Some promises are great promises no matter how you look at it!
Many are the plans in a man’s heart,
but it is the LORD’s purpose that prevails.
Proverbs 19:21
We often think of this verse and imagine we are doing everything right, and the Lord will be sure it succeeds. Have you ever considered this verse from the other side? Think of it this way, can you REALLY ruin your child’s life?
It’s not unheard of for a parent to be suddenly concerned about homeschooling high school. “I don’t want to limit their future!” or “What if I can’t teach calculus?” The fears are legion, but God’s word is clear.
The Lord’s purpose will prevail.
It will prevail against failure, gaps, and math frustrations. It will prevail even when you make a mistake. The Lord’s purpose will prevail despite your best attempts. Even if you DO NOT WANT your child to become a doctor, or an artist, or an electrician or an author, if that is the Lord’s purpose, IT WILL PREVAIL.
It’s very freeing. You can’t mess up. That doesn’t mean you should stop trying, though!
Romans 6:15
What then? Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means!
But if you are trying to do the right thing, praying and asking for guidance, then you can rest assured. The Lord’s plan and purpose for your child will prevail. If the Lord intends for your child to do great things, you (as a mere mortal) can’t stop that process. Blessed relief!
Quick review; why should we study scripture, again? Because God’s word is perfect and good. Because it is renewing, and can make you wise. Because it gives joy – but also gives warnings. Because it gives real rewards that last.
Psalm 19:7-11
By them is your servant warned;
in keeping them there is great reward.
They are more precious than gold,
than much pure gold;
they are sweeter than honey,
than honey from the comb.
The law of the LORD is perfect,
reviving the soul.
The statutes of the LORD are trustworthy,
making wise the simple.
The precepts of the LORD are right,
giving joy to the heart.
The commands of the LORD are radiant,
giving light to the eyes.
The fear of the LORD is pure,
enduring forever.
The ordinances of the LORD are sure
and altogether righteous.
It doesn’t say here that you need a textbook or study guide. It’s almost as
if you need only a Bible! But this Psalm does explain the “why” behind
studying the Bible in your homeschool.
I was reading through Proverbs, looking for some direct instruction about finances, and I stumbled upon something very interesting. Read these scripture verses, and see if you notice a theme:
Blessed is the man who finds wisdom,
the man who gains understanding,
for she is more profitable than silver
and yields better returns than gold. (Proverbs 3:13-14)
Choose my instruction instead of silver,
knowledge rather than choice gold (Proverbs 8:10)
How much better to get wisdom than gold, to choose understanding rather than silver! (Proverbs 16:16)
Now I might be a bit slower than your average bear, but it seems to me that the Lord is saying that wisdom is more important than gold or silver. Wisdom is worthy of searching for and pursuing. Wisdom and knowledge are worth the effort, and worth all the hard work. It’s more important than investing in gold – AND it will get you a better annual average rate of return!
For some families, these verses may help them as they consider the cost of college. College is worth the effort. College may be worth the investment. Nobody knows your family, your finances, and your child’s future income better than you. With all those factors in mind, it may be worth taking a college loan – particularly since it has better dividends then gold and silver (which are doing pretty well right now, what with the government printing money like crazy, LOL!)
I say this with some trepidation, however, because the Bible also has a LOT to say about debt (none of it good). This is DEFINITELY something you should pray about and consider carefully.
One of my Gold Care Club members was talking to me about college debt, and how much debt was OK. From a secular perspective, you want to look at some specific statistics. Look up the statistics for one college at a time. What percent of students graduate on time? What percent of students are employed within 6 months of graduating? What is the average income for graduates? What is the average income for students getting a specific degree? How much debt does the average student accumulate at that college? Then take all the information and put it all together. Can the average student get a job that will pay off the average debt in a reasonable amount of time?
The Lord appears to be a big fan of investing your money in wisdom. It’s worth it. How MUCH to invest can vary from family to family. It’s worth going over the numbers though. After all, it’s better to get wisdom than to pursue gold!
Some people experience the panic before they begin homeschooling high school. When they first come to grips with this prospect, they cry out, “Me? Homeschool High School? No Way!” Have you ever thought you weren’t qualified? Perhaps you don’t have a college education. You may not even have a degree in classroom instruction! And yet God, in his infinite wisdom and humor, has chosen YOU to do this crazy thing.
Moses knows just how you feel. He was called on to approach a ruler and demand the freedom of the slaves in Egypt. How did he respond to this task? He panicked! “Me? No Way!” He had some great excuses too!
Moses said to the LORD, “O Lord, I have never been eloquent, neither in the past nor since you have spoken to your servant. I am slow of speech and tongue.” The LORD said to him, “Who gave man his mouth? Who makes him deaf or mute? Who gives him sight or makes him blind? Is it not I, the LORD ? Now go; I will help you speak and will teach you what to say.” But Moses said,
“O Lord, please send someone else to do it.”
~ Exodus 4:10-13
Moses thought that his slow speech would make him incapable of the task. But the task isn’t dependent on skill, it’s dependent on obedience. Look at it this way; if God called you to homeschool high school, He WILL give you the skills you need for the job based on your obedience.
Don’t feel like you aren’t qualified. Moses proved that he didn’t need to be a smooth-talker in order to get his job done. You don’t have to achieve a high degree of education to be successful either. Whether you graduated college or not, it’s the love of your child that will ensure success. In fact, check out the statistics on page 2 of this brochure: Homeschool Achievement Statistics
When you feel like quitting, you may call out, “O Lord, please send someone else to do it.” Moses said it himself, and the Lord still seemed fond of Moses! Don’t beat yourself up about panic, just remember that the Lord has always been faithful, and He always WILL be faithful. You can do it!
Listen. Learn. Discern. Get guidance. Sounds great! Now if we could just teach our children to have a quiet time and devotional with the word of God, they could listen, learn, discern, and get guidance too!
Proverbs 1:5
Let the wise listen and add to their learning, and let the discerning get guidance.
Sometimes kids will gobble it up, and love reading the Word. Other times… not so much. Same kid, just different stages. It doesn’t mean they have made a long term commitment to fighting you on devotions. In general it just means their brain is focused on other things.
There are two things that can help you train a child to have devotions. First, demonstrate a devotional lifestyle, but having a quiet time yourself. Show your children that real adults really read their Bible on a day-to-day basis, and that will become normal behavior for them.
We read it together, and discussed the scriptures we read. I called it “cozy couch time” because I wanted it to be a warm, friendly, non-schoolish environment. My goal was for them to love scripture. Like teaching them to love reading, I thought the best way would be to get cozy with the book.
Later in high school, I bought them each their own devotional. Rather than commentaries, I really liked The One Year Bible NIV
Each day it provides a section from the Old Testament, New Testament, Psalms, and Proverbs. It was a good fit for me, because sometimes I get bogged down in some sections (Lamentations and Revelation come to mind…..) and having a mix of Old, New, and Wisdom books really helped me have something each day that would spark my interest and keep me excited about devotions.
One of the most difficult parts of parenting is always making a decision about which direction to go. In the beginning is the decision to have children, then choosing how to have the baby. Then nursing? Go back to work? What about homeschooling?
Even now that we have made it to the homeschooling part, we still have decisions in front of us. What is the best decision for our children? Should they take a class outside the home? Where should they go to college? How do you make the decisions? Read this story in the Old Testament, about Abram and his nephew Lot made a decision about which direction they should choose.
Genesis 13:8-18
So Abram said to Lot, “Let’s not have any quarreling between you and me, or between your herdsmen and mine, for we are brothers. Is not the whole land before you? Let’s part company. If you go to the left, I’ll go to the right; if you go to the right, I’ll go to the left.”
Lot looked up and saw that the whole plain of the Jordan was well watered, like the garden of the LORD… So Lot chose for himself the whole plain of the Jordan and set out toward the east. The two men parted company: Abram lived in the land of Canaan, while Lot lived among the cities of the plain and pitched his tents near Sodom. Now the men of Sodom were wicked and were sinning greatly against the LORD.
The LORD said to Abram after Lot had parted from him, “Lift up your eyes from where you are and look north and south, east and west. All the land that you see I will give to you and your offspring forever. I will make your offspring like the dust of the earth, so that if anyone could count the dust, then your offspring could be counted. Go, walk through the length and breadth of the land, for I am giving it to you.”
So Abram moved his tents and went to live near the great trees of Mamre at Hebron, where he built an altar to the LORD.
Lot chose the direction that looked the prettiest. He chose in a superficial way, based on outward appearances. Abram knew that what make a place “good” was the Lord – and anywhere he went with the Lord would be the right place.
When you are making decisions about where to educate your children, whether for an outside class or for college, avoid looking at the outward appearances. It doesn’t matter how many people say it is wonderful, or who else is doing it, or what the current fad might be. Look beyond the superficial. Do you really want your children there? Will it make them a better person, or is it just the best-looking?
Listen to your heart. Parents know best. Not your friends or relatives, not your homeschool buddy or the author of a book. Parents know best.
I have a new homeschool high school Twitter site. Get all the homeschool posts of parents homeschooling high school by joining my Twibe.
If you do your job well, your children will become well-educated. Unfortunately, that sometimes can make teenagers feel like they are “smarter” or “better” than someone else. It’s a challenge to convey encouragement about their good efforts, without encouraging them to become prideful. The Bible equates “being wise in your own eyes” with evil that should be shunned.
Do not be wise in your own eyes;
fear the LORD and shun evil.
This will bring health to your body
and nourishment to your bones.
Proverbs 3:7-8
I’m not sure if this is just a “phase” that children go through. I know that age comes with wisdom. As you get older and learn more, you start to realize how much you DO NOT know. That humble wisdom may be the wisdom that comes with age.
Teach your children to be wise, but teach them not to be wise in their own eyes.
I love the promise at the end; health and nourishment! As a nurse, I love to see promises of health!
Sometimes I have a “sad day.” Those are days when I am faced with Romans 3:23:
For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.
Those are the days when I recognize a small or large problem with my now-grown children. Did I really forget to teach them that sleep is important? Have I failed them completely because they throw out Tupperware instead of washing it? “Sad days” are a good time to reflect a bit, fast, and pray. “Sad days” are usually followed by a promise from the Lord.
A “promise day” is when I hold to the promise in Proverbs 22:6:
Train up a child in the way he should go, and WHEN HE IS OLD he will not turn from it.
Sadly, there is no mention of regular sleep OR Tupperware in the verse. Perhaps that means it’s optional. Perhaps it means that isn’t required at all. Maybe what it means is that our children get to grow up and make their own decisions. They get to choose when to sleep, and what to throw out. In fact, there are a HUGE number of things they will choose to do or not do, regardless of how well we train them in the way we should go. My friends with older children tell me there is yet another kind of day I will face, a “blessed day.”
A “blessed day” is mentioned in Proverbs 31:28:
Her children arise and call her blessed.
I confess. There are gaps in my children’s education. I may have skipped the unit study on sleep. I think I only demonstrated the washing of Tupperware, without actually mentioning circumstances when it is appropriate to throw it away. We have to get used to gaps like that. Nobody can really do “enough” because children will grow up to make their own choices. As parents, we can’t possibly think of everything and every situation that our children may get themselves into.
It’s a sad day. Tomorrow will be a promise day. One day I’ll get to that blessed day. That will be fun!
Let me take a guess. Your children don’t always listen to you. Once in a while, you communicate something very clearly to them, and they act like their ears are filled with cotton. At some point you may have felt like your children did not take full advantage of your experience and expertise by implementing your instruction.
Jesus took the Twelve aside and told them, “We are going up to Jerusalem, and everything that is written by the prophets about the Son of Man will be fulfilled. He will be handed over to the Gentiles. They will mock him, insult him, spit on him, flog him and kill him. On the third day he will rise again.” The disciples did not understand any of this. Its meaning was hidden from them, and they did not know what he was talking about. Luke 18:31-34
Look at how clearly he communicated with his disciples. He’s not talking to kids, either – these are grown adults, functional at home and at work. Still, they simply did NOT understand. The concept of dying for sin and raising from the dead was simply an impossible thought for them to comprehend. Their brains couldn’t understand it, so their brains threw out the entire message.
I think sometimes our concrete information and suggestions sound like foreign concepts to our kids. Prioritize? Plan ahead? Do difficult things before fun? It’s very frustrating to watch the blank stares. Or worse, the “sure mom!” followed by…. nothing.
I have no answers, only empathy. I can tell you that Jesus knows how we feel. It’s better than going it alone!
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It only takes…One Macy’s catalog to convince me I’m not beautiful enough…One Timberdoodle catalog to convince me that I’m not homeschooling enough….One Vision Forum catalog to convince me I don’t have character enough…Yet just One Word from God shows me that I am loved more than enough! Thank you Lord!
~ Dear Sister of Spunky Homeschool
God’s Word says in Jeremiah 31:3:
The LORD appeared to us in the past, saying: “I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with loving-kindness.”
As much as these catalogs are great and wonderful resources, they can sometimes lead to feelings of insecurity. Your standing before God has nothing to do with catalogs. Homeschoolers, and homeschool catalogs, will often share only the bright-and-beautiful side of homeschooling. But even those people in the magazines aren’t perfect.
“For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” Romans 3:23
I have photos in my photo album of perfect children doing great homeschool projects too. I can tell you, those things did NOT happen everyday! In fact, when they DID happen, it was so unusual I ran to get my camera and take a picture!
Of course you’re going to have a bad day now and then. Don’t keep score next to a picture of impression of a homeschool magazine or even a homeschool mom blog. It’s an unreasonable expectation. Nobody is perfect, we just sometimes accidentally have a perfect moment. Don’t beat yourself up. It happens.
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