The chief end of education

The Gist of Bible first homeschooling: Cultivating a child’s faith is the most important responsibility a parent bears

Part I: the Bible as the source and center of education. Find Part II here.

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If you believe that “Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy Him forever,”¹ then there is nothing more vital in your children’s education than to raise them up to love the Lord. If eternity is at stake, act like it. Pour your prayers, your time, your energy, your thoughts, your resources, your intentions, your attention, your life into making sure, above academic tests and getting into the right college, above sports and extracurricular performance, above employability, above fun and socialization, above physical safety, above everything else, that your child is saved. “For what good will it do a person if he gains the whole world, but forfeits his soul?” (Matthew 16:26)

To discern precisely what that means and what your responsibilities are, it’s best to first look directly and exclusively to the Bible without reference to modern views about what “education” means. Assume that the Bible is both necessary to construct Christian education and sufficient. The apostle Paul tells us “All Scripture is inspired by God and beneficial for teaching, for rebuke, for correction, for training in righteousness; so that the man or woman of God may be fully capable, equipped for every good work.” (2 Timothy 3:16-17). You should be on guard for reading into the Good Book things that simply are not there; you are looking to conform your life with the Bible, not conform the Bible with your life… and modern society’s expectations.²

Figure 1. “Just trimming the parts that don’t vibe with my truth.”

Of course, the Bible is not a precise grade-by-grade manual - certainly, there is no mention of required courses in calculus or the arts. There is not even a catalog of how great believers were specifically educated. Perhaps most notably, given that the secularization of public schools was one of the main motivations for the modern homeschooling movement, the Bible does not describe, much less endorse, any institutional schools. Instead, parents are given the ultimate responsibility for sustaining a specific multi-generational covenant.³ When it comes to education, if you’re a Christian parent and your children believe, you’ve succeeded; if you’ve failed to make their belief your utmost educational priority, you’ve failed (ultimately, whether they do believe is a matter of God’s grace, but He clearly desires to work through parents).⁴

What does that mean? We are commanded, above all, to “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and, with all your soul, and with all your mind” (Matthew 22:37). We are to love others sacrificially (Matthew 22:39-40)⁵; to acknowledge and repent our own ongoing sinfulness (Romans 3:23⁶, 1 John 1:8-9⁷) and believe in the exclusive claims of Christ’s provision of salvation through grace alone (Ephesians 2:8-9⁸), and in believing, to become more like Christ through spiritual transformation (Galatians 5:22-23⁹, Ephesians 4:22-24¹⁰). Finally, we are called to make disciples and spread the Good News of salvation (Matthew 28:19-20¹¹) as well as share our spiritual gifts in service to others (1 Peter 4:10-11¹²).

Moses, speaking in Deuteronomy to the Israelites who had seen so many miracles, instructed clearly “do not forget the things which your eyes have seen and they do not depart from your heart all the days of your life; but make them known to your sons and your grandsons” (4:9) and further, that “You shall teach [God's commandments and word] to your children, talking of them when you are sitting in your house, and when you are walking by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.” (11:19). Is God around only on Sundays, perhaps at grace before dinner and nightly prayers, or is He with you and sovereign at all times, in every hour? (Can He be in a secular school?) This obligation didn’t disappear. Christ chided his disciples for keeping children from him, insisting instead that they hear the message as well; and His disciple John later wrote “I have no greater joy than this, to hear of my children walking in the truth.” (3 John 1:4).

Figure 2. Twelve grown men watched bread multiply, lepers healed, storms calmed and still asked, ‘Do you have a sign for us?’ Your kids will need constant reminders, too.

I cannot emphasize enough for Christian parents: there is no substitute for belief. If pursuing belief requires completely upending plans, defying social expectations, removing your kids from things or people they love¹³, or enduring significant discomfort¹⁴, you are obligated to do it. Though it would be illegal in most if not all American states (and horrify secular observers), it would be a perfectly Biblically sufficient education for a child to read only the Bible and learn welding (or whatever other basic skills were adequate to provide a living and matched his God-given gifts). Generations of faithful farmers did exactly this. Meanwhile, the typical secular education, with all its “comprehensiveness,” does not teach what is necessary. Of course, it is not unbiblical to teach a lot more; Christians created the liberal arts education to learn all aspects of God’s creation and expertly exercise stewardship over it - we’ll talk more about that in our next correspondence (indeed, you can take a Bible first approach to any of the other methods I’ve written about, and if you’re a believer, you should). But Christians must be constantly keen to ensure that at the center of all things they learn is the truth of faith. The Puritan preacher Cotton Mather put it neatly: “Before all, and above all, tis the knowledge of the Christian religion that parents are to teach their children.…The knowledge of other things, though it be never so desirable an accomplishment for them, our children may arrive to eternal happiness without it.…But the knowledge of the godly doctrine in the words of the Lord Jesus Christ is of a million times more necessity for them.”

Might this make your kids weird? We often forget, amidst a nation long occupied by a majority of self-identified Christians, that we are not meant to fit in. This should be all the easier to understand as our culture secularizes. Christ said, “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, because of this the world hates you.” (John 15:18-19). If you find yourself asking what others might think, you should prayerfully consider whether you are succumbing to counterfeit gods of social conformity, prestige, or still something else that can never deliver. The fundamental question for children is not whether they are prepared for life but whether they are prepared for the afterlife - whether they are saved. Pursue not the praise of men! Give your children a sense of self worth separate from what others think of them.

While the truth of the faith is simple and beautiful and can be conveyed easily to most people, including children, it is natural that true believers should hunger for its details and for examples to become exemplar. A Christian education therefore should involve early literacy and then deep, frequent, long study of the Bible that should continue throughout one’s life. If the source of your religion is a book, the most important book ever, you and your children need to be reading that book - and, further, not a bowdlerized version, but the truest translation you can find (until and unless you decide to learn Hebrew and Greek). While it’s possible and common to not perfectly know all the Bible says and still be saved, biblical literacy is still the foundational aspiration of a Christian education, essential for wisdom and spiritual growth.¹⁵

The poet John Milton insisted that “The end then of learning is to repair the ruins of our first parents by regaining to know God aright, and out of that knowledge to love him, to imitate him, to be like him.” The fruit of faith is piety and virtue. How are you observing and cultivating that fruit in your children? Yes, it is biblically virtuous to work hard¹⁶ and be honest¹⁷, the typical sources of praise in academia, but how else is your children’s behavior approaching Christ’s? It’s not as easy to give a score out of 100 to someone’s righteousness, their selflessness, their obedience to parents, their self-control, their patience, their kindness, their love as it is on a math test, but it is important, and worthy of continuous prayer, attention, and discipline. As Leland Ryken explains: “Milton the educator is less interested in how much a person knows than in the kind of person he or she is in the process of becoming.” What does Christian character look like in your child and how can he explore it? How will he witness, how will he evangelize? How will your child be visibly different, so that no nonbeliever may wonder if Christianity is transformative?¹⁸ These are far more important questions than what precisely he learns. It is only after faith, after virtue, that one can (and must) pursue a vocation based on the gifts God has provided to each individual to provide for himself.

Jesus warned that “It is better for him if a millstone is hung around his neck and he is thrown into the sea, than that he may cause one of these little ones to sin.” (Luke 17:2) And it’s crucial to understand that children are sinners, too.¹⁹ “Foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child” and “a child who gets his own way brings shame to his mother” - and there is a biblically prescribed solution: “The rod of discipline will remove [foolishness] far from him” (Proverbs 22:15, 29:15). Indeed, the Bible goes so far as to say “He who withholds his rod hates his son, But he who loves him disciplines him diligently.” (Proverbs 13:24) and that “Though you strike him with the rod, he will not die. You shall strike him with the rod And rescue his soul from Sheol.” That discipline is not to be imposed in anger, but with calm and prayer, with an eye toward whether someone is repentant (Proverbs 28:13)²⁰ and with the goal of restitution (Numbers 5:6-7)²¹. Whether you take this literally or metaphorically, Hebrews 12:11 advises this isn’t gentle: “For the moment, all discipline seems not to be pleasant, but painful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterward it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.” The fruits are serious: “Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.” (Proverbs 22:6) “Correct your son, and he will give you comfort; He will also delight your soul.” (Proverbs 29:17). In his famous 1828 dictionary, Noah Webster, a devout Christian, defined “discipline” first as “education.”

Discipline can be hard but let us never forget the point of it all: that Christians are raising children to believe so that they can enjoy forever the love of God, whose very core of his trinitarian identity is that he has been loving forever.²² And the Father should always be the model for your own parenting as you contemplate your children. The Gospel is the good news! Insofar as you’d do everything you possibly could to free your children from literal chains of slavery, be no less vigilant in freeing them from the slavery of sin. Ronald Reagan’s mother had a particularly good embrace of this joy, telling her son: “Jesus is with you, is aware of your life and fully engaged in it; God is in everything; He will let [nothing]²³ befall you that will not be to the ultimate benefit of your soul. Sometimes He steps aside for trouble coming your way but only if it will refine you or prepare you to be with Him someday in heaven, where you'll know a happiness beyond all human understanding. So there is no cause then for sadness, only for joy. ‘Do not be afraid.’”²⁴

In our next correspondence, we’ll tackle what a broader curriculum looks like from a Christian perspective.

1. The Westminster Catechism

2. “And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.” Romans 12:2

3. “We will not conceal them from their children, But we will tell the generation to come the praises of the Lord, And His power and His wondrous works that He has done. For He established a testimony in Jacob, And appointed a law in Israel, Which He commanded our fathers That they were to teach them to their children, So that the generation to come would know, the children yet to be born, That they would arise and tell them to their children, So that they would put their confidence in God And not forget the works of God, But comply with His commandments” Psalm 78:4-7. It’s also natural to rely on the broader community of believers, especially in your church, but parents come first. In fact, Douglas Wilson points to a number of references in the Old Testament in which children’s behavior, especially defiance of God’s law, brings “shame” to parents, suggesting responsibility; in the context of the New Testament, where Christians discover that they cannot follow the law perfectly and there’s a new covenant, that is still good to know. See also next footnote.

4. Importantly, even if your child does not believe, that does not risk your own salvation. “The person who sins will die. A son will not suffer the punishment for the father’s guilt, nor will a father suffer the punishment for the son’s guilt; the righteousness of the righteous will be upon himself, and the wickedness of the wicked will be upon himself.” Ezekiel 18:20

5. “The second is like it, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ Upon these two commandments hang the whole Law and the Prophets.”

6. “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God”

7. “If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous, so that He will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

8. “For by grace you have been saved through faith; and ]this is not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not a result of works, so that no one may boast.”

9. “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.”

10. “that, in reference to your former way of life, you are to rid yourselves of the old self, which is being corrupted in accordance with the lusts of deceit, and that you are to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth.”

11. “Go, therefore, and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to follow all that I commanded you; and behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

12. “As each one has received a special gift, employ it in serving one another as good stewards of the multifaceted grace of God. Whoever speaks is to do so as one who is speaking actual words of God; whoever serves is to do so as one who is serving by the strength which God supplies; so that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom belongs the glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.”

13. “Whoso keepeth the law is a wise son: but he that is a companion of riotous men shameth his father.” Proverbs 28:7

14. “And if your hand or your foot is causing you to sin, cut it off and throw it away from you; it is better for you to enter life maimed or without a foot, than to have two hands or two feet and be thrown into the eternal fire. And if your eye is causing you to sin, tear it out and throw it away from you. It is better for you to enter life with one eye, than to have two eyes and be thrown into the fiery hell.” Matthew 18:8-9

15. “Now these people were more noble-minded than those in Thessalonica, for they received the word with great eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see whether these things were so.” Acts 17:11; “And that from childhood you have known the sacred writings which are able to give you the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.” 2 Timothy 3:15; “This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it; for then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will achieve success.” Joshua 1:8

16. “For even when we were with you, we used to give you this order: if anyone is not willing to work, then he is not to eat, either. For we hear that some among you are leading an undisciplined life, doing no work at all, but acting like busybodies. Now we command and exhort such persons in the Lord Jesus Christ to work peacefully and eat their own bread.” 2 Thessalonians 3:10-12

17. “Therefore, ridding yourselves of falsehood, speak truth each one of you with his neighbor, because we are parts of one another.” Ephesians 4:25

18. A nonbeliever once confronted a pastor: “Why would I become a Christian? I’ve met plenty and they don’t seem to be different from anybody else.” The pastor responded, “Perhaps you’ve never actually met one.” “But someone may well say, ‘You have faith and I have works; show me your faith without the works, and I will show you my faith by my works.’” James 2:18

19. “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” Romans 3:23, emphasis added

20. “One who conceals his wrongdoings will not prosper, But one who confesses and abandons them will find compassion.”

21. “Speak to the sons of Israel: ‘When a man or woman commits any of the sins of mankind, acting unfaithfully against the Lord, and that person is guilty, then he shall confess his sin which he has committed, and he shall make restitution in full for his wrong and add to it a fifth of it, and give it to him whom he has wronged.”

22. Delighting in the Trinity by Michael Reeves

23. Noonan wrote “little,” but Romans 8:28 tells us “And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.” (emphasis added)

24. When Character Was King by Peggy Noonan