robloweyx: Missional Homeschooling

Posted by Debra | 2 comments

I read an article online this week which asserted that Christian homeschoolers are not a people of mission. ?And it truly didn?t give any homeschooler an out. ?The author purported that because we don?t take part in the government school structure we are destroying society and failing our Christian purpose. ?It assumed that we keep our light to ourselves. ?It assumed. ?How I?d love to take the writer for coffee and tell him the real story of homeschooling.

Stereotypes about us abound from the socially-conscious neo-hippie postulation to the rural, patriarchal structured family idea and everything in between. ?The beauty is that all of them are true and homeschooling can?t be pigeonholed. ?The world continues its assumptions however and claims to know how we all dress, pray, progress, and teach. ?It assumes that we support a certain sameness in our methods, rationale, worldviews, and goals. ?These assumptions are often captious, always unfortunate and they miss the one true common thread of homeschooling:

Mission.

The thing the article claimed we do without, is actually at the very heart of why we do. ?In truth, we believe intently that we are involved in something restorative. ?Whether in our child, our family or in our culture, we believe that we are embarking on a personal mission to take what?s unformed or broken and progress it to something whole and beautiful. ?Our hearts virtually throb to make something right.

Sometimes that something is our child with exceptional needs; we know that their customized learning will elevate them. Sometimes it?s our gifted children who need an outlet, a cheerleader, an opportunity; we know our innovation will free them. Sometimes we look into our local schools and sense that our child won?t find a place there; we know our commitment will support them. ?And we also look out to the world around us at its great needs and challenges and know that our willingness will heal them.

In truth, we don?t keep our children sequestered all day every day, yet the world doesn?t recognize this to be true. ?Recognized or not homeschoolers still take to the streets to raise money for disaster relief, send packages to troops, visit the elderly, travel to places where their skills can be a blessing to others, welcome the disenfranchised into relationship and feed the homeless in our city centers. ??And that?s just my one support group. ?But being active in social justice isn?t the whole of being missional.

We bring missional home and make it part of our DNA. ?We take on the yoke of educating our kids because in some sense we believe that we, and they, are sent people; that our lives are not just about this day, but about the days to come for all of us. ?We believe in the communities we live in and we take our homes out into them to serve. ?But we also honor and protect the time that is required to teach our children what sent-ness looks like so that they will be deft to impact the world both now and in their futures.

Of all the Christian homeschoolers in America, the common thread that binds us is our intentional, daily, motivated pursuit of the end goal ? to rescue and redeem whatever God has given us, be it narrowly confined to the youth in our home (if we restore and redeem only one child is that not enough?) or broadly through justice efforts around the world.? Daily through the lens of living out the commission to make disciples, we elevate, free, support and heal through our teaching, our example and our love.? This is homeschooling?s very mission; missional to the core.

Debra Anderson?has three sons ages 13 and younger. Her passions are education, spiritual formation, marriage, writing, and missional living ? not in that order. She has her seminary Masters degree in Christian Education, is married to her pastor-husband of 18 years, and resides in Denver, CO. In spite of moves between four different states, she has always home educated her boys ? even on the hard days. She maintains a blog at?www.emergent-homeschool.blogspot.com.?