The Big Test (Part 1 – When To Let Your Kids Go)

For some reason, this subject has been heavy on my heart lately. I have prayed daily for wisdom about whether or not to write about it – and for God to reveal His truth to me on the topic. I have many dear friends who may simply disagree with the amount of protection that I give to my own children. The answer to the question “When should I let my kids go out into the world?” is not the same for every child or family. There is no easy formula. But for those who have children and who want to see them glorify God in their lives when they leave the nest, let me just say this – this is one thing that you don’t want to get wrong.

I plan to cover this topic in three segments:

1) The Big Test
2) The “Salt and Light” Argument
3) The Danger of Not Letting Them Go

Whether you agree or not – I encourage comments. I especially encourage other viewpoints when they are accompanied by scripture. Believe me when I say that this was written under prayerful circumstances, and with no accusing finger pointed at anyone. Really.
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Imagine for a moment this scenario. Your child, along with every other child in your neighborhood, must prepare for, and one day take, a written test administered by the local school district. The ground rules are pretty simple. They go like this: 1) the questions are not a slam-dunk – they require real knowledge and preparation about a known topic, 2) your child may take the test any time between the ages of six and twenty-one, 3) they have only one opportunity to take the test – no re-tests are allowed, and 4) the test is truly “pass-fail” – that is, if they pass, your child will be allowed to live, and if they fail, the school district will execute your child.

How much preparation would you insist on before you let your child go take the test?

I’m sure that most parents would insist on their child’s attention to the subject matter, and would enforce a great deal of preparation time. I think most parents would worry enough about the consequences that they would establish a study routine that would guarantee success. Many parents would take over the training personally, just to leave no doubt that their child is ready for the Big Test. No one would simply look at the test casually, and send them off one day saying, “I think they’re probably ready.”

My analogy is not perfect, but I believe it is very much like the multiple decisions we must make as parents to give up precious hours and oversight of our children– to public school, sports, and even to church youth group. When they are not under the care and attention of me and my wife, bad things can happen. Minds can be changed. Respect and allegiance may shift. Our children may see things that they will not be able to get out of their minds – things that may never leave their thoughts, even into adulthood. Yes, some of these things can happen at home, too, but I firmly believe that my wife and I stand a better chance of providing the proper oversight to my own children than any other people on the planet.

Things are different today than they were for most of the last five thousand years. “Progress” which we now take for granted, like cars and buses and the ability to move about and gather into large groups many times a week have changed the face of the family – and I think eroded the importance of the parents in a child’s life. The practice of stratifying children into age groups at churches, through youth ministry, is fairly recent. Public schools in the United States have only been in existence for the last 150 years. Before this, families would learn together, often huddled around a Bible or a copy of Pilgrim’s Progress. There were no youth group activities or PTA meetings in Bible times.

Most of our friends are aware that we homeschool our children. We don’t do this to provide them with a superior education (though I think that is indeed a benefit). We do it for this reason: a study conducted by the National Home Education Research Institute and presented by Pastor Voddie Baucham shows that 70-88% of professing Christian teens fall away from their faith at the end of their freshman year in college. Yet, only 6% of homeschooled, professing Christian teens fall away in that time frame. Consider those statistics again…there is at least a seven out of ten chance that a publicly-schooled child will reject God after their first year of college. Less than one out of ten will do so if they are homeschooled.

This study may be tough for some to accept, especially when so few of us believe that such a result could possibly occur in our own family. And we should understand very clearly, the study does not explicitly prove that schooling is the only factor that determines a child’s grasp on God’s grace. It stands to reason that a homeschooled child will have more parental involvement in his or her life, and this is a big contributor to the Christian walk. I believe further study would conclude that public-schooled children who enjoy a devoted father and mother, and a family who prays and worships together regularly will improve on the 70-88% odds greatly. But once again, any study that concludes with such a diverse result – 70-88% versus 6% - is either flawed, or else it has uncovered a fundamental issue to be considered.

Either our children will change the world, or the world will change them. It’s a rare situation where two opposing views are thrown together for hours a day without at least one side’s viewpoint being changed. These are hard words to read. They were hard words to write. But in the end, isn’t the goal of every Christian parent to ready their children…for the Big Test?

Next: The "Salt and Light" Argument