Jigsaw Puzzle of Life

The largest homeschool survey ever undertaken, the Gen2 Survey, found that 87% of young people kept the faith if they shared the following criteria:

1. They had a good relationship with their parents, especially their fathers.
2. They were homeschooled.
3. They were involved in a local church.
4. They had some training in worldviews,

How significant is that 87%? Depending upon which Christian survey one looks at, the overall evangelical community is losing anywhere from 63% to 88% of their children after the first year in college. In comparing these polar opposites and putting them in financial terms, we could invest with the former and make an 87% return on $1,000 ($1,870) or we could choose the latter and lose an average of 75% ($250). As the old adage goes, “Statistics don’t lie,” especially if those statistics are compiled by Christian organizations.

Most homeschooling parents can hopefully check off the first three boxes – if not, there needs to be another conversation – but what about the fourth one? What are worldviews and why are they so important, especially at this point in our history?

No doubt many homeschooling parents are already highly involved in worldview training, but there are others who have heard the term but haven’t realized the powerful impact it has, as we see in the Gen2 survey. Our worldview is basically the lens through which we see the world. It is like a pair of glasses. If our glasses are tinted with a certain color, it will affect the way we see our surroundings. Imagine driving on I-94 through Chicago at rush hour on Friday afternoon, wearing glasses that have three or four cracks in each lens. Yikes! Everything would be exaggerated and thus inaccurate. This is the potential danger we expose our children to on the highway of life if they do not have significant exposure to a biblical worldview and a basic understanding of competing worldviews.

Imagine you received a jigsaw puzzle from a friend. All the pieces are there. The only problem is you don’t have a picture on the front of the box to know what the puzzle is supposed to look like. Or, worse yet, you have the wrong picture on the cover. Talk about a daunting task. This is the equivalent of doing life without having a biblical worldview. However, it gets even more dire. If we don’t intentionally pass on a biblical worldview, a competing worldview will be thrust upon them from an outside source. The potential is eternal damnation.

Through the perspective of their worldview glasses, our children will make major life choices including whom they will marry, how they will raise their children (including mode of educations), what vocation they will enter, how they will handle their resources, what religious principle they will adhere to, etc. Worldview is so important because we cannot act separately – at least in the long-term – from how we see the world. For instance, Christians give 10% of their income into God’s kingdom. Why? That is what the Bible teaches us. Our worldview dictates our action of sacrifice. For those without a Christian worldview, that often equates to walking in the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life with the reward of such a lifestyle ending in eternal destruction.

Education is preparation for life. It is the transference of ideas to equip our children to engage in the world around them. The goal of home discipleship is to demonstrate an accurate front cover of the jigsaw puzzle of life, so that they will know how to piece together the days, weeks, months and years that follow.