Skip to main content

"Finally! Prayer in Public Schools" By Tom Ascol from his blog (http://www.founders.org/blog/2007/07/finally-prayer-in-public-schools.html)

Finally! Prayer in Public Schools

The Carver elementary school in San Diego is paving the way for prayer to be returned to public schools. Carver administrators have set aside 15 minutes from classroom instruction each afternoon to accommodate 100 religious students that are newly enrolled in the school. Amazingly, the ACLU seems willing to stand down on this one and let the practice continue, evidently not concerned that this action violates the establishment clause of the First Amendment.

Many fundamentalist groups would be celebrating this new found sensitivity toward and encouragement of religious expression in a government school if it were not Muslims who are being served. That's right. The Carver policy has been designed to allow Muslim students to observe salat as prescribed by the Quran.

This article (http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/metro/20070702-9999-1n2prayer.html) from the San Diego Union-Tribune tells the story. What it does not tell, however, is what these events display to someone committed to confessional Christianity and the Baptist understanding of church-state relationships. Let me offer a few personal opinions of what the Carver school actions suggest.

Our government elementary and secondary school system is irreparably broken. There are obvious exceptions from classroom to classroom and even from school to school, but the system is beyond repair. We no longer have a Christian worldview underpinning the efforts to educate the populace. McGuffey's Readers (in their original form) would never be allowed in most modern government classrooms. Though I realize that this issue is laden with difficulties and often addressed unhelpfully shrill voices, I am more convinced than ever that Christians need to start developing exit strategies for our children to leave government schools. By all means, let's keep sending Christian teachers to the classrooms. They should go as missionaries who recognize that they are invading territory that is hostile to the claims of our Savior.

Education cannot be morally neutral. All teaching has an unavoidable perspective. The widespread perspective of our government schools has moved from a basically Christian worldview, to a secular worldview into rapidly developing anti-Christian worldviews that play right into the hands of radical Islamists who are unhesitant to work pluralism to their advantage as they plot to move from tolerance to equality to supremacy. If you doubt their goals you have not listened to their proclamations.

The battle against Islam will not be fought primarily on foreign fields and will certainly not be won by guns and smart bombs. It is an ideological fight. It is a battle for the minds and souls of men and women and boys and girls. Only a muscular, vigorous, radically biblical Christianity can prevail. The insipid versions that dominate the American landscape--including the evangelical landscape--cannot stand against militant Islam. Only the true Gospel of Jesus Christ will do. And it is that Gospel that, I believe, has been largely lost or forgotten by many in our day who name the Name of Christ and assume that they understand and believe what He taught.
All of this to say, the Carver school administrators' antics further highlight our desperate need for reformation on a large scale. The Gospel must be recovered and churches must be reformed according to the Word of God. May the Lord grant us both through the outpouring of His Spirit.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Issues I Have Been Associated With Recently

The King James Only Controversy : I have been in 3 churches since the Lord was pleased to save me, the last 2 of them as a pastor. The first church was when I was not a pastor, but did teach Sunday School, and preached occasionally. It was a church that used the KJV of the bible, but neither I or the pastor was hardcore KJV Only. The second church was the first church I pastored. For the sake of some long time members in that small church, I used the King James version for sermons, but after I was there a year or two, I began using the NKJV for Scripture Readings. My third church, which is the one I'm pastoring now in Idaho, does not use the KJV. We offically use the NASB for our sermons, and the ESV many times when quoting other scriptures. I know some of my long time Christian friends from Maryland are KJV Only. I am not. I think it is an issue that we can agree to disagree on, but it seems there may be some that cannot. In the not so distant future, I'll post on the Blog why

Christian Discussions and Chem-Trails

What a title, huh? I just didn't want to post these separately :-). This morning as we were sending off our daughter, son-in-law, and grandchildren, there was a Chem-Trail right over us in the sky. Have you heard of Chem-Trails? They are chemicals being put in the sky to supposedly help with so called global warming  :-). Sadly, too many people still think this is a conspiracy theory. For those that do, I recommend you just put that in a search engine and see what comes up and just start reading. They come from the exhaust of commercial airliners, but they are not the same as "contrails." Contrails dissipate and follow the plane. Chem-trails stick around. They have certain chemicals in them (Aluminum and Barium are two of them if I recall correctly) and they just add to the list of toxins that our bodies absorb and endanger our health. If more people would pay attention and communicate with our elected officials at all levels perhaps, we could put a stop to this Lord will

"The Pill: Is It Abortifacient?" From Challies.com

Interesting article for your information. First 10 responses included. To see the article and all of the responses, go to www.challies.com/archives/000564.php . The Pill: Is It Abortifacient? Here's a topic I've been meaning to bring up for a while. Before I start, I should point out that my knowledge of the sciences (other than aspects of computer science) is absolutely shameful. I last studied science in my second year of high school and only passed because during the final exam I sat behind and to the right of the class brain and was able to copy her multiple choice answers (I offer no excuse for my behaviour except to say I was unregenerate at that time). So my knowledge of biology and chemistry are poor at best. Before I begin, I'd like to point out that I have no aversion to using birth control. My wife and I have had only two children in our six years of marriage, so you could correctly draw the conclusion that we have employed birth control to space out our children