Monday, April 15, 2013

Reasons to NOT homeschool...??

I have been thinking lately about all of the responses that I get from strangers who find out that we homeschool our children. Many times when other parents hear that we homeschool, they say to me, "Oh, I wish I could do that, but..." They then proceed with reasons that they would not or could not homeschool. I am going to share with you some of the reasons that I have been told as to why parents say that they cannot homeschool their children. I will then share my feelings on that response. There are such a variety of reasons that I have heard, that I decided to do a series on it instead of one very long posting.

(You can find Part One of this series, here.
 You can find Part Two of this series, here.
 You can find Part Three, here.
 Part Four, here.
 Part Five, here.
 And Part Six, here.) 


"My child NEEDS to be in public school.  He can be a witness to all of those children and teachers for Christ.  His ‘mission field’ can be his school.”   As a child, my parents did not take me to church.  I knew very little about Jesus, and even less about His life and what He did for me.  As a public school student, I had many friends who did attend church.  They would tell me about their church outings, their Sunday school classes, and all types of things involving their church.  They would usually ask me after they had told me these stories if I went to church anywhere.  I would tell them that I did not.  Not ONCE did one person invite me to go to church with them until I was in high school!  Not ONCE did any of them attempt to tell me more about Jesus or that He died to save me!  I was a sophomore in high school before a friend invited me to go to church.  (I had attended church before this time with neighbors and other family members, but did not go to church anywhere regularly.)  I went with this my friend in high school a couple of times, but since she did not attend regularly, neither did I, until we both stopped going altogether.  I did not attend church regularly until I was in college, due to another friend inviting me.  I do not think that those who did not invite me to their church after telling me their stories were "bad" or "un-Christian," I just think that they simply did not know WHAT to say.  Children are NOT trained at these young ages to be missionaries.  They will not be prepared to answer questions that most little children will have…maybe they have the same questions themselves and have never had them thoroughly answered.  For example, we had a little boy stop at our house one afternoon.  The children were outside playing, and he had just gotten home from school and was outside riding his bicycle.  He saw us and wanted to play with my children.  He came up to where they were, and my children started asking if he knew the story of “Jonah” and other stories from the Bible that are their favorites.  He said that he did not know about those stories.  My children proceeded to ask him where he went to church.  His answer shocked me…  He said, “Sometimes I go to church with my grandma, but I do not really like to go to church.  It is not fun!”  My children LOVE to go to church and will even cry if they do not get to go due to sickness or weather related issues.  So, they were confused by this boy saying that.  He continued, “My mom and dad said that you do not have to go to church to believe in God anyway, so there is no reason for us to go.”  My children turned to me and asked me if that were true…they had never been confronted with this question before, and did not know how to respond…even though they are in church as often as possible, and we study Bible every day in our homeschool…   So, I responded that the Bible does teach that we are to meet together with others who believe the same way we believe.  The boy said, “Well, I guess my parents don’t know about that part.”  He then started telling my children about Roman gods, which is contrary to what they had been taught.  At this point, my children let him know that they had never heard about the things that he was saying.  I told him some Bible verses that refuted what he was saying…  He left and never has returned.  This child was 9 years old.  My guess is that his grandmother was a regular church-attender, and that this discussion had happened before with his grandmother and his parents.  His answers to things came very easily, as if he had heard these things before.  If this child had been on the playground at school having this same discussion with my children, they would not have had any answers for him, and would have come away from the conversation confused.  This would not be due to the fact that they have not been taught...they have...but they don't have training to be missionaries at young ages.  Peer pressure is one of the biggest ways that "good" kids turn "bad."  It was better for my children to be there with me, seeing MY response to this child, and learning from that, than for me to throw them in with the wolves and hope they survive! 

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4 comments:

  1. I think this is a great point. I know that as a public school student, I was not a good witness of Christ to those around me. Especially at a young age, the desire to fit in makes it very difficult for a young child to choose to stand out by talking about God.

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  2. Completely agree. I also was not a good example of Christ in school in fact I gave him a bad name more than once. When you see other church goers doing things they shouldn't you think, if they do it and go to church, why can't I? It would break my heart to only see my children for 5 hours (or less) a day. Having children raised by someone else, no wonder when there is a break parents can't wait for their kids to go back to school!

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