God and education

As many of you know two years ago we felt God leading us to homeschool the girls. This process was not as easy as it sounds, it was not a decision that we just took within a day, there were tears, fears and many what if? What if it doesn’t go right? What if we do a bad job? What if the whole future of our girls go through the window 🙈

It all started when Ella was pleading us to homeschool her. You know, as parent we didn’t want just to jump into it. Unless there is really a strong sense of we need to do that, but Ella one day came and told us that she prayed and felt the Lord telling her that she can be homeschooled, when she came to us with that, what do you do? Do we ignore it? Especially when as missionaries one of our values is to know God and make him Known, in the teachings that we do a lot is about hearing Gods voice and even if it’s a mistake we try to walk with people through the journey of is that really you God? There is even a book about it by Loren Cunningham, so here is our child hearing God’s voice that she can be homeschooled.

I remember when we dedicated our girls to God and said to Him, our children are yours tell us and please guide us how to raise them. I love the story of how God told Joseph, Mary and many others how to raise their children, what to do with some and what not with others. Samson was not allow to have his hair cut, Samuel was raised to be a prophet, John’s parents were told what his name needed to be and here we are, debating whether is God speaking through our child or is it just a feeling? We took that word from her and prayed together and asked God, is that you God? We need a confirmation, a clear sign please. We are leading a ministry, Daniel was about to lead a DTS which would mean full time for 3 months. I felt the Lord telling me to not be in DTS leadership, so I didn’t. Then the DTS that Daniel was about to lead had to be cancelled due to low numbers. This happened a few weeks before Ella asked us to take her out from secondary school to be homeschooled. We found all of this interesting and we surrendered our lives, our minds, our own rights and asked God to please give us a clear sign, as for us we didn’t know how do we homeschool Ella when she is starting to choose the subjects for her GCSE (stands for General Certificate of Secondary Education. They are highly valued by schools, colleges and employers. The qualification mainly involves studying the theory of a subject, together with some investigative work, while some subjects also involve practical work). Of course for me Wendy was scary, because I had no idea what does that mean. My only perspective or understanding of it was seeing a lot of parents asking for prayers, some concern for the kids, others making sure their kids eat a lot of lentils during their exam times, others that they sleep well, others not going anywhere so their kids can concentrate and study. So of course I was scared I had no idea what I was getting into it and worse how do I prepare my child for something that I don’t even understand the value or what it means. So here I am asking God, “you know Ella better and us better, can we do this? Please we need a sign, a very clear sign please.”

That Sunday I will remember so much, I went to church and I was getting ready to lead worship. I had 5 minutes to get my hot water and biscuit to go back to start, as I am coming to have a biscuit before going to worship, (in England most churches have tea and biscuits before they start the service as a way of bringing and connecting with community). Anyway, I come to get my biscuit and one of the mums asked me about how am I doing? And I said I am ok praying for wisdom for Ella to see if we homeschool, suddenly she tells me I am a secondary teacher and I feel strong to tell you that if Ella is asking you to do that, do it, don’t think twice, just do it and that was my sign. She said that and my 5 minutes are gone I needed to go.