Thoughts on September Grief

Earthly nations decay, and there is no exception. It's much easier to read about it in history, than to be in the middle of it happening. Nations are made of people,  and sin and death, the instruments of decay, hurt people. I am one. When, like decadent and luxurious Rome, nations topple, the people in them are hit with sudden grief. And just like many Americans, the people now buried in dust thought at the time that Babylon or Rome or the Caliphate would always be the world's power. Our nation hasn't toppled yet, but the worms are eating it - and that's both grievous and okay.

He who said "My kingdom is not of this world" is our King. His servants are safe both here and hereafter in His service, but perhaps we've forgotten what that kind of safety is. It's a safety that transcends anything a government can provide. A just government should provide safety for its citizens because it is right, but if we put our trust in it, we are wrong. We want a safe and righteous country and should pray for one, but we don't need one in order to be the witnesses of the risen Christ. If He sees us not doing a great job of witnessing for Him in a safe context of dignity and respectability, He is free to give us a dangerous context of misrepresentation and scorn, in which we can discover that we are still safe in His omnipotent love.

If we haven't wanted badly enough for Jesus to return, we might start feeling uncomfortable enough to start praying for it more earnestly. We might start feeling unsafe enough to stop worrying about our perceived safety and serving with more abandon the One who is a shield about us in all places.

Conservatives being depicted as Klan members in Facebook post 9-14-2025

We could curl up in grief and demonize our opponents. They are blinded by their unwillingness to acknowledge Christ as Lord, and so they demonize us as His representatives. It makes them feel in the right, and it hurts us deeply, when the Lord's people have enjoyed decades of national respectability. We are tempted to fight to prove them wrong and get our dignity back. We could list their monstrosities of error and could scorn them as miserable liars. Or we can choose to lay down our lives for them as people worth the Redeemer's blood. For them, we can risk proclaiming the gospel narrative because it has a power to convert and redeem that surpasses every reasonable argument. The dividing line must come at the cross of Christ. Let them know that it is for Christ's sake that they hate us, and not our food choice, school choice, or political choices. Only proclaiming the gospel itself draws the line that gets us hated as Christ's people. Being hated merely as a white conservative is not worth it. Being hated for Christ's sake is worth it. But do they know where we stand?

Make no mistake at this juncture. Those who serve this world may be in the guise of the left or the right, though the right is more sympathetic at this point in history to the things Christians value. We must not confuse the temporary blessings of God's grace with our eternal calling as His people. We must not be willing to sacrifice our love for the lost (including people on the left who hate us) speaking words of hatred against them because we want our nation back the way it was. We want Christ's kingdom to come. We want people on the left and the right to worship Him. Our pursuit of justice should be done as a service to God who calls nations to do justice, and not motivated by idolatrous fear for our comfort. If justice is taken from us, it's not the end of our Christian life. It's the next step in our calling to follow Him who was rejected of men. When He returns, no one will reject Him, and it will be worth everything to know that we are His.

Musings on Home Education

 Why I Homeschool Our Children

A Brain Dump

I think that when people learn that I homeschool our children, they assume that they know why. Really, no one has ever asked me why I homeschool or questioned it in any way that I can remember. It's usually something like 'Do you homeschool?...Oh, that's wonderful. *Smiles at children*". It's nice to have a positive response from people, but I hear things from time to time that make me think that people assume they know why we homeschool, when they don't really. Honestly, I was asking myself today, "Do I even know why I homeschool?" Since I was happily homeschooled for most of my school years, leaving my early and trying days of first and second grade at a typically-flawed Christian school, far behind, it simply seemed natural to keep homeschooling. I wouldn't just set up lesson plans for my kids, I would pick up from where I left off on my own education and keep my nose in as many books as they did, and we would putter and hum our way through the crisp fall days with open-windows, the blanket-wrapped winter sick days that are mostly audiobooks, or winter snow days that are rushing to get one required subject done before hitting the sleds, and then float (or trudge as the case may be) into spring, interspersing scholarly endeavors with forays into the garden and lunch at the picnic table. I just wanted to live this life.

But of course, the real reason we are home educating our children, is that there are no schools in convenient distance that are inculcating the truths and virtues that we desire for our children - such as worship of the Creator, deep family relationships, and the high hilarities of language, Greek, Latin and English - among other things. That's a good justifying reason. 

But as I've now kept the home school ball rolling for 6 years, and the thought that our oldest may someday need more instruction than I can provide, I realized that my attachment to homeschooling was not merely one of principle. It is perhaps even more an attachment of fierce independence. Imagine - having another person, separate from our family, dictate my daily schedule - my child's teachers at some school having power over when we eat breakfast and what books we have to read and what time we have to go to bed at night. I inwardly recoiled at the thought, and pitied in my heart all the poor, slaving mothers who toil to keep their kids on the school's schedule. It made my blood hot to imagine myself losing my days of idyllic independence in order to be at the beck and call of another institution. I also reflected that this reaction is not exactly virtuous. But really, how can people say home schooling is hard, when they have to roll out of bed in the darkness to send their child to a school that probably has fluorescent lights in the classroom and no fresh flowers dropping dried petals and spider webs onto the spelling book? Not even mentioning the leftover bacon and fresh banana bread that may be acquired from the absurdly nearby kitchen during school hours, I believe that homeschooling can possibly be too idyllic to prepare children for the harsh realities of life in a fluorescent lit office cubicle. But I'm not afraid to defy that fear and give out spelling words from the kitchen, with my hands buried in sticky granola mixture, which will soon sustain the weary apprentice of cursive handwriting and spoil his appetite for lunch (oh dear, what are we having for lunch?). 

I do not disguise from myself that this idyll has its shortcomings. I do not imagine that home education can give a child all that they need, any more than a public education. These will each leave a child with gaps, of either community or family or knowledge, that they will long to fill. But we will pray about filling those gaps. Ultimately, whatever way we prayerfully choose to educate our children, the education is something that God has provided, and we give thanks for the blessings and trust God to provide what seems to lack. My feelings about homeschooling may come and go, and be better or worse from day to day, but the life that God has provided for us is a reality for which I can give thanks, even as time brings changes.