message tuesday

Parents choose Island Christian Academy for a variety of reasons; some are drawn smaller class sizes, a positive environment, a high academic standard, or sometimes it has more to do with the Christian values we desire to instill in our students.   All are wonderful reasons to choose ICA.  These are all ways we accomplish the mission of integrating faith and learning.    We want students to grab a hold of the truth that there is no direction in human society into which God has not spoken.  He, after all, is the sole creator and author of life who clearly illuminates for us the best possible way to live the best life possible. 
A couple of years ago a student posed a question to his teacher in one of our classrooms, and I have to wonder if it enters the thoughts of other students and maybe even parents at times.  His question went something like this: “I understand why we have devotions and  Bible class, but why in the world do we have to talk about God in science or history or any other subject?”   Great question!
I recently read a quote that so eloquently answers that query and articulates one goal of classical Christian education that we apparently had not yet successfully communicated to that student. 
“The task of all Christian scholarship – not just biblical studies – is to study reality as a manifestation of God’s glory, to speak and write about it with accuracy, and to savor the beauty of God in it, and to make it serve the good of man.  It is an abdication of scholarship when Christians do academic work with little reference to God.  If all the universe and everything in it exists by the design of an infinite, personal God, to make his manifold glory known and loved, then to treat any subject without reference to God’s glory is not scholarship but insurrection.”
                                - John Piper, Think: The Life of the Mind and the Love of God
While it certainly applies to academic study, it also applies to every vocation one could possibly choose in life.  Hopefully as we partner together, we can all learn what it means to “make his manifold glory known and loved” in our daily life and work.
Something deep to ponder on a dark and rainy evening! 
See you next Tuesday evening for our Classic Christmas at 7 pm!  
May there be warmth and light in your home tonight.
Brenda