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By Contributing Writer, Leah D. Smith
*This is an excerpt from the newly released book, Diapers, Dishes & Dominion: How Christian Housewives Can Change the World.
“A student is not above his teacher, but everyone who is fully trained will be like his teacher.” (Luke 6:40)
The Bible says our children will be like their teachers and God requires us to disciple and instruct them in the ways of the Lord.
There is only one kind of education our kids should get: a distinctly Christian, Bible-based education.
Don’t throw this book out yet! I don’t know where you are in your understanding, but frankly, until about four years ago I didn’t give a flying hoot about public versus Christian education or home schooling. Until I realized the seriousness of the whole issue, I thought it was a matter of “personal conviction.” I pretty much assumed that each individual should just pray and think about it—as if it were some kind of mystical decision.
Well, I’d like to share some of the reasons that truly convinced me that a secular, government education is not an option for Christian parents; not now, not ever.
1. You shall not steal. (Ex 20:15)
At first, this might seem strange that I quote one of the Ten Commandments to argue for a Christian education, but let’s look a little closer at this. Earlier we saw how important it is to God that we still obey His commands in the New Covenant and how Jesus defined love as obedience to them (John 14:15).
The public education system starts on the wrong foot because it breaks the eighth commandment regarding stealing. The way it works is that the government takes money from people by force to pay for the education of other people’s children. There are serious penalties if you don’t pay up—like losing your property. This is stealing in its very basic form. The government is certainly not above God’s Law! It is to submit to it.
This might raise all kinds of objections in your mind initially, but please hear me out.
Let me put it another way. If my neighbor to the left is poor and my neighbor to the right is rich, and I go the rich house and take money to give to my poor neighbor, regardless of my good intention, that is called stealing. It violates God’s Law.
In today’s society, the consequence would be imprisonment.
If I hire my friend to go and rob the house so we can give it to our poor neighbor, it is still stealing. We will both go to jail for conspiracy, breaking and entering, and theft. Now supposedly, when I elect the government to go ahead and take money from people so it can fund things like public schools and programs for the poor, somehow that is no longer stealing. Something has gone awry!
Here is the real question: is it okay for the government to take money from people when it’s “for a good cause”?
The answer does not lie with how we feel about it. The answer lies with how God feels about it. You might be thinking, “Well, how will children get educated if the government doesn’t pay for the schooling?”
There are a couple of points to think about here. For one, the education children receive from government schools is resulting in the highest illiteracy rates in modern history! Many students graduate and cannot read. This is a fact. The government system is not even close to adequate, not to mention that what they are learning is hostile to the Word of God (under the guise of “neutrality,” remember), right down to the supposedly mundane facts. Government textbooks are written by people who are claiming to be neutral, when in reality, many textbook writers are unapologetically anti-Christian, secular humanists and hold to Marxist ideologies (if you don’t know what this is, just know it’s bad).
Secondly, people were successfully educated for centuries out of their homes and out of private, one-room schoolhouses. These methods cost nothing compared to what it costs to educate a child in any given public school.
An article in The Washington Post entitled “The Real Cost of Public Schools” shocked people when they learned this startling information:
We’re often told that public schools are underfunded. In the District, the spending figure cited most commonly is $8,322 per child, but total spending is close to $25,000 per child . . . .
What? If the government is actually spending close to $25,000 per child (which all comes out of our pockets) and only $8,000 of it goes toward the student, where is the other $17,000 of our money going? Not toward our kids’ education. It’s in the hands of greedy government bureaucrats and teachers unions. They take all that money from us for education, and it winds up providing the worst education in history and paying the government and unions an extraordinary amount to do it!
In sharp contrast, the average cost per homeschool student is $546. Private schools also cost a great deal less and provide a much better education. The minute you privatize something, it creates a healthy competition. Competition is what drives prices down and quality up. This is a very good thing in the arena of education! When you lower the bar so that one size fits all—like government education has—you lower the quality and drive up the price. That is how the free market works versus government regulation.
The answer to educating our children without breaking God’s Law is to get the government out of the business of education and privatize schools.
God designed families and churches to educate—not the State. When the State steps in to do our job, God considers that an act of “tyranny.”
Render Unto Whom?
The bottom line is that we have to understand nothing is free. Education is not free. Healthcare is not free. It is always paid by someone (the taxpayer), whether they want to or not. The government doesn’t have any money—only people do. The government takes our money and then redistributes that money to where it decides it should go. It is playing the role of God.
God will not bless that act. Just because it has become legalized theft in our corrupt system does not make it okay with God. No matter how you slice it, the very root of the public school system breaks God’s law of stealing and that should be a very serious crime to any Christian. The issue of taxes is a big topic. People love to quote “render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s” without realizing the other part of that verse. “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.”
What does Caesar own? Caesar owns what it takes as its own, whether it breaks God’s Laws or not. What does God own? The entire universe. We render to God what is God’s: everything, including Caesar.
“The earth is Caesar’s and the fullness thereof.”
Oops, that’s not quite right, is it?
“The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof.” (Psalm 24:1)
We must pay our taxes because we don’t want to go to jail and because we must respect the authority over us. However, because “Caesar” claims something is his does not mean it is okay to break God’s Law. It does not mean that as Christians, we do not work to change those ungodly laws with every breath that is in us. If Christians support and vote for a government that is breaking God’s Law, we partake in the stealing of our neighbor’s property too. It is a very dangerous thing when the church makes unholy alliances with the world. It brings upon itself disaster and judgment.
These are serious things to consider. We may not have all the alternative answers and solutions right off the top of our head, but the most important thing here is that we first realize where God draws the line: His commandments.
When it comes to education, we must compare the system, its roots, its funding, its intentions, its results—and all other aspects—to the Word of God.
That is what it means to be a real Christian.
About leah
Strong words; I love it!
I had never considered it in the context of ‘stealing’ before but that argument actually makes sense; a very interesting idea I am going to have to ponder for a while.
I like what Joel Belz of WORLD said. He wondered why we are all in a tizzy about socialized health care (which only concerns our body) and not about socialized education (which concerns our soul). Good post.
“We must pay our taxes because we don’t want to go to jail and because we must respect the authority over us. However, because “Caesar” claims something is his does not mean it is okay to break God’s Law. It does not mean that as Christians, we do not work to change those ungodly laws with every breath that is in us. If Christians support and vote for a government that is breaking God’s Law, we partake in the stealing of our neighbor’s property too. It is a very dangerous thing when the church makes unholy alliances with the world. It brings upon itself disaster and judgment.”
So thankful for yalll who are a step ahead of me; I have much to learn and de-program still! You articulated this so well, what a gift to praise the Lord for!
I cant wait to share this with my famil–will make for good conversation because the stealing aspect is something we haven’t thought of before. Thank you!
Leah, you just hit the bullseye. Another translation of Psalm 24:1 is this: “The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it,” (New International Version) Which obviously leaves nothing whatsoever for poor old Caesar, and that is most likely exactly what Jesus mean when he gave a seemingly ambiguous answer to the question, “Should we pay Caesar’s tax?”) (see Mark’s account of this incident, which is recorded in all three synoptic gospels.)
I say seemingly ambiguous because it is only so for folks who do not know Scripture or the impeccable character of Jesus. On several other occasions when Jesus was challenged by the religious leaders he relied on Scripture to justify himself, his teaching and his actions, so we may be sure on this occasion he had Psalm 24:1–and the four other passages in the OT to the same effect–in mind when he responded to a question, which Luke (CH 20) tells us was designed to trap him in speech so that he could be handed over to the power and authority of the governor, Pontius Pilate, who was in charge of collecting Rome’s taxes in Judea. Jesus’ response completely flummoxed the foolish spies who were sent to trick him, but when the spies returned and told their bosses (the chief priests, scribes and Pharisees) what Jesus had said, these learned Jews knew exactly what Jesus had told them, to wit: “Don’t pay that murdering thug a single shekel nor denarius.” When they discovered what Jesus had told their spies, the religious leaders sent their police out to capture Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. Thus, when they dragged Jesus before Pilate the charged him saying, “He opposes payment of taxes to Caesar.” (NIV)
Taxes, as you note, are stealing, for they are indistinguishable from extortion. To think that because the almighty State commits the crime makes it any less onerous is to elevate the State to a superhuman status and practice the religion called Statolatry. Jesus obviously would not endorse what has become the largest extortion racket on earth and the most prolific violation of his Father’s law. It is also worth noting that Jesus had previously gone to great lengths to frustrate Caesar’s taxes by calling Matthew and Levi away from their tax booths, leaving everything to follow him, and had redeemed (subverted) one of Pilate’s chief tax collectors, Zaccheus, which had to have caused a severe disruption to the collection of taxes in Jericho, which was in Pilate’s tax jurisdiction. Based on the fact that Jesus was known to associate with tax collectors is is reasonable to assume that he had saved many others from their life of crime, which would be a compelling reason for Rome to crucify him.
Are you aware of the book, HOME SCHOOLING, A HOPE FOR AMERICA, by Carl Watner? See: http://www.voluntaryist.com/books/index.html scroll down to find it.