to do while here on earth? If it is simply to add an inoffensive Christian flavour to society so that some people will think, “Well, that’s so nice I’d like to join them,” then I think we have missed the point.

We are to be the lamp set on a lamp stand, not to be seen by others so much as TO DISPEL THE DARKNESS.

NZ is crying out for ANSWERS, not possibilities or good ideas. As Christians so often we know we have the answers in the Bible, but we take it so much for granted. Unless we are prepared to offer Christ, that is the Word of God, as the only hope for this nation, our friends and families and their families, then we really have nothing more than any of the secular counselling agencies or Social Welfare Officers of the state are offering.

Our children listen to the way we converse with our non-Christian friends and neighbours. They listen to what we say. Now granted we must use diplomacy, tact and sensitivity in sharing the Gospel, and there is truth in the idea that we must first earn the right to share the Gospel with our friends and workmates. But too often we think of sharing anything Christian with non-Christians as “witnessing”, and therefore as a separate activity. THIS IS A FALSE VIEW OF LIFE, and a view we DO NOT want to impart to our children. The Gospel and various aspects of it can and should be on our hearts and minds all the time, as they determine whether our speech and actions are distinctively Christian or basically the same as the pagan next door. Actually the truths of Scripture should not just be on our hearts and minds: they should be the frame of reference through which all incoming data and all outgoing messages are filtered. Only in this way can we think God’s thoughts after Him, acting and reacting in ways pleasing to Him. .And we want to be building this consistently Biblical frame of reference into our children’s hearts and minds as an integral part of our homeschooling programme. It is pretty tough to do when we do not have this consistently Biblical frame of reference in ourselves as yet. Many Christians, calling us to think Biblically yet speak secularly, themselves only know how to think secularly.

OK, so how do we go about building a consistently Biblical frame of reference? Work at it. We are talking about our minds here, our intellect, and the Lord Himself said that the greatest commandment was to love the Lord our God with ALL our heart, soul, MIND and strength. So use our minds to study the Scriptures on a continuing and regular basis. This is not the same as listening to sermons or tapes or someone else’s prepared mid-week study when you may or may not have actually read the chapter under study. This means pursuing a topic through the Scriptures and other study helps as if you were doing the sermon. I personally enjoy studying up an issue I may find , say, in the letters to the editor column. To focus my study I make it my aim to write a reply letter as a result of what I have learned , and most of the time they are published. And sometimes it starts a real debate through the papers, giving me even more issues to study up (and incidentall y , more opportunities to share the Word of God with the population at large). Listening to tapes is of course an excellent way to imbibe spiritual truths, as long as you use plenty of discretion in who you listen to.

One thing the saints have done all through the ages, something which is a lot of work but which repays in vast dividends, is to memorize Scripture. Do not just think in terms of a verse here and a verse there. Go for whole chapters, and memorize entire books. The wisdom gained, the experiences of God bringing a verse to mind for just the right occasion, the insights while reviewing and meditating on passages memorized to keep them sharp, the time with the children as they listen to see that you memorized it correctly and when you listen to see that they memorized it correctly, the blessing to others by bringing a quote rather than a paraphrase to bear on an issue at hand are all well worth the work. And as home schoolers, we can as a family memorize a verse around the breakfast table and review it together at the lunch break and review it again at tea time. We took a whole year to memorize James chapter one, and found that our 5-year-old had memorized it along with us even though we left her out of the process thinking she was too young! And again, those precious times around the mea1 table or while studying together are great for discussing the meaning of a verse or the blessings of a recent time in study or meditation over a passage of God’s Word … these things all build in a Biblical frame of reference into our children.

In addition, these methods of loving the Lord with our minds will cause us to think Biblically. Then we may act and speak Biblically as well. This idea of thinking Biblically yet speaking secularly seems a bit inconsistent, and we do not want to introduce these inconsistencies into our children’s education. To be consistent, let us first ensure that we think Biblically so that we are then ABLE to properly speak Biblically. OK, we may need to watch our vocabulary and stay away from certain Christian jargon, but we must use ideas and concepts that come straight from the only source of pure truth we have : the Bible. As the Lord says in Jeremiah 23:28-29, “And he who has My word, let him speak My word faithfully. ‘What is the chaff to the wheat?’ says the LORD. ‘Is not My word like a fire?’ says the LORD, ‘And like a hammer that breaks the rock in pieces?’ “

From Keystone Magazine
November 1995 , Vol. 1 No. 5
P O Box 9064
Palmerston North
Phone: (06) 357-4399
Fax: (06) 357-4389
email: craig@hef.org.nz

The Anti-Spanking Lobby

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The Anti-Spanking Lobby

Posted in Statist and Professional Trends

Our family had a lot of fun a few weeks ago when we appeared on the Holmes Show as the “Disciples of Discipline”! I had written an article on spanking, the parental skill of the judicial application of the rod of correction, which appeared in a recent edition of Above Rubies. Someone had sent a copy to Holmes.He had read in that article that we were Christians, spank our children, are home schoolers and foster parents as well. He may have thought he was on to some fringe people or extremists, which always make good stories. Well, if you ever find yourself in this position,and I hope many of you do, since many New Zealand parents are literally tearing apart at the seams because they do not know are totally unaware of the educational and parenting skills many of us Christian home schoolers take for granted. If you are ever in this position, you must plan ahead. Speak only in measured and calm tones. Decide before hand what you want to say and what you do not want to say. Anticipate the trickiest questions they might ask and practise how you should answer them.

They spent the first two hours with us filming and talking about home schooling. They then indicated that they were favourably impressed with us as a family. So we relaxed about the upcoming interview on spanking. And sure enough, they were easy on us and did not try to make us look bad. We believe the Lord also overruled when the final cut and editing took place as His Biblical standards seem to have come across accurately.

So where is the debate on whether to ban smacking in the horne up to at this point? I rang Labour MP for Hamilton East, Dianne Yates’ office, and they assured me she had no further plans to introduce legislation of that sort. Someone rang me to say that the Minister of Justice also had no plans to amend the Crimes Act to make spanking illegal. I rang the office of the Commissioner for Children in Wellington to see what they were up to. Although they have nothing in the pipeline at the moment, it was conveyed to me that when the political and social climate was right, they would be considering moves to ban parental corporal discipline. They have already published several pamphlets with titles like, “Hitting Children Is Unjust.” Now, most of us would hopefully agree that to haul off and hit a child with a back-hand across the mouth because you were annoyed is totally unacceptable. But to this crowd, hitting also means smacking and spanking no matter how lightIy or lovingly done. They also sent me a disturbing article by a Ms Penelope Leach, titled, “What’s Wrong with Hitting Children?” It is terribly biased. Check out this paragraph explaining that abused children seem to blame themselves for the abuse, and never the one who abused them. Watch the language carefully:

“A study of a very large sample of University students, reported in the international journal Child Abuse and Neglect shows that this tendency to self-blame for physical punishment continues into adult life and therefore into parenthood. Subjects retrospectively justified not only punitive but brutal parents by assigning crimes to the children they used to be. Far from blaming those parents, they often expressed gratitude to them for the way they themselves had grown up. And during interviews, they consistently played down the violence used towards them. For example, 80% reported being spanked as children, but only 40% reported that they had received ‘physical punishment’; for many young adults, then, smacked bottoms were too trivial to count. Some subjects had suffered lasting bruises from parental beatings, but only 10% of them considered those punishments to have been excessive or cruel. Even amongst the group of students who had received hospital treatment for fractures, or other serious injuries resulting from parental punishment, only 43 % classified themselves as having been ‘abused’ or ‘cruelly treated’. The study concludes that ‘the recipients of punitive physical discipline are the least likely to recognise its inappropriateness.”

I find this paragraph one of the best promotions IN FAVOUR OF smacking from the pen of unbelievers that I have ever read. As much as the authors clearly despise spanking, those University student-subjects of theirs clearly did not. So the authors had to fabricate imaginative interpretations of their findings to agree with what they wanted to find . These poor, confused University students were so perverted by their loyalty to their parents that they were unable to think for themselves. Even among those who definitely had been subjected to excessive force, the kind that broke bones, only 43 % said they had been ‘abused’ or ‘cruelly treated’. So tbe study reckoned that these adult aged University students were a) deluded, b) unable to recognise their ill treatment and c) so rnessed up as to actually express gratitude for the way their parents had treated them. In other words, if you disagree with the authors’ pre-commitment to the idea that spanking is never justified, by their reckoning you need professional help for you are clearly not a full packet of biscuits!

Write to the Office of the Commissioner for Children for their pamphlets and a copy of this article quoted above: PO Box 12537, Wellington, ph. (04) 471-1410, Fax (04) 471-1418. Moves to make criminals out of us parents who spank our children are likely to come from this office.

From Keystone Magazine
November 1995 , Vol. 1 No. 5
P O Box 9064
Palmerston North
Phone: (06) 357-4399
Fax: (06) 357-4389
email: craig@hef.org.nz

KEYSTONE Vol.I No.IV September/October 1995

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To read the Keystone magazine click this link:

keystone-vol-1-no-4-september-october-1995websiteready.pdf

Contents:

Editorial: Fathers’ Involvement

Home School Research: Results of NZ-wide Home Schooling Survey

Subscription Information

Puzzle

Support Group: Wellington Home Schoolers Association

In Line With Scripture: Genesis 1:28

Over a Cuppa
Teaching Other Peoples’ Chidlren, Part III
Evaluating Your Child’s Progress

Learning Disabilities: A.D.D. and Allergies

Statist & Professional Trends

(Christian Commenton Current Issues)

NZ Reading Methods Questioned NZ Qualifications Framework

Christian Education Qualificatons Trust

School Certificate

Compulsory Schooling
Supervisory Allowance
Correspondence with Politicians
Letter from Vice-Chancellors’ Committee

Provisional Entrance Regulations

Letter from Canterbury University
Trading Post
Action Station
Discounted Books, T-shirts, Back Yard Scientisl Books, Grammar Game.. .. .See Catalogue (encl.)

Teach Them That Work is a Blessing

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Teach Them That Work is a Blessing

Posted in In line with Scripture

“Then God blessed them, and God said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth.'” – Genesis 1:28

The Word of God tells us that the first thing God did after creating us was to bless us….and look how He blessed us: by giving us work to do. Work is a blessing. Sometimes it seems like a curse, but you know why that is, don’t you? God gave us this blessed task before the Fall (recorded in Genesis 3) and ever since then, because God has cursed the ground (not us) because of our sin, the work has been a lot more difficult. And men have been trying to get out of doing the required work ever since. To work smarter rather than harder, to become more efficient, divide the labour among ourselves, invent labour saving devices is all perfectly legitimate. But to look at work itself as a necessary curse is to be less than thankful to God for the blessing of the work with which He blessed us. Remember, the problem is our sin, not God’s organisation of the world we live in.

Now the implications for us home schoolers is that we must teach our children to enjoy work for the blessing that it was originally intended to be. If our attitude to our 9 to 5 job or our housework or the yardwork or car maintenance is lousy, so will our children’s attitude toward work be lousy. If we threaten our children’s misbehaviour with giving them extra work to do, what does that communicate about how we view work? Our culture is already full of laziness and sloth, even to common farewell slogans such as, “Take it easy,” or “Don’t work too hard,” so we should be endeavouring to mirror God’s standards rather than slipping into the world’s mould.

The Fourth Commandment talks about the Sabbath, but introduces it by another command, “Six days you shall labour and do all your work.” If we or our children (whose lives we have completely taken into our hands by deciding to home school them), if either of us is to fulfill this very first task God assigned (which was repeated to Noah at the end of the Flood, and by our Lord Jesus in a fuller form in Matthew 28:18-20 and repeated by Paul in II Corinthians 5:18-20), then we must put off our old selves with their anti-Christian anti-work attitudes, and put on the new nature of Christ.

Allow your children to see and hear you revelling in a job well done. Allow them to help you, even though it is a pain, and takes so much longer. But you can put your hands on those of your child and guide them through the task. What a marvellous opportunity! Allow them to see your concern that whatever task you do, you are committed to doing it well, to the best of your ability. Remember, before Christ redeemed us, we were UNABLE to work as we ought, that is, to work for the glory of our God and our Saviour/Redeemer. So now that we are saved, praise God, let’s get stuck in and make up for lost time! Is not our God worthy of our best?

Cursed be that old kiwi attitude you sometimes hear in the workplace when the boss isn’t around: “Near enough is good enough.” Not so for us Christians. “And whatever you do, do it heartily, as to the Lord and not to men.” (Colossians 3:23.) Our children are watching us,as well as God. He will call us to account for our actions, having already poured out His wrath for our lousy work habits and all the rest upon His perfect Son. But our children just might pick up our negative habits and repeat them all over again. Let it not be so! Christ redeemed us parents from the pit that we might spare our children our mistakes and instead give them a roaring head start so they can bring far more honour to Him than we ever even think about. “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven. ” (Matthew 5:16).

From Keystone Magazine
September 1995 , Vol. 1 No. 4
P O Box 9064
Palmerston North
Phone: (06) 357-4399
Fax: (06) 357-4389
email: craig@hef.org.nz

KEYSTONE Vol.I No.III July/August 1995

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To read the Keystone magazine click this link:

keystone-vol-1-no-3-july-august-1995websiteready.pdf

Contents:
(Regular Columns)
Editorial
Letters
Home School Research Test Scores of 16,320 Home Schoolers Look Good
Subscription Information
Learning Disabiities Signs That May Point to ADD
Puzzle & Contest
Tough Questions People Throw Your Way How Can My Teen Sit School Cert?
America’s Phantom Caller

Over a Cuppa Teaching other Peoples’ Children, II; Science Workshops
In Line With Scripture Deuteronomy 6:4-7
Statist & Professional Trends (Christian Comment on Current Issues)
Effectiveness of ERO
Govt’s Response to Science & Education Committee’s recommendations
Correspondence with Politicians
Modifications to School Certification
MOE Questionaire on S.C
Action Station
CHomeS Roundup
Discounted Books
Trading Post
Back Yard Scientist Books