Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 1071 | Christianity Today: Kids Need Public School

Starting point is 00:00:00 Christianity today says Christian parents should be sending their kids to public school for the sake of their faith. Also, the IVF industry is rightly under scrutiny for some of its very sketchy practices in the state of California. Today is all about how Christians must stand against corruption and stand against evil for the sake of children. This episode is brought to you by our friends at Good Ranchers. Go to Good Ranchers.com. Use code Alley at checkout. That's good ranchers.com code Alley. Hey guys, welcome to Relatable. Happy Monday. Hope everyone had a wonderful weekend. Okay, this is it. The week of Share the Arrows. And you know what? After this week, you won't have to hear me talk about it anymore.

Starting point is 00:00:55 Actually, I'll probably talk about it just a little bit because I'll just be reeling from how amazing it was, I'm sure. But right now, I'm just excited about it. So thank you so much for all of your prayers and your encouragement, whether you're attending or not, we still do have tickets. We have tickets available. And so if you have not yet decided, go ahead and bite the bullet. We've got seats available. Every seat in the house is a great seat. Balcony seats are available. We've got VIP, all access tickets, breakfast tickets available too. And it's going to be awesome. We've got all these amazing speakers, Candice Cameron Buret, Rosaria

Starting point is 00:01:32 Butterfield, Abby Halberstadt, Francesca Bada Steli, Lisa Childers. I mean, it's just going to be so good. of you, worshiping together, reminding ourselves being reminded of the God who is in charge and the time-tested truths that we get to hold on to, the clarity that we get to have in an age of chaos and cowardice and confusion. So get your tickets, share the arrows.com if you have not already. And just continue to pray for us. Continue to pray for everything to go smoothly, for God's production, for his favor, for his grace, for him to be glorified. Thank you so much for all of your support over the past few months as we've been planning for this. All right. Let's get into the topics set in hand today. I've been wanting to cover this for a long time for a few weeks now, and we finally

Starting point is 00:02:28 have gotten around to it. We're taking a pause from imminent politics and election discussion to talk about what I think is a really important cultural and even biblical piece that came out in Christianity today on September 6th about public school. So this is titled, public school can be training ground for faith. I responded to it on X, but I've been wanting to give a fuller response on the show. So here's a summary. This author, Stephanie McDade, is a theology editor at Christianity today. And many of you know, Christianity has been leaning left for a while. And so we're not all that surprised when we see arguments like this, but it still has its influence in certain circles of Christianity. So it matters what we're seeing on the pages there.

Starting point is 00:03:14 McDade argues in favor of Christians sending their children to public school because she argues research shows regular church attendance is more important than school choice. She also sees more benefit in exposing her children to worldly ideas and values while they live under her roof rather than attempting to keep them sheltered in a Christian school, which is the only reason for sending children to a Christian school that she addresses. So her assumption is that the only reason we would send our kids to a Christian school is to shelter them from scary ideas that we don't want them introduced to. And if we want them to get antibodies, I'm actually probably giving a better argument and the one she gives in her article.

Starting point is 00:03:54 But if we want them to have antibodies to be able to refute secular arguments, then we need to send them to public school to make sure they are able to combat those lies. So here's her article. She says last month, actor Kirk Cameron described Christian parents who send their children to public school as subcontracting their parenting and discipleship out to the government. Very articulate. He might have said that on my show. He said that public school is created.

Starting point is 00:04:22 dating little Marxists, little status, little atheist, drag queens, strippers, drug dealers, you name it. By contrast, author Jen Wilkin has made faith-led arguments in favor of public education, citing benefits for children, including a more diverse socialization. Is that biblical? Is that like a biblical reason? I'm not even addressing whether or not that's a good reason, but I don't think that we could say that's a biblical reason, a healthy exposure to different worldviews and fulfilling

Starting point is 00:04:48 the call of loving their neighbors by being in the school system. I would love to stop right there and give my entire refutation of those statements, but I've actually done an entire episode refuting what Jen Wilkin has said in defense of sending kids to public schools. We will link that episode, the YouTube episode as well as the audio form of the episode, if you would like to go check that out. McDade in this article writes that as a new school year starts with an election underway, the Christian case for public schooling is worth revisiting. She writes that she and her husband have decided to send their daughter, who is currently

Starting point is 00:05:28 a toddler to a public school for several reasons. So first, I just want to address this. We've got someone telling you that public school is totally fine who doesn't even have their kids in public school. Okay? And look, I've got toddlers too. I think it's fine to have an opinion about education. I think that's okay. You can be informed about this subject without having kids. in school. But what you don't really have the authority to do is to tell you, is to tell parents, even more experienced parents, that public education in this country is fine for your children, that it's a healthy choice, a healthy option, and really accuse the other side of fearmongering, of exaggerating, of not really having any biblically based or logic-based arguments. That you can't

Starting point is 00:06:19 really do because you don't have a firm grasp on what's going on in the public school system, even though you should. You could have an idea without being in the public school system because we see it. It's reported on. I listen to parents who talk at these school board meetings, who talk to me about what's going on even at the public schools in pretty conservative suburbs in red states. They're seeing things like gender ideology and social justice and progressive forms of SEL. But with all the wisdom of a mother of a non-school-aged child, she says Christians should, for the sake of their children's faith, send their kids to public school.

Starting point is 00:07:07 She says studies show there are more important elements for building and safeguarding our kids' faith in the school they attend. She is referencing research that suggests taking children to church regularly matters more than finding the right school. Okay, even if that is true, I haven't looked at the methodology of that particular study. But even if that is true, even if it is true that church is more important than the school you go to, I don't think there's anyone denying that. So right off the bat, we've got a straw man there.

Starting point is 00:07:40 I don't think anyone is saying that your child's school is determinant of their salvation or is the driving factor of their sanctification. That's not the argument those of us who advocate for Christian education, whether that's homeschool or Christian school, are arguing. That's not what we're saying. And that's still, that's not a good case against sending your kid to Christian school. Yes, church might be more important. What happens at home might be more important.

Starting point is 00:08:08 But that doesn't make your education not important at all, right? So right off the bat, we've got a poorly formed. formulated argument. And the interesting thing is when you look at this study, you find that the marginal differences that this article cites between public school Christians and Christian educated homeschool or private school educated Christians is actually a lot bigger. Like we looked at the study and it found that homeschoolers are 51% more likely than public school children to frequently attend religious services into their young adulthood. Students at religious schools had a higher likelihood of frequent religious services attendance becoming a registered voter and

Starting point is 00:08:54 fewer lifetime sexual partners than public school students. So she really brushes over the conclusions of the very study that she bases her argument on for sending your kids to public school. We've got more on this in just a second. Let me pause and tell you about our first sponsor. it's Carly Jean, Los Angeles. So I'm wearing my merch right now, my cute Jesus wins merch, but then I realized I am wearing my tank top underneath my sweatshirt is from Carly Jean Los Angeles because I'm always wearing CGLA. I love their clothing so much. It is so flattering.

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Starting point is 00:09:57 But even if you have, go ahead and use my code Allie B. You'll get 20% off your order when you do. That is Carlyjean, Los Angeles.com, code Allie B. The author argues that she would rather most of her child's first, Close encounters of the worldly kind happen while the child is still under her parents' roof, not after she leaves home. But see, your child can still have worldly experiences, can still encounter worldly secular arguments under your roof without being inundated by these arguments for eight hours a day, five days a week, for 13 years of her life.

Starting point is 00:10:45 Like that is a lot of propaganda imbibing that you are just hoping and praying that she is able in her young mind to refute. Really, what you're saying is that you want to put your child on the front lines of the battle before they are even big enough to hold up their shield. See, if my children are going to encounter worldly ideologies, like gender ideology, for example, I want to be the one. I want their dad to be the one to talk to them about this. To introduce those ideas to them in a way that they can understand, in a way that is framed by God's truth. I don't want them hearing those ideas first from someone who believes that they are good and true. There is authority that comes with being the first one to introduce a concept.

Starting point is 00:11:45 to a child. Whoever gets their first tends to be the one that the child listens to. I want the school to do their job, the Christian school to do their job. I want them to teach theology that is in accordance to what scripture says. I want them to show how God is in math, how God is in science, how God is in literature, how God is in history. I want them to learn how to write and to reason and how to memorize and how to calculate. Well, that's what I want from Christian education. Again, whether that's at home or in a traditional classroom. I want them to have excellent academics where they are learning not only what to think,

Starting point is 00:12:36 but also how to think, how to research, how to persuade, how to argue, how to apply God's word to every area of life. That's what I want for my children, eight plus hours a day, five days a week for 13 years. And within that, yes, you learn apologetics. Within that, you learn about worldly ideologies and worldly arguments and different forms of faith and religion. That you have to use God's truth to combat. But I want them to hear those things from the perspective of someone who knows what is actually good, right, and true and is not trying to evangelize to my child in the name of progressivism or moral relativism or any form of secularism or paganism. Of course.

Starting point is 00:13:32 I went to Christian school, kindergarten through 12th grade. And I was, it's true, protected from a lot of things. And I thank God for that. I think my parents for that. That was one of the greatest gifts that they ever gave me besides just being godly parents themselves and loving each other. I would say those are the greatest gifts. But underneath that, I would say the greatest gift they gave.

Starting point is 00:14:02 me was my Christian education. And my dad always said that he would work as many jobs as he needed to to make sure that my brothers and I got to go to a Christian school. My parents didn't. They didn't come from money at all. They went to public school. My mom was a public school teacher. My grandmother was a public school teacher. My grandfather was a public school band director for years of his life. And so my family has a history with public education. But even in the 80s and 90s, when my parents were figuring out, you know, the kind of education that my brothers would get and then later on I would get, they understood that there's a difference. Not only a difference academically, a big difference academically, but also a difference in the worldview that is being taught. And I learned from kindergarten to 12th grade, not only how to memorize scripture and understand.

Starting point is 00:14:56 scripture, but how to apply scripture to every area of my life. And that is a gift that I use every day. I'm thankful for college. I'm thankful for my communications degree. You could say that I use that every day too, but honestly, I liked to communicate before I went to college. It's really my education kindergarten through 12th grade that I consider my foundation for what I do. And you know what's interesting is that I am very thankful for the scripture recall that I have. I don't always remember the references, but I can call a lot of verses to mind. And that's not me patting myself on the back. That is me thinking the grace of God, but also the Christian education I had that taught us how to hide God's word in our heart. And so whenever I think of a verse, I think of it in the NIV.

Starting point is 00:15:56 And what's interesting about that is that I have been reading the ESV exclusively for 12 years. My ESV study Bible, if you don't have one of those, go out and get one. It's pretty cheap on Amazon or you could go to your favorite Christian bookstore, get you an ESV study Bible. It really shaped my theology and changed the game for me. And yet, when I think of scripture, when I think of a Bible verse, I think of the NIV. Why is that? because when my mind was most pliable, when I was most malleable, I was learning the Bible with my new adventure Bible. You remember that? I can put up a picture because I posted it on

Starting point is 00:16:38 Twitter. But it was like the sparkly, silver, purple and pink new adventure Bible. And of course, you had to like highlight all the edges of the pages and like write your name on there. This is the new adventure Bible that I had forever. And that's what we were. learning out of. And I love that even though I like the ESV more than NIV, I love that that's the version that comes to mind because it's a reminder to me as a mom what sponges my kids are and that the things that I am teaching them now, they are going to remember and that they are going to be able to call to mind. And it is such a reminder to me of the importance of Christian education. And so I don't know where I would be without my Christian education, not to mention the academics of it. I know that

Starting point is 00:17:30 there are different towns that offer different things, and there are some excellent public schools academically, and there are some academically really poor private schools. But I can tell you, and I just say this to moms and dads that are thinking about education for your kid and you think it's really no big deal, even aside from the theology of it, it also matters. the quality of education that you're getting, I was like a B plus, I was a B plus student on average. A's in English, like probably C plus and science and math because I just hated those so much. So I was, I was a fine student. Certainly wasn't valedictorian. And I went to college. I didn't have a scholarship or anything, but I had friends in college my freshman year who did

Starting point is 00:18:20 have scholarships, who were there on a full ride because they had a 4.0 in high school and or they were on a half ride they had these academic scholarships and yet when we got to freshman year college was really hard for them they were really struggling college was easy for me i'll say that not again because of my own natural brilliance or anything but because i was so academically prepared because of the education that i had that it wasn't hard at all if you want to set your child up best. It matters the education that they get. It matters the theology training that they get. It matters the academic quality that they get. If you want to give your kid the best leg up on life, what education will you get them? Will you make sure that they have? That is at least

Starting point is 00:19:12 one of the questions that we have to be asking when we're thinking about education. All right, let me pause and tell you about our second sponsor. That is Good Ranchers. You don't have to wait until November to vote. You can vote every day with your dollar at good ranchers.com. You can make a powerful choice to support American meat, American farms and ranches. All of the meat from Good Ranchers is from American Farms and Ranches. They are helping revitalize this industry that has been hit by so many unfair regulations. The prices are so high for them to conduct business.

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Starting point is 00:20:37 think of it like strength training. Your children need to build muscles of faith and public school can provide weight to lift while you're around to spot them. Let them wrestle with worldly counter narratives to God's truth while they're still under your care. That may feel risky, but the alternative keeping them sheltered, then letting them be exposed. to everything all at once when they leave for work or for college is risky too. I think this person doesn't have any understanding of Christian education. Sure, you are protected from some things when you go to a Christian school, which I think is good, by the way, like we should be protected from some things.

Starting point is 00:21:12 It's bad to expose our kids to bad things too early. But also, it's not like you're not living in the world. It's not like you don't have friends. It's not like you are not plugged into media. and entertainment at all. I think I understood fine enough exactly what was going on in the world, what was sin, what was right, what was wrong. It wasn't really a culture shock when I got to college and I found out that people drink before you're 21. Yeah, that was something that I knew. But I was protected from a lot of the effects of that because I went to a school that had something

Starting point is 00:21:47 called the 24-7 policy. And if you were caught having sex, doing drugs, or drink, 24-7 that includes in the summer that includes on the weekends, you got expelled. And so that was the consequence that a lot of parents and a lot of students were facing if they disobeyed the rules in any of those ways. I think that probably protected a lot of young people from really bad choices and really bad consequences. And I think that was a grace for a lot of people that protected them. And the thing about sending your kids to public school for strength training and saying that you're there to spot them, but you're not. That's the thing. You're not actually there to spot them. Christian education in partnership with the parents who are the primary faith trainers for our kids,

Starting point is 00:22:41 the primary stewards of our kids' hearts and minds, that is the spotting. Because life, whether you go to Christian school or not is strength training. You're going to go through hard things. You're going to face rejection. You're going to face disappointment. You're going to have to learn how to obey your parents. You're going to have to learn discipline and organization just by being in school. You are going to hear other ideas. You are going to hear things you disagree with, whether they're presented by teachers or not. You're going to see things in the world that you know don't align with scripture. But having a refuge away from that, and during the school, hours and at home and at church is actually a way to prepare and to rejuvenate your child,

Starting point is 00:23:27 to make sure that your child is prepared as possible. Look, I don't want my child at, you know, a toddler age at five years old to hear from a teacher that it's possible for a boy to become a girl. She doesn't need to hear that. They don't need to hear that. What they need for the first several years of their life is a foundation of truth and beauty. What they need is to hear what is good and what is right, that God made us male and female, that it's impossible to be born in the wrong body. I wouldn't even say that in an early age. I would just say that your body is good, that God made it good, that it is good to be a girl or a boy. That's beautiful, that's purposeful. We're all made in God's image. God does everything with intention and care. God made everything.

Starting point is 00:24:17 God made everything for his glory. He loves us so much that he sent his son to die for us. Basic observations, mommy, daddy, aunt, uncle, grandma, papa. Like, you know, all of those distinctions are good. They're part of God's world. That's the foundation that we are laying, the biblical foundation that we are laying for our children. They don't need to hear secular ideology's response to biblical truth yet. They simply don't, especially, as I said, when it's presented in a way by teachers as if it is good and right. That can be really dangerous. The choice is between 13 years or however many years your child is sitting in a classroom,

Starting point is 00:25:04 13 years of biblical training or 13 years of anti-biblical training. That's what you've got. We don't really have neutrality here, especially today. It would be great if we had schools that were teaching biblical virtues, even if they weren't saying they're from the Bible, and then just focusing on math and writing and reading, reading the classics, that would be one thing. Then it wouldn't be as much, as much of an issue for Christians to have to think through. It would still be something to have to think through and I'll explain why, but it wouldn't be. that big of a difference. But now we've got anti-God ideology, maybe not the specific kindergarten teacher that your kid has, but the public school system, the administrators, the bureaucracy,

Starting point is 00:25:58 the counselors, the teachers unions, the curriculum writers, all of those people behind the scenes are progressive. Even the best public school teachers in the world, and some of you are listening to this podcast, the sweetest lights of Christ in the public education system ever. Like, you know how corrupt and how godless it is to the core. So we're choosing between that and a Christian education. I understand not everyone has a choice, but if you have a choice and you know your responsibility is to raise up your child the way that he or she should go, don't you think that's the better option to give them as much solid theological grounding as you possibly

Starting point is 00:26:38 can versus throwing them on the front lines when they don't even have the strength to pick up their sword? come on come on and I hear a lot um that well you know my school in the suburbs of Alabama it's not liberal it's it's I know the teachers they go to our Sunday school class and they're completely solid and they're not teaching gender ideology they're not teaching social justice first I say yet and I'm not even talking about that one individual teacher again I'm talking about the system. But second, and I was just talking to a friend about this, has a really great school system by them. And I said, even if it is a great school and they don't teach all of the liberal

Starting point is 00:27:25 nonsense, they're still not teaching the Bible. And so even if they are getting at best a neutral education, and I'm wincing as I say that, because I just don't think that happens today, even if they are getting that, they are not getting the truth of God's word every day. They're not getting scripture memorization. So all of the other kids their age that are getting that education, again, whether at home or in the classroom, they just have a leg up. Now, I am not saying that where you send your kid to school is determinant of their salvation. I know strong believing adults who are amazing parents, amazing people who went to public school their whole lives. I also know people that I graduated with, who are apostate, who are hostile to God, who have completely

Starting point is 00:28:19 rejected their upbringing. So obviously, it's not salvific where your child goes to school. But I think as parents, it is a matter of wise stewardship of our responsibility to their hearts and their minds. And I also, this is an encouragement for you parents, that the things that you are teaching your kid, the things that your kid is learning, even if they do walk away one day, I have heard so many testimonies of people saying, yeah, I walked away in college or as a young adult.

Starting point is 00:28:55 And then maybe they got married, they had kids, and they start thinking about their faith again. They start thinking about go to church. And they remember, they say, and a hymn came to mind. And a Bible verse came to mind. And I thought about that church again, and how that was the last time I ever felt truly loved.

Starting point is 00:29:12 And I found myself calling out to God when I had reached my lowest, even though I had prayed in 10 years. You don't know how God is going to water and give growth to those seeds, but we do have to plant as many seeds as possible. And education is one way to aid in that. I simply do not want teachers who are hostile to what I believe to be handling the heart and mind of my precious and malleable child. All right, we'll get into more of this in a second. Let me pause and tell you about our next sponsor. That is Alliance Defending Freedom. All right, the public education system and many industries, institutions in the United States are openly hostile to Christians living out their faith in word or indeed. And sometimes these Christians find themselves the victims

Starting point is 00:30:05 of lawfare by progressive activists who want them fired because they prayed publicly or because they won't go along with gender ideology. And the people at Alliance defending freedom, they stand up for these people. They stand up for these believers, these Americans that are trying to simply live out their constitutional rights, exercise their constitutional rights, and they do this without charging them. They're an amazing organization. I got to spend time within this summer. They are doing such good work on behalf of vulnerable people. They also have this amazing guide.

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Starting point is 00:31:07 So she says that Philippians 215 supports her argument. Christians are called to be children of God without fault in a warped and crooked generation. And she says, we know how seriously Jesus takes harm against children, how gravely he judges those who fail to treat them with the proper dignity. Anyone who despises a child or causes one to stumble is better off drowning in the depths of the sea then facing the wrath of God for their actions. Yeah, that's true. And I don't want my child to be one of those little ones that is caused to stumble

Starting point is 00:31:48 by the activist teacher who believes that he is liberating children by telling them they might be born in the wrong body. I don't want that teacher to be the one that introduces that child to different definitions of marriage or who tries to make my child into a social justice activist. So I agree that children should be protected. I agree in being against any harm to children. And there is so much harm that is done to children through the public education system. She writes that we can't permanently protect our children from the world and its influences. And at the very least, they'll encounter the worldliness of their own sin. Again, that is true. I would say that's a counter to her entire argument.

Starting point is 00:32:37 We don't need to send them to public school in order to counter the world. The only question is when they'll face that challenge and who will be around them when they do. She said, my worries about sending my child to public school are more about her physical safety, especially when school shootings happen an hour away. Also, those tend to happen, not always, but they do tend to happen more at public schools. Then her exposure. to people and ideas that might cause her to wrestle with her faith values or sense of self, even at a young age. See, I just think that is a complete dereliction of duty as a parent. We are supposed to protect our children. That doesn't mean that we overly shelter them.

Starting point is 00:33:16 That doesn't mean they don't meet different kinds of people. But we are supposed to protect them, right? Of course. We're supposed to protect them from evil. We're supposed to protect them from darkness. And if we want them to get the antibodies necessary for a strong faith, we can introduce those. She says that hostility is the reality in which we parent as Christians, the hostility of the world towards Christians, and that tension of witness and holiness, shrewdness and innocence is what we must faithfully navigate, whatever schooling decision we make. That I agree with. It's a dance of both entrusting our kids to God in knowing that God has entrusted them to us. True. And it's a dance we don't undertake lightly, for at the end of all days, we will be held

Starting point is 00:33:59 accountable for how we performed. True. True. I agree with all that. And I highly disagree with the conclusion that she comes to. What does Voddy Bacom say? You cannot be surprised if you send your kids to Caesar and they come back romance. I mean, that's the bargain. That's the risk that's being taken. And I think we have to realize that public education isn't the same that it was 20 years ago when you were in school. It's not like it was. was 30, 40 years ago. That's for sure. It's not even like it was 10 to 15 years ago when I was in school, 15 years ago, I think that's when I was in high school. Yeah, wow, long time. Things have changed really quickly. The sexual and immoral revolution has sped up and its victims are getting

Starting point is 00:34:51 younger and younger. I want my kids to have the best foundation of theology possible so that when they do encounter wrong ideas, when they do encounter lies, they know what is good and right and true. I don't need them to know every single lie to know the truth. I don't need, I don't need them to know everything that's wrong and bad and evil for them to know the truth. I want them to know the truth to know the truth. And by the way, if you're looking at, for example, classical curriculum and like Charlotte Mason is like this and other forms of classical curriculum, they are teaching kids how to be apologists. They are teaching kids how to be theologians. They are teaching kids how to research, how to write, how to argue, how to defend their faith. We basically took an

Starting point is 00:35:44 apologetics class when I was a senior. We had to read Reason for God by Tim Keller. I know there's some things that Tim Keller said over the years that we don't agree with, but it was a great book. understanding questions about God from a skeptic's perspective. I read mere Christianity in high school, and we read all kinds of secular books, too. And I really think, again, just academically so excellent and the things that I had to be exposed to, but in learning how to see God in all of it. And so I think that I was much better equipped, actually, to defend my faith than a lot of friends who just didn't have the same theological foundation. Now, is it true that your parents matter more?

Starting point is 00:36:35 Is it true that your parents are your primary disciples? Absolutely. I'm not refuting that at all. And I understand there are exceptions to this. A lot of private schools don't have help for. for kids with special needs, even if it's dyslexia or ADD, and that can be tough. Sometimes public schools have the best resources. Another rebuttal that I get a lot is like it's really expensive, which is 100% true.

Starting point is 00:37:02 I will not discount that. Christian school, especially nowadays, because the demand has gone up because of where public schools have gone. It is like it's so expensive. But there are hybrid options. There are homeschool options. And before you say I could never homeschool or it's too expensive to homeschool, I don't really know any rich homeschooling families. The families that I know, they have to sacrifice to make it work.

Starting point is 00:37:30 And there are moms that homeschool their kids with the help of co-ops and other teachers who say, I thought that I could never do this, but it was best for my kid. I encourage you to look into it. Look into something like Charlotte Mason or classical conversations. There's a lot of resources out there. there's a lot of help for you. Unlike how it was 20, 30 years ago, there's a ton of community and a ton of support. If that's something that you're thinking about and you're just lacking the confidence in doing it, you can do it. I mean, God has equipped you and you and your husband to steward your

Starting point is 00:38:05 child, to prepare your child, to equip your child. You don't have to be, you know, a Pulitzer prize winner to teach your child English. And so, if that's something that you're thinking about pulling your kid out of public school, either making the sacrifice, sending them to Christian school, or teaching them at home, I do believe that, like, God is faithful in that, and he will help you make that decision. And I also get a lot of people say, well, what's going to happen to all the kids at public school if all the Christians leave? And I do understand that, but your kids, your kids, your six-year-old is not a missionary. your kid is the mission field.

Starting point is 00:38:46 You are evangelizing to your child. Your child at this young age does not have to walk into a mission field every single day and be responsible for not only learning math but sharing the gospel with everyone they encounter. I'm not saying they can't. And I'm not saying they shouldn't be sharing the gospel. But remember, we're not sending our kids out into the mission field of public school to sacrifice their well-being, their theological training for the sake of other people's kits. Like God is sovereign. He is sovereign over their salvation and sanctification. There are beautiful,

Starting point is 00:39:23 wonderful Christian teachers who I think as long as they can should stay in Christian school and be lights there. But don't sacrifice your child's education for that reason. Think about how you are stewarding your child's heart and mind. There were a lot of responses to this that I thought were good. For example, Darrell Harrison said, he quoted Carl Marx, the education of all children from the moment that they can get along without a mother's care shall be in state institutions. Carl Marx. And of course, we see this in several countries in Europe, where children are actually forced to start state-funded schools, public schools, at three years old.

Starting point is 00:40:09 and that is for the purpose of cultural uniformity. That is to make sure that everyone is on the same page ideologically. Megan Bastum said, it's good to see the immediate pushback to this post, but it seems a little silly to pretend that Christianity today is confused or misguided. Its purpose for years now has been to deliver the next generation of evangelicals to secular progressives on a platter. They are in the neutering business.

Starting point is 00:40:39 Ouch. You know, I would have to agree with that. I don't know that every single article or every single author at Christianity today is just that progressive, but I will say this is intentionally pushing the envelope to try to get conservative Christians to calm down and take evangelizing and discipleship less seriously, I think. Let me pause in and tell you about our next sponsor, and that is Jace Maddochle. President Biden has signed off on a highly classified plan that shifts America's nuclear strategy to focus on China as a nuclear threat and to prepare for the possibility that the communist nation could team up with North Korea and Russia against the United States. If that doesn't make you nervous, well, I don't know,

Starting point is 00:41:22 we're trusting in God, so we're not being paranoid, but we do want to be prepared. And that means getting an emergency kit of the medical supplies you need through the Jace case. It's a personalized emergency kit that contains essential antibiotics and medications that treat the most common and deadly bacterial infections. It provides five life-saving antibiotics for emergency use. Go to jace.com, enter code alley at checkout for a discount on your order. That's promo code alley at j-a-s-e.com. Okay, I know that's a controversial. I know that's a controversial discussion to have. And obviously, parents who send their kids to whatever school love their kids, and I'm not doubting that. I am passionate about this subject, and I'm sure that comes across because I think

Starting point is 00:42:11 it's so important for our kids to have the best foundation possible. But God is in charge. And if for whatever reason, because there are exceptions, you have to send your child to public school. I know that you are doing the best that you can to disciple them while they're at home. And that is absolutely a challenge. We won't minimize that. But God is in charge. Do the best you can to catechize your kids every second that you are with then. That's all of our responsibilities. And God is faithful. He is in charge of their salvation. And we have to hope that we are being obedient and that the seeds that we are planting, he will water and give growth to them throughout their lives. All right. So let's, let's go to a non-controversial topic. And that's IVF, a topic that everyone agrees on, right?

Starting point is 00:43:03 No, this is probably the most controversial thing that I talk about, the dangers of in vitro fertilization, and I mean the ethical dangers, but also the physical dangers for the little lives that are being created. This is something that I started thinking about only a few years ago. So if you had never thought about the ethics of IVF, you're not alone. A lot of Christians haven't thought about it. I hadn't thought about it either until relatively recently. But since a few years ago, we've talked about it quite a lot because it's.

Starting point is 00:43:33 it's become the center of a lot of political and cultural and moral discussions, which I think is good. But it's very contentious because there are many people, many of you out there, who have used IVF to conceive your beautiful children. So it's understandably very personal. Infertility is extremely personal and very sensitive. And no one does IVF as like a first resort. And so I understand why this is such a touchy subject and why it can be so hard to talk about. And yet, we have to talk about it because lives are on the line. If we believe that life starts at conception, then we believe those are in-souled image bearers of God and how we treat them matters. And the IVF industry discards more lives every year than the abortion industry does. And right now we've got

Starting point is 00:44:22 one million frozen image bearers on ice. Many of them abandoned, many of them waiting to be adopted out by someone. Maybe they'll be waiting years. even decades, and many more of them will be discarded. And even Christian parents who go in with the best intentions, they find themselves in an ethical quandary when they have created, say, six embryos, and they plan to transfer all of them. But then something happens. They can't have more kids, say after three.

Starting point is 00:44:52 And then what do they do with the other three on ice? What happens to them? They can't bear the thought of adopting them out. They can't bear the thought of leaving them on ice indefinitely and paying that freezer fee. and they can't bear the thought of discarding them either. That is the ethical quandary that every single couple who walks into IVF potentially faces, and that's a really, really serious thing. And these stories demonstrate just how precarious the IVF situation is when it comes to unborn life.

Starting point is 00:45:21 This was reported by TMZ. And I know TMZ is a little bit of a tabloid, but they do have good sources. So Celebrity IVF Clinic to be sued over lost embryos, A popular IVF clinic frequented by celebrities like Kim Kardashian is now facing a lawsuit alleging the clinic wrongfully discarded 16 embryos belonging to one couple after failing to label them. So this is the same clinic also that Paris Hilton and Chrissy Teigen used. It's crazy how many of these celebrities use IVF and all of them, all three of them, also paid surrogates. So you are renting the womb of a woman and you are causing a separation between.

Starting point is 00:46:02 the child and the only woman, the only home he or she has ever known. And you are creating the child with the intention to do that, which is why it is different than adoption. Adoption redeems an already broken situation, whereas surrogacy creates a broken situation. Last October, this clinic informed the plaintiffs in this suit that all of the eggs were fertilized and would be placed in an incubator to grow into viable embryos. But a few days later, an R.P.N. M.G. Doctor told the pair that the company had discarded and thus destroyed all of the plaintiff's embryos, the suit alleges. They eventually admitted that one of its employees had not labeled the couple's embryos before placing them in an incubator, then removed the unmarked embryos from the

Starting point is 00:46:46 incubator and intentionally threw them away. I mean, how often, this is one story that we know about, but how often does this happen? It's so sad. And of course, these parents are devastated. These were their children. they had their own unique DNA. Their gender was already determined at the point of conception. And now she has to go through egg retrieval. Again, she has to go through the IVF process. Again, that is very hard on the female body.

Starting point is 00:47:17 That's another thing that's not really talked about there. And so isn't it interesting, whether we're talking about abortion or whether we're talking about embryos, the value or even the validity of a human, is determined by whether they are wanted. But we don't talk about adults like that. We don't talk about teenagers like that. We don't say that a toddler who is unwanted or abused by their parent isn't really a human being and can just be killed. And yet we talk about embryos like that. I mean, it is just a crying shame, the cognitive and moral dissonance that exist when we're talking about these little lives inside the womb. And remember, this is very similar to what happened.

Starting point is 00:48:01 in Alabama. Democrats say that like Trump and his, I don't know, cronies overturned or like banned IVF in Alabama. That's not what happened. This was a lawsuit that was filed by parents who were going through IVF. The IVF clinic destroyed their embryos and they sued because of that. And then based on an old law in Alabama, the Alabama Supreme Court said, yeah, these parents are right. You destroyed human beings and that's not okay. And of course, that had massive implications for the IVF industry, which instead of having the reaction of like, oh, I didn't know people were being destroyed in IVF that's really sad. People had the reaction of, oh, but what about me and what I want?

Starting point is 00:48:44 Which is really sad. It's a disordered way of thinking for the Christian. And we have one more example of this, but I do have another ad. We've got five ads today, which is always hard to get in our five ads. So let me go ahead and do that, and then I'll close this out. It's My Patriot Supply. There is a lot going on the world. know what's going to happen. And that's why we just want to be prepared with our food supply.

Starting point is 00:49:05 Go ahead and get a four-week emergency food supply kit from my Patriot Supply. When you go to preparewithally.com. You'll save that $50. Go to preparewithallie.com for your four-week emergency food kit. Preparewithallie.com. Okay, there was this other article that was recent in the times on September 15th. Want a girl with blue eyes inside? California's VIP IVF industry. So when you treat kids like objects or accessories, it shouldn't be surprising when they're also discarded, like an unwanted piece of candy.

Starting point is 00:49:47 So here is what the article says. Welcome to California, fertility capital of the world. Thanks to many years of liberal regulation, as well as a free market, the state's fertility industry is booming. What have we always said? America is the wild, wild west of reproductive technology in the worst way possible.

Starting point is 00:50:04 This is where wealthy people from around the world wanting babies flock to, willing to pay the big bucks. Regulation is relaxed. The state permits commercialized surrogacy. This is a form of trafficking. It's basically a form of prostitution. You are selling your body for money, which can cost up to $100,000 plus living expenses. People always talk about surrogates like they are so generous. They are getting paid a ton of money to do this. Egg donation. Some donors charge up to $150,000. It's not donation. You're selling your eggs, another form of prostitution, and sperm donation, $5,000, as well as selection of sex. And in some instances, I color, $30,000. So we're putting a literal price tag on children and on women's bodies and on male DNA. Yikes. How just dark and draconian is this? And dystopian. I'm I should say. California has 92 fertility clinics, the most of any U.S. state.

Starting point is 00:51:09 There's so much demand the doctors cannot be trained fast enough. Part of this is because we're getting married really late, putting careers before our children. And so women are chasing their careers until they're 40 years old and wondering, wait, why can't I get pregnant? I finally settled down because like the female body just isn't made to do that. And so then they're going through IVF, multiple rounds of IVF, not knowing that IVF is, is very rarely successful when you get to that age. It's not very successful at all in general, but especially the older that you get. So that's part of what's happening here. A cottage industry of high-end fertility concierges has popped up, which can source acupuncturists, ship breast milk,

Starting point is 00:51:53 and for those who want twins, organize two surrogates to be pregnant at once. So disgusting. A question of ethics. In most of the industrialized world, it is legal to test IVF embryos for certain genetic disorders, such as cystic fibrosis, sickle cell disease, and Down syndrome, the difference is that the U.S. has not regulated screening for an embryo sex or other traits. So if you decide, say you get all female embryos, you didn't want a female, you just wanted a son, you can discard all of them based on their sex. This is eugenics. This is what's happening in the IVF industry. The majority of L.A.-based IVF Dr. Jeffrey Steinberg's clients are from countries where sex selection and eye color selection is banned. Eye color selection. Like they're a designer

Starting point is 00:52:43 purse or shoes that you're picking out. These are human beings made in the image of God. We are so extremely backwards in how we think about children. We think about them as objects. We think about them as possessions. We don't think about them as human beings with rights, made in the image of God with an innate value, we are going all the way back to pagan, ancient Greece, and Rome who really saw children as subhuman. And they were only seen as valuable in so far as they could contribute to their family's wealth or contribute to society in some other way or they were seen as sexual objects. And what changed that was the introduction of Christianity. What changed that was the gospel. What changed that was Christians who followed a

Starting point is 00:53:31 God man who said, let the little children come to me, for to such as these belongs the kingdom of heaven, who said that these children are made in the image of God, and therefore they matter. And so Christians changed education. They introduced orphanages. They introduced organizations and shelters for the most vulnerable. Hospitals. Christians changed the game for the most vulnerable. We have always been for our 2,000-year history a refuge of clarity and courage for those who are victims of the chaos and confusion of our age.

Starting point is 00:54:11 We have led the way in education. We have led the way when it comes to caring for the sick and for the child. We have stood in the way of child sacrifice from Nero to Newsome, from Herod to Harris, That is who Christians have been. That's what we must continue to be, whether it comes to the education of our children or the creation of our children. All right. That's all we've got time for today. See you guys back here tomorrow.

Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 1071 | Christianity Today: Kids Need Public School

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