CHEC "Men's Leadership Summit," Part IV - "A Vision for the Family"

#4 in an ongoing series on Christian Home Educators of Colorado 2009 "Men's Leadership Summit" (otherwise known as the "The Vision of the Leadership Summit") held in Indianapolis, Indiana, at one of the hotels owned by Bill Gothard's group over the weekend of March 5-7, 2009. Previous post in this series: CHEC "Men's Leadership Summit," Part III - "The Battle for Faith and Family". First post in the series: 2009 Christian Home Educators of Colorado (CHEC) "Men's Leadership Summit," Part I.

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The following content is from Doug Phillip's first speech at the 2009 CHEC "Men's Leadership Summit" ("MLS")--"A Vision for the Family"--delivered Friday morning, March 6, 2009 and available in full, audio form from ResoundingVoice.com.

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Phillips' first words, after he was introduced to the audience, are very interesting.

At first, I wasn't going to mention them. But then I realized they say some very important things about where his heart lies. Specifically, Phillips acknowledged his fellow presenters at the Summit:

It is such a great honor to be able to be here with the men who I think are not only some of the finest teachers and speakers that God is raising up, but some of the most important works in the world today, but men that are my pals, my friends. They are my paisanos. They are men that we have had the privilege of being in many battles together, traveling around the country and sharing a synchronous message. Our hearts are linked together.

And then he explained his purpose.

"I don't consider myself, necessarily, the best candidate to deliver [the following] message, or the person who is most capable of articulating it just the way it needs to be said," he said, "but it's on my heart and I have to say it. I have to talk to you about these things. I've been dying to talk to you about these things."

And--as he did pretty much for the rest of his speech--he told a story . . . this one from when he was an incoming freshman at the College of William and Mary.

He said he was assigned to a dorm "just yards away from a sewage facility" that "smelled to heaven." And he described how his sensitivity shifted over that year from absolutely hating and despising the smell so much that he couldn't imagine being able to live there . . . to the point where, as he described it, "[The smell] became very natural to me. It was something I actually liked."

That is the way it is in our culture, he said. "We are immersed in a culture that has become putrid in the eyes of the Lord because of the way we've abandoned God's law word, the way we have turned to our idolatries and away from the Lord, and the way we've lost our first love."

"I'd like to challenge all of you this morning that we need to clear the air," he continued. "We need to bring the wonderful, refreshing scent and the odor of the Word of God, which is able to cleanse the soul, to cleanse the mind, to cleanse the spirit, and bring that into our lives and to drink deeply from that very Word of God."

His speech, he said, was "going to be a talk on perspective"--a perspective of antithesis.

This is a very important word: anti-thesis. It speaks to the tension between competing worldviews, the antithesis between the Word of God and everything else; the antithesis between the system of Christianity and secular humanism; the antithesis between God's priorities for our lives, and the world's priorities for our lives.

Another word I'm going to speak of is the word remnant.

Now I'm going to try to let the Scripture define that word itself. But in the context of this discussion, we'll be talking about those people that are set apart unto the Lord, that are representatives of the church of Jesus Christ and are sent, often alone, in the day of adversity and the day of tremendous apostasy.

So we'll mention remnant and we'll mention antithesis, and we'll mention other things. But let me begin by inviting you to go back in history with me for just a moment.

And so he asked his audience to imagine being part of a nation--like ancient Israel--in which the judgments of God fall upon the people for unfaithfulness to Him--judgments like "barrenness of the womb; national economic disaster; the moral destruction of sons and daughters; servitude to the state and foreign nations; sickness and pestilence; catastrophic weather patterns; and violence from individuals who descend from the air and have no regard for women and children. In essence, all the plagues and the calamities that are prophesied in Deuteronomy 28."

And with this setup in mind, he said,

I want to remind you [that] the most basic proposition to any theory of home education or life . . . is this: "The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge" [Proverbs 1:7]. "The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom" [Proverbs 9:10--JAH]. "The fool has said in his heart there is no God" [Psalm 53:1--JAH].

But if the fear of the LORD [is w]hat gives you wisdom and . . . knowledge, this, then, is our predicate for our system of thinking, of philosophy, of theology, and everything. It is not the fear of man. It is not the fear of circumstances. . . . It is not the fear of the externalities which are all around us which gives us wisdom. In fact, "faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen." [Hebrews 11:1--JAH]

In other words, the fear of the Lord not only gives us wisdom and knowledge, but it is true faith that tells us to believe when all the empirical data seems to be pointing us in the opposite direction. We must believe what God says when you cannot taste, touch or smell the victory, simply because God said it. That's enough. . . . [E]ven our ability to process information and facts is derivative on God's good grace to allow us to see the truth.

"But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know [them], because they are spiritually discerned" [1 Corinthians 2:14--JAH].

How much we need spiritual discernment!

So Phillips urged his hearers to go back to the time of Nehemiah when Sanballat and Tobiah "ridiculed and mocked and reviled and gossiped and organized teams and parties all geared at tearing down the work of the Lord."

That, he said, is the kind of time Christians--and especially, homeschoolers--live in today.

He suggested the Newsweek cover [mentioned by Kevin Swanson in his speech] that said "We're all socialists now!" is an example of "the gloating of the enemies of God."

Thomas Malthus has won. Population control theory is now the only theory that is taught or that is believed.

Charles Darwin has won. He's been elevated to the status of God, and his theory is not a theory. It is fact.

The contraceptive mentality has won. What originated with the evil workings of Margaret Sanger and others who are the greatest despisers of the testimony of God in the 20th century has emerged into something which is vehemently proclaimed as being the righteous end for the church itself.

Euthanasia has won!

--He told the story of a church where they passed out instructions for euthanizing one's parents--all "in the name of Christ," he added, sarcastically.

This is the world we live in. And our enemies are gloating. They're gloating because they see our inconsistencies. They're gloating because they see our hypocrisies. They're gloating because they see that we do not really believe what we claim to believe. And as a result, we have become worthless in the cultural battle. Or at least that's the perception of mainstream Christianity by our enemies. And it's always been this way: Enemies gloat.

God says don't listen to them.

What is the answer? "Not fear" and "not fleeing."
"[L]isten to the words of God to those that are in a state of complete, abject discouragement in the midst of catastrophe and absentee preachers," he pleaded. Remember God's statement to Elijah (1 Kings 19) referenced by Paul in Romans 11: "I have reserved to myself seven thousand men, who have not bowed the knee to [the image of] Baal. Even so then at this present time also there is a remnant according to the election of grace" (Romans 11:4-5).

Back to Nehemiah (Nehemiah 4:14):

The American Standard version Bible begins saying this, "When I saw their fear, I rose and spoke." In other words, when I saw the fear of the people, when I saw them trembling, when I saw them not believing in God, I rose and spoke . . . --and now continuing in the King James, "And I looked, and rose up, and said unto the nobles, and to the rulers, and to the rest of the people, Be not ye afraid of them: remember the Lord, [which is] great and terrible, and fight for your brethren, your sons, and your daughters, your wives, and your houses."

This is a battle cry of a prophet standing alone in the midst of national judgment and tribulation. This is a battle cry of a man who understands that in his day in the context of what God had given to him, he had to purify again the holy city of God. And that meant building walls. They were symbolically important, but they were also important for the fulfillment of prophecy. It had to be done. And even though everything around him said defeat and destruction, he said, "Families, get together and fight."

Phillips earnestly contended that "those that do not give up; . . . those who are about the business of restoring ancient covenants and who are not about abandoning them; . . . those who repair breaches" can look forward to blessings like what we find in Isaiah 58:12: "And they that shall be of thee shall build the old waste places: thou shalt raise up the foundations of many generations; and thou shalt be called, The repairer of the breach, The restorer of paths to dwell in."

"Brethren," Phillips pled,

would you like to be a repairer of the breach and restorer of the path to dwell in? I want it so badly I can taste it! I can feel it. Here is something worth fighting for. Here is something worth dying for. Here is something worth living for. Because this is the kingdom purpose of the church of Jesus Christ. . . .

You and I are presiding over the worst international cultural apostasy of the West in more than a thousand years. There [have] been terrible wars, terrible evil. Horrible things have happened. The 20th century was the century of mass genocide. The 19th century was the century of intellectual apostasy by the humanistic elite. The 18th century was a century of confusion and mixture between Enlightenment thought and the residue of Puritanism and Christianity. And we can go back even further and see what wonderful things God birthed 500 years ago as the Reformation fires were burning hot. And we are still living off the light that shone from those days. But there is something different about this time. This is, . . . one of the most unique times, because this is a time of remarkable firsts. . . . Here's what's happened, never before in the history of the West:

• Never have we had major nations, major cultures that once claimed to be Christian, fundamentally questioning whether marriage is one man and one woman for life. Never has it really been questioned. It's always been a precept. Oh, men have done evil things. But the institution of marriage--though men would sin, though bad things happened, no question--from a legal and cultural perspective, [marriage] was still sacrosanct. It was not to be violated. It is on your watch, it is on my watch that the sodomites are redefining marriage in our land. Never before in history. First time.

Here's another first.

• This is the first time recorded--at least according to our demographers and our historians that look at this--when more Christians want to prevent babies than want to have babies. More professing Christians want to thwart the womb, to pervert the natural function of the body, to separate life from love, than don't. First time ever. We have no other recorded time that we know of, where there has been such an epidemic of desired barrenness, delayed fertility within marriage, than we have today.

Here's another.

• This is the first time, the first time, that man en masse, and the church itself, has placed its hand and blessing on sending 18-year-old girls to take the place of men overseas to die in combat. You can call it whatever you want, combat, noncombat, whatever it is, it's combat. It's the field of battle. It's the protection of the families. In many cases while dad stays home and changes the diapers of the babies.

This unbelievable effeminacy, this complete abdication of male responsibility at the level that we are currently having, statistically is born out for a higher number of deaths of women--all combined--in the wars in America have taken place in the last 10 years and then some.

This is a judgment on our land. It's not that America is about to have judgment; it's that America is in the midst of judgment. This is a judgment. It is perverse. It is evil. It is wrong. And where is all this pointing to? The family! The family. The relationships of parents and children, husbands and wives. It is the family. It is the family.

And one need only go into the bookstores today to see a new brand of Christianity in our Christian bookstores that almost seems to magnify effeminacy in men as a virtue.

Oh, the supersensitive, soft, 50-50 marriage man.

I think men should be sensitive. God calls them to live with their wives according to knowledge, to be sensitive to the Spirit. But that's not what I'm talking about, here. I'm talking about watered-down manhood where men will not lead and they think that's virtuous, that's a good thing! It's noble for men to be that way!

It's repulsive.

Phillips continued on this theme of effeminacy for a while.

He noted how Wyoming, whose state motto used to be "The Cowboy State" is now "The Equality State" because they were the first with women's suffrage, to have a female governor and so forth. "Regardless of what you think of that, I would just like you to consider the change of paradigms from the cowboy state to the equality state," he said.

"But brothers," he continued,

This is a time of profound antithesis. This is a time when the dark is getting darker and the light is getting lighter and the difference between the two is clearer and there will be no fellowship philosophically, theologically, practically, between these two competing worldviews. And the road before this nation . . . may be filled with thorns and bitterness and horrors the likes of which we have essentially been spared before in our past, but these judgments and horrors are the product of our worship of the false gods of our day, our idolatries . . . of self, of materialism; philosophical idolatries: evolutionism, social Darwinism, feminism, statism, Marxism, and hundreds of -isms, both personal and philosophical, which have taken us captive personally and, more importantly, as a church. They're the results of our idolatries, our love for things more than our love for God, our love for security more than our love for freedom in Christ.

But rather than this being our season of fear, I believe that wise Christians will view this moment as a time of unprecedented opportunity . . . because God is putting you at the center of an unfolding controversy. He's putting you at a place where there is a need for leadership. There will be need for the next five to 10 years for leadership like there has never been a need for leadership before. Crisis is opportunity in disguise.

And the opportunity?

[M]en are having conversations . . . that men [we] haven't had since the Reformation . . . about fundamental principles of sola scriptura as applied to pedagogy and to education. . . .

We are having conversations about the roles of fathers and family reformation that we have not heard at least since the 18th century. . . . But it was really the 16th century and the 17th century that brought out great works of reformation in the area of the family. Why? The Bible was open. Why? The doctrines were preached: the sufficiency of Scripture; the priesthood of the believer; the self-attesting authority of the word of God; the perspicuity of Scripture (namely, that it is knowable, that it is understandable, it is intelligible to all of us who are believers if we study to shower ourselves approved unto God, rightly dividing the word of truth . . .).

This remarkable moment in history is significant, because we are having discussions about reforming the family in a way we haven't had those discussions before. And some of the conversations we have are hard conversations . . . [because] it's really painful when the entire wave of society is moving in the precisely opposite direction you are moving in.

Antithesis. Antithesis. Remnant antithesis.

And so, in the midst of all these things, we are watching a small, but nonetheless potent, work. You are here and you are men, and 18 years ago, when the homeschool movement was beginning to thrive, there wouldn't have been enough men in leadership to fill one fourth of this room. . . . God did that: progressive sanctification in the homeschool movement! Praise the Lord.

This small reformation is potent and it's taking place . . . in exactly the precise place that God declares it has to take place to make ready a people prepared for the Lord: in the hearts of fathers! Because if you want to make ready a people prepared for the Lord, you must, must, must turn your heart to your family. It is one of your first priorities. It is the manifestation of real revival. . . . [S]o, if you want to say where are the important things taking place in the world, you don't look to Washington, DC. You look to the church. If you want to understand what's really happening in the church, you . . . look to the families that make up the church. And if you really want to know what's happening in those families, you ask what's happening with the heads of the households. What's happening to the men? . . . Are they turning their hearts to their children? Do they love their children and their brides so much that it is a defining principle in their life and fills their hearts with gladness and joy when they think of their little ones?

Phillips then told a number of stories he said he believes illustrate how significant this point is. "While the professing, mainstream church ignores the great works of God and--may I say it?--despises it, reviles it, sometimes hates it, do you know the world is actually fascinated by us? They really are!"

He told a story about the Duggar family, of 20 and Counting fame,¹ to prove the point.

As the Duggars attended the San Antonio Independent Christian Film Festival (SAICFF; sponsored by Phillips and his paisanos).
The blessing of children, he said, was being presented to the people of America on national television. And people were fascinated. The Duggars "seem to love each other. What's the matter with those people? They love babies! They're having fun! They're doing professional things! . . . What in the world is going on here?"

National Public Radio, he said, "[t]he single most liberal radio network in the world, outside of Soviet communist nations and things like that," visited the festival and interviewed a bunch of the participants.

"Gentlemen," said Phillips, "in my entire life I have never heard such an excellent, well-produced, favorable, God-honoring radio broadcast as the one I heard on NPR. Unbelievable! . . . [T]he reporter . . . told our story in a way that no one [else] told our story. And guess what happened after that went out? . . .

Christianity Today, which is, sadly, Secular Humanism Today so much of the time, basically put out an article furious at [us] trying to establish an independent Christian film movement. What a horrible thing! Hollywood is our friend! We love Hollywood! We bask at the feet of Hollywood. Oh, Hollywood!"

So while the [from Phillips' perspective, only ostensibly] Christian publication criticizes SAICFF, NPR lauds it.

Then Phillips mentioned that Fireproof, a film produced by a Baptist church in Albany, Georgia, was "the top grossing independent film of . . . 2008."

The contrast was too great to ignore:

[While] NPR is saying, "This is really worthy," . . . the Christian community says, "We're scared. . . . Let's not rattle this cultural love affair we have with Hollywood, please. At all costs, we don't want to do that."

Another story: Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar on The View with Barbara Walters.

Here he is with his wife Michelle and Jim Bob and Barbara Walters is just squinting and she's making faces and she wants to say something really, really mean, but that other blonde haired girl won't let her do it. And she's looking at them and she's thinking, "This is . . . Blecch! Disgusting! All these children!" But it doesn't quite come out of her; you can just see it on her face.

And Michelle's response is to radiate Christ. And Jim Bob just radiates Christ.

Meanwhile, . . . less than half a million American families even eat dinner together. When they do, they spend less than 20 minutes together. Only 22.1% of the households in America have children. Guess what that does to the American family? It breeds selfishness.

Back to the decline of American society:

• Data shows that "between 1970 and 1995, the percentage of Americans 15 and older who ever married fell dramatically."
   
• "During the same period, the average age of a first marriage rose from 21.8 years to 26.6 years."
   
• He quotes at length from Dr. Allan Carlson, to the effect that in the 2000 census, it became clear that there has been "a massive retreat by young adults from marriage. In that year, 73% of women ages 20-24 were in the never-married category, up from 36% in . . . 1970."
   
• "There were 4.6 million unmarried couples cohabiting in 2000, an increase of 800 percent since 1970."
   
• "The marital fertility rate in 2000, meanwhile, was a third below the 1965 figure."

Phillips quotes Carlson and notes that Carlson places much of the blame for these statistics in the lap of the U.S. government's push for college education and the concomitant increase in college debt. This debt, says Carlson, "creates perverse material incentives for young adults to succumb to cultural trends like cohabitation and the avoidance of parenthood."

And, said Phillips, "[t]his is the antithesis [of what Christian homeschoolers are seeing]."

Remember: he was addressing a group of homeschool dads when he said,

Your children are getting married, maybe not as soon as you would like. Maybe too soon. But they are beginning to get married, and they’re getting married to godly spouses.

He told of going to a wedding in Louisiana where "multiple generations of families came to gather as fathers were honored, as both sets of fathers came out.

And they testified to the concept of covenant before an entire audience as the groom stood up and preached the gospel on his wedding day. It was unbelievable! I mean, it was the sort of thing that you never hear of.

And you know what the most amazing thing of all is? Our children are growing up thinking it's normal! . . . At least some of them are.

If your children aren't seeing, you need to think about where you're going to church. You need to think about where you live. You need to think about a lot of different things, because we are in the midst of a battle for their souls and the antithesis is all around us, and you want to be on this side and not [that] side . . . because the future of America, the status of the church, the hope of our families, rests on our Christ-honoring commitment to take the narrow path of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Next concern: what he called "the birth dearth," "blighted barrenness," "a demographic winter."

Brothers, of the many judgments that are coming and that are, in fact, prophesied as a principle in Scripture, in places like Deuteronomy 28 and others, to nations that forsake the God of their fathers, who break covenant with the LORD, is . . . barrenness. . . .

[R]eplacement fertility is 2.1 children per woman.

In 1987, the fertility rate was 2.1 for women. It's dropped. It's dropping and dropping dramatically. From 1980 to 2005, the population of children under 14 went from 22% to 16%, while the population of people over the age of 65 went from 14% to 17%. From 1820 to 1998, U.S. birthrates fell from 5.5 per family to 1.5 per couple. Now, it's picked up a little and went down a little, but it's nowhere near what's necessary if we're going to have a thriving economy. And while we can look at this--and many people are looking at this--in terms of economic considerations, there is a far greater spiritual issue behind all of this that many people are missing. . . .

Brothers, I hope you get it.

I hope you understand that children are a blessing and not a curse. I hope you understand that debt is a curse and children are a blessing. Let's stop applying for curses and rejecting blessings! Let's start looking for blessings. I hope you understand that you represent one of the few groups in the entire world that are bringing forth an abundance of children, and you're doing it for the glory of God.

--I cut large swaths of Phillips' discussion of this issue. He spent quite a bit of time on it.

Some additional illustrative comments on the subject:

• "Do you know the main population groups that are bringing forth an abundance of children? Mohammedans and homeschoolers. And, by the way, we're really different. But, you know, not everybody thinks so."
   
• "We have individuals, publishers, press, radical left-wingers, even inner-sphere internet blogosphere railers, who would claim that somehow there's something oppressive, something perverse, something terrible, something outrageous that comes from loving children and desiring to have more babies."
   
• "In a recent book that was published by Beacon Press called Quiverfull, many individuals in this room are made to look like monsters, absolute monsters! And though we are told we're a small group, Beacon Press, which happens to be one of the leading publishers of radical lesbian, feminist, transgender books, with this recent book by Kathryn Joyce, has come out to tell us this really is a movement of racism. Well, she didn't put it exactly like that. It's our movement to perpetuate white society.
  
  "Have you taken a look at homeschool families lately? We are some of the most ethnically diverse, so-called racially diverse families, I've seen."

I'll quit there. You've gotten the guts of his pro-life/pro-birth message.

Next subject: seven principles of "what constitutes a real biblical reformation."

1. "[W]e must open the lost Book of the Law" (with reference to Josiah and the [accidental!] discovery of the Book of the Law by Hilkiah the priest--see 2 Kings 22 and 2 Chronicles 34). [Phillips did a great job of developing this theme, but I am going to assume my audience realizes, as he summarized the issue: "[W]e have to believe that God speaks through the Scriptures, that the Old Testament and the New Testament, properly interpreted in light of the death, burial and resurrection of Christ, are our guidebook."]
    
2. "There must be a conviction and a repentance and a turning from sin. Christianity is not an intellectual assent. It is a personal relationship which is born out of repentance. And without conviction and repentance and turning from sin, there is no reformation revival."
    
3. A love of God's revealed priorities, "the wedding of orthodoxy and orthopraxy. Sound theology and practical living."
   

   There is such a fear to apply the word of God. And there is a legalism in this fear. Some of the greatest Pharisees I've ever met in my life rail against those that seek to know the heart of God in making application to their own life. . . .
   
   [T]here is only one standard and it isn't your feelings and your emotions and it isn't a still, small, quiet voice. . . . It is God's Word, properly interpreted, with the Holy Spirit guiding.

4. "[A] turning of the hearts of parents to their children to make ready a people prepared for the LORD . . . [which] necessarily means a Hebraic education, . . . a walk-along, talk-along discipleship. . . . That doesn't mean others can't come along and help you, stand beside you, or anything of that nature. It means that the responsibility is on you. You can't take that lightly and you don't want to, because you love them."
    
5. The turning of hearts that results in discipleship "necessarily results in the reformation of family life and family culture . . . which is why the family is one of the greatest evangelism tools in the world. What a powerful evangelism tool in a world of broken homes: to bring people into your house and to let them see the love of Christ--the way you live your life in your home!"
    
6. "[A] biblical and multigenerational vision of victory to bring forth the Great Commission will emerge . . . the flip side of the coin of the Dominion Mandate which teaches us that we are to be fruitful and multiply. . . . This is not political takeover; it is not forced submission to the Gospel. What this is is our acknowledgment that there is no realm, no sphere, no closet, no window, which is not and must not be proclaimed as being under the Lordship of Christ. This is our duty.
   
   "And the Great Commission teaches us that we are literally to 'disciple the nations, teaching them all things whatsoever I have commanded.' That means Genesis to Revelation. . . . We are to disciple nations. That's what our founding fathers did, our true founding father up at Plymouth. They began to disciple a nation. They discipled a nation. And we have freedom today."
    
7. "[T]here will be a heartfelt desire for the ongoing work of semper reformanda. We will never be content. We will never say we have got it figured out. We are constantly questioning ourselves in this sense. We are constantly evaluating: Where do we stand before the Lord? Are we being prideful? Are we being idolatrous? Are we being selfish? We are constantly asking, Have we really taken this thought captive to the obedience of Christ or have I rendered this as a realm of neutrality?"

Phillips suggested that the homeschool movement of the '80s was a semper reformanda movement that "wanted to absolutely reform education in a way it had never been reformed before, both the methodology and the substance."

Now, fellows, I've got something hard to tell you. And this is for me, too. This is for all of us as we stand at the centerpiece of a great antithesis and a great judgment in our land: . . . If we dream and if we hope to be part of the solution to be more than recluses, more than just mere survivors; if we hope to really make a difference for the Lord and to be salt and light and the breadbasket of love when this world is going to need it so badly, we are going to have to get our personal and collective houses in order.

This means, fellows, that we're going to have to get real serious about repentance. . . . Here's what I'm talking about.

Some of you . . . are not really acting as the heads of your home in love. Some of you men are still struggling with perpetual bitterness. Some of you may still be angry at your fathers. . . . [S]ome of you are porn addicts. The statistics speak for themselves. Some of you have lost your love for Christ. You're content with emotions.

Brothers, judgment begins with the house of the Lord. . . . We will be useless and we will become a statistic if we don't take seriously the need to get on our face before God now.

And so he recited several Scriptures (all in the King James) having to do with repentance:

• Jeremiah 6:16.
   
• Proverbs 3:1-8.
   
• Psalm 34:14-15.
   
• Luke 9:62.
   
• John 3:30.
   
• Philippians 1:6.

And, finally, Phillips held out one final antithesis, or contrast, between two men whose multi-centenary birthdays occur in 2009: "In fact, I would ask you to look back over the last one thousand years and just consider: Who are the two most influential men of the last one thousand years?" Phillips suggested they are John Calvin and Charles Darwin.

"John Calvin has been correctly described as the true founding father of America," Phillips said. "[Y]ou don't have to agree with everything Calvin said or did. . . . No man, no system, has had such an impact theologically on this nation or other nations as John Calvin for good. . . . Our republican system of government is largely birthed in the principle of the priesthood of the believer. Presbyterian principles of government and polity . . . were brought over here and established and influenced our founders.

"And yet [Charles Darwin] had at least as much influence for evil," Phillips claimed. "Today most Christians have bought into elements of Darwinian thinking. Even if you say you don't believe in evolutionism, it's amazing how many precepts of Malthusian population control, of eugenics, and of other things come together to poison our mind."

Phillips then made a statement that he would repeat Friday evening:

History is never, ever shaped by majorities. . . . History is made by dedicated minorities.

Whether for good or ill, it's the minorities who make the difference.

And, Phillips urged, the minorities themselves are often shaped by their families.

So with Charles Darwin, "[whose] grandfather Erasmus was a God-hater."

Do you know that there are five generations of God hating Darwins--scoffers, God-haters? [And Charles] Darwin attracted other men who became his good friends, like Thomas Huxley who . . . became the personal mentor of H.G. Wells [and] H.G. Wells became the adulterous lover of Margaret Sanger [founder of what is now known as Planned Parenthood]. . . . [T]he philosophies of eugenics, the philosophies of social Darwinism, the philosophies of government statist education--all of these things can be connected to a handful of individuals who knew each other, who married into each other's families.

I am skipping an interesting story Phillips told about Admiral FitzRoy, the man who invited Darwin to accompany him on the voyage of The Beagle.

But I would like to share what Phillips said in conclusion:

In about 72 hours, I will be on a plane to Ecuador. And, God willing, if all goes well, I'll be standing on the Galapagos Islands about 24 hours after that with a film crew and with homeschoolers thanks to the generosity of some individuals who believe it important enough for us to make a major television documentary teaching fathers how to disciple their children about antithesis and about Darwin. And we will be standing there with the Galapagos turtles. We will be standing there with the penguins. We will be standing there with these amazing marine iguanas, the only iguanas of the world that live underneath the ground, and we will look into our sons' eyes, and we will teach them the truth. We will teach them that we are living in a day of battle.

We are teaching them that if they . . . depart from the principles of Scripture, they will be destroyed. We will teach them that true reformation begins with sola scriptura and those who leave the principle of love in Christ and the Bible as the authority are ultimately damned to hellish philosophy that will poison all of us around them. We will teach them that it was the compromise of the Church which led to the destruction of civilization and it is only the restoration of the fundamental principles which the reformers articulated that we can ever have hope because those principles were true. And seeing the church strong and healthy regardless of whether America thrives or whether America fails. We will teach them these things. And we will desire to give them hope, hope that through the difficulty which is ahead, we will persevere, we will be able to be strong for the Lord, we will be God's witnesses.

I began with reading Romans 11:2-5. I read it to you again:

I have reserved to myself seven thousand men, who have not bowed the knee to [the image of] Baal. Even so then at this present time also there is a remnant according to the election of grace.

Will you be part of that remnant? We need you, men. We need you so badly!

Your children's children's children, in their lives and their hope, in part [depend] on the grace of God working through you at this perilous hour.

May God have mercy on America and may God build up this important homeschool movement for the glory of God.

Amen.

---

So. My comments?

Honestly: I found Phillips' presentation, overall, very engaging. The logical connections between various pieces wasn't always clear. It seemed he bounced around quite a bit. But his stories gripped me and held my attention.

Phillips used certain catch phrases that put me on edge.

• I don't like his derogatory use of "Mohammedans" rather than "Muslims."
   
• I thought I could "tell where he was going" with his emphasis on male and female roles, his reference to "effeminacy." But he didn't actually go there.

And if I ignore what I sense I "know" about his bigger agenda; if I listen only to what he actually said in this speech: frankly, overall and, even, in these details, I sensed I could "buy" just about everything he had to say.

I wanted to see him develop the themes, but as far as he went, I sensed I was with him. I agree: There is something inappropriate about men abdicating what I perceive as their (our!) legitimate role as protectors.

Still, at the same time--and this is where I'm not sure Phillips, or I, or our culture has figured things out--I sense men need to receive the offer of help from those women who want to participate in the forefront of the battles at their sides. If God is calling a woman to engage in battle; if she has been granted the spirit of warfare (may I call it that?), the heart to do battle; if she has the physical aptitude and desire and eagerness: why should she be turned aside? --So far, I am unconvinced that Phillips or anyone else, with reference to Scripture or not, is able to show good cause for turning them aside.

Would I volunteer for battle if I were a woman? I don't think so! But let me confess: I didn't volunteer for physical military combat as a man, either. I have never been a "martial" person. But who am I to turn away someone who says he (or she!) wants to fight?

Anyway.

That is, in my opinion, at least at this point in Phillips' two-part presentation (the second portion still to come), a rather minor quibble.

Did Christianity Today deserve the dig he gave it? Did NPR deserve the praise? --I'm not convinced. Having read the referenced articles, I think Phillips misrepresented them a bit. But, okay. The SAICFF is his "baby." I can see why he would become a bit touchy about it . . . and why he would be unhappy that the Christianity Today commentator questions the legitimacy of the "separate" film industry idea Phillips is touting . . . and, even, why he would view the NPR article as being positively disposed toward the SAICFF (though I don't believe it was). But, simply, having an article that presents participants' viewpoints pretty much without editorial commentary . . . I can see why that would be viewed as positive.

Are John Calvin and Charles Darwin the most important historical figures of the last 1,000 years? Well. Maybe. They certainly deserve to be considered right "up there" among the top echelons of most influential. But I don't think I would want to proclaim them, absolutely, the winners. And, come next year, or a few years from now, when some other significant historical person's birthday or key centenary comes up, I wouldn't be surprised to hear Phillips himself say that that person is "most influential."

But, once more: My opinion: these are very minor quibbles.

Is American society as a whole in a state of major decline? --I am happy to register my "vote" with Phillips and agree that many of the issues he raises are worthy of attention. They are symptomatic of some rather deep rot in the culture. And I appreciate his bringing these things to our attention.

Do American fathers, in general, need to pay more attention to their families--their wives and their children? --Again, I think, no question. This is a worthy message. We men, we fathers, need to hear it. And I appreciate Phillips' bringing this message for our benefit (the benefit of our families; the benefit of us, personally, as men and fathers).

And having said this, I think I have little more to say . . . until his next speech, what Phillips called "Part II" of his "State of the Homeschool Nation" address. Because it is there that . . . well, . . . let's deal with that when we get there. [You should see quite a bit faster turn-around on that than you saw on this speech! Sorry about that.]

---

¹ A very nice book, by the way! Return to text.

---

Next post in this series: CHEC "Men's Leadership Summit," Part V - "Visionary Fathers".

CHEC "Men's Leadership Summit," Part III - "The Battle for Faith and Family"

#3 in an ongoing series on Christian Home Educators of Colorado 2009 "Men's Leadership Summit" (otherwise known as the "The Vision of the Leadership Summit") held in Indianapolis, Indiana, at one of the hotels owned by Bill Gothard's group over the weekend of March 5-7, 2009. Previous post in this series: CHEC "Men's Leadership Summit," Part II--"For Such a Time as This -- The 1000-Year Battle Over the Hearts and Minds of the Next Generation". First post in the series: 2009 Christian Home Educators of Colorado (CHEC) "Men's Leadership Summit," Part I.

---

The following content is from Voddie Baucham's speech at the 2009 CHEC "Men's Leadership Summit" (what I will refer to, simply, as "MLS" from here on out) on Thursday evening, March 5, 2009: "The Battle for Faith and Family." The original speech is available in full, audio form from ResoundingVoice.com.

I will confess, it took me two listenings plus several readings of detailed notes from the speech before I think I understood the relationship between the content of Baucham's message and the title.

When I finally saw that relationship, I realized it might be helpful to share the final words of his speech at the beginning of my post rather than at the end.

So here is his summary/conclusion:

We're in the midst of a crisis of faith and family that has manifested itself in both the church and the home. And ironically, both [the church and the home] have undermined the home. Why? The home is the place where God forges leaders for the church. The home is the place where Paul told Timothy to go and look for men who were qualified for leadership in the church.

The home is the place that fortifies and carries on and undergirds what is being taught in the church. The home is the place that has more time, more opportunity, and more relational clout [than does the church] as it relates to the discipleship of the next generation.

So what the enemy has done is very skillful. He has taken a scalpel and drawn a line of separation between these two entities. And, as a result, he's weakened them both.

Our churches are not as strong because we're not calling elders based upon the qualifications that we see in their homes.

[And o]ur homes are not as strong because we're not part of churches that have elders who are modeling for us what we ought to be and to do and to teach.

And so, with that summary/overview/conclusion in mind, I think you may find it easier than I did to understand where Baucham is going. . . .

*******
Interesting: Baucham begins his speech by identifying himself with a movement, the family-integrated church movement.

"I am a pastor of such a church," he says. And he then explains what such a church--his church--looks like. It is

committed, absolutely committed--in our structure, in our doctrine, in our practice, in our philosophy--to a very simple principle: we look men in the eye and say, "I double-dog dare you to disciple your family and we are not going to do anything structurally to put a net under you. It's your job. We'll equip you, we'll encourage you, we'll hold you accountable, but nothing we do here will take that job out of your hands. That's who we are. That's how we exist. That's our mission. That's our focus.

So, just for the sake of full disclosure, let me tell you that I am speaking to you as a pastor, a church planter, of a family integrated church about this issue of the battle for faith and family.

And with that, he is off to the races.

Most people in America today, when they speak of a crisis, think in terms of economics. But "that's not our most significant crisis," says Baucham. "Not by a long shot. Our most significant crisis is a biblical crisis, a worldview crisis."

He lists some statistics to back his claim:

• "Less than 10% of professing Christians in the United States possess a biblical worldview. And only 51% of pastors in America have a biblical worldview."
   
• Two-thirds of Christians in the United States assert that there is no such thing as absolute truth.
  
  "These people say they are born-again. And two-thirds of them say there is no such thing as absolute moral truth. It makes you wonder what they think they're saved from."
   
• "Only four out of 10 [professed Christians] say they are absolutely committed to the Christian faith."
   
• "Only 44% of church youth say humans are capable of grasping the meaning of truth. In other words, the majority believe truth is unknowable."
   
• "85% of church youth agree with the statement that what is right for one person in a given situation may not be right for another person who encounters the exact same situation.
  
  "That would be situational ethics. Relativism. That's 85% of church youth."
   
• Less than 5% of the teens today identifying themselves as Christian [these are the church youth!] are theologically literate enough to be called Christian.
  
  
  • "62% of them agree with the statement, 'Nothing can be known for certain except things that you experience in your life.'"
     
  • "The majority of teens who identify themselves as Christians believe that Jesus sinned during His earthly ministry."

"No wonder we are currently losing 70 to 88% of them by the end of their freshman year in college!"

In essence, says Baucham, this--the confused, weak worldview, readily abandoned by so many professing Christians--is the biggest crisis the church faces today.

And from where does this crisis arise?

Baucham urges these three sources:

1. Pastoral Laxity.
    
2. Multigenerational Failure.
   And,
    
3. Parental Impotence.

Concerning pastoral laxity, Baucham turns to Titus 1:5ff (ESV):

This is why I left you in Crete, so that you might put what remained into order, and appoint elders in every town as I directed you--if anyone is above reproach, the husband of one wife, and his children are believers and not open to the charge of debauchery or insubordination. For an overseer, as God's steward, must be above reproach. He must not be arrogant or quick-tempered or a drunkard or violent or greedy for gain, but hospitable, a lover of good, self-controlled, upright, holy, and disciplined. He must hold firm to the trustworthy word as taught, so that he may be able to give instruction in sound doctrine and also to rebuke those who contradict it.

What are the qualifications Paul lists for a man to become an elder (and, therefore, by extension, a pastor)? Is it a man's academic training? (No.) Is it his ability to preach? (No.) How good his family looks when they stand together? (No.) Rather, it is how he interacts with his family . . . and how his family responds to that interaction. In other words: How well is he doing at home?

Paul doesn't demand a perfect marriage; otherwise we wouldn't need 1 Peter 3:7--"live with your wives in an understanding manner."

[All w]e are talking about [is] a man who knows what it means to be a biblical husband and a biblical leader of his wife, and a biblical shepherd of his wife, even during their difficult days.

To be qualified as an elder, a man doesn't need to have perfect kids, either, Baucham affirmed. Rather, "He keeps his children in subjection. [He c]ontinues to discipline [them]."

We don't have to find "perfect" men to serve as elders and pastors; rather, we need "men who can serve as model fathers" and models of godliness. "For an overseer, as God's steward, must be above reproach. He must not be arrogant or quick-tempered or a drunkard or violent or greedy for gain, but hospitable, a lover of good, self-controlled, upright, holy, and disciplined." . . .
And here's the problem:

Most churches never, ever, ever look at a man's marriage or the discipleship of his children. Most churches call a pastor without ever having met his wife or children. Their only question is, "Can he preach?" "Has he grown another church of this size to be bigger?" "Does he look good behind our pulpit?" "Does he have the right credentials?" "Will he help attract the kind of people we're trying to attract?" The only question they have about his wife and kids is, "Do they look good standing with him?" --That's it.

But, of course, that is exactly opposite what Paul teaches. For Paul, it is only after the issue of character--as it is demonstrated in the home--that the issues of preaching and teaching (in terms of "holding fast to the trustworthy word . . . so that he can give instruction in sound doctrine" . . . and in terms of being able to refute those who contradict sound doctrine) come up.

In essence:

If we can't get past model husband, model father, godly Christian character . . . , who cares if [a pastoral candidate is] articulate?

Recapitulating the key points Baucham seeks to draw from Titus 1:5-11:

• The family is the primary teaching unit in the New Testament.
   
• The shepherd's job is . . .
   
  
  • To be an example to the flock (1 Peter 5:3).
     
    
    • Of being a model husband.
       
    • Of being a model father.
       
    • Discipling your children and your wife.
       
    • Of being a godly man. . . .
    
    
  • To equip.
     
  • To encourage men concerning "what we're supposed to be doing in our homes."

In other words, the pastor's job is not to be the one who does all of these things. But he's selected because he models what we are all supposed to be doing in our homes.

That's the responsibility of an elder. . . .

Baucham reminds his audience of Swanson's reference to Deuteronomy 6:7 (where godly parents are told of their responsibility to teach their children the word of God at all times and in all circumstances: "when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise . . .") but also Ephesians 6:4 ("Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord").

Whose responsibility is it to raise and train and disciple your children? It is yours. It is yours.

It is a pastoral responsibility to equip the saints for works of service . . . not to usurp these saints or the saints' authority or responsibility. Not to do what the saints are called to do.

You're called to disciple your family.

As a pastor, I'm called to model and to teach and to encourage and to hold heads of household responsible and accountable for teaching in their homes. That's my job. Not to set up structures that are meant to alleviate the responsibility. That's not my job. That's not what I'm called or commanded to be.

So much, for now, on pastoral laxity.

Next issue:

Multigenerational Failure

Baucham mentions that this is going to be his last speech before turning 40. I mention that (and he mentions that) in order to identify who he is talking about when he says,

The generation before mine taught us: "You are successful as a parent if you give your kid more stuff than your parents gave you . . . and give them an education that will enable them to give your grandkids more than you gave them." That's successful parenting in our culture: Give them more than you got and give them an education that will enable them to give their kids more than you gave them. . . .

Notice. There's nothing there about walking with God. . . . That's why, when [most people in our culture] buy a house, [we] ask, "How are the schools in this area?" . . .

What are we asking [when we ask this question]? Are we asking about the character that the[se schools] will forge in our children?

No.

We are saying, "What are the test scores in the schools in this neighborhood?" And, "Are they going to get my kid into the kind of schools that I want my kid to go to for college?" --That's all we're asking.

And so we'll pay $50,000 more to live over here than it costs to live over there.

Why? Test scores.

God help us!

That's the mindset.

And the result of it is a generation without direction, that's completely floundering and lost.

Baucham then quotes from Psalm 78:5-8 (ESV):

He established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers to teach to their children,
that the next generation might know them, the children yet unborn, and arise and tell them to their children,
so that they should set their hope in God and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments;
and that they should not be like their fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation whose heart was not steadfast, whose spirit was not faithful to God.

"That's what the last generation neglected. And so we are reaping the whirlwind."

And this, then, leads to . . .

Parental Impotence

Why are parents impotent? Because they were educated by "a Marxist, secular humanist system." They "learned to depend on the government for everything" and they are "waiting for certification, permission and instruction for everything."

Think about the questions people ask you when they find out you homeschool:

1. "Is that legal?" "Can you do that?" "What do you have to do to do that?"
   
   They always have a question about legality. Why? Because that's their mindset.
    
2. "Where do you get your curriculum?" "Who do you report to?" "Are you tested regularly?"
   
   Where's that coming from? That's statism! That's Marxist socialism.
   
   And then, to go all the way over the edge to socialism:
    
3. "What about your children's socialization?"
   
   In other words, they're admitting that they see the school system as responsible for discipling their children: "How are you getting away with not letting the government disciple your children?"

They all ask the same questions. It's a running joke in the homeschool community because nobody asks any other questions. And their questions all go back to certification, permission, and instruction.

Why?

Because they're Marxist, secular humanists to the core disguised as Christians. That's why. . . .

The homeschool movement is now rife with parents who

• do not know their roles
   
• do not have a vision for their families
   
• are afraid to lead.

"Tell me what to do."

And it is at this point that Baucham protests the behavior of the parents he identifies as "Marxist, secular humanists disguised as Christians" by commenting that "They are not [homeschooling] for worldview reasons. . . . They are doing it for safety and higher test scores."

Baucham closes his speech with "a little shock therapy."

When [people] say they can't do [some]thing, I say, "You racist, you!" [NOTE: Baucham is a black man. --JAH]

And they look at me: "Wha-?!??"

[And I answer,] "If I took you to Africa or Asia or South America, and we preached the gospel and some people got saved, you'd spend two weeks there and find one of the guys with God's hand on him, and you'd say, 'Now, you're the pastor and this is your church.'

"But you're saying that God is not good enough for you. --You racist!"

[There are] guys pastoring churches all over the world who don't know half the knowledge, information, or expertise of some of these whining Christians in America who will not start a church.

[And why won't they start a church]? Because we've been brainwashed. We're waiting for certification. We're waiting for permission. We're waiting for instruction. . . . Instead of opening up the Bible, looking at the qualifications found [there] and getting started.

. . . Now does that mean we go run off into anti-intellectualism? . . . Listen, I have more degrees than a thermometer. But none of that matters as much as [the Titus 1 requirements for elders].

But here's the other thing: Do you know how many schools we have access to just on the internet? Do you know how many books we have access to? Who says you can't be self-taught?

Here's what's ironic. Some of these same families, they sit there, and they're homeschooling their children, right? So all of a sudden they've been liberated. They've left the plantation. "Yes! We can educate our children!" And they defend their right to homeschool: "My child doesn't have to go to the institution. We can educate them right here." But we say, "Go and be a pastor," and they say: "Oh, no! I've got to go to the institution for that!"

What happened to all your homeschool principles?

I'm not sure why Baucham, a Southern Baptist preacher who pastors a fairly substantial congregation, seems to advocate home churches. But it appears he does. And it appears he urges the men who were present at the MLS to consider starting home churches themselves and not to use the excuse that they lack viable models to follow.

"You want to know a person without models?" he asks.

I didn't hear the gospel until my first year in college. I was raised by a single, teenage, Buddhist mother in drug-infested, gang-infested, south-central Los Angeles, California. . . . Last two generations, both sides of [my wife's and my] family: 25 marriages, 22 divorces. . . . [O]ut of my 25 first cousins, I only have one who is currently married to and living with his spouse. . . . [M]y maternal grandmother had seven children from five different men and my paternal grandmother and grandfather lived next door to each other and had three children and were not married one day. . . . And you have the audacity to ask me that question . . . ?!?

Here's the problem: "What if I do it wrong?" That's the fear: "If I don't have instruction, if I don't have certification, and if I don't have permission, I might do it wrong."

Doing it wrong is better than not doing it.

Come on, how big is your God?

In six days, He created the universe. But you try to disciple your family with the Bible and He can't handle that!?

I can just see God in heaven going, "Oh, my . . . !"

The angel comes up to Him and says, "What's happening?"

"Oh! That family down there. They really love Me and they're trying to disciple their children, but they got Step 2 out of place. I can't help them."

That's how we act.

The antidote to this kind of impotent thinking and behavior?

One: Biblically qualified pastors.

Two: Mature brothers and sisters in the faith.

And three: Discipleship-oriented homes.

The average individual gets 14,000 instructional hours in school. If you spent four [instructional] hours a week in church--two hours Sunday morning, an hour Sunday evening, plus an hour on Wednesday night--it would take you 70 years to match that.

If you got only two instructional hours a week in church, it would take you 140 years!

And we treat church like it's the only place where we combat the secular teaching in the public schools?

No. Give me the 14,000 hours, thank you very much!

That's what I want. I want the 14,000 hours [so I can disciple my kids at home].

[It is at home] where the discipleship is taking place. Plus the time we have in the Lord's house.

*******
For me, this, what I have shared with you, is the heart of Baucham's message.

However, knowing that I have several female readers who are concerned about any potential anti-women messages that may have been communicated at the MLS, I thought I should share this final thought that came up somewhat close to the end of his speech.

Fact is, Baucham continued into Titus 2, very briefly.

His primary message, as I recall, was to note, once more, how central the home is to all that Paul intends the church to accomplish.

And so, in the midst of his brief discussion of the first section of Titus 2, Baucham asks, rhetorically, why we find all the detailed instruction for women (Titus 2:3-5) and so little for the men (composed, solely, of, "Likewise, urge the younger men to be self-controlled").

His answer? "That's because he already covered it in chapter 1."

"But isn't chapter 1 concerned solely with the qualifications for elders?"

His reply:

Let me go through that list again (starting in verse 6) and raise your hand if you don't want any one of these things for your sons: above reproach; husband of one wife; children believers, not open to charges of debauchery or insubordination; above reproach (again); not arrogant; not quick-tempered; not a drunkard or violent or greedy; hospitable; a lover of good; self-controlled; upright; holy; disciplined; holding from to the word; able to give instruction in sound doctrine. . . .

Don't fool yourself: Elders are not a separate category of person. They are examples of what all of us are called to be. They are chosen based on their ability to do what all of us are called to do and to model it for the rest of us as we all go and do it together. That's the job of an elder. That's the function of an elder. Every one of us ought to raise our sons with this in mind: "I'm going to raise my son so that the only thing missing from him as far as qualifications for an elder is the call of God." That's it. Everything else, we're going to aim for, we're going to push for.

---

As with Kevin Swanson's speech before his, I found the majority of Baucham's speech encouraging, inspirational, thought-provoking and challenging. "Yeah! I want to do something! 'Let's go!'"

• The statistics he shares about professing Christians' belief systems disturb me greatly: just as they obviously disturb him. I am fully aligned with him in his concern.
   
• His suggestion that the average evangelical church fails to look at or consider a pastoral candidate's family and family relationships as either qualifications for or against his candidacy: that bothers me. (Is his claim true? I don't know. If it is, however, that is deeply unsettling.)
   
• His emphasis on the legitimate role of the pastor: to provide a model for the congregation, to teach and to encourage parents in their discipleship responsibilities: I love it! (Indeed, this has been a pet peeve of mine: that the professional staff in so many churches seems intent on "doing it all"; they hardly permit--much less encourage--members of the congregation to do the various works of service to which they may be called and for which they are uniquely gifted. No. The institutional church, in these cases, is all about the institutional church. (Kind of like so much of the mass media today is all about the mass media and what the "celebrities" are doing.) It is wonderful to hear a pastor speak up for, as it were, "the little guy."
   
• His analysis of our cultural values: that each generation is supposed to give its children more "stuff" than the generation before gave them . . . and prepare their children to give the grandkids "even more": Brilliant!
   
• I loved, too, his parsing of the "How are the schools?" question that--as he rightly points out--impacts the basic desirability of a house and/or a neighborhood. "Right on!" How sad that our culture asks first, foremost, and almost exclusively, about test scores and not about the character of the students. Indeed, how sad (as I've observed) that so many parents in our culture assume they can do nothing about--they can do nothing to shape--their children's (and their children's friends') characters. It breaks my heart.
   
• His analysis of what he calls the "Marxist, secular humanist" mindset: again, brilliant! --I don't know if he has the name or title quite right. (Is that really what Marxism and secular humanism teach?) But the idea of everyone "waiting for certification, permission and instruction for everything": Whew! I have few doubts he's pegged a major problem. I would far prefer Christians had the self-confidence (and/or God-confidence!) to move forward with whatever-it-is the God has placed upon their hearts.

Finally,

• I appreciate and agree with his analysis of the bare time involved when people send their kids off to classroom schools. It really does make sense to me that we parents should want to increase the biblical influence in our children's lives and, if at all possible, we should desire not to place their education in the hands of people whose values and worldviews are wholly antithetical to our own.

And yet . . .

With all of these truly insightful and encouraging viewpoints, the more I have thought about what Baucham says, the more uncomfortable I have become with certain--usually somewhat more subliminal or slightly too far/"over-the-top"/extreme--messages he threw in. For example,

• He explains what his FI (Family-Integrated) Church (or FIC for shortest) is all about by quoting what he and others at his church say to husbands/fathers who visit: "[We] double-dog dare you to disciple your family and we are not going to do anything structurally to put a net under you. It's your job. We'll equip you, we'll encourage you, we'll hold you accountable, but nothing we do here will take that job out of your hands."
  
  I am thrilled with the idea that the church will equip and encourage and hold parents accountable in this area. I understand the need to avoid putting a net over a man or woman or parental couple who have determined to disciple their children (i.e., that the church will do everything in its power never to discourage parents in these tasks or to limit parents' ability and desire to train up their children in the way they should go).
  
  But "no net under" such parents? "[M]y job . . . [is n]ot to set up structures that are meant to alleviate the responsibility . . . for teaching" or training?
  
  Why not?
  
  It seems to me that we are called to "bear one another's burdens (and thus fulfill the law of Christ)" . . . (Galatians 6:2). Aren't we? So how does this "no net" idea help fulfill this "law of Christ"?
   
• As noted above, I think Baucham has a vital message to any church that would dare offer leadership roles to men (or women) whose leadership or involvement in their own families is less than exemplary. It would be an absolute travesty if a church were to offer the role of eldership to men or women who are married and/or who have children . . . and these candidates have lousy relationships with their spouses and/or refuse to offer appropriate discipline to their children--as if these qualifications are of no account.
  
  However. I got the sense that Baucham was saying something very much stronger than I have, here.
  
  Indeed, I got such a strong sense of what he seemed to be saying--and he said it so convincingly and well--that I began questioning a decision that our own church is about to make concerning a change in pastoral staff: should it hire a mid-20s-something young man to serve as a senior pastor if he has no children and is, in fact, unmarried? After all, "No need, even, to ask, 'Can he preach?' If we can't get past model husband, model father . . . who cares if he's articulate?"
  
  I'm just saying: I began to question the idea of hiring a young, single pastor on the grounds of Baucham's message alone: "'We need to see how a man treats his wife and how he disciples his kids before we can consider him for a role as pastor or elder. He has to serve as a model concerning how married men should treat their wives and kids.' --And, obviously, this man, unmarried and childless, cannot possibly serve as such a model. Therefore, [I was beginning to think], he must be unqualified."
  
  But then I got thinking: Where does that kind of thinking lead?
  
  
  • "Only a married man can serve as an elder."
     
  • "Only a married man with children can serve as elder."
     
  • "No single men can serve as elders."
     
  • "No men who have not had children can serve as elders."
     
  • "No one but a married man with children can serve as a church-planter."
     
  • "No one but married men can serve as missionaries."
     
  • "No women can serve as elders."
     
  • "No women should serve as missionaries or church-planters."
     
  • "It doesn't matter if a man is a paragon of virtue, mature, humble, slow to anger, temperate, gentle, generous, hospitable, a lover of good, self-controlled, upright, holy, disciplined, holding firmly to God's trustworthy word, able to give instruction in sound doctrine, able also to rebuke those who contradict it: he cannot serve as an elder unless he is married with children."
     
  • "It is possible that only Peter, of all the apostles, was properly qualified to serve as a missionary or church-planter. (After all, he is the only one among the apostles that we know, for sure, was married! --Mark 1:30)" . . .
  
  . . . And it was about here (if not several points up from here!] that I realized there is something crazy about where this kind of thinking leads.
  
  What are we supposed to make of Paul's suggestion that "it is good for [the unmarried and widows] if they remain even as I" (1 Corinthians 7:8)? And what of Jesus' statement about eunuchs "for the sake of the kingdom of heaven" (Matthew 19:12)? Are we to believe that Jesus was misusing language, here, and that He really meant to say that any sexually pure man or woman, hetero- or homosexual, who refused to marry (obviously: a member of the opposite sex), could not possibly serve in God's Kingdom? [I don't see how you can find such a message in that passage! Indeed, I see the opposite. . . .]¹
  
  *****
  I haven't come to full answers to the questions that have now been raised in my mind as a result of thinking about what Baucham says at this point in his speech. I have not gotten involved in--haven't read up on--the debates I have (just now, in the last few days) realized are (or, at least, I am given to understand, must be) raging between partisans related to (what are the organizations' names?) the Council on Biblical Manhood & Womanhood (CBMW) and Christians for Biblical Equality (CBE) (???; maybe there are other such organizations, but, for some reason, these two organizations came up in my hunt for organizations that, apparently, believe, pretty much, opposite perspectives concerning most (??) of the issues related to how men and women (or, perhaps more accurately (????) husbands and wives (???)) are "supposed" to interact (???). [Please forgive all the question marks. But, as I said a moment ago, this is not an area in which I have spent any time reading or studying!)
  
  Despite my disclaimer, however, in a manner similar to what I wrote in Perspectives on an Evolving Creation, 4b, it disturbs me to find ourselves, possibly thoughtlessly and foolishly, on the verge of rejecting whole swaths of our spiritual heritage . . . because many of the apostles themselves seem not to have "lived up" to the standards being advocated by men like Voddie Baucham in the speech he gave at the CHEC 2009 "Men's Leadership Summit."
   
• The whole issue of "parental impotence" and parents who do not know their roles, do not have a vision for their families, are afraid to lead, and are homeschooling for safety and higher test scores rather than worldview reasons.
  
  For some reason, Baucham--and, I expect, Swanson and Phillips and others--are "down" on these parents. They want the full disdain and pressure of the church [the "spiritual" equivalent of "the full faith and credit of the United States"] to be brought to bear on these "Marxist, secular humanists [who are] disguised as Christians."
  
  Whew!
  
  Those are fighting words! Heavy words! The kind Jesus reserved for the hyper-religious of His day: y'know, the Pharisees and Sadducees and teachers of the Law . . . but never (that I recall) with the "sheep without a shepherd," the lost, the weary, the heavy-laden.
  
  But I get the feeling Baucham is using those very words not to address the hyper-religious and self-righteous. No. He uses them to describe--and, in many ways, to address--the ones who are lost and without a shepherd.
  
  Rather than appealing to these people who are at least groping for a better way, it seems he is chastising them, telling them they are no good, worthy of condemnation, worthy of being "cast into the outer darkness," as Jesus might have expressed the same kind of judgment.
  
  May I suggest a "better way" (or, at least, the way I would prefer to see Baucham and his friends to use)?
  
  Rather than proclaiming, as R.C. Sproul, Jr. does,² the "growing divide" in homeschool circles between those he proudly identifies as "movement homeschoolers"--who homeschool "because we believe it to be the Biblical choice, not because we merely prefer it"--and the "different bunch of folks" whom he disdainfully claims "typically are . . . moms [who] see homeschooling as a choice, an arena wherein they can excel by helping their children excel"-- . . . I would like to urge them to appeal to these parents and "show them a better way."
  
  I think they have the statistics and the examples that can readily convince the weak and wobbly. But rather than beat up these "weaker brethren" for their (alleged) failure to live up to the exact same standards that these super-spiritual "leaders" have attained, why not appeal to them as "ambassadors for Christ" (2 Corinthians 5:20) and seek to draw them as God did (and still does): with bonds of love (Hosea 11:4)?

I think I've said enough for this post. I will be interested to read your observations and responses!

---

¹ ETA on 4/6/09 at 8:00 p.m.: At dinner tonight, Sarita pointed out that Jesus Himself was a single man. Would he be disqualified to serve as an elder? Return to text.

² I found this quote in the eighth paragraph below the "Part 13" subhead in ThatMom/Karen Campbell's 13-part article The Pros and Cons of the Family Integrated Church Model and Movement. Return to text.

---

Next post in this series: CHEC "Men's Leadership Summit," Part IV - "A Vision for the Family".

CHEC "Men's Leadership Summit," Part II--"For Such a Time as This -- The 1000-Year Battle Over the Hearts and Minds of the Next Generation"

#2 in an ongoing series on Christian Home Educators of Colorado 2009 "Men's Leadership Summit" (otherwise known as the "The Vision of the Leadership Summit") held in Indianapolis, Indiana, at one of the hotels owned by Bill Gothard's group over the weekend of March 5-7, 2009. Previous (and first) post in this series: 2009 Christian Home Educators of Colorado (CHEC) "Men's Leadership Summit," Part I.

---

I should note that, in my last post on this theme, I was quoting from my informant's summary notes about the CHEC 2009 Men's Leadership Summit held at the Indianapolis Training Center of Bill Gothard's Institute in Basic Life Principles.

I decided, if I was going to report any more, I had better listen to the recordings from the meeting and convey very accurately the specific messages of those who spoke at the convention.

This post comes from the opening speech Kevin Swanson made to the convention on Thursday evening, March 5, 2009 and is available in full, audio form from ResoundingVoice.com.

*******
After some introductory comments about his family and his father-in-law's deathbed conversion from anti-Christian zealot to believer, Swanson transitioned to the primary subject of his speech, "The 1000 Year Battle Over the Hearts and Minds of the Next Generation."

He began with an expression of thanks:

Let's thank God for the men and women who went before us--the R.J. Rushdoonys, the Gordon Clarks, the Cornelius Van Tils--who created the materials that we are using today. I've also read some great materials written by Gregg Harris and Chris Klicka and Mike Farris. These guys were writing things in the 1980s that we are saying today. . . .

We here, today, stand on the shoulders of guys who went before us 20 and 30 years ago who started The Reformation of the 20th Century [the homeschool/home discipleship movement].

Let us also thank God for the many Deborahs and Esthers--the many, many women who were faithfully teaching their children in the '80s, '90s and 2000s. . . .

But if men don’t step up to the plate today, this Reformation will not move on. . . . We have been raised up for such a time as this.

And with that, he was off and running, first with a littany of societal failures.

Key points:

• "Manhood has virtually become extinct. Men are not being men." Evidence for this claim:
  
  • 70% of young men, according to Newsweek magazine, are not grown up by 30 years of age. ("That's up from 35% in the 1970s.")
  • They don’t have steady jobs.
  • They are making less money than their parents did in the 1970s and less than women their same age.
  • They live at home with their parents.
  • More girls are in college and involved in student government than are young men. (57% of the people in college today are women; 43% men. "In our local public high school, where our church meets for worship, there are pictures for all the members of student council: 18 are women; three are little boys.")
  "I believe you're seeing, here, a picture of the future of this nation if men are not men."

By contrast,

• 1 Samuel 23 shows us mighty men of God, the mighty men of David, men who, for a span of 40 years, had the opportunity to advance the kingdom of God. They were men of vision and courage. And we need such men today to discern the real dragons and take them on.
  
  "I believe, with the 480 men here, today, we can see some significant positive change in hundreds and hundreds of churches and families across America."

What are the dragons Swanson believes these men must slay?

• "We need to engage in the battle of Ideas--the most dangerous battle today. We need to take down everything/every thought that puts itself above Christ."

But,

• "We need to engage in this conflict together."
  
  "People are engaged in vision-casting, but not involved in a battle for unity."
  
  Swanson noted that in Ephesians 4:1-3, Paul says, "I want you to strive [Swanson: "like a gladiator, fighting for your very life"] to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace."
   
• We need to "destroy speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God," and "take every thought captive to the obedience of Christ" (2 Corinthians 10:5). But at the same time, we need to engage in the battle of love.
   
• We need to give our lives.
  
  "I want men willing to die, to shed their blood for the Christ who shed His blood for us. Oh, would that God would make us willing to bleed for the Kingdom, to bleed for the truth, and to bleed for the love of the brothers!"
  
  Therefore, "Don't you dare bring your vision to the dinner table where you are slicing differences between brothers. No. You engage in vision-casting as you bring brothers together at the same time.

And with those principles in mind, then, Swanson noted, "I have been working with many of you on a Homeschool Manifesto. But I'm not bringing the Homeschool Manifesto out to split the homeschool movement. No! I'm bringing a vision, a manifesto, that we can agree upon. . . . "

At this point, then, he inserted a side note about the Manifesto many of the men who attended the Summit expected they were going to be working on:

By the way, we are going to put off the publishing of the Manifesto. We're not doing it this week, because we don't think we have cultivated it enough. We're going to give you an outline, a preview of that Manifesto. And we're going to beg for your wisdom, for your vision, as we continue to mold this vision of a Christian education manifesto for the 21st century.

I think it's about time we had such a manifesto because, number one, education is falling apart in America. Our culture is falling apart. And the culture, the social system, is a derivative of the educational system. And the political system is a derivative of the social system. And it's all falling apart. Is that clear to anybody who has picked up the Wall Street Journal lately . . . or any newspaper? Our world is falling apart! I mean, the character of this nation is in free-fall. [He then recapitulated the statistics he quoted already plus a lot, lot more--a very grim report about Western culture and how it is destroying everything it touches.] . . .

Call it what you will, existentialistic, humanistic, materialistic, whatever it is, it is enveloping our culture, our academic system, our universities, our economic system. It is raging. And if our little children even get one little toe in that river, it will suck them through and [make] them join the millions upon millions of Christian children who have been taken into this river.

It's against this bleak backdrop of a virtually irredeemable culture that Swanson then builds his case for a new model, a new vision for education--not education; not homeschooling, but discipleship and nurture.

He begins with a little intellectual history lesson and a statement of how he, himself, would prefer we teach world history--the history of what he calls the City of God and the City of Man.

What is the source of all the cultural decay he summarized for us?

I think we're coming to the end of an about 1000-year project of building the City of Man.

The City of Man is built by the Cains of this world, the humanists, those that refuse to fear and love and worship the living God. It is their project. And this project has been worked on for the last 1000 years. . . .

[W]hat we see over the last 1000 years is the slow growth of the modern empires, beginning with the Holy Roman Empire, moving on to the Spanish Empire, then the French Empire, then the English Empire, and, finally, the American Empire. . . .

"We need to teach our children the history" of these empires, says Swanson. "About 30 seconds for the City of Man."

What is the City of Man?

• Egypt. It builds its towers, then they fall down.


• Assyria does the same.


• Then Persia.


• Then Greece.


• Then the Romans.


• Then the Spaniards.


• The French.


• The English.


• The Americans.

They all fall down.

That's the history of the City of Man. And that's all our children need to know. About 30 seconds.

THEN we need to take about four years to teach them about the City of God--church history, what God is doing around the world. We should take about four years to teach about the City of God, the Kingdom that will never die. "We want to give our children a radically different education than what they will get in the City of Man."

"Schaeffer said that the City of Man always builds its towers so high that they all fall down. They start with optimism, but they end in pessimism." That's why these empires begin with tremendous literature, and then they stop writing. "It all ends in pessimism . . . because they are not focused on the eternal, the Kingdom that will last forever."

Examples:

• Swanson mentioned several examples of optimistic literature with which various (modern European) empires began and then contrasted those to Nietsche, Schopenhauer, Jean Paul Sartre, the Existentialists, and so forth.


• In terms of popular culture:
  
  
  • "The '80s most popular hit was 'My grandfather's clock' ("My grandfather's clock was too large for the shelf, so it stood 90 years on the floor . . ."). --Yes, the '80s. The 1880s."
  
  Contrast that to
  
  
  • The most popular album two years ago which included a song that referred to the singer's mother as a female dog. Or
  
  
  • The #1 song last year--it spent 8 weeks as #1 on the charts--was by Katy Perry, a pastor's daughter . . . "and it encourages girls to be lesbians!" [Well, not quite. Though it definitely comes close. The song is titled "I Kissed a Girl (and I liked it)." --JAH]

"How do we get to the culture we have today? From a fairly Christian Europe to a thoroughly secular culture we have today?"

Swanson suggests,

It all started back about 1000 years ago when Aquinas said [Summa, Part I, Question 1, Article 1--"Whether, besides philosophy, any further doctrine is required?"--JAH], "Theology, included in sacred doctrine, differs in kind from that theology which is part of philosophy." What he says is, "You've got your Christian theology over here. You've got yourself about the trinity, about the redemption, about the atonement, about the incarnation. You've got all that over here. And then we've got our philosophy over here and that's the stuff the Greeks gave us. That's science, that's physics, and that's chemistry. And never the twain shall meet. They don't have contact with one another. They are not a division of one another. They are just separate forms of learning."

Moreover he says [Summa, Part I, Question 1, Article 2--"Whether sacred doctrine is a science?"--JAH], "[J]ust as the musician accepts on authority the principles taught him by the mathematician, so sacred science is established on principles revealed by God."

So you've got the authority of the scientists and the mathematicians over here, and you've got the authority of God over here. And he has this radical separation in mind.

And why is this important? Because this is the beginning of the secular university. This produces the intellectual apology for Christians to engage in building the City of Man.

See, Christians wouldn't have been involved in these things--Christians wouldn't have gotten into these horrific systems that leave God out--if they weren’t taught a thousand years ago that you can have your theology over here and your philosophy over here, and these things are separate things.

[I am sorely tempted to comment on what he says at this point, but I would like to let him finish his "argument," and then I will say a few things. So let us continue. --JAH]

Illustrations of this radical separation:

• In seminary: "I never had a seminary professor ask me about my personal walk with God. If you have seminary professors teaching theology without getting involved in nurturing and discipling, you've got a problem."


• A 13-year-old girl from his church was babysitting a three-year-old girl who, the babysitter knew, went with her parents to a certain mega-church in the area. At one point in the evening, something happened so that the 13-year-old said to the 3-year-old, "We need to praise God for this." And the 3-year-old replied, "No we don't! We only do that on Sunday!"


• I do not understand how 35% of evangelical young people could vote for Barack Obama.


• Book in Barnes & Noble called Galaxy. "'The heavens declare the glory of God . . . '--but that verse was never mentioned in the book. God is nowhere mentioned in the book."

"Guys," says Swanson, "if you teach science, if you teach chemistry, . . . don't you dare to do it without stopping from time to time and saying, '. . . Children, let's worship [the God who made these things]. Get down on your knees and worship the God who made these things.'"

Universities haven't taught that way in hundreds of years. I'll tell you, that's what's ruining chemistry and biology and science in our modern age. It's a scary thing what's happening. You teach science without the fear of God for a hundred years, I fear what they will do to that science. They'll destroy it.

As an example of what he expects dads to do, he tells of a science class his family held centered on the dissection of a road-kill raccoon his wife picked up one day on her way home from the store. Apparently, they invited a number of other families to join in the lesson. There were "about 25 kids and moms" all ready to begin when, Swanson says,

I said, "Let's lift our hands and praise the God Who made this animal. Let's worship God in this. . . . Have you made a raccoon like this lately? . . . Let's worship God." So we worshiped God together. We lifted our hands and we worshiped God who made this beautiful raccoon. . . . I know that's weird because we're a thousand years away from doing that kind of stuff. But we've got to restore "The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom and knowledge" in all of these various areas of life.

I believe that the reformation of the modern era began in the 1960s . . . with Henry Morris and John C. Whitcomb who said, "There is a God who made these things."

I know that evolutionism and deism and Unitarianism has distanced us from God over 200 years of our history. And we have been learning these things in laboratories that have not been teaching the fear of God and the worship of God. There has been nobody trembling before this God as they wonder at His universe. And, by the way, this is one reason why science is so dull. Because you take a book like Galaxy, and you gut God from that book, and you start saying, "Hey, it was chance that put it together. There is no purpose, no meaning in any of that. It's just a random event that create-- . . . I'm sorry. It just happened. . . ." --When they complete their explanation of the metaphysic, we're all wondering why we should stand in wonder about all these things. . . .

If you can't fear a personal God Who is behind it, Who made all this, then you have no reason to be interested or engaged or in amazement in any chemistry class or astronomy class or biology class.

May God help us to restore these things.

Another point:

If you had the choice to subject your children either to four hours a day of study under a public school teacher or four hours a day of interaction with their peers--one or the other but not both: which would you choose? I think, with the average child, I would go with the teacher. Why is that? . . . Because, it turns out, the people who do the most to discipleship, the most education, the most training in terms of a child's education, academics, attitude, perspectives, etc., etc., are not so much the teacher as Hollywood. The Hannah Montanas, the Eminems and the Nicholas Cages and the Katy Perrys of the world that have a tremendous amount of influence upon the attitudes, the perspectives, the dress, the language of our children--far more than the average teacher. And this is why we are concerned. [Not sure who, exactly, the "we" is in this sentence. But that is the word Swanson used. "We are concerned." --JAH]

We see a raging river that is sucking our children into an alternate worldview, an alternate perspective, an alternate culture, an alternate social system. And we think that's extremely dangerous, and therefore, brothers, I'm telling you, where we are today is desperate times. And desperate times call for desperate measures. And this, I believe, is why you are here today. And this is why about 95% of our Christian friends out there don't understand what we are doing. They think we are pretty whacked. They think we are the radical right fringe of the Christian movement. That's because they believe there is a tiny little dent on the fender of their social system and that's about it, and there isn't something principally wrong with the way we've been educating in our private schools, even--our Christian schools as well as our public schools.

[But] we've got to reassess the way we are educating our children from the bottom up. "Desperate times call for desperate measures."

And so the solution? The "desperate measures"?

I think the solution we are talking about this weekend is . . . found in Deuteronomy 6:7.

[In] Deuteronomy 6:7 God says, "I want you to teach your children My Word as you sit in your house, as you walk by the way, as you rise up, as you lie down. I want it to be integrated and I want it to be like a frontlet between the eyes. Write it on the posts of your gates and on your house. Write it on the walls. Put it all over the place.

"I want your children to run into Me all the time, always confronted with the existence, the importance, the relevance, the fear and the reverence of Me. I don't want your children ever, ever, ever to get the impression they can go to Sunday school and learn their little God stuff on Sunday, but then Monday through Saturday they can enjoy their godless education, their godless art, their godless culture, their godless Eminem, their godless rape rap, or what have you. No! I want My Word to be integrated into every aspect of their lives. I want them to live in the atmosphere of the fear of God all the time. As the Proverbs say, ' . . . all the day long.'

"I don't want them ever to have the impression that they can pray on Sunday and do whatever they want the rest of the week."

Brothers, this begins by bringing the fear of God and passionate worship and the confession of our sins right into the algebra class.

I'm tired of segregating these things. And if I ever do any other kind of classes where I'm teaching anybody but my own children, I'm going to do the same thing I do with my own children: we are going to be on our knees worshiping God. We are going to be confessing our sins . . . as we study chemistry . . . because God says, "I want you to teach your children My truth as you sit in your house. You see, I want you to take the truth, the reality, the absolute truths, the ethics of God, the laws of God, the perspectives of God, and teach them My worldview, My truth, in the womb of relationship."

And I say we call that discipleship.

And that, brothers, is the Manifesto.

We are going to bring back the relevance of God. We're going to bring back worship, bring back confessions, bring back relationships in the education of our children.

Swanson describes some of the things he witnessed in the Christian school where, when he first started his church, he rented office space.

• He says he saw a boy "[drop] his pants for a girl in the hallway."


• And he heard a lot of "yelling and disrespectful language" and kids "taking God's name in vain." And in the midst of all this kind of behavior, a teacher stops the class and says, "Let's pray." Which they do. And then he has them open their "pagan textbooks which had no mention of God at all; God was irrelevant to these textbooks."

"Guys," says Swanson, "I think that's a travesty! If God made this world, I think He deserves a little more credit for it. And it bothers me when you've got these Aquinasites in these Christian schools that are saying, 'We'll have our little prayer over here, but, boy, that prayer, that relationship with God is sure not going to touch the way we do science. It's sure not going to touch the way we walk through the hallways. It's sure not going to touch the way we speak disrespectfully to the teachers in the classroom. . . .'"

A few moments later, Swanson makes a confession.

I taught in Christian schools myself and I tell you . . . I don't remember wading into some kid's life and discipling him. Now that is to my shame, but that is just what we did . . . at least in the early 90s when I was teaching in the Christian school movement.

As you read the Word of God what do you find? You don't find the word education. What do you find? You find words like discipleship, nurture, hearts ("My son, give me your heart." [Proverbs 23:26]). Can you remember a teacher say, "My student, give me your heart"? Did you ever have a college professor do that? "William, I'm concerned about you"? That's not taught in teaching colleges. They're not taught about hearts. They're not taught about relationships. They're not taught about discipleship and nurture and love. Maybe love. But I just don't think we've uncovered these things enough.

We need to call [Christians] to use words like discipleship and nurture. Stop talking schools with me. Don't talk about education with me. Let's not talk about home education and Christian education, Christian schools. Let's talk about discipleship. Let's talk about a focus on faith and character. Let's focus on the discipling of a child.

To make the distinction he's trying to make absolutely clear, Swanson notes that, if the public schools were ever to collapse . . . so that those who currently send their children to the public schools were to begin teaching their children at home, that wouldn't solve any of the great societal problems he mentioned.

Discipleship, however, "teaching to obey all things Jesus commanded us": that is transformative.

So, brothers, let's restore the concept of discipleship in our homes and in our families. Let's take the arms of those little children and say, "Let me lead you to Jesus. Let me teach you about Christ." Let's nurture them in these relationships. Let's nurture them in the algebra class. Let's disciple them in the chemistry class. Let's worship God in the physics class. And then we'll shock everybody when we begin confessing our sins in the geography class.

That's education!

Swanson closed with an appeal to teach a few deeply rather than the many in only the shallowest manner.
"See," he says, "what I see happening throughout Christian history, . . . is a trade-off between quality and quantity. . . .

[O]ver the last 200 years, thanks to the 19th-century missionary movement--and I praise God for it--we have had a massive increase in the quantity of the Christian faith in places like Africa and Asia. And I say, praise God for that. But at the same time, most of that Christianity went a mile wide and an inch deep. Now I think we need to make a very important, deliberate strategy change in the way that we do missions, evangelism, Kingdom work on Planet Earth and that is to apply ourselves to more of a quality effort in establishing the Kingdom of God.

And where will that quality effort come from?

First and foremost, from Christian families discipling their children--and in the case of the men who were listening to him speak, from the fathers discipling their sons in the way they should go.

---

John's Commentary
I want to begin my commentary by noting that I agree with much of Swanson's analysis, most of his attitudes, and, over-all, his revulsion at the way our culture--and most of the evangelical Christian subculture--has gone (and is still going).

I can't imagine responding in any different way. The stuff that is happening is truly horrifying.

I agree, too, with the majority of his prescription for solution. Let us "go deep." (Indeed, that is what my wife and I attempted with our own kids while they were living at home and we homeschooled them; it is what we continue to do even today as they are now young adults in their 20s and very early 30s. We continue to speak into their lives. Regularly. Not only--nor, necessarily, even, primarily, by words. But by deeds. How we live our lives.)

But then. Then. Then there is something--I have a hard time putting my finger on it, but there is something--I just can't quite go along with in what he says.

[ETA at 4:00 p.m. on 3/29/09] I can identify and fairly easily parse one piece that bothers me. From his conclusions surrounding the raccoon story.

He says he called his children and the other students to worship God. "So we worshiped God together. We lifted our hands and we worshiped God who made this beautiful raccoon."

I think that's beautiful.

And I appreciated his comment about the feelings such behavior tends to engender:

I know that's weird because we're a thousand years away from doing that kind of stuff. But we've got to restore "The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom and knowledge" in all of these various areas of life.

I know what he's talking about. I get some of the same feelings sometimes (though not much, anymore, since these have become such deeply engrained "habits of life" after years of practice; but . . . ). I get those feelings sometimes when I have to interrupt someone at the start of a business meeting at Sonlight: "Hold on a second! We start our meetings with prayer!" (Clearly, what is habitual and "normal" for us, who have led the company for several years, is not habitual for any of our external advisors nor most of our employees.) Or when our family goes to a restaurant and bows for prayer.

So I'm "all up with him" in this matter of worship.

But I have a harder time with his comment about "the reformation of the modern era began in the 1960s . . . with Henry Morris and John C. Whitcomb who said, 'There is a God who made these things.'"

I'm sorry. Weren't any other evangelical Christians saying God had made--or created (even ex nihilo)--everything there is?

Even if they didn't advocate for a young-earth and/or instantaneous, God-spoke-it-and-poof-it-came-into-existence kind of scenario, is it legitimate to suggest that these, our spiritual forebears, didn't say, "There is a God who made these things"?

Having said what I just said, however, I find my heart beating in rhythm with what Swanson says about how "evolutionism and deism and Unitarianism has distanced us from God."

And it disturbs me every bit as much as it seems to disturb Swanson that--I dare say--very, very few Christians have been teaching "the fear of God and the worship of God" in the sciences in the last 100 years or more. Our advocacy for methodological naturalism comes far too close, far too often, to real ontological naturalism (as I discussed in my post on Seeking to distinguish "methodological" from "ontological" naturalism). Far too often, I'm afraid, we really do operate (as I confessed I operate too often) as "functional atheists."

And so I applaud Swanson when he seeks to indict us for failing to tremble before God as we wonder at His universe. Swanson is onto something when he says, "[Y]ou take a book like Galaxy, and you gut God from that book, and you start saying, 'Hey, it was chance that put it together. There is no purpose, no meaning in any of that. It's just a random event that create-- . . . I'm sorry. It just happened. . . .'" --You do that, and, I agree, there is good reason to ask "why we should stand in wonder about all these things. . . ."

And I join him in praying that God will help us to restore the fear of God as the recognized beginning of wisdom in our culture.

At the same time, however, I'm not convinced he and his friends "have it right" when they suggest the only proper, the only possible solution to the perceived purposelessness of our culture is to be found in a young-earth, poof-God-made-it-appear-in-an-instant "metaphysic."

He (and they) may be right. But, as I've been discussing here in John's Corner of the World, I sense the young-earther's philosophically-based opposition to the so-called "random chance" aspects of modern evolutionary theory not only fail to reply appropriately to the challenges raised by atheists when it comes to the modern theory of evolution, but it fails to respond properly to the philosophical problems in Christian theology associated with God's sovereignty over apparent randomness, chance, and chaos ("chaos theory") as these relate to everyday issues . . . whether the throw of the dice, the flipping of a coin, or any other apparently unpredictable event.

It doesn't help us understand--nor seem to show much confidence in--God's sovereign oversight of history. If God is acknowledged by Christians as only in control when He controls through obviously miraculous means, then it appears there is something wrong with the statements found in such passages as Proverbs 16:33 ("The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from [Jehovah]."); Proverbs 16:9 ("The mind of man plans his way, But [Jehovah] directs his steps."); Proverbs 21:31 ("The horse is prepared for the day of battle, But victory belongs to [Jehovah]."); and so forth. (See the section on "Historical Science" in Perspectives on an Evolving Creation, 2c - Evolution and Creation - Excursus 2: Science.)

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Moving on.

Perhaps it is his own It's not quite as clear to me, but I think some of my discomfort with Swanson's speech comes from his extension of the bifurcation Aquinas noted in his Summa essays.

Swanson pulled two sentences--in fact, two pieces of sentences--from larger sections. And when I read those portions-of-sentences within context, I get a different sense, a different meaning, than what Swanson (and, potentially, many others) may have pulled from them.

For example, the first quote: "[T]heology included in sacred doctrine differs in kind from that theology which is part of philosophy." That is the final sentence in a longer (though only an 8-1/2" x 11" page long) article in which Aquinas notes that, in accordance with what we learn from 2 Timothy 3:16 (as well as other Scriptures), "It was necessary for man's salvation that there should be a knowledge revealed by God besides philosophical science built up by human reason." Yet there are truths which God has granted us humans to learn by means other than the Scriptures. Thus, "the astronomer and the physicist both may prove the same conclusion: that the earth, for instance, is round"--a conclusion learned not from Scripture but from these "philosophical sciences."

Yet Swanson seems bent on criticizing Aquinas for making that observation. Why? Is he trying to make points where none, rightly, ought to be made?

Then again, he says,

[W]hy [are these things that Aquinas says] important? Because this is the beginning of the secular university. This produces the intellectual apology for Christians to engage in building the City of Man.

See, Christians wouldn't have been involved in these things--Christians wouldn't have gotten into these horrific systems that leave God out--if they weren’t taught a thousand years ago that you can have your theology over here and your philosophy over here, and these things are separate things.

And I think, "What are you talking about? God's people have always been involved in culture-building, the same kinds of activities that Swanson identifies as "building the City of Man."

God has called His people to the responsibilities of fiduciaries, the responsibilities of stewards, the responsibilities of exercising dominion under His dominion. And responsibilities include--and have always included--food gathering or production; the building of houses; the caring for children; protection with lethal force, if necessary; trade. . . .

The question is not whether Christians are permitted to "engage in building the City of Man." The question is, "whom will we serve" while doing it (Joshua 24:15)?

Sadly, I have seen many Christians--even those who are outspokenly in line with the Swanson/Phillips/Baucham camp--engage in building their own "Cities of Man." Perhaps their empires are no larger than the influence they exert on their own families and the people and groups they directly touch outside their families.¹ But the fact remains: the key question is and always will be--even moment by moment: "Whom will you serve . . . now?" And, "How will you serve?"

Suppose I determine to honor God through analyzing weather patterns (which analysis may contribute to the saving of human lives, the protection of crops, or all manner of other "City of Man" kinds of benefits). And suppose I engage in that kind of activity through the use of complex computer models created on supercomputers developed by God-hating atheists: Is all my work for naught, because, somehow, I am building the City of Man?

Listening to Swanson, I get the idea he thinks such work would, indeed, be defective for just such reasons.

But I don't think so.

On the other hand, perhaps I am missing his point.

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There are a couple of final things I would like to note.

"It bothers me," he says, "when you've got these Aquinasites in these Christian schools that are saying, 'We'll have our little prayer over here, but, boy, that prayer, that relationship with God is sure not going to touch the way we do science. It's sure not going to touch the way we walk through the hallways. It's sure not going to touch the way we speak disrespectfully to the teachers in the classroom. . . .'"

I wonder who he means to be criticizing with these words.

It sounds as if he is criticizing the Christian school teacher himself for calling his class to prayer in the midst of all manner of coarse and God-dishonoring behavior. It sounds as if he is criticizing the school administrators and those who support such schools.

But isn't it the students (primarily) who ought to be called on the carpet for their failure to recognize God in their daily activities?

Oh, yes! The teachers (and, probably more, the parents), I have no doubt, need to call their children to account for their behavior. But the heart change is something that has to take place in the God-dishonoring students themselves.

Now, Swanson criticizes the Christian school for using a "pagan" textbook. And perhaps the criticism is deserved. I don't know what book they were using nor the alternatives available to them. I don't know to what degree the instructor may have wrestled with the text to note its deficiencies in the hearing of his students.

Perhaps his teaching was wholly inadequate, and he, himself, needs a major dose of education and discipleship so he begins to see God's hand at work in and through the very subject matter he is attempting to teach.

But I think I'd like to throw Swanson's comment a bit back in his lap. He obviously doesn't like that "little prayer" offered in the midst of a crowd of students who have, themselves, clearly not bought-in to a vibrant Christian faith.

But what should we say about the "little worship" (or even "big worship") Swanson wants to tack on to all his science, math, and "even" geography classes? Suppose his own children (or whoever is present for one of his lessons) happens not to believe in God or desire to serve God: is Swanson's worship, then, invalid? Or is it, for some reason, more valid or efficacious than the "little prayer" of the teacher he implicitly criticizes in the Christian school classroom?

I'd like to press the point one step further. What if a teacher in the Christian school (or public school) were to take Swanson's admonition to "nurture" and "disciple" to heart? What if such a teacher were to do the very thing Swanson says he never did when he was a teacher in the Christian school? Might that teacher have a profound impact on his or her students?

(I believe he or she would.)

Let me confess: My kids have been nurtured and discipled by a caring Christian teacher or two in the public high school where they attended. They received similar ministry from Christian professors at the universities and colleges where they attended. I was nurtured and discipled by some Navigator disciplers when I attended Michigan State back in the mid-1970s. I am very grateful for all these people's ministries.

I think it is fine for Swanson to call us to deeper and more effective ministry to our children and others--both children and adults. But I don't think it is necessary or right for him to suggest (or, at least, strongly imply) that only he and his group and those who follow him--and no one else--"does it right."

******
Finally: I really appreciate his call for us to seek the hearts of the next generation. May we do that very thing.

May it be said of us, or of our children after us:

"Thank you, teacher, for saying, 'Give me your heart.' Thank you, professor, for saying, '_________, I'm concerned about you.' --Your personal concern made a profound difference in my life."

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¹ 4 April 2009, 11:59 AM emendation: This sentence originally featured a parenthetical clause that offered an example of such City-of-Man empire-building: "failing to pay legitimate bills, for example, while keeping funds for [one's own family]."

The clause included two links to a site that, when I wrote this article, gave documentary evidence for such behavior on the part of a modestly well-known "leader" in homeschool circles--someone who was present at the 2009 CHEC Men's Leadership Summit but did not speak.

Under threat of legal action for making such information known, the owner of the website I referenced has since removed the documentation.

Since I have no direct or personal knowledge of the situation; since I now lack the documentary evidence to back the example; and since I, myself, do not want to become embroiled in a lawsuit; I have decided to remove the reference.

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This circumstance, however, has gotten me thinking about a new idea. I have posted a separate post to cover that idea.

Return to text.

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Next post in this series: CHEC "Men's Leadership Summit," Part III - "The Battle for Faith and Family".