Today I will wrap up the discussion of what it means to train students to shine as lights in our world.

The last area of this discussion is the one that most people undoubtedly think of first when thinking about why a school exists…the academic instruction of students. Like any other school, the effective Christian school exists to provide academic instruction of the highest quality. In fact, it has always been my conviction that a Christian school that fails to accomplish this has failed the students and parents of students in its school, even if it manages to succeed in providing quality spiritual instruction. The Christian school has a serious two-fold responsibility, and it is a both-and responsibility, not an either-or. The effective Christian school does not decide between providing either top notch academic instruction or in-depth spiritual instruction and discipleship; rather, it recognizes that one cannot truly be provided without the other, and strives to accomplish both at the highest possible level.

Let me elaborate. A Christian school cannot provide spiritual instruction at the expense of academic instruction because the spiritual instruction would lack all relevant meaning and application. A student who memorizes Bible verses, learns Bible stories, and even understands the essential doctrines of the Bible, but has no idea how to apply those things in his or her life or how the teaching of Scripture can be lived out in every day interactions with others will not be able to effectively shine as a light in the world because he or she will have no idea how to do so. This student will either fail to realize that he/she has a light, or will hide said light out of fear of interacting with the world. This student will have acquired significant knowledge, but will be lacking wisdom–the ability to utilize the knowledge that has been acquired. What this means, bottom line, is that the student has been given a powerful weapon but has no idea how to use it. There is really only one word for this–useless.

At the same time, a Christian school which treats spiritual development as an aside and is too timid to treat Bible as an actual class deserving of a grade and requiring actual work from the students will have committed an equally egregious offense against its students. While the relationship between a believer and the Lord is a personal matter, it is also a corporate issue. Believers have a responsibility to encourage, edify, and exhort one another in spiritual growth, and this cannot be accomplished in a mamby-pamby manner which refuses to provide genuine accountability.

Likewise, a Christian school which teaches its academic content in a spiritual vacuum, refusing to integrate biblical principles or apply biblical instruction to the study of science, math, history, English, etc. will have succeeded in training its students to believe that “religion” is to be kept separate from all other spheres of life…which is far from what Scripture teaches.

The successful Christian school, the one that trains its students to shine as lights in this world, teaches academic content at the highest possible level, demanding excellence from its students in every area, while simultaneously weaving biblical instruction and application into every subject at every grade level. Students learn the who, what, where, when, why and how of the academic subjects (acquiring the necessary academic knowledge) and then also learn how to take what they have learned and use it as a springboard for future learning, digging deeper into certain areas and developing applications for both the academic and spiritual knowledge they have acquired in a practical way.

What might this look like specifically? In the sciences, it means understanding the scientific explanations for (insert specific content here), including the secular arguments (read “Darwinism,” for example) while also learning the pertinent biblical content. Then, when given the opportunity, these students can recognize the secular approach, can discuss it intelligently and cogently, and can respond with a well-developed and articulate apology for the biblical position. Science is but one example; the principle holds true for any topic or issue.

Students who have not been equipped to recognize and engage in this manner have been handicapped. If they fail to recognize or understand the secular arguments they are likely to be sucked in by them at worst, or to have no idea how to respond to them, which is only marginally better. This is like equipping the student with a brilliant light, but hiding it inside of a black box or forgetting to show them how to turn the light on. On the other hand, equipping the student with the knowledge necessary to recognize the secular arguments and to respond, but failing to teach him how to do so in an articulate or winsome manner is akin to giving him the same brilliant light and forgetting to tell him not to shine it directly in someone’s eyes. Let us not forget that living in total darkness is much like blindness, but sudden and direct exposure to brilliant light can also cause blindness. What I mean is that boldly and, yes, obnoxiously shining the brilliance of biblical truth into the eyes of one who has to that point only known darkness can have the opposite effect of what we may intend. It can be offensive–even painful–and can drive someone deeper into darkness. The well-trained and properly equipped student has the light and he knows who to use it (including the discernment to know how much light is appropriate at any given time, and when is the right time to increase the light). Only then can this student effectively shine as a light in our world.

Thus far we have examined how shining as lights begins with our behavior–simply acting in a way that is contrary to the world and sin nature, and as a result serves to shine as a light in the darkness of the world. We also discussed the importance of teachers and staff members who live out what they are teaching, since actions speak oh-so-much louder than words. We examined the importance of learning and knowing the Word of God so that we can “hold fast” to it as Paul instructed. Peter addresses this issue as well, in 1 Peter 3:15, instructing believers to be always prepared to “make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you…” (ESV). Part of holding fast to God’s Word is knowing it thoroughly enough that we can explain what it means and how it impacts our lives when we are asked by others to do so. Students who are effectively taught from a biblical worldview and thoroughly grounded in biblical truth will be always ready; they will not need to request a “time out” to put together an answer and they will not stutter and flub their way through some garbled explanation that makes no sense to anyone (including the speaker!).

I am not suggesting that every student will become an eloquent speaker or a world class apologist for a relationship with Christ. I am, however, suggesting that students who are trained to shine as lights in our world will know, to borrow titles from Paul Little, both what they believe and why they believe it. Does that mean they will never need to look up an answer or say “I don’t know” in response to a theological question? Of course not. But it does mean that they are equipped with answers and they are ready to give them.

Immediately after the exhortation to be always ready with an answer Peter adds that said answer is to be offered in “gentleness and respect.” This is another part of training students to shine as lights in our world–teaching them how to be lights in the world in an appropriate manner. We are not to be gentle to the extreme of being cowardly; in other words, we are not to shy away from opportunities to speak out for our Lord or His teachings. Peter himself boldly proclaimed the gospel message even in defiance of the instructions of the Sanhedrin, stating that when the two are in contradiction it is far more important to obey God rather than man. But the answers that we offer, and the life that we lead, must not be offered in a way that is offensive. The message will be offensive, whether it is a spoken word or a lived-out message, because the cross and the teachings of Jesus are an offense to the world in and of themselves. We cannot hide the offensiveness of the message to the lost, nor should we ever try. We must never “hide our lamps under a bush.” But we must take care to ensure that it is only the message that is offensive and not the way in which we deliver it.

Several things are important to keep in mind here. First, we cannot convince anyone of the truth of Scripture or the need to accept Christ by our own persuasion or rhetorical eloquence; the Holy Spirit will convict hearts and draw unbelievers to the Lord in accordance with the will of God. Our responsibility is to faithfully plant seeds and shine our lights. Second, as believers we are not better than unbelievers, and we must never carry ourselves or present our messages in a manner which might suggest otherwise. We were born in sin, too, and until God, through His mercy, drew us to Him allowing us to accept the gift of Christ’s death and resurrection we were headed to hell, too. We are no better now than we were then–in and of ourselves. We are now members of the family of God, but “not by works of righteousness which [we] have done.” We did not do anything to earn or warrant salvation, nor could we have. So the only difference between the believer and the unbeliever is that the believer has already accepted the free gift of God. Accordingly, we must never come across as arrogant, superior, or more deserving.

It is not by mistake that in my discussion of what it means to train students to shine as lights in our world that I have not yet even touched on academic instruction. As important as that is, and as large a part as that plays in the training of the students, it will be for naught if the proper understanding of the spiritual side of this relationship does not come first and foremost. An individual can have all of the academic honors man can offer, but if he does not know Christ and understand the biblical instructions for believers to shine as lights in this world his book learning will benefit him not at all. That is why I have spent so much time trying to clearly articulate what this really looks like. The academic portion of the equation is important, however, and Lord willing I will address that part tomorrow.

The next thing that is important to notice about Paul’s admonition to shine as lights in the world is that he follows his statement that believers are, to the twisted and perverse generation (unbelievers), “lights in the world, holding fast to the word of life….” What is the word of life? It is the truth of Jesus Christ, the gospel message, the Scriptures. A necessary part of shining as lights in the world is holding firmly to the truth of the Bible.

There are many people in the world who read the Bible but who have no idea what it means and have no conviction that it is anything other than great literature. I can still remember a class I was going to take in college, a New Testament course. The professor of the class made it very clear on the first day of class that he did not believe that Paul wrote all of the New Testament books that the Bible says he wrote, that the Bible is not true or inspired by God, and that we would be examining the New Testament with that background. I did not take the course; I dropped it immediately and took an intro course in African history instead. But that professor was a perfect example of the innumerable people in the world who know the Bible in an academic sense, who can carry on lengthy conversations about it and can dissect it in dozens of different ways, but who have no relationship with the God of the Bible and have no understanding of what they are reading. These people are like the Ethiopian eunuch who was reading Isaiah; prior to Philip arriving in obedience to the Lord’s instruction and explaining what it meant to the eunuch he had no idea what he was reading. These people profess to be wise, and from a purely academic and intellectual knowledge standpoint are wise, but their understanding has been darkened and they are, in fact, fools (Romans 1:22).

The first step to holding fast to the word of life is understanding what it means. Just like the eunuch needed Philip, we all need someone to come along side and explain what the Scriptures mean to us until we are able to graduate from the spiritual milk and chew on the meat of the Word ourselves. Students need a guide, a teacher, to explain to them the truth of God’s word. Parents have that responsibility, pastors and Sunday school teachers do, but so do the teachers in the Christian school. In truly Christian education every class in every subject is taught with biblical integration. There is no separation of Bible and history, math, science and English in a curricular program with a biblical worldview. Our relationship with Christ is not a Sunday-only thing. It is day by day, moment by moment, and should influence every area of our lives. This is the kind of instruction that students require in order to learn what it means to hold fast to the word of life. How does the Bible apply to friendships, decision making, relationships with parents, academic integrity, benevolence, service to others, and on and on. Only when students learn that the teachings and the truths of the Bible are pertinent and applicable and relevant to the situations they will find themselves in every day and the decisions that they will have to make, and only when the submit their will and natural tendency to the guiding of the Spirit and the teaching of the Word will they be able to shine as lights in the world.

Yesterday I explained how simply not grumbling, complaining and questioning is a way to shine as a light in a dark world since such behavior is so contrary to what the world finds normal and expected.

Immediately after the instruction not to grumble or question Paul says that believers are to behave that way in order to be blameless and innocent. Of course believers do not lose their sin nature and we do not stop sinning after being born again. However, our sin nature should be continually put to death through daily decisions to live a God-honoring life. This requires moment-by-moment decisions; it is not something that happens once and is done.

The point that Paul is making, I believe, is that if we grumble and complain–in other words, if we act just like the word–there will be no effectiveness to our testimony or our witness. When we act like the world we are providing grounds for unbelievers to “blame” us. They can rightly point to our behavior and identify the contradiction between what we are saying with our mouths and how we are living our lives. There will be a disconnect between our talk and our walk. And as we all know, people pay much more attention to, and are much more impacted by, what we do than what we say.

Will we ever be innocent? Of course not. Not during this life time. But we should live our lives in such a way that when unbelievers are looking for glaring contradictions in our lives between our talk and our walk they will not be able to legitimately identify any. This means, of course, that when we do mess up (and we will) that we confess our shortcomings. We need to take ownership of our mistakes, apologize to those we wrong, and acknowledge when we fall short. This is almost unheard of in the world, too, because this behavior is also contrary to sin nature.

Paul goes on to say that we are to be blameless and innocent “in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation.” As wicked as our world is today, it was just as wicked when Paul was writing to the church in Philippi. While I may be in the minority, I have never been a believer in the idea that it is much harder to grow up today than ever before or much harder to live for the Lord now than it used to be. Have there been times in our nation’s history when God-honoring behavior was more the norm and more culturally expected that it is now? Yes, probably so. But the same possibilities for sin existed then that exist now, albeit in different forms. Ever since Eve, and then Adam, ate of the fruit in the garden, every generation has been “crooked and perverse.” When we read about Noah we read that the behavior of man was so wicked and evil that God regretted having made man. It was so bad that He decided to wipe out all but eight people on the earth and start all over.

Back to what this means in terms of training students, though, it means that teachers and staff members at the school must model for the students the kind of life that Scripture calls believers to live. Teachers must not grumble or question, even when they want to. Teaching is tough. Anyone who has ever worked with children for any length of time (their own or someone else’s) knows that eventually the patience of even the most calm and easy going person will be tried. How do we act then? Teachers and staff members must also model acknowledging wrongs and asking for forgiveness. There was a time when it was considered a huge sign of weakness for an adult to apologize to or admit a mistake to a child. In some circles that is still true. But what Paul is instructing us to do is, of course, contrary to human wisdom. When a teacher loses his or her cool in the classroom, or in any other way demonstrates behavior not consistent with Paul’s exhortation to be blameless and innocent, appropriate actions must be taken.

Next, teachers and staff members must expect this kind of behavior from the students in the school. Teachers must teach students how to behave in this manner, through words and actions, and then provide opportunity for them to do so. That means teaching students how to identify a wrong, how to acknowledge it, and how to seek forgiveness for it–from the offended person(s) and from the Lord.

Training students to shine as lights in our world goes beyond what I have described here. It includes preparing students to present an effective defense of the Bible, to proactively witness to the unbelievers around them, and to actively oppose evil in our world. But these things come later. The foundation to those things is personal choices and actions. So training students to shine as lights in our world begins right in the school with the relationships between students and teachers.

I have always thought that a lighthouse is a particularly appropriate metaphor for the Christian life and the responsibility that Christians have to shine as lights in this world. I am currently privileged to serve as Superintendent of Sunshine Bible Academy, and the same metaphor could be used substituting sunlight for the beacon of a lighthouse. The passage of Scripture that is the basis for this metaphor is Philippians 2:14-16, which reads as follows:

“Do all things without grumbling or questioning, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world, holding fast to the word of life, so that in the day of Christ I may be proud that I did not run in vain or labor in vain.” (ESV)

First of all, the very idea of light should be addressed. Light is the opposite of darkness, and there is no lack of darkness in our world. In physical darkness there is an absence of light. Rarely if ever have most people experienced complete darkness because there is often some light, however small, coming from something. In our homes these days, unless the electricity is out, there is often plenty of light even when all of the lights are turned off. We have digital clocks, which are themselves lights, on microwaves, ovens, alarm clocks, and DVD players. We have lights indicating “on” or “off” on all manner of electronics in our homes. If we go outside there are usually street lights, lights from car headlights, and/or light from the moon and stars. We have all of these lights so that we can see–either see where we need to go, see what we are doing, or see what time it is. But the bottom line is that light drives away darkness. When a light is turned on darkness is eliminated within the reach of that light source. Where light is, darkness is not.

It is interesting to think about the fact that when light is not present darkness naturally results. There is nothing that we have to do to create darkness. Once the sun goes down, darkness will result. We do not have to flip any switches, cover any windows or otherwise do anything in order to create darkness. It will come. Darkness is always lurking, ready to spread as the light fades. As light dissipates, darkness is already there. We never have to “turn on the dark.”

I’m talking about physical light, of course, but spiritual light and darkness are the same way. As a result of sin and the depravity of man we live in a world filled with spiritual darkness. We do not need to do anything to cause that darkness to be present or to spread. To paraphrase Mark Twain, the only thing necessary for darkness to dominate the world is for those who have the light to do nothing.

Looking back at our verses, grumbling, complaining and questioning are the natural outgrowths of man’s sin nature. We do not have to do anything for those to be present. When things are not going our way, when nothing is working out the way we want it to, when we need to do something we would rather not do…grumbling and questioning will happen without any effort required on our part at all. That’s because we are self-centered, and naturally express our dissatisfaction when things aren’t going our way. To not grumble and question then requires action on our part. It requires us to turn on the light of dying to self, putting our desires and preferences aside and doing what needs to be done without whining about it. Doing that is part of shining as lights in our world. Only one part, to be sure, but a definite starting point.

We will continue to look into this next time….