"The Real World"

Last week I had the privilege of welcoming a family of three to the PCA community. It was a huge decision for them to enroll their three daughters in a Christian School, but they were seeing the major disconnect between the Christian home and the anti-Christian public school system and felt that, as responsible parents, they had no choice. One of the hurdles they had battled was the accusation from their peers that they were at risk of sheltering their children from the “real world.”

On November 25^th, 2011 I posted a blog defending the “greenhouse effect.”  Here are just some of the then noted aspects of the “real world” from which I make no apologies for protecting my child:

·         An environment where he/she could be bullied and physically threatened by peers, with no real recourse of remedy?

·         An undisciplined atmosphere where authority figures (teachers) are commonly sworn at?

·         Educational viewpoints which consistently challenge traditional Christian values? 

·         A system which aggressively promotes a re-definition of family? 

I asked the parents, who are biblically literate people, if they could imagine God saying to the Israelites, under Moses, to “go and occupy Canaan, keep my statutes in everything but … let the Canaanites educate your children.”

Dave J. Koetje, President of Christian Schools International, writes this: “In a world of scraped elbows, wrong turns, and bruised self-concepts, our children need the security of a place where parent and teacher values are aligned.  . . . .Our children need a place where they can reach out to an adult and know that the Christ who is continuously shaping that adult is the same Christ who is at work molding the child.”

That's how to deal with "the real world."