What Makes Christian Education Christian?

These are the speakers for the on-line Biblical Integration Summit to be held this coming Wednesday, November 14. Attendees will have the ability to select any presentations they want to view, and view them as many times as desired on that day. Unlimited viewing of all of the sessions after that day will be provided at a reasonable fee through Faith Markets.  

What makes Christian education Christian? Is it having Christian teachers? That's a good start. Christian teachers are necessary. But many dedicated, God-called teachers are working in the state schools. How much Christian education is taking place there? Having Christian teachers, even in Christian schools, does not guarantee Christian education will be occurring. 

What about having chapel service once a week, or daily Bible instruction, and opening classes with prayer? These are important, too, but they do not necessarily Christian education make.

Christian education is "made" when a biblical worldview permeates all academic subjects, after-school sports, and the fine arts program. But what does that mean?

This is where the Biblical Integration Summit comes in! 

Anyone with access to the Internet, worldwide, may attend the Summit at no charge this coming Wednesday, November 14. All of the speakers have been pre-recorded on video, so each speaker's presentation may be viewed individually, as many times as desired on that day, rather than having the whole event streamed linearly.

One special aspect of the Summit is that 3 teachers I know will be sharing about their own "biblically integrative" experiences in teaching elementary and secondary students at their respective schools in Washington State, Iowa, and Virginia. 

I have seen these teachers' presentations and they are truly excellent, both in terms of information and inspiration. These concise presentations by 3 master practitioners in their field are each about 15 minutes long. You will not be bored! I guarantee it! The teachers are Kim Tarr, Vicki Greer and Gaby Urgo.

As for myself, I will be introducing "3 Tools for Biblical Worldview Integration" during my 20-minute session. I will share why "biblical worldview integration" can best be understood as "contextualization," and I will illustrate this through 3 tools that are used by the most "biblically integrative" teachers I know.  

Reserve your seat for this free event today, by clicking here.

Forward this information to your friends and social media connections by using one of the links below: 

Posted by Dr. Christian Overman 

Biblical Integration Summit Online

Faith Markets will be hosting the "Biblical Integration in Education Summit" 100% on line, November 14. 

I urge all teachers and administrators to "plug in" to the free Biblical Integration Summit online, Wednesday, November 14. 

Eleven skilled presenters will be sharing, including Dr. Marti MacCullough (Distinguished Professor Emeritus at Cairn University), Gavin Brettenny (Head of Black Forest Academy, Kandern, Germany), Harold Klassen (educational consultant with Teach Beyond), and yours truly [that's me], plus more.

Three of the presenters are teachers from schools that have completed the Worldview Matters "WRAP" teacher training program [click here to learn more about this program]. These master teachers (Kim Tarr, from Lighthouse Christian School, Gig Harbor, WA, Vicki Greer, from Isaac Newton Christian Academy, Cedar Rapids, IA, and Gaby Urgo, from Grace Christian School, Staunton, VA) will be sharing "integrative" lesson plans they have used successfully with their students, in grade 2, grade 5, and grade 10, respectively.  

You may watch any of the presenters at any time throughout the day on November 14 for free, if you have reserved your seat ahead of time. To reserve your free seat, click here. 

If you are unable to attend the event on November 14, but you would like to watch the event later (or you will attend the free event and want access the content again later), you may purchase unlimited access to all the Summit video presentations for $99, through Faith Markets. (You must reserve a seat in order to access the recorded content later.)

The Biblical Integration in Education Summit will address topics such as:

What is biblical integration?

Why is biblical integration foundational to an authentic Christian education?

How is biblically integrated education done most effectively in the classroom?

This Summit equips educators to effectively lead their students in integrating a biblical worldview into their lives. I suggest you reserve your seat today: click here.

If you know others who would be interested in the Integration Summit, you may use this link to share information with them: https://summit.faithmarkets.com/biblical-integration-summit8s1fd4ji?affiliate_id=1363287

Or you may simply forward this blog post to your social media connections by using one of the links provided below. 

Posted by Dr. Christian Overman 

The Friends We Can't Afford To Live Without

Last week we explored our Personal Board of Directors. This week, let's think about the people we can't afford to live without.

Tom Rath discovered something surprising that goes against common thinking about the workplace. He discovered that a person having a "best friend at work" is seven times more likely to be engaged in his or her job. 

Rath is the best-selling author of How Full Is Your Bucket? and StrengthsFinder 2.0. In his book titled, Vital Friends: The People you Can't Afford to Live Without, Rath identifies eight types of friends. He says these are the friends we can't afford to live without: 

The Builder: a person who motivates you to accomplish things you would not otherwise accomplish.

The Champion: a person who sings your praises to others.

The Collaborator: a person who has similar interests, and shares those interests with you.

The Companion: a person who is always there for you.

The Connector: a person who introduces you to others.

The Energizer: a person who gives you a boost.

The Mind Opener: a person who challenges you to think outside the box.

The Navigator: a person who provides guidance for you.

Reading this book made me aware that I not only need other people, but others need me as much as I need them.

Who are the friends you can't live without? Can you name them? What kind of a friend are you to them?

The context of Ecclesiastes 4:9-12 is the workplace. It says:

Two are better than one, 
because they have a good return for their labor; 
If either of them falls down, 
one can help the other up.
But pity anyone who falls 
and has no one to help them up. 

Also, if two lie down together, they will keep warm. 
But how can one keep warm alone? 
Though one may be overpowered, 
two can defend themselves. 
A cord of three strands is not quickly broken. 

Who's On Your Personal Board Of Directors?

 Everyone has a Personal Board of Directors. 
Can you identify yours?

This post is the 4th most frequently viewed post of my 10 years of blogging. I was introduced to the exercise below by Dr. Kathy Koch (pronounced “cook”), Founder of Celebrate Kids, Inc. With Kathy's permission, I have shared it with many over the years.

I invite you to take out a clean sheet of paper, and write the following at the top: My Personal Board of Directors. 

In the middle of the page, draw an oval to represent a large conference room table. Around this table, print the names of others who currently influence you the most, in a positive way. They may be living or deceased. They may be people you have not met, such as authors, media personalities, sports figures, or musicians. These are the voices you turn to, listen to, and learn the most from. These are the voices you take seriously when you want counsel, ideas, motivation, companionship, guidance, or a boost of confidence. Limit the number of Board Members to six or seven.

Now write a short description by each name that identifies the reason he or she is on your Personal Board of Directors. For example, “He always makes time for me,” or, “She never makes me feel like my ideas won't work.”

Finally, write a short personal note to one of your Personal Board Members (a living one), thanking this person and letting him/her know that he/she is on your Board, and why. Better yet, write a note to all of your living Board Members.

Several of my Personal Board Members have sat at my board table for more than 30 years. My wife has been on my Personal Board of Directors for nearly 50 years!

These are the friends I cannot afford to live without.

Who's on your Personal Board of Directors? Maybe you can't limit it to six or seven. Get a larger piece of paper. Thank at least two of them today, and be sure to let them know why they are on your Board. You will be glad you did, and they will be glad, too.

One question: Did you include Jesus on your Personal Board of Directors? Hopefully He’s at the head of the table!

He's been at mine for 60 years.

The Remarkable Link Between Liberty and Labor

When "Thank God It's Friday" and "Happy Hump Day" are commonly heard at work, one has to wonder if the workplace is a kind of prison for many people. A British friend of mine, David Oliver, wrote a great book on this topic, titled, Work: Prison or Place of Destiny.

The "Thank God It's Friday Syndrome" can easily take over when we fail to keep the remarkable link between liberty and labor in mind.

What is that link? 

Check it out in this short clip from God's Pleasure At Work: 

If the video does not play click here.

An Awkward Question

Mr. Rogers testifying before congress in 1969.

Photo by http://www.fredrogers.org/frc/news/mister-rogers-goes-washington-may-1-1969 (United States Senate via fredrogers.org) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Last week, after posting a piece in which I quoted Martin Luther extensively, a friend sent me an awkward question: 

"And while you tend to quote Martin Luther, why don't you ever quote anything from his book, 'On the Jews and Their Lies'?"

It's strange, isn't it? From the same mind that gave us "A Mighty Fortress Is Our God," came an anti-Semitic treatise. 

I've never read this book by Luther, nor will I waste my time doing so. But the book will not disappear. 

It's like the unwanted-yet-interminable caterwaul of ludicrous statements made by male buffoons in a high school yearbook, yet with no comparison in its devastating self-condemnation because it wasn't written by an injudicious teenager. Luther doesn't have that excuse. It pains me.

In response to my friend, I referred him to a song written by that great children's philosopher-pastor, Mr. Rogers. It's a thoughtful song (as all Mr. Rogers' songs are) titled, "Sometimes People Are Good." 

The opening stanza goes like this: 

Sometimes people are good
And they do just what they should.
But the very same people who are good sometimes
Are the very same people who are bad sometimes.
It's funny, but it's true.
It's the same, isn't it for me and...

When Mr. Rogers wrote that line, "It's funny, but it's true," he was not saying it was something to laugh about. He was saying it's strange. 

But did Mr. Rogers really think it was so strange? 

No. As he said, "It's the same, isn't it for me and..."

I'm not justifying Luther's anti-Semitic book in the least, nor am I minimizing this most egregious error. It's a dark blight on an otherwise very bright light. I'm just saying Luther was, in fact, human. That's not an excuse. It's just a fact. 

We could all use a bit of Mr. Rogers' perspective today. I invite you to take 2 minutes to watch him sing the "Sometimes" song during the first season of Mr. Roger's Neighborhood, in 1968, some 50 years ago:

If the video does not play, click here.

"Shovel That Manure For The Glory Of God"

God used a bull-headed former monk with a red-hot pen to quash the "Sacred-Secular Divide" by putting farming on the same level with the priesthood.

Martin Luther, in The Babylonian Captivity of the Church, wrote:

"Therefore I advise no one to enter any religious order or the priesthood, indeed, I advise everyone against it--unless he is forearmed with this knowledge and understands that the works of monks and priests, however holy and arduous they may be, do not differ one whit in the sight of God from the works of the rustic laborer in the field or the woman going about her household tasks, but that all works are measured before God by faith alone."

He also said:

“The idea that the service to God should have only to do with a church altar, singing, reading, sacrifice, and the like is without doubt but the worst trick of the devil. How could the devil have led us more effectively astray than by the narrow conception that service to God takes place only in church and by works done therein… The whole world could abound with services to the Lord ['Gottesdienste']…not only in churches but also in the home, kitchen, workshop, field.”

Luther declared, “A dairymaid can milk cows to the glory of God. If your job is shoveling manure, then do your best and shovel that manure for the glory of God.”

It’s hard for us to fully appreciate how radical these words were in Luther's time. The “Sacred-Secular Divide” was deeply entrenched, and God raised up a bull-headed former monk with a red-hot pen to quash it by putting farming on the same level with the priesthood. 

Luther understood we are not only saved by faith, but we also work by faith, both priest and shoemaker. Followers of Christ live by faith. Any work done by faith, for the glory of the Lord, is Gottesdienste, “service of God.”

Luther further declared: “The Christian shoemaker does his duty not by putting little crosses on the shoes, but by making good shoes, because God is interested in good craftsmanship.”

Martin Luther King, Jr., stood on his namesake’s shoulders when he said this about a person's calling:

“If a man is called to be a streetsweeper, he should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted, or Beethoven played music, or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will pause to say, here lived a great streetsweeper who did his job well.”

Christianity gives labor dignity.

Martin Luther King's ideals were based upon Christian principles.

Photo by Nobel Foundation (http://nobelprize.org/) [public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

What Success Looks Like

For the past 10 years, I have blogged about how we can approach human labor in the larger context of the biblical worldview. Yet, to the best of my recollection, I have never addressed the question of what success looks like when it comes to our state of mind at work.

I will do this today. 

However, as I do this, I am reminded of Viktor Frankl, the psychiatrist of Jewish descent who spent two-and-a-half years in four Nazi concentration camps, penning these words in his great book, Man's Search for Meaning: 

"Don't aim at success," advised Frankl, "the more you aim at it and make it a target, the more you are going to miss it. For success, like happiness cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side-effect of one's dedication to a cause greater than oneself or as the by-product of one's surrender to a person other than oneself."

This is excellent advice. "Success" (like "happiness") is not the target. Rather, it is the by-product of surrender to a cause much greater than ourselves (the Kingdom of God), and to the most important Person in the universe. 

To see what success looks like, with respect to a biblical state of mind at work, click here. 

As with the list of "Juicy Questions" I provided last week, the list of mental attitudes I am sharing today is not intended for ingestion all at once. You'll choke on it. Focus on one state of mind per week, and it will  keep you occupied for nearly a year. 

Onward and upward.

Juicy Questions

[Photo used by permission of Crosstown Church of Christ.]

When I think of John Calvin working in the broken city of Geneva to renew it, in the 1500s, one word comes to my mind: intentionality. 

When Calvin taught the believers how to connect their faith with their "station in life," he was intentional and specific. As I mentioned last week, he advised bankers to not charge more than 4% interest, lest they fall into the sin of what the Bible calls "usury."

For Calvin, getting people "saved" was not the end game. It was a necessary first step, and Calvin knew there was a second and a third and a fourth. He understood believers are called to observe all that Christ commanded, and he recognized that this observation was to fully occupy our lives after we say "I do" to the Lord. 

Leading people to say "the prayer" is great. But teaching them to observe [practice] Christ's commands is a big part of the Great Commission of Matthew 28 as well, and intentionality is needed.  
 
May I encourage you to be more intentional about observing Christ's commands in your workplace today?

I will provide you with some thought-provoking questions to "get the juices going." Glance through the list provided below, and see if one or two questions resonate with you.  Think about these questions as you approach your work today, whether your work is in the home or in the marketplace. Try a couple more questions tomorrow, and the next day, etc.  

For my list of juicy questions, click here.

Three Essentials

Corruption in the church was no stranger to Calvin.

[Photo formerly attributed to Hans Holbein (public domain), via Wikimedia Commons.]

A low point of my summer came when I heard about the child sexual abuse by 300+ priests involving 1,000+ victims over 70 years in Pennsylvania. The scope of the scandal stunned me. 

The problem is not limited to the church. In our nation's schools, 25% of US school districts reported incidents of sexual abuse over the past 10 years. In 2014 alone, roughly 800 school employees were prosecuted for sex crimes with students. These were caught. Imagine 70 years.

Yet, non-believers will add the latest church scandal to their justifications for rejecting Christianity (of any stripe) altogether. 

Corruption in the church is not new. I think of the priests who operated houses of prostitution in Geneva, in the 1500's. 

The people ran the bishop out of town in 1530. William Farel, a French evangelist, came in 1531. His co-worker, Antoine Froment cried in the markeplace, "We must reform the church in order to reform the nation!" 

Farel sought John Calvin, demanding he come to Geneva to apply the theology he was writing about. Calvin came at the age of 27, and rebuilt this broken city on three essentials:

1. Preaching the Gospel: "...so that people would be saved and start to be transformed and the church would be restored to biblical purity."

2. Teaching: "...so that people would know how to live, the authorities would know how to govern, and all would know how to work in their different spheres." 

3. Accountability: "...so that the teaching would not just be theoretical but applied in all areas of life."

Calvin had no room for a Sacred-Secular Divide. He believed "holy vocations" included the work of the banker as well as the pastor, and advised bankers to not charge high interest rates, identifying this as the sin of "usury" in the Bible. Calvin understood that Jesus is the Lord of all banks.

Geneva became "a city on a hill," where a healthy church of transformed people engaging in God-glorifying work throughout every sphere of life in the city brought righteous commerce and just governance to the public square from the inside out, not the outside in.  

John Knox came to Geneva and took what he learned to Scotland. English believers were influenced by Geneva, and later brought the so-called "Protestant Work Ethic" to North America.  

See Thomas Bloomer's, "Calvin and Geneva: Nation-Building Missions." Click here. 

There's hope. If...

Biblical Worldview Training Boot Camps

Join fellow teachers and administrators for training and inspiration at the Manderley Christian Camp & Conference Center this summer, in Pikeville, TN.

It's my custom to take a break from blogging during the summer months, so my next post, Lord willing, will be out on the first Friday of September.

In the meantime, I invite you to join me at the Manderley Christian Camp & Conference Center, in Pikeville, Tennessee, this summer, for the 2018 Biblical Worldview Training Boot Camps for Teachers and Administrators, hosted by Renewanation.

I look forward to speaking on The Lost Purpose for Learning, and also providing practical tools for accomplishing biblical worldview integration in the classroom.

There are 4 camps this summer, held on the following dates: July 23-24, July 26-27, July 30-31 and August 2-3.

For details, including registration, click here.

I hope to see some of you there!

Onward and upward.

Christian

Posted by Dr. Christian Overman 

This Is Not Your Mainstream European Thinking

Viktor Orban delivers his inaugural address at the start of his third term as Prime Minister of Hungary. 
Photo by Thomas Kovacs

From a Christian perspective, there is not a lot of positive press coming out of Europe these days.

So what happened on May 10 was unusual, as the Prime Minister of Hungary, Viktor Orban, was sworn into office for his third term. He won the election by a 2/3 majority. This in itself is noteworthy, but what is more noteworthy is Mr. Orban's inaugral address.

Consider this:

“Let us acknowledge that hidden behind the successes one always finds the grace of God. So the following is not just a rhetorical flourish, and not just tradition, but a deep conviction: Soli Deo gloria – Glory to God alone.” 

And this:

"I will not conceal our intentions: here before you I am making it clear that, acting in the name of Hungarian freedom, my government will be a determined opponent of [the plan for one European government], the process that has led here and its intermediate steps. Multiculturalism was the first such step. Political correctness, which muzzles freedom of speech, was the second. This is where Europe stands today. The third step would be the mandatory migrant resettlement quotas. We must and we will enter the arena of European politics, in order to stop the Europe that we love – and for which we are ready to make major sacrifices – climbing to the next step towards self-immolation. We shall oppose the mandatory quotas, stand up for Christian culture, and fight to defend borders.”

Stand up for Christian culture?

And then this:

"One cannot renew an entire nation in secret. In my view, a contribution to the results we have achieved so far has been made by our open declaration that the age of liberal democracy is at an end. Liberal democracy is no longer able to protect people's dignity, provide freedom, guarantee physical security or maintain Christian culture...Our response to this changed world, the Hungarian people's response, has been to replace the shipwreck of liberal democracy by building 21st-century Christian democracy. This guarantees human dignity, freedom and security, protects equality between men and women and the traditional family model, suppresses anti-Semitism, defends our Christian culture and offers a nation the chance of survival and growth. We are Christian democrats, and we want Christian democracy."

Glory to God alone?  Protect the traditional family model? Suppress anti-Semitism? Defend Christian culture?

This is not your mainstream European thinking.  

Let's keep Mr. Orban, and Hungary, in our prayers.

Posted by Dr. Christian Overman