Homeschooling breeds rebellion?

I have a friend that is a homeschool mom as well and she has a couple on public school mom friends that she shares playdates with after library hour each week. Her friends have asked her several questions about homeschooling (your know, the usual stuff-what about socialization-do you test them-do you report to someone-how can you homeschool with no degree?) but they recently asked her one I had not heard or thought much about before. Doesn't homeschooling breed rebellion? Aren't you teaching them to rebel by homeschooling?



My dictionary defines rebellion as "an organized uprising to change or overthrow an existing authority." At first glance, and based on that definition, homeschooling may appear to be a rebellious act against government run schools. As homeschoolers, my husband and I have organized together and are changing an existing authority in our family. We are replacing the governments authority over our children with the authority of us as the parents. On the surface that may look a little rebellious but when we look a little closer, the opposite is the truth. The government started the rebellion when they started public schooling and took the God given authority over children from the parents. The public school system is the organized uprising and they have changed and/or overthrown the authority of the parents and the authority of God. That is the rebellion-not the homeschoolers. The Bible says in Deuteronomy 6:7 "And thou shall teach them diligently unto thy children, and shall talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up." When we read verses 5 and 6, it is clear that when the Lord is telling us to "teach them diligently" the them is referring to "these words, which I command thee". We are supposed to teach our children the things of God and we are to teach them to our children ALL day. The only way to teach our children things of God all day is to have our children with us. When we send our children to a public school where NOTHING of God is taught or even allowed to be discussed, we are rebelling against God. The government school system was started as a help to the parents and parents were essentially in charge. Gradually the school systems have taken over more and more of the parental rights to the point that some believe the parent's rights end at the doors of the school. It has been going on so long now that the parents willing GIVE their authority over to the government schools. They have forgotten (or never realized) that God gave the children to THEM and they do not have to surrender their children to the government run schools. They do it just because everyone does it and they think they have no other choice. They don't think twice when they have to submit to background checks before they are allowed to go on field trips with their own child. They don't think twice when they must send a note explaining to the teacher when they decide to take their own child out of school for a day. They don't think twice when they have to rearrange their entire schedule because the school has to do some make up days at the end of the year. They don't think twice about the schools teaching their children concepts that they fundamentally disagree with like evolution or homosexuality. They don't think twice about these things when it comes to their own children but then feel like WE are being rebelious because we choose otherwise for our children. They think that we are teaching our children to rebel because we homeschool but don't realize that the public school system is actually teaching their children to rebel. It teaches the children to rebel against the God given authority their parents have over them. If a child can not submit to this God given authority they will rebel against all other authority throughout their life. Lots of people (including me a few years back) say that they could never homeschool because they don't think their children will listen to them and get the work done. My son was in 3rd grade when I discovered and began researching homeschooling. Anytime I had to help him with his homework, it was a fight. I did not do things just like his teacher did and therefore, in his eyes, I was wrong. He had been taught that his teachers had the final authority not his parents. He was taught to always look to someone in the school system for the right answers and not his parents. The first year of homeschool was spent with just he and I rebuilding our relationship and yes there were some fights involved when it came to getting his work done under my direction but within that year he realized that I am not as stupid as the public school had caused him to believe. His father and I have now become the ones he comes to with questions and he looks to us for guidance. The questions are not so tough yet but in a few more years when the questions will be about sex or drugs, I am soooo thankful that he is in the habit of seeking advice from his parents now instead of from the school system or teachers or school counselors or peers. Because my children are learning to submit to their own parents now they will be more likely not to live a rebellious life later. A person can not easily submit their lives to God if they never first learned to submit to their own parents. Many christian parents think they can undo the teaching their kids get in school about topics they may not agree with but that is very unlikely. If I could not even undo my child's thinking on a simple math problem because his teacher did it a little differently, how would I ever have been able to undo everything he may have learned about evolution after several years of public school science classes. My child would have always had in his mind that the science teachers at school had more authority than I did. So some people may think of me as rebellious for going with God's plan instead of the world's and in some ways maybe it is but I will continue to choose to rebel against the world and not rebel against God. The consequences are way too high the other way around!!

The SIMPLICITY of Salvation

Amy from Daily Pleasures has started a blog to give outlet to and inspire others who like to write. She has posted a few "assignments" for anyone that would like to participate and it has really been fun writing some poetry and reading other ladies works. Anyone that is interested in partaking in some writing fellowship, hop on over to her other blog and pick a project.



We have been challenged to think on and write on simplicity. My dictionary defines simplicity as "the state of being easy to understand". I have spent a few days thinking about simplicity and most of the things I come up with actually would fall under the definition of the word simplify-"to make easy or simple". Of those things I find there is also always a need for me to do something like I need to simplify my kitchen cabinets or I really should simplify my homeschool notes. Simplicity is already simple. We have to do nothing else to make it simple. I can think of one thing that truly epitomizes the meaning of simplicity to me and it is Salvation by grace through the shed blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. God has already done all the work. He has simplified for us. John 3:16 says "For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." There ya have it-Simplicity! We believe-He saves us!

Simplicity is not something that most of us humans are real comfortable with. We can not seem to wrap our brain around the idea that something can really be that simple and we do all that we can to complicate God's simplicity. People try to add levels to God's plan of salvation and those levels always seem to have US doing something....we have to be good...we have to stop sinning...we have to confess...we have to pray...we have to be baptised or take the Lord's supper or become a member of a church or any of the other hundreds of things men have tried to add. Men have essentially taken the emphasis off of the Lord and somehow made salvation all about themselves but God said ALL we have to do is BELIEVE. James 2:18 says "Yea, a man may say, Thou hath faith, and I have works: shew me thy faith without thy works, and I will shew thee my faith by my works." This shows us that the faith(belief) must come first. After you believe, after salvation, then the works begin. The Holy Spirit will then convict us of our sinfulness. Once we are convicted we will see a need to confess; In order to confess we will turn to God the Father in prayer; When we start having a relationship through prayer with the Father we will want to please Him with the way we live and turn from our sinfulness; We will want to show others about the changes in our heart so we get baptised to symbolize the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus as well as death and burial of our old self and resurrection of our new self in Christ. All of these things happen because of our belief in Jesus Christ, after we are saved. Every time we try to add to and complicate God's plan, we are basically saying that the sacrifice that Jesus paid for us on the cross was not enough, that His life and death were not good enough and we have to do something to finish His work. John 19:30 says the work was finished without our help..."When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said, It is finished: and bowed his head, and gave up the ghost." Salvation is a gift from God that He offers to any that believe on the life, death and resurrection of the Saviour, Jesus Christ. Romans 10:13"For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved." Now that is what I call simplicity.

Load off my shoulders-GOD IS SOO GOOD!

Kalysa's surgery is getting closer and closer everyday and the stress of it all has started settling in on me. I am so thankful that the Lord worked it out and we are able to utilize the Shriner hospital. When Kalysa was just 2 1/2 years old, she was referred to a specialist. Many children with her condition are referred just to an orthopedic doctor often specializing in sports medicine who would normally do surgery. The only problem with that is that they do basically the same surgery for all muscle tightening problems and it often does not work or has to be repeated several times. Kalysa's therapist at the time had heard great things about Dr. Wright, the only pediatric physiatrist(specialist in children's reabilitation) in the state of Oklahoma, and we were able to ask her pediatrician to specifically refer her to him. Dr. Wright has worked with her for the last 4 years with botox injections to relax the muscles, physical therapy, casting to stretch the muscles and splints to keep them from tightening back up-everything he could to avoid surgery. His efforts were fruitful and the muscles in her right leg have responded well-she no longer walks on her toes on the right foot and her muscles now have a normal range of motion. The left leg has continued to give her problems. Little did we know 4 1/2 years ago that Dr. Wright personally knew and had been working with and learning from Dr. Gates, the children's orthopedic specialist with the Shriner hospital. Dr. Gates specializes in orthopedic surgery on children and will customize the surgery to exactly what each patient needs based on the results of a full gait analysis that will show him exactly what each muscle is or is not doing. Without Dr. Wright setting up a personal appointment in OKC with Dr. Gates for Kalysa, we would never have had this opportunity. God has been working all these years behind the scenes. As of today it is 1 month until our first scheduled visit to a hospital that is 400 miles away. The stress of this impending trip and the costs associated with it really started weighing on me this past weekend. The hospital provides a place for the parents to stay but not the siblings. Kalysa has to check in early in the morning so it would be necessary for us to be there the night before requiring us to need a motel room for all of us. The costs have been adding up and adding up in my head. Today I contacted our local Shriner organization to see what may be available in the way of transportation assistance. Would you believe that they already have Kalysa on the list with her appointment dates and times and have already scheduled to drive her and I down in their van the night before her gait analysis, they have a motel room booked and paid for for us and have scheduled to bring us back home after all her tests are finished. The only thing I will need to pay for is food and they have a cafeteria at the hospital. The man assured me that their food is unusually good for hospital food and very reasonably priced-about $1.50 for breakfast. They also have her transportation there and back scheduled for the surgery. We are hoping that we can all be there as a family when she has surgery and the van can only take the patient and one parent but my mom and a friend from church are going to be driving down so it may still be possible for Monty and the kids to share a ride and not have to spend a lot of money. Also the kids may be able to ride home with grandma before we leave so we will not have to have a motel room for them the whole time. I have been starting to really stress about these 2 trips and the details were already worked out without my help or my knowledge. Oh Wow! GOD IS GOOD-ALL THE TIME-ALL THE TIME-GOD IS GOOD!!! I want to thank everyone who has been praying with us. God and God alone is faithful in hearing and answering our prayers and I am so thankful for His promises. I am just in awe of how wonderful He is to us even though we deserve nothing. The Lord Jesus Christ already gave His life on the cross to save me and that is more than enough for anyone but He is so faithful and loves us so much that He continues to care for us and provide for us. I fail Him so often yet He has never and will never fail me. I stand amazed!!

Be careful in the morning

As I started to get out of bed this morning my foot touched a familiar soft fuzziness. Luckily the feeling was so very familiar and, even in my half sleep half awake state, I immediately recognized it to be the fuzziness of Kalysa's ever present Raggedy Ann blankie.

She must have gotten up to go the the bathroom in the wee morning hours and decided to come lay down by mom. When Keslee decides to come into our room in the night she will squeeze her way into the bed either between Monty and I or right on the edge beside me and go back to sleep to then begin pushing, kicking and elbowing her way to more room. Kalysa has always just come in and lay on the the floor beside the bed never disturbing anyone else and gone back to sleep. She has with her a couch pillow so she must have been up and contemplating where to lay back down. Isn't she a sweet picture of innocence?! It always makes me smile to wake up and see her tucked in contentedly next to mama's bed.

When the boy is gone, peace reigns!

On Monday we sent Kenyon away. Yep, he left on a church bus to go to camp for the week. He was so very excited about it. This is the 4th year that he has gone to camp and he has had so much fun each time.

There he is there in the red shirt. (sorry about the blurriness-man I need to work on my photography.)

He was extra excited this year because they are going to a new camp this time and they have horseback riding. He had to have some extra money for that so he got himself a job. Through July he has gone on the paper route with me 2 nights a week for $5 a day. He rode along and had to roll and bag the papers for me. Even on the nights when they were extra fat and he had some troubles getting them in the bag, I did not help him. He struggled but figured it out and got his job done and earned his own money for the extras at camp.

It is so strange how one boy can have such an impact on the house. When he is gone peace reigns. The girls play so nicely together that I can sometimes forget that they are even here. It is not that the boy is bad but just that he is a boy. He is busy all the time. He has to be doing something at all times which equals getting into things most of the time and noise follows him EVERYWHERE he goes. When he is around, even if he is helping me, I never seem to be able to get things done in a timely fashion, I have spent this week-with no boy-getting things done. Of course I had to spend one day cutting and gathering limbs from the storm. If Kenyon would have been here, he would have no doubt wanted to be involved with using the big clippers and cutting limbs but it would have taken a lot longer with his help. I spent another day in my own bedroom. My neighbor, Ms Barbara, has been really sick for awhile(please pray for her-they can not figure out what is wrong) and she is having her sister move in with her to help out. Her sister did not want to give up her own bedroom set so Ms Barbara got rid of her extra set. SHE GAVE IT TO US! :) I spent a whole day taking everything out of our room and replacing it with a new MATCHING bedroom set. We had one chest of drawers, 2 smaller dressers and a queen size head board but nothing matched and our bedroom was crowded.

We got a new chest of drawers

a dresser with mirror

the matching headboard

and a bedside table.

I rearranged the whole room and cleaned out everything. It took me the biggest part of a whole day but it was so nice to be able to spend the day with peace and quiet. The girls played house most of the day and stayed out of my way as I moved furniture around. When Monty came home, he was so surprised at what all I had gotten accomplished. I asked him how he liked it and he said " it finally looks like a bedroom. I feel like I am in a motel." I have had to resist the urge to just sit in my room all day and pretend that the rest of the house looks just as good.

This afternoon my son will be home. I have really missed him and can't wait to hear all about his week at camp but am I a bad mom for enjoying the peace we have had while he has been gone?

Tornado or just Really Windy?

Last Saturday we had a storm blow through. It was around 8:00pm and we heard the thunder rolling. It had been kinda dark and lightening in the distance for a few hours. We were all sitting in the living room and all of a sudden a downpour of rain and hail started. The hail was only pea size but there was a ton of it and the wind was blowing SOOOOO hard. I even made a comment that if we lived by an ocean I would think we were in a hurricane. The leaves were being ripped off the trees and plastered to the front window and the screen door. After a just a minute we could not even see out the window due to the driving rain and the leaves on the windows. It only lasted about 5 minutes and when the storm stopped our electricity went out. We walked outside to see if everyone's electricity was out and discovered that the 5 minute storm did A LOT of damage! The whole neighborhood was outside assessing the damage and discovering all the trees and limbs that had been ripped down. I called channel 4 to see if we had just had a tornado but they said the radars showed no rotations just straight winds. Living in Oklahoma, tornadoes are a common occurrence and the damage we sustained is consistent with tornado damage except that all houses were still standing. The next day I drove around and took some photos of the tree damage. It is amazing what the wind can do.

notice all the leaves in the road

in front of a house down the street

on the corner

this is the house they just filmed a movie in last month

in the street

half this tree is missing

limbs barely hanging on

already chopped and ready for pick up

the rest of this tree was in the road

luckily this house is empty but for sale

a school sign ripped from the cement stand

the rest of the school sign

the tree in my back yard

our tree hanging over the fence and laying in the road before I cut them loose

other limbs beside our fence.

I know some of these pictures are pretty fuzzy but we took them from the car. We had even more limbs in the back yard that I did not get pictures of. There are still about 3 branches that are broken but still hanging in the tree. Only problem is they are about 20 feet up so I am not sure how we are gonna get them down yet. The wood chipper truck came through today (AT 7:30 AM) and picked everything up so the streets are back to normal.

Coincidence? I think not!!

Webster's dictionary defines coincidence as two events happening at the same time by accident but appearing to have some connection. My head defines coincidence as two things that obviously have some connection but the world wants us to believe happen only by accident as a way to deny the existence of God and deny His authority. There are so many things that fall under this second definition that I have decided to start writing about them as the Lord reveals them to me and I plan on using this same title for each of them.



The Bible says that creation will reveal the Lord's majesty. Creation is also the largest area that the world has used the coincidence argument by trying to sell evolution as a viable explanation for our very existence. Well I'm not buying it! Let's look at the sun-ok not LOOK at the sun because we all know that we can not safely LOOK directly at the sun, but you know what I mean. The sun is the light for the world. It is everywhere. Without the sun there would be nothing but darkness. Even when we may not see it, it is there. It's reflection shines on us from the moon. Everything else revolves around the sun. The sun does not change but it's light changes everything it shines on. The sun's light is available to all people. Everything on earth requires the sun in order to grow and live. The sun sustains all life. Is it a mere coincidence that THE SON is and does the same things? Jesus Christ is the light of the world and without Him in your life you will have nothing but darkness. He is everywhere and everything in your life should revolve around Him. He does not change but He promises (and not doubt will) change everyone He touches. Salvation through the shed blood of Jesus Christ is available to everyone and everyone requires Him in order to grow in His grace. The Son of God sustains all life-not just a life on earth but eternal life. God gave us the sun at creation and without it we would not be able to survive on earth. We are not given a choice as to whether or not we want the sun's light-it is there for our own good. It is there to ensure we have a chance to live the life God has given us on earth. It is there to point us to the SON. The SON is also there to ensure we have a chance to live-eternally with our creator in Heaven and without Him we don't have that option. God gave us His only begotten Son but he also gave us a choice this time. We can choose to reject the Son but we will face the same consequences we would have if we had the opportunity to reject the sun-death and darkness. Knowing how stupid us humans can be, if rejecting all the sun has to offer was an option I am sure we would be doing it the same way most are rejecting what the Son has to offer. So for life and warmth and growth let's all look at the SON-ok not LOOK at HIM because we all know that we can not LOOK directly at the face of God and still live, but you know what I mean.