Bridging the Gap

Schooling children is an area of great faith. Equipping our children is a call that God has given us that will lead them in the right way. "Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old he will not turn from it". (Proverbs 22:6) What a comfort and a promise this is! When a family prayerfully seeks the road of education the Lord calls them to, it is a humbling experience. We were two months away from kindergarten with our first child when our hearts were moved to homeschool. I had never even said the word. We followed obediently and found blessings in abundance. The precious time spent with the children will always be a great treasure to me. It was a privilege to have this experience and to pour myself out to train up our children. The Bible was our greatest resource and the deepest desire of my heart was that they would be filled with His Word. The kids learned to write by copying Bible verses, they learned to read this way too. There is history (Judges, Kings), math (Numbers), science (Genesis) and so much more. Of course I had school curriculum, lots of it, but the Bible was the most precious resource of all. I will always remember the day the phone rang and we got confirmation that our eldest child had been accepted into the public Junior High School that I had attended when I was a child. I fell back into the couch and cried. We were entering a new season. God was calling us to public school. I was so frightened and yet we knew God was calling us to trust Him just as we had with homeschooling. We obediently followed and were blessed. There are so many amazing opportunities in public school. The children did projects, plays, music! They had experiences that I couldn't truly give them at home. They excelled and blossomed and were well equipped. They had strong faith and shared boldly. I now had a much larger opportunity to meet families and share with them the love of Christ. I made new friends along with my children and God brought new ministry into our lives. I cherish the time God has given us in public school with the challenges and victories and blessings. They were all there during homeschooling too! The most important thing to do regarding schooling our children is simply to obey God and follow Him. His ways are so much higher than ours. We could never even get close to the exquisite plans He has for our children and for us. "Trust in the Lord with all of your heart and lean not on your own understanding, in all your ways acknowledge Him and He will direct your path." Proverbs 3: 5-6