On Aug 16, 2008, Matt Runion said:

After reading the editorial in the Aug 14th Baptist Messenger entitled, "From the Schoolhouse to God's House" (http://www.baptistmessenger.com/story/7C3353F139658554047EB2DB9CDDE9E9), complete with its statistics which revealed that there are roughly as many SBC congregations in Oklahoma as there are public schools (1754 vs. 1800), I couldn't help but think back to some other statistics I had recently read: "From age 5 to 18 years, children spend 16,000 hours in school and about 1,600 hours in church." "Research indicates that 88% leave the church within four years of graduation." "Nearly 90% of America’s children attend schools, which by law must be completely secular." Please don't misunderstand me. I completely agree that SBC congregations in Oklahoma should adopt public schools, their teachers, staff, and students, and minister to them and show them God’s love however we can. However, in addition to that, and in light of the above statistics taken from the Southern Baptist Association of Christian Schools website ( www.sbacs.org ), I am also very much in favor of using the facilities and people that God has blessed our congregations with, and seriously consider offering a alternative “public” school system -- one that is open to the public but owned and operated by the Body of Christ thru the congregations of the BGCO/SBC. Consider for a moment the following: What if just a little more than 1% (roughly 20) of our SBC congregations in Oklahoma committed to starting a Christian School or to housing a Christian homeschool cooperative, and were each able to attract 1% of Oklahoma’s currently enrolled public school children? That’s more than 6,000 children that could be shown the love of Christ throughout the course of a 16,000-hour Christian education, and in my estimation would be far less likely to be in the 88% that "fall away" after graduation. What about 2%? 3%? What if these congregations then leveraged the technology of the Internet to connect these new “public” schools together in a way to share teaching resources between themselves and other established Christian schools, where a calculus teacher in a Christian school in Del City could teach a class to students meeting in a church in Ardmore? What would stop “us” from reaching outside the boundaries of Oklahoma even, to pool our resources amongst other interested congregations SBC-wide? What would happen if the BGCO and SBC focused some of our in-state and "home missions" outreach resources to the task of establishing such schools as a permanent fixture of direct outreach to the community's children and their families? Perhaps the time has come that we time we take on a two-pronged strategy, to not only minister to those in the public school system, but also develop a comprehensive plan to save children from it. I don't believe it's an issue of whether or not God is strong enough to accomplish such a feat, but rather, whether or not we are willing to allow Him to work thru us and the resources He's already entrusted us with to bring Glory to Him.

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On Aug 18, 2008, Patty said:

I have an idea that might seem novel to all the Christians out there that pull their children from public schools and put them in private "Christian" schools or to be more isolated, home schools. How about first of all, you LIVE out your Christianity in the home as well as teaching your child about Christ. Bring them up in the home and church under the leadership of the Holy Spirit, teaching and living before them all that is taught. Then, you send your children to public school as the salt and light that your children were meant to be. I, as a Christian public school teacher, have seen this played out many, many times in the classroom. It is amazing how children can lead other children to know God, who He is, His character, how to get saved, etc. Just a few months ago, in my elementary classroom, the students had an interesting discussion about the Trinity. In the discussion, since they brought it up, I mentioned praying to God. One boy asked me later how to pray. He had never prayed before. I did not instigate this conversation. Christian students did. Of course I told him how to pray. So before you haul off all the Christian kids from public school, don't think about what your child will GET, but what your child may GIVE. Thank you.

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