How to Choose How to Educate Your Children: A Biblical Process

A process for choosing how to educate our children

One of the most difficult decisions parents will make is the decision about how to educate their children. Perhaps it would be better to say that some of the most difficult decisions parents will ever make are the decisions about how to educate their children, since for most parents, they will have to regularly revisit the matter as their lives change, as their family grows, and as different options become available or unavailable. These decisions are not only difficult and consequential, but they are also often judged by other Christians who have strong feelings on the matter. No wonder, then, that many parents struggle to decide with confidence.

I have no interest in telling other families what they ought to decide. I do have an interest, though, in helping parents make their decision with wisdom and confidence. To that end, I’d like to lead you through the process I would use if I had to make this choice today.

Principles

Before I do so, though, let me establish a few preliminary principles.

This is a matter for parents to decide, not the wider church, not social media, and not advocates of any particular position. It’s interesting to me how many people who advocate the rights of parents to make decisions for their children are quick to bind the consciences of other parents when it comes to education. I believe this is a matter for parents to decide.
This is a matter for parents to decide because it is to them that God gives the charge to raise their children in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. Education is not the sole component of this charge, but it is certainly a significant part of it. Extended family, church, and friends may all play a role in raising children, but ultimately it is the parents who bear the responsibility.
The best decisions flow from a biblically guided mind and a well-informed conscience. Not only that, but the best decisions rely upon the wisdom of other people, and especially the wisdom of other Christians—those who help us better understand Scripture and who help us shape our conscience according to it. We can have confidence in our decisions when we rely on Scripture, conscience, and the wisdom of others.
No educational option can allow the parents to be uninvolved. Whether education is entirely in-house or entirely outsourced to a public or Christian school, the parents owe it to the Lord to remain informed and involved. We cannot abandon our children to even the best of schools or the best of teachers.
Broad statements like “Christians should never enroll their children in public schools” or “homeschool is never a good option” are unhelpful when Christ’s church spans the world and the ages. We can best serve our brothers and sisters in the Lord by speaking calmly, respectfully, and without hyperbole, knowing that what may be true or possible in one context may be false or impossible in another. At the very least, a statement like “Christians should never enroll their children in public schools” might be better stated as “it seems to me that it would be unwise for Christians in this area to enroll their children in public schools.” “Homeschool is never a good option” might be better stated as, “For my family, it is difficult to see how homeschooling would be a wise option.” Let’s make sure we distinguish our own context and options from those of others.

Before I proceed to the process, let me suggest what parents should desire from their children’s education. What is the purpose of educating them, and how should we want them to emerge from this period of their lives? As they become adults, what should their education have accomplished for them? Here is what Aileen and I considered:

We wanted them to be sufficiently educated that they had options available to them in their adult life—options that, Lord willing, would be related to their gifts, desires, and abilities. This required exposure to many different disciplines, and it required both skillful teaching and committed learning.
We wanted them to learn how to function as adults and to be neither worldly nor naive. Wise parents neither completely withhold them from this world nor completely turn them over to it. Rather, wise parents expose them to the reality of this world and its brokenness, but in appropriate ways, at an appropriate pace, and with plenty of parental interpretation.
As Christian parents, we wanted our children’s education to play a role in showing them their need for Christ and, as they turned to him in repentance and faith, to equip them to live with godly character and according to the Great Commission.

Education, then, is a training ground for vocation, and it is an aspect of preparing for a life lived for the good of others and the glory of God. With that in mind, let’s turn to a process.

A Process

If I had young children and had to decide how to educate them, here is a process I would use. It is framed around five questions.

1. What are my possible options?

I would first lay out all the possible options to ensure I know the full context for my decision. This is important because there may be options that are available in other jurisdictions that are not available in mine. There may be options that Christians laud or insist upon that are not possible for me. For example, in some places, homeschooling is forbidden, while in other places, Christian schooling is unavailable. In some places, there are multiple public schools to choose from, while in other places, there is only one. Hence, I would need to gather my options.

In my town, we have these options:

Public school
Catholic school (which in Canada is publicly funded and, therefore, free)
Christian school (which in Canada is not publicly funded and, therefore, not free)
Private school
Homeschool

To further complicate the picture, in many urban areas, public schools offer several options: English, French, or French immersion.

2. What are my actual options?

Now that I have laid out the possible options, I would consider the actual options. These, of course, can vary a great deal depending on a number of factors. A widower who is raising several children while also serving as the primary breadwinner may find that homeschooling is off the table, even if it may be what he most desires. If a family has fled to a new country as refugees and is just beginning to get established, Christian schools and private schools may be out of their financial reach. In Canada, some Protestants are comfortable enrolling their children in Catholic schools, yet those schools are typically only available to children whose parents have been baptized Catholic. This makes it a possible option for some, but not others.

When Aileen and I had young children, we simply could not afford a Christian school or private school, and we had no access to the Catholic schools. Hence, the only options actually available to us were public school, in either English or French immersion, or homeschool.

3. Who should I speak to as I make my decision?

This third question takes into account the biblical perspective that wise decision-making depends upon outside counsel (see Proverbs 11:14; Proverbs 15:22). When deciding on something as consequential as education, I know I would be wise to take advantage of such counselors. I would speak to trusted people who have chosen each of the options and I would ask them about their convictions and their experience. I would ask what they appreciate and what they struggle with when it comes to their decision. I would also speak to some teens or young adults who have come through the different options, and, if possible, to teachers I know within the various systems. Then, of course, I would also speak to one of the elders of my local church and ask for his wisdom and prayers. In these ways and more, I would do my best to sharpen my understanding of both the theory and the reality of the different options.

It is here that I would also look into specific schools. I may have a clear conscience when it comes to public school, but perhaps the one my children would have to attend is known for its activism or violence, which might make it an unsuitable choice. Perhaps the local Christian school is Christian in name only and teaches false doctrine. Perhaps there are no other homeschoolers in my area, making me concerned that I would feel isolated. There could be lots of different factors to consider.

4. Which of these options do Scripture and my conscience permit?

The next question would filter out any options that might be available, yet not be permissible according to my understanding of God’s will for his people. For this question, we simply have to acknowledge that Christians have the latitude to come to different conclusions based on their knowledge of God’s Word, the maturity of their conscience, and the specifics of their situation. Some Christians have deep convictions that lead them to enroll their children in public schools, and some have deep convictions that lead them to homeschool. I grew up in churches in which most people believed that Christian schooling was the only appropriate option, so that both public schooling and homeschooling were essentially forbidden. Christians are all over the place on this matter!

When speaking as broadly as I am doing in this article—an article that will inevitably be read by Christians across the world—I can only say that I would have to know my own context, search the Scriptures, pray for wisdom, seek counsel, and then heed my own conscience. If I did that, I would be confident that no one has the right to pass judgment on my decision.

5. Which of the available options do I believe is best for my family?

And now we come to it: I would have to make a decision. Of course, this decision would not need to be permanent or irrevocable, so I could think a year at a time, a school at a time, and a child at a time. That said, stability is important to children, and ideally, I would prefer to make a confident and lasting decision instead of one that is hesitant or short-term. Still, I would know that I could always change my decision later on.

By the time I reach this fifth question, I would have already determined what God forbids me from doing according to his Word and what I believe he forbids according to my conscience. I would have gathered information and sought counsel. This means I could now make a decision with confidence that God would be pleased with me and would be eager to bless me, no matter what I decide. Because my process had (hopefully) eliminated wrong decisions and minimized the likelihood of unwise decisions, I would be left with only choices that God, as my Father, would now gladly bless and support. This is the freedom we have as Christians.¹

Reflection

One of my articles that gained a substantial response in terms of both quantity and conviction is the one titled What If God Doesn’t Care a Whole Lot About How You Educate Your Children? In that article, I considered the purpose of educating our children and then reflected on the reality that I haven’t seen that any of the options necessarily lead to a better outcome when it comes to the long-term educational and spiritual strength of our children.

I need to offer a key caveat: I’m thinking particularly of families who had biblical convictions about education and followed those convictions to one of the options. They believed before the Lord that homeschooling would be best for their family so homeschooled, they believed before the Lord that Christian schooling would be best for their family so Christian-schooled, or they believed before the Lord that public schooling would be best for their family so enrolled their children in public school. They did not just dump their kids into whatever option was the easiest, or the “default” for their subculture, or the one towards which they felt the most peer pressure. Rather, they operated according to biblical wisdom and conviction. They also built other structures into family life that would strengthen and support their children—church commitment and participation, family devotions, personal habits of Scripture reading and prayer, and so on.

I stand by this and, in fact, the past few years have only reinforced it. We have now had several decades in which homeschooling, public schooling, and Christian schooling have been running in parallel. It seems to me that if one of them were universally superior or inferior, or if one of them was always met with God’s smile and the other with God’s frown, we would know by now. But I see no evidence of this. I have seen all of the options lead to children who love the Lord and are able to function well in his world, and I have seen all of them lead to children who forsake the Lord and have few options in his world.

All of which is to say, I think we may place more weight on this decision than we need to. I am not saying that it doesn’t matter, and that you can just choose any option and see equal results. Rather, I’m saying that what seems to be most important is how we make the decision and how we love and support our children as we press on in homeschool, public school, Christian school, or any other kind of school. I have said it before, and I’ll say it again: Somehow along the way, we Christians began to treat the education of our children as if it were the most important element in the success and salvation of our kids. And if it wasn’t ever the most important, it was certainly at nearly the top of the list.

But I have come to believe it’s not nearly as simple as that. I’ve come to believe that, though education is undoubtedly very important, what’s more important than the decision we ultimately make is the basis on which we make it and the support we bring to it. I’ve come to believe that when we operate by wisdom and conviction, when we pray fervently and decide boldly, God is eager and willing to pour out his blessings upon us and upon our children, no matter what direction we choose. Because that’s the kind of God he is.