I hope you enjoy them both as much as I have.

Yes, it’s Meltonman – strange minister of a Biblical doctrine who came to Buckeye with powers and abilities far beyond those of mortal men.

Meltonman – who can change the course of mighty apologetics, bend paper clips with his bare hands, and who, disguised as Brad (mild-mannered elder for a small Baptist church) fights the never ending battle for Truth, Justice, and the Biblical Way!

She loves the Lord and seeks Him regularly through His Word  and in prayer. She loves, respects, and helps me. She loves our children and pours herself into their education. She shares my vision for our family. She is beautiful, humble, intelligent, and funny. She has a strong desire to serve and demonstrates this in her care for our family and others. We stay connected through our shared faith and through meaningful conversations. We have grown closer over time and especially during the difficult times we’ve shared together. I know that God has blessed me more than I deserve in so many ways and having Jenn as my wife is definitely one of those blessings.

As we have journeyed together in our Christian walk I know that we were not always biblical in our approach. Even after coming to faith I know that I still had many blinders on in the area of marriage and family. Because we are sinful, the only way to remove these blinders is for Christians to read what the Bible says and then change what we are doing to conform to the principles, patterns, and commands found in God’s Word. With so much misinformation out there, I decided to share the basics about what the Bible teaches regarding marriage.

What the Bible says about Marriage

Right after God made Adam (man) in His own image, He saw that “it was not good for man to be alone,” so He made Eve (woman) from the body of Adam and she was also made in His image (Gen. 1:27-28; 2:18, 21-23).  God then divinely instituted marriage to be an exclusive union between one man and one woman. As the first human institution, it is the foundational jurisdiction for civilization. In addition to companionship, God created marriage to provide man with a suitable helper, to provide safe parameters for sexual union and the procreation of children, to provide the right environment for raising children in the faith, and for taking dominion over the earth (Gen. 1:27-28; 9:7; Ps. 8; Mal. 2:15-16). “For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother, and be joined to his wife; and they shall become one flesh” (Gen. 2:24).

Further guidelines for marriage:

• We are to remain virgins until marriage (Deut. 22:13-17; 1 Cor. 6:13-18; 7:12-14)-No pre-marital sex!
• We may only marry one person (Gen. 2:21-25; 1 Tim. 3:2,12)-No polygamy!
• We may not marry non-believers (Ex. 34:15-16; Deut. 7:3-4; 2 Cor. 6:14-15)-Do not be unequally yoked!
• We may not marry our own blood relatives (Lev. 18:6-8; Deut. 27:20-23)
• We may not marry people of the same sex (Lev 18:22; 20:13; Rom. 1: 26-28; 1 Cor. 6:9-10)-No homosexuality!
• We may not commit adultery (Ex. 20:14; Pr. 6:32; Luke 18:18-20).
• Since God joined a married couple together, marriage is not just a civil contract, therefore, a married couple should remain married for life and they are not permitted to divorce except for sexual immorality (Matt. 5:32; 19:1-9) or abandonment by an unbelieving spouse (Matt. 19:6).
• A widow is free to remarry a believing spouse (1 Cor. 7:39) and encouraged to do so if tempted by the flesh to sin (1 Cor. 7:8-9) or if they are still young (1 Tim. 5:14).
• A person who illegitimately divorces and remarries another person is guilty of adultery (Matthew 19:3-9).
• Women who are unequally yoked with unbelieving husbands are counseled to be a witness to them through their example (1 Cor. 7:14; 1 Peter 3:1).
• If a man does not treat his wife respectfully, his prayers will be hindered (1 Peter 3:7) and if he breaks faith with his wife then God will not accept his sacrifices (Mal. 2:14). The principle here is that if a husband treats his wife poorly then it will harm his relationship with God.

Unbiblical Marriage

These passages from the Bible clearly relate how importantly God views marriage and yet marriage is not viewed the same way by most self-professing Christians.

• Most young people have sex before marriage.
• More and more adults are choosing to live together and engage in sexual immorality instead of marrying or they do so for a while before marrying.
• Many Christian men are addicted to pornography, which is adultery of the heart (Matt. 5:27-28).
• About 25% of self-professing Christian marriages end in divorce, which is close to the national average.
• Homosexual groups and their secular humanist allies are aggressively working to force society to recognize a union between a man and man or a woman and a woman as being equal to that of one man and one woman. The arguments they use are the same kinds of arguments that polygamists use. Many self-professing Christians ignore God’s clear prohibition against homosexuality and, instead, say that homosexuality is a blessing from God and that God would want to bless a relationship between two people who love each other.

The people that advocate these positions are not Christian and they are not interested in truth. God is the source of truth and God condemns these behaviors in His Word. God established marriage and the family as the first human institution. Since it is divinely instituted then only God can change it.

What Marriage Symbolizes

Up to this point we can see that marriage is incredibly important as mankind’s primary human relationship, but it is even more important than we realize because it also characterizes another relationship. In Ephesians 3:4-7, the Apostle Paul uses the word “mystery” to describe truths about Christ that were previously unknown until God revealed them to His prophets and apostles in New Testament times. Later, in Ephesians 5:25-30, Paul reveals the mystery of the relationship between marriage and Christ’s relationship with the Church:

“Husbands love your wives just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her; that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, that He might present the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she should be holy and blameless and undefiled. So husbands ought to also love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself; for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes it, just like Christ also does the church, because we are members of His body. For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and shall be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. This mystery is great; but I am speaking with reference to Christ and the church.”

In this passage we see that the love a husband has for his wife must be modeled after that of Christ’s love for the church. Jesus gave everything he had for the church including His own life, which means that a husband must love his wife in an unselfish and sacrificial way. Furthermore, a husband’s Christ-like love seeks to purify his wife of anything sinful that would displease God.

COMING NEXT: 

“Restoring the Biblical Family: God’s Plan for Men and Women”

How does that design and purpose compare with your own family?

What roles has God established for men, women, and children?

What changes would you need to make today to conform your view of marriage and family life to the vision that God established in His Word?

These are questions that every self-proclaimed Christian must go to the Bible with and seek to answer.

God’s Plan for the Family is Basic Christianity

God ordained the family as the foundational institution of civilization. God’s plan for the family is basic Christianity and should be taught boldly and completely by every pastor in every Christian church across America and in the world. Furthermore, every Christian should understand and be in agreement with this plan because this is foundational to our faith.

Unfortunately, it’s hard to find good examples of a Biblical family in America today because of the pervasiveness of Wimpy Christianity. In fact, Biblical families are so rare that many assume the dysfunction we see in many homes is actually what the family is supposed to look like, but nothing could be further from the truth. The Bible certainly has a lot to teach us about what God’s vision for the family is, but most “Christian” families do not resemble that vision. So, the problem is not that God is withholding information, but rather we are choosing not to follow what He wants us to do in our homes.

God’s Word vs. Man’s Ideas

There is absolutely nothing controversial about God’s plan for the family if you are using the Bible as your guide for life, but that is almost always not the case. Instead, self-professed “Christians” are replacing the authority and sufficiency of God’s Word (the Bible) with the ideas of sinful man. Consequently, since God’s plan for the family goes against the culture, it is not only under attack by the world, but it is also being undermined in the Church itself.

My question is “Where do we really get off calling ourselves Christians when we ignore the most straight forward reading of the Bible altogether or, instead, twist it to conform to the rest of American culture?”

If you claim the name Christian then you need to be submitting your will and conforming your life to the words contained in the Bible. If you are not, then you have a false view of God’s Word or you are just playing games with religion. Remember, a true Christian is a new creation (2 Cor. 5:17) and evidences salvation through obedience (John 14:15; 15:10-11; Titus 1:16; 1 John 2:3-6; 3:21-22; 5:1-4), good works (Eph. 2:10; James 2:14-17), spiritual fruit (John 15:8-9; Gal. 5:22-23; 1 John 4:7-14), and even faces persecution because of his or her faith (2 Timothy 3:12).

Are You All In?

In other words, a true Christian is “all in.” What I mean by that is that he or she recognizes that man is sinful and it goes against his or her nature to do things God’s way. Therefore, God’s Word must be our guide for all matters of life and faith. It must be read and applied to all areas of life. All of us have blinders on and we must constantly be reading God’s Word and reforming our practices to conform to it. So, are you all in? If you are, then I challenge you to read what God says about the family and start making application from it. I will be blogging on Restoring the Biblical family for the next few months.

COMING NEXT:
Restoring the Biblical Family (Part 2):
God’s Plan for Marriage

You can do all things through Christ Who gives you strength! (from Philippians 4:13)  His power is made perfect in our weakness (from 2 Corinthians 12:9), and He will receive all the glory!  God uses the weak things, the lowly things, the despised things, the things that are not! (from 1 Corinthians 1:27, 28) I pray this will encourage you to Homeschool Your Children No Matter What!

Divorce doesn't have to shut the door on Christian homeschooling.

I homeschooled my three children from the very beginning. I was convinced by God’s Word and by the beautiful (though difficult) experience that it was the very best thing for them and it was right where I, as a mother, belonged.

Unfortunately, after a few years, my life suddenly turned upside down and everything I thought I knew was a tumultuous, shattered wreck. Divorce was not something I ever thought I would experience, but now I had the most horrible ache in my heart… It seemed nothing could take the immense pain away.

From homeschool to public school

Believing that since I could barely face each day my children would be better off in school, I enrolled the two who were school aged in the public school down the street. It was not the worst mistake I ever made, but the worst sin for which my mother heart is grieved to this day. My children were thrust into a world of Godless “friends”.

My daughter’s teacher who was “more qualified than I was to teach her” had outbursts of anger in class and meditated on Confucius aloud daily. My son’s teacher who was “more qualified than I was to teach him” was just a kid, fresh out of college with no children of her own who frequented night clubs.

My son was labeled at age 7 as a remedial reader and learner, and my daughter was puffed up and stressed with competition. My daughter was bullied; my son became a bully. Both were exposed to forward behavior from the opposite sex. And sadly, my three children, once always together, were always separated.

Straying from God

Believing this was my only choice as a single mom, I went to work to help support my broken up family. I was the most spiritually and emotionally vulnerable I had ever been and now became more bombarded with temptation than I had ever been… a very dangerous combination. I now thank God that I usually worked until I was sore from head to toe and had pathetically little to show for it. Thank God that in His great mercy He did not allow me to succeed in the detrimental thing I didn’t know I was doing!

After working for six months, I suddenly realized that I was straying from the LORD in ways I never dreamed I would. My son was always in fights and detention and failing (yet being passed on). My daughter’s heart was being lost as well. Our family devotions were replaced with homework. Our fun little wagon walks were now replaced by lunches in the cafeteria, which was a futile attempt to “know” my kids’ friends.

One providential night in the bustle of waiting tables, God broke my heart for what was breaking His. I NEEDED TO BE HOME WITH MY KIDS!!! How would I pay the bills? How would we eat? I hadn’t even been receiving child support lately! What would I do? I had NO IDEA! But I NEEDED TO BE HOME WITH MY KIDS!!! I gave my as-little-as-possible notice that night.

Working through hard times–Together

What followed is a testimony that divorce is almost unbearable and that God is Yahweh Jireh-My UNFAILING Provider! For as long as I was a single mom I never knew how my children and I were going to make it the next week. The day after I quit my job, I was talking with a friend and neighbor who suggested I clean houses. She sent an e-mail out for me and within a few days I had several clients-enough to cover the bulk of my bills. I was able to take my children with me. It wasn’t easy teaching them and cleaning at the same time, but praise God we were together.

I juggled multiple jobs simultaneously. Paperwork for a small business, painting, tutoring, selling gift certificates at a restaurant, and selling popular products were some of the things God gave me the strength to do in addition to the houses I cleaned. All of these were things I could do with my children.

“And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.” (Romans 8:28 NKJV)

It was a testimony against divorce for my children to see the life of struggle and pain. Some days we did not get “school” done. Some days I cried most of the day. I wish I knew from the beginning that it was NOT protecting my children to keep them from seeing my tears by sending them to school. It actually bonded my children and I together to experience life’s very real hurts and trials together, processesing it from a Biblical perspective.

A bad day of homeschool is better than public school

With all that public school did to work against my goal of my children’s salvation and spiritual discipleship, IT WOULD HAVE BEEN BETTER FOR MY CHILDREN TO MISS A WHOLE YEAR OF “SCHOOL” than for them to be robbed of the spiritual, emotional, and physical protection of Christian homeschooling!

If your days are all broken up, if you aren’t consistent for a while in teaching the parts of speech and long division YOU are STILL your children’s BEST teacher-God appointed! This too shall pass!

WHATEVER YOUR CIRCUMSTANCES, fix your eyes on Jesus-focus on tethering your heart to the Lord and discipling your children! Stay in the Word, cry out to the Lord in prayer, learn verses together, and SING to the Lord with all your hearts “…the joy of the Lord is your strength”! (Nehemiah 8:10b)

What good is it if your children can perform multiple digit long division with decimals but their hearts are just as divided?

“What good will it be for a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul”? (Matthew 16:26 NIV)

My children

In case you are wondering, it has been many years since my divorce. I continued to homeschool all three of my children. I later remarried and periodically earned income on the side to help out in the early years of our marriage-always with my children.

My oldest daughter is now a lovely 20-year-old lady, walking very closely with the Lord, completely pure and set apart for Him.

My son is now 19. At 15, he went to live with his father and attend public school. He failed in school and embraced a very sinful lifestyle. He eventually dropped out of high school after getting into a lot of trouble and is not walking with the Lord. Our hearts grieve for him, and we pray he will someday forfeit the world and gain his soul.

My youngest daughter is a beautiful 15-year-old follower of Jesus Christ. She has never spent a day in any form of school other than homeschooling and is the brightest beam of “socialized” sunshine you’ve ever met! We are uncommonly close to each other and our marvelous REDEEMING God and Savior!

Persevere through life’s hardships

Time constraints, financial crises, academic deficiency, relational difficulties, family tragedy… there are circumstances that make homeschooling seem impractical or even impossible. Remember, “…’With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.’” (Matthew 19:26b)

I know other moms who have similar experiences of homeschooling as single moms and whose children are both spiritual and academic successes. I know of women who didn’t speak much English and felt unqualified, but who bravely trusted God and were successful in using English curricula to teach their children.

God rewards those who obey Him in difficulty. “And my God will meet all your needs according to His glorious riches in Christ Jesus.” ( Philippians 4:19) I have met dozens of women whose children are grown and who wish they had homeschooled! I’ve never met one who said she homeschooled and regretted it!

Here are a few lifelines that God threw to me when my storms were raging. I pray they will encourage you! Galatians 6:9; Deuteronomy 6:1-9; Deuteronomy 11:18-21; Proverbs 16:3; Deuteronomy 30:9 and 10; 2 Timothy 1:7; Joshua 1:7-9; Proverbs 2:3-5; Proverbs 3:5 and 6; Isaiah 40:31, Jeremiah 33:3.

Be encouraged! HOMESCHOOL YOUR CHILDREN…NO MATTER WHAT!

Click here for more information on financial help for children of Single Parents who Homeschool

As self-proclaimed Christians we use the Bible to give us the content of our faith and to give us wisdom and discernment as we seek to make decisions in daily living. In short, it is an authoritative and sufficient guide for all matters of life and faith.

The Sad State of the Church

A few months ago I wrote a blog (“Reformation: A Response to Wimpy Christianity”) on the sad state of the Church in America, which said that the Church has become wimpy and anemic because it is not biblical. My solution is that we desperately need to reform the Church by applying the Bible to all areas of life and faith.

One of the biggest problems facing the Church today is that self-proclaimed Christian parents do not evangelize and disciple their children the way God said to in His Word. It should be no surprise then that 7 to 9 out of every 10 children raised in self-professing Christian homes are not saved.

What the statistics say…

So, let’s stop and examine that statistic real quick. If there are 50 million Christian married couples in America and each couple on average has two children then there will be 100 million children. So, if only 1 to 3 out of every 10 of these children come to a saving faith in Christ, then the next generation of Christians begins with only 10 million to 30 million people. If they in turn get married we will have 5 to 15 million Christian couples having 10 to 30 million children. With only 1 to 3 children out of 10 being saved, the number of Christians going on to the next generation is somewhere between 1 million to 3 million on the low end to 3 million to 9 million on the high end. Are you beginning to see the problem?

I am an ordained minister in the Southern Baptist Convention, which is among the biggest promoters of evangelism among any Christian association or denomination. A while back I heard that something like only one out of every ten Christians in the SBC leads somebody to the Lord, which means that conversion baptisms are almost nonexistent. Sadly, even those numbers are misleading because they include congregations that practice easy believism and decisional regeneration.

That being said, what if 50% of Christians were able to lead at least one person to the Lord in their lifetime (not including their children) and that person remained a Christian their entire lifetime? What would that look like if we maintained a generational conversion rate of 10 to 30% of children raised in Christian homes and added these outside conversions?

The following chart demonstrates that this dramatically improves the overall numbers at the 30% child-conversion rate, but the Christian population is still declining rapidly. Even so,  the 10% child-conversion rate still drops drastically even with the added conversions. These statistics should point out that we can’t reach the world for Christ if we are losing most of our own children.

Sadly, most of those who make decisions for Christ do not evidence the salvation they claim because they lack obedience, good works, spiritual fruit, and they are not being persecuted for their faith (because a world that is hostile to God finds that their faith isn’t worth persecuting). In other words, they are not saved.

My question is why on earth are we spending so much time, effort, and money on saving the lost outside the church while completely neglecting God’s plan for the salvation of our own children? Even if 5 out of every 10 Christians led someone to the Lord and those people had genuine faith, you would still have a steep reduction in believers with each passing generation until Christianity in America became as dead as Christianity in Europe is today.

A Lack of Pastoral Leadership

Clearly, the question of how Christian parents should evangelize and disciple their children is one of the most strategic and critical facing the Church today and yet I’ve seen little to no leadership from pastors in this area. (Here is a blog post I wrote with what the Bible says about educating our children.)

This is reflected by what I experienced at a conference I attended at Focus on the Family’s headquarters several years ago. The theme of the conference was how to evangelize and disciple children and it was attended by a couple hundred pastors, student ministry directors, and children’s ministry directors from throughout the country.

At one point during the conference the leader (a VP at Focus on the Family) asked all of those present to stand up if they had a specific plan for raising their own children in the faith. Sadly, only three people stood up that day: the leader, his wife, and I.

In other words, the trained ministry professionals who are most often in charge of trying to raise other people’s children in the faith do not even have a plan for their own family. It’s a clear-cut case of the blind leading the blind.

Worse yet, the little advice that I have heard from pastors is almost always contrary to Scripture, which is even worse than silence because it verbally endorses an unbiblical perspective. Of course, silence also endorses unbiblical practices because they are not being confronted.

One of the qualifications for being an elder/pastor in the church is that you must manage your family well (1 Tim. 3:4; Titus 1:6). Part of managing your family well is making sure that you raise your children in the faith.

I don’t know how a pastor or the congregation he serves can consider him qualified if he does not have a biblical plan to raise his children in the faith. In fact, very few pastors have taken the time to look at Scripture and seriously think about what it means to evangelize and disciple children biblically. If they did then they would stop promoting public school and they would stop hiring well meaning twenty-somethings to disciple teenagers in their church and would instead start equipping and encouraging parents (especially fathers) to disciple their children and holding those accountable who refuse not to.

Roadblocks to Reformation

Very few people are talking about these subjects in Christian circles often because they either have blinders on in this area or because we get attacked whenever we do. Here are five reasons why we are attacked for taking this stand:

• Unexamined Presuppositions: Most self-proclaimed Christians have blinders on in this area and have not seriously examined what the Bible says on this matter. Most self-professed Christians are unknowingly holding to secular humanistic presuppositions in this area. Of course, presuppositions if they are unexamined can be dangerous things because our knee-jerk reaction is to defend them rather than examine and change them. Pride gets in the way too. Its hard to admit when we are wrong.
• We turned out ok…didn’t we?: Most of us went to public school and we figured that we turned out okay, so our children will too. We reason that anybody who thinks otherwise is legalistic. Of course, we fail to see that we were, in fact, damaged by this experience. The damage is that we make decisions based on experience rather than making decisions based on the Bible. That’s called humanism. To change direction, we have to acknowledge that we were damaged by public education and that our parents were wrong in sending us there. It would be good for our parents to understand this as well.
• Egalitarian Feminism: God’s plan for the family includes specific roles for men and women. Men are to be leaders, providers, and protectors of their wives and children while women are to help and submit to their husband’s leadership as well as nurture and give life to their children. The sad truth is that the Church in America is weak in this area because they do not teach God’s plan for the family, therefore, those attending Christian churches rarely hear sermons on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood from the pulpits. So, women who do not recognize biblical roles will have a problem with giving up their careers (and their total autonomous freedom) in order to pursue their role in God’s plan for the family.
• Finances: Many parents (husbands and wives) don’t want to give up the extra income they have from two careers. This is really a heart issue. Most parents wouldn’t hesitate to risk their lives and even die for their children and yet they often fail to demonstrate the same concern for their children’s walk with Christ. One of the most important things you can ever do as a parent is to point your children toward Christ and yet most parents are unwilling to lose the money needed to follow a more biblical pattern of education. They want the toys, trips, cars, houses, etc. Of course, there are also those parents who initially lacked the vision to prepare to disciple their children at home and now they are in debt up to their eyeballs. There are also single parents in this boat. (Click here to read an excellent article about a divorced mom who homeschooled her children.)
• Evangelism: The command to evangelize does not negate the Biblical mandate for Christian parents to raise their children in the faith (incarnationally, informationally, throughout the day) nor require our children to be indoctrinated by the state. Family-based evangelism is a better application of both teachings. The truth is that mature Christians are called to be salt and light (Matt. 5:13-16). Unfortunately, most children raised in Christian homes are not Christian. They do not hold a Biblical worldview, they know little to no doctrine, they are biblically illiterate, and they evidence no fruit of redemption. We become salt and light when we stand for truth apart from the culture! Our children are gifts from God and they must be protected and raised in the nurture and admonition of the Lord (properly discipled), so that they may become knowledgeable and faithful followers of Christ. It is then that they become arrows in the hands of a warrior (Ps. 127) to go out into the world to advance the cause of Christ. Again, not only are public schools not biblical, but the vast majority of children raised in Christian homes do not come to faith because they are discipled to become humanists rather than Bible-believing Christians.

My motivation and my risk

Please understand that I have nothing personally to gain by you making the decision to home school your children. In fact, I’ve lost significant financial support in the past because I’ve advocated Christian homeschooling and I’ve also received threats from other donors saying that they will no longer support us if we continue to promote Christian homeschooling. Clearly, I have been hurt financially by this and I risk further harm by continuing to advocate for it.

What if you decide to homeschool? Do I benefit then? The answer is most likely not because I don’t have curriculum to sell you or a vast array of other products. Actually, chances are that if you decide to homeschool your children, you will have less money with which to support my ministry, so we don’t benefit there either.

Therefore, from a financial perspective there really is no good reason for me to challenge you to homeschool your children from a Christian worldview. I have nothing to gain for holding this position. So, why would I risk losing more financial support during horrible economic times when we are already suffering from significant losses?

The reasons that I advocate for Christian homeschooling despite the risks are:

• I love God and I believe that when we do things God’s way we bring glory and honor to Him. which is our purpose in life.
• God is sovereign and those who come to faith do so in response to God’s grace. At the same time, man is responsible and He seems to honor those who honor Him. I want every child raised in a Christian home to come to a saving faith in Christ and the best way for this to happen is by following God’s plan.
• I love the institution of the family and I want to see families function in a Biblical manner. Husbands need to lead their families in love. Wives need to help their husbands and love their children. Children need to honor and obey their parents.
• I love the Church and I want to see it reformed, so that it is no longer anemic. I want to see Christians go out into the world and make disciples. Strong Christian families and strong Christian churches can impact the world for Christ.
• The things of this world are temporary, but the things of God are eternal.

To those who disagree

I expect many of you to have a knee-jerk reaction against the things that I am teaching, which is fine. However, if you disagree with my position then there is only one appropriate response:

Be a Berean (Acts 17:10-15): Scripture must be our common point of reference (aka Nexus) or else we are merely playing games with religion. So, go to the Bible and see if what I am teaching is true. If it is not true then show me from Scripture where I am wrong. If it is true then repent, turn to God, and follow His ways.

If you are not willing to go to Scripture and argue your position from it, but rather simply choose to argue from your own experience, emotions, and human reason, then you deny the authority and sufficiency of Scripture by your actions. In other words, you are demonstrating that you hold a secular humanistic worldview rather than a Christian one. You need to repent and turn to God.

To those who persecute

There are some who would prefer that I teach only on Mormonism because Mormonism is an enemy of truth, which is true, but Mormonism and other cults only grow as a result of the hypocrisy of Wimpy Christianity in America. Parents who teach Biblical truth in their home, personally disciple their children, and cast a vision for their family do not have children joining Mormonism.

Many self-professing Christians say they believe that the Bible is authoritative and sufficient, but then deny those important truths in practice because they do not use the Bible when making decisions. Doing so demonstrates that we either (1) lack the faith to believe that God’s ways are best and we forget that man’s ways are tainted by sin,(2) that we are ignorant and need to start living examined lives in light of Scripture, or (3) that we are not saved because the things of God are nonsense to a lost and dying world.

Mormonism is only a symptom of a lack of orthodoxy (right doctrine) and orthopraxy (right practice). Therefore, to fix the problem of Mormonism and other false worldviews requires Christians to keep Christ as their first love and honestly seek to apply all of Scripture to all of life. How we educate our children is critical to this.

It is incredibly sad for any self-professing Christian to threaten to pull support from a Christian ministry simply because the ministry is intentionally seeking to rightly handle the Word of God and make honest application from it. Our applications are not infallible, but we have to make application nonetheless.

If you refuse to be a Berean and search out what I have taught, but instead choose to simply persecute me in response then that is your sin. I will fear God over man any day because I trust that the God of the universe will continue to watch out for me and my family (“Standing Strong: Fear God, Not Man”) .

The Good News!

The Good News is that God loved us so much that He sent His Only Son to die on the cross to atone for our sin. It is by grace through faith in Christ that we can be reconciled with God. God has given us His Word, so that we can follow and obey His teachings for His Glory. We must seek to do all things for the glory of God.

During a time when most children raised in self-professing Christian homes are rejecting the faith, we must turn to God’s Word for answers. (We should be doing this in both good and bad times.) God’s plan for the evangelizing and discipling of children is revealed in the Bible and education is a very important part of that plan.

The Bible says that education is discipleship and that the message must be rooted in Biblical truth and the methods used must be parent-directed. There is no education option available that better represents these biblical principles than Christian homeschooling.

Be faithful by making the application and give God the glory!

Other Recommended Links:

• The Centrality of the Home in the Evangelism and Discipleship of the Next Generation

• Needed: An Exit Strategy from Public Schools

This is one of the most important questions a parent will ever ask because Jesus said that when our children are fully trained they will be like their teacher (Luke 6:39-40), which means that education is discipleship.

In fact, the choice a parent makes for their child’s education is one of the most significant factors in determining whether or not they ever come to a saving faith in Christ and what the fruit of that faith looks like. It’s a weighty question that carries eternal consequences.

A Tale of Two Families
I regret that my wife and I initially decided to home educate our children for pragmatic reasons rather than basing our decision on biblical principles.

You see, my wife’s educational experiences were generally favorable, but her work as an elementary school teacher led her to the conviction that the public school system was not an option for our family.

On the other hand, I did not enjoy my public school experiences growing up and my work as a youth and college pastor allowed me to also see the disastrous impact public education had on the students in my ministry. Consequently, we both decided to home educate when our first-born was still a baby.

Zachary drawing a picture for a unit on Africa.

Of course, the problem with basing decisions on experience is that experience is not a fixed standard of truth and other parents can use it to reach very different conclusions.

For example, not long ago a homeschooling mother told my wife that she was going to put her oldest daughter in a public high school because the mom wanted her daughter to get a “good education,” so that she could go on to a “good university” and get a “good job.”

Ironically, studies show that homeschooled students score significantly higher on standardized tests and have higher GPAs in college than do their public school counterparts, but that’s still not the primary reason why we should homeschool.

In fact, this mother’s emphasis on earthly things (Rom. 12:2; 1 Jn. 2:15-17) rather than on eternal things (Col. 3:1-2; 1 Tim. 4:7-8) is sending her daughter the wrong message.

Foundational Questions
In this example you can see how two Christian families make very different decisions based on personal experience. So what do we do now?

Conflict is uncomfortable for most people, so in situations

Jonathan learning archery.

like this it is common for the two families to simply say that both methods are equally acceptable. This allows the families to do what they want to do without being challenged to examine their decision, which is unfortunate.

If we trust Jesus and believe that education really is discipleship, then can we honestly say that both options are equally acceptable for Christian parents to make? Are all educational options morally neutral? If we say that one option is better than the other, then which one and why? By what standard can one education option be judged as superior to another?

These are important questions that every Christian parent must ask and only the Bible can provide the answers.

Worldview
Many self-professing Christians in America today say they believe that the Bible is God’s Word and that it is the only authoritative guide for all matters of life and faith. Unfortunately, most turn around and deny this truth practically when they do not use the Bible to make their decisions.

Instead of relying on what God revealed in Scripture, they rely on their experience, emotions, and human reason as the foundation for truth. Of course, relying on the wisdom of sinful man is foolish (Jer. 17:9; Mark 7:21-22; Rom. 1:21).

Zachary and Jonathan building a volcano for their science project.

Sadly, this popular practice is the practical outworking of a secular humanistic worldview, which denies God’s authority and makes man the center of the universe. This form of idolatry dishonors God and it discredits His church.

So, if we claim to be Christians, then we must repent and deny self in every area of life in favor of following God’s ways. An excellent approach for doing this is to make decisions by asking questions that begin with the words “If all I had was the Bible, how would I…”

Christian Homeschooling
Some advocates of Christian homeschooling don’t wish to offend, so they write about it as if it is one of many great options that are available. I am not one of those people.

Christian homeschooling is the absolute best option for Christian families because it is the only educational option that applies both the message and the method prescribed in the Bible for the discipleship of children.

• Message:The Bible says, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and knowledge of the Ho
  

  Madison at the Phoenix Zoo

  ly One is understanding” (Pr. 9:10), which means that God is the foundation for truth (Pr. 1:7; Col. 1:17; Ps. 2:1-6). It also says that God revealed His will to humanity through the words contained in the Bible (2 Pet.1:21; 2 Tim. 3:14-17; Ps. 119; Pr. 3:5-6) and that He expects us to obey them (John 15:14; James 2:22-24; 1 John 3:24; 5:2-3). Therefore, reverence for God as well as obedience to His Word must be the foundation for any educational message.

• Method:Throughout the Bible parents are commanded to disciple and train up their children in the nurture
  

  Zachary holds a snake at AZ Game & Fish's Family Day.

  and instruction of the Lord (Gen. 18:19; Ex. 12:26-27; Ps. 34:11; Pr. 6:20; 22:6; Eph. 6:4). In Deuteronomy 6:4-9 it says that parents are to educate children throughout the day and that the method they use should be incarnational (role-modeling) and informational (teaching). It is the family and not the church nor the state that has this mandate.

Other Educational Options
Clearly a Bible-based message combined with a parent-led method is God’s plan for the discipleship of children. Every

Madison milks a fake cow at a Maricopa County Fair exhibit.

other educational option available to Christian parents is in opposition to God’s plan in one or both of these areas.

• Public/Charter schools: Neither the message nor the method are biblical.
• Virtual schools: Provides a home-based environment, but the message is not biblical and parents are not the primary teachers.
• Christian schools: Better than public schools because the message may be biblical, but parents are still not the primary teachers.

The Vision
Although my family began Christian homeschooling for pragmatic reasons, we continue to practice it today based on the following Biblical principles:

• Jesus said that the purpose of education is to disciple our children.
• Emotion, experience, and human reason are not fixed standards of truth, therefore, they should not be used as a guide for making decisions.
• The Bible is God’s authoritative guide for all matters of life and faith.
• Therefore, the educational message must be rooted in Biblical truth.
• The Bible mandates that parents raise their children in the faith.
• Therefore, the educational method must be parent directed and taught throughout the day both incarnationally and informationally.

The vision for Christian homeschooling is that our children have a saving faith in Jesus Christ, so that they leave our home to not only pierce the culture as arrows for the cause of Christ in the world (Ps. 127), but also pass on their faith to the next generation (Ps. 78:5-7).

So, if all you had was the Bible, how would you educate your children?

Click here to listen to Education is Discipleship: The Vision for Christian Homeschooling!

Click here to read an earlier article on why we homeschool.

Melton Family Homeschool Room

If you are a parent, church leader, or someone who cares about evangelizing and discipling children and youth, then I strongly encourage you to watch a movie that is available to be viewed for free right now online.I encourage you to watch the video and see for yourself if what they say has merit. Feel free to leave a comment to this blog after you watch the movie and I will respond.

Click here to watch Divided online for free!
Filed under: Biblical Authority, Christian Living, Church, discipleship, evangelism, Family Life, Heritage Baptist Church, Marriage and Family Ministry, Reformation and Revival ]]> http://bradmelton.wordpress.com/2011/07/13/divided-the-movie-watch-it-for-free-online-until-september-15-2011/feed/ 0 bradmelton Divided the Movie http://bradmelton.wordpress.com/2011/07/13/a-plurality-of-elders-at-heritage-baptist-church-avondale-az/ http://bradmelton.wordpress.com/2011/07/13/a-plurality-of-elders-at-heritage-baptist-church-avondale-az/#comments Wed, 13 Jul 2011 19:26:36 +0000 Brad Melton http://bradmelton.wordpress.com/?p=815 Continue reading →]]>

(L-R) Brad Melton, Jason Young, and Nathan Marr

Our family moved from Prescott Valley to Phoenix in April 2009, and we began attending Heritage Baptist Church(Avondale) in August. At Heritage we were thrilled to find a congregation that shared our convictions in so many critical areas and earnestly sought to take all of Scripture and apply it to all areas of life.  We’ve called it home ever since.

Ordained as Pastor/Elders

In addition to God answering our prayers by placing us with a like-minded church family, I am blessed to share that another brother (Nathan Marr) and I were ordained to serve as pastor/elders in April 2011. We joined Jason Youngwho is the founding pastor of Heritage Baptist Church. I was previously ordained to the gospel ministry by Willow Hills FSBC of Prescott in 2009, but in my capacity as a speaker and ministry director I functioned as an evangelist rather than as a pastor.

Being a pastor of a church is a blessing because it allows me to speak truth into the nitty gritty of peoples’ everyday lives on an ongoing basis. This kind of ongoing active discipleship is an area that I love and am excited to be a part of.

The Sufficiency of Scripture in Family and Church Life
Furthermore, some pastors that I’ve talked to over the years have challenged me by saying that what I teach looks good on paper or sounds good in a sermon, but that is not real life. Therefore, I am able to demonstrate through an actual church that the Bible is sufficient for reforming family and church life and that we should embrace the truth that God’s plans are better than anything sinful man can dream up.

Being a part of an eldership team (a plurality of elders) is not only biblically based, but it also allows us to serve from our strengths and compensate for one another’s weaknesses. Furthermore, it allows me to serve in the calling of both an undershepherd as well as an evangelist, which is important to me.

Heritage Baptist Church meets at 10 a.m. in the cafeteria at La Joya Community High School in Avondale (Whyman Ave. & Avondale Blvd.).

Sundays at Heritage

Heritage Baptist Church meets at La Joya High School in Avondale (Whyman Ave. and Avondale Blvd.) at 10 a.m. on Sundays. The worship service lasts until around 12:30 at which time we share in a fellowship meal. The Lord’s Supper is observed each week during the meal. Heritage is not a large church in comparison to other congregations (we have about 40 families), but it is not a seeker friendly church either.

Biblical Practices

The people who attend Heritage hold the conviction that the Bible must be applied to all areas of life. There are no children’s or youth ministry programs because parents have the biblical mandate to raise their children in the faith, which means that fathers in particular are expected to disciple their families. Expository preaching and church discipline are also practiced. The church is also going through a period of rapid growth, so the timing for additional leadership is providential.

The men of Heritage Baptist Church pray over Nathan Marr, Brad Melton, and Jason Young.

I’ve served in full-time Christian ministry for more than ten years now. During that time I’ve been faced with situations that caused me to decide whether to fear God or to fear man. I wish that I could say that I was always 100% perfect, but that would be a lie. Even so, I am blessed to share that we’ve faced difficult challenges and stood strong for the cause of Christ. One of the passages of Scripture that always encourages me during difficult times is found in Daniel 3.

The Fiery Furnace

About 600 years before the birth of Christ, the Babylonians conquered Jerusalem and took a large group of Jews into captivity. Among these Jews were Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, who were renamed Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego. These men were renamed as part of the process of indoctrination away from Judaism into the pagan ways of the Chaldeans. At some point during the captivity, these men were appointed to serve as administrators over the province of Babylon and they were required by King Nebuchadnezzar to attend the dedication of a 90-foot tall statue which he had built on the plain of Dura in the province of Babylon. When the music was played at the dedication, all those attending had to bow down and worship the statue or else they would be killed. All of those in attendance did so with the exception of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego.

Human nature being what it is, certain Chaldeans brought charges against the men with the hope that the king would execute them. Therefore, the king ordered the men to be brought to him and when they were present he told them to either bow down and worship the statue or die in a fiery furnace. The men told the king that they would not bow down and worship the statue. In response the king’s face contorted with rage and his wrath poured out with the order to heat the furnace seven times hotter than normal.

God Protected Them

The heat was so intense that the strongest men in the king’s army died while taking the prisoners to the furnace. However, something amazing happened. The three men who had been tied up, began to walk around in the fire and a fourth person with the appearance of the son of the gods appeared in the flames with them. Therefore, the king called to the men to come out of the flames and when they did the king saw that the men’s hair had not been singed, their clothing had not been burned, and they didn’t even smell of smoke at all. So, the king walked closer to the furnace and yelled, “Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego, come out, you servants of the Most High God, and come here!” Moments later the king issued a decree that “any people, nation, or tongue that speaks anything offensive against their God shall be torn limb from limb and their houses reduced to a rubbish heap, inasmuch as there is no other god who is able to deliver in this way.”

We see from this passage in Daniel 3 that these men feared God more than they feared man. Furthermore, the men did not require some kind of assurance that God would save them before they acted. Instead, they acted in faith that God alone was worthy of worship and, regardless of the consequences, they would not bow down and worship any other. God chose to use the faithfulness of the men to serve as a witness to the king and his leaders by protecting the men from the king’s own hand. As a result, the king and his leaders saw that the God of Israel was more powerful than any other and that He must be honored as such. As a result of the faithfulness of the three Jews, the God of the universe received the glory due only to Him.

Facing Persecution Today

In this day and age, Christians are also called to stand up for truth in the face of opposition. There is a map that hangs on the wall in our home school room from The Voice of the Martyrs, which designates those nations where Christians are persecuted even unto death for their faith. The nations that severely persecute Christians in this way are almost exclusively Muslim, atheistic, or Hindu.

Anyone who calls Islam a religion of peace needs only to observe how Christians are treated when Muslims comprise the majority in any nation. “Islam or the sword?” was the motto of this religion at its inception and it appears to remain the truest form of it. You can call Islam many things, but peaceful is not one of them.

In the United States, many people profess to be Christian, but most of these lack a biblical worldview, spiritual fruit, good works, and obedience to God, which are evidences of saving faith. Even so, there are Biblical Christians in America and they are persecuted for their faith, but it is usually not to the extremes faced by our brothers and sisters elsewhere in the world.

In America we are persecuted because:

• We reject religious pluralism.
• We believe that Jesus Christ is the only way to salvation.
• We believe that all people are accountable to God.
• We believe that all who die apart from Christ will spend eternity apart from God.
• We believe the Bible is God’s Word and that its truths apply to everyone.
  
• We believe that God ordained the family as the foundational jurisdiction for civilization.
• We believe that men and women are equal and were made by God to serve different roles.
  
• We use the Bible as the source of morality and ethics.
• We believe that God-ordained marriage is between one man and one woman.
• We believe in the inherent worth and dignity of every human being (preborn or born) because they are image bearers of God.
• We believe that the special revelation given to men thousands of years ago trumps the humanism of mankind in the 21st Century. 
• and so forth… 

The simple truth is that all Christians who seek to live godly lives in Christ Jesus will be persecuted because we are called to obey God’s Word and His Word is offensive to this depraved world. Therefore, when we are faced with persecution we must always stand strong and fear God rather than man because the things of this world will pass away, but the things of God last forever. To God be the glory!