To hear more teaching on the subject of raising and training children, consider listening to the following sermons:

Shepherding Adult Children:    • Shepherding Adult Children  
The Wrong Answer for Your Child's Greatest Need:    • Parenting 101: The Wrong Answer for Y...  
The Context for Christian Parenting:    • Parenting 101: The Context for Christ...  
Christian Parenting:    • Christian Parenting | Ephesians 6:4  
A Generational Plan for Discipleship:    • Parenting 101: A Generational Plan Fo...  

In this episode of the Straight Truth Podcast, Dr. Philpot and Dr. Richard Caldwell discuss the importance of preparing and guiding our children for sending them out into the world for secular education. Whether it's sending them off to elementary, middle, high school, or college, we want our children to take with them the biblical and moral values we teach them at home. We want to see them prepared for all walks of life they will encounter as they go out to receive any kind of secular education. But how can parents instill a deep-rooted faith in their children so that when they encounter worldly ideas, arguments, and controversial subject matters, they're prepared for them? What can and should parents do to prepare their children for these kinds of environments? Join us to hear the answers to these questions and more as Dr. Caldwell seeks to guide us to think carefully, wisely, and biblically about raising, training, and sending our children out into the world of secular education.

Dr. Caldwell says that one way of training our children as they grow up in our homes is to make sure we are teaching them in a way where it’s not just a question asked and an answer repeated. Catechizing our children has wonderful benefits, but we need to be sure that we are always teaching our children truth in a way that we're encouraging them to embrace it in their own hearts. We want to teach them to think carefully and holistically about the truth they’re embracing so that they understand what they believe and why they believe it. As we train our children these ways in our homes, modeling it and living it out with them, we are preparing them as they grow up to face objections and people who believe contrary to the things we believe.

As you prepare to send them off to college or university, you want to think carefully about where you send them. If you’re going to be paying for or contributing financially to their continuing education, send them where they’ll receive an education, not indoctrination. Then, as you send them out, stay in touch with them, stay connected to them, and talk with them throughout their entire journey. Ask them specifically about their walk with God and about things they are running into at school. Ask them about their friendships and how their faith is enduring. Ask them about challenges they’re facing in their own hearts. Be careful and diligent in your relationship with them as you seek to help and encourage them along their journey.

But what about the years before we send them off to college? Should we consider pulling our children out of the secular education environment altogether? Would it be better to homeschool them and place them in private Christian schools if we can? Dr. Caldwell says these are all individual decisions. He and his wife raised four children some were homeschooled, and some went to private Christian school. However, Dr. Caldwell shares that from the time they did that until now, the moral influence of the public education models has degraded. So he definitely believes there is a place to pull our children out and educate them in a way that accords with truth. But we want to do this in a way that doesn’t isolate them from the very things and arguments they'll be dealing with for the rest of their lives. We don’t want them to be naïve or underdeveloped when it comes to the pushback they're going to get in this world. A part of preparing them for life is preparing them for those who do not believe what they believe.

No matter how much biblical truth we steep them in, what we teach, train, and model for them, it must take root in their own hearts. Even great parenting can result in unbelieving children. We need to understand that there’s something that our children need that we can’t produce through any process of training. Great parenting cannot overcome the problem in our children from birth since the fall; that requires God. God must save our children. It's the monergistic work of God's grace that saves, not decisional regeneration. It is God alone who saves, who grants repentance and faith in His Son. Therefore, when we think it’s just information in and godliness out, we've really misunderstood what's required for the salvation of our children. But when we understand that it is God alone that saves, it should drive us to our knees and humble us in our parenting approaches. As we are training and teaching our children biblical truth, we need to be praying and asking the Lord to save them.