Latest / Cultural Wars | America Out Loud News / Christian education, worldview, and school choice with Dr. Max Lyons

Transcript

Christian education, worldview, and school choice with Dr. Max Lyons · Cultural Wars | America Out Loud News

• 0:11
  Welcome to Last Hope of a Dying Republic.
• 0:13
  I am your host, Reverend Bill Cook, founder and CEO of America's Black Robe Regiment.
• 0:19
  My lovely wife Junior is here with me.
• 0:22
  We are so excited to be part of the Morning in America broadcast series on America out loud.
• 0:27
  And we hope that you will join us on a weekly basis.
• 0:30
  We have some wonderful guests lined up who you want to hear.
• 0:33
  As we say every week, you may be wondering what the Black Robe Regiment is.
• 0:38
  It's an historical term that the British use to describe the pastors who fought in the American Revolutionary War, who the British blame for what they call the rebellion.
• 0:48
  Today the Black Robe Regiment is raising up courageous pastors to secure liberty to our own generation and the next.
• 0:55
  They are the last hope of our now dying republic.
• 0:58
  I believe all of us have a part to play.
• 1:01
  For more information on the America's Black Robe Regiment, go to our website, br USA.org.
• 1:07
  Our guest today is someone who's been doing his part to be the hope of this dying republic.
• 1:12
  Dr.
• 1:12
  Max Lyons.
• 1:14
  Hello, Max, thank you so much for joining us.
• 1:17
  I'm going to just share your uh biography briefly.
• 1:22
  Max is married to Margie, and they have four children and eight grandchildren.
• 1:27
  Max has degrees in mathematics and Christian school administration.
• 1:32
  Max was a teacher and administrator at Stonebridge School and two other Christian schools in Tidewater.
• 1:39
  It is the Southeastern part of Virginia, for those of you who are outside of Virginia.
• 1:45
  From 1979 to 2014, he was the director of teaching services at the Foundation for American Christian Education from 2014 to 2025.
• 1:57
  He currently serves as president of the Biblical thinker, where he writes, speaks, and coaches.
• 2:05
  He and Margie teach part-time at Dominion Classical Academy.
• 2:10
  Max and Margie have written nine books.
• 2:12
  Their latest project is the student worldview dictionary, a tool for properly defining important worldview words.
• 2:20
  This dictionary, based on Noah Webster's original 1828 dictionary, is the only Christian dictionary for children.
• 2:29
  You can reach Max at the Biblicalthinker.com.
• 2:34
  And Max, what is it that you coach?
• 2:40
  Schools and people that are planning to start a Christian school have done that for many many years.
• 2:46
  So if you've got that on your heart, you can reach out to me.
• 2:51
  Also coach teachers and anybody needing assistance with Christian education, whether it's in the home or the church or the school.
• 3:02
  Well, that is awesome.
• 3:04
  I know there's an incredible growth in Christian schools starting up, and there's an incredible need for coaches for that very thing.
• 3:29
  So Bill and I homeschooled our children for 18 years, and we're happy to say that we have uh three of our five children who have children are homeschooling their children.
• 3:41
  And now I'm also helping to homeschool my some of my grandchildren.
• 3:47
  So Christian education and homeschooling is something that's very near and dear to our hearts.
• 3:53
  But at the same time, I also was a public school teacher for 22 years.
• 3:58
  So I've seen both worlds, the public schools, uh and I also have taught from kindergarten all the way to high school.
• 4:06
  So I've seen uh both worlds, the public uh school and the the homeschool um movement.
• 4:14
  So what kind of education do you think is proper?
• 4:18
  There's actually four kinds public school, private school, and then there's private Christian school and homeschooling.
• 4:25
  So what are your thoughts about those four different kinds of schooling?
• 4:30
  Well, thank you, uh Judy and Bill for this opportunity.
• 4:34
  I talk about this a lot, and uh this is is this is an important question because uh all of us have opportunities as parents and sometimes grandparents to choose the education of our children, and we've got liberty in our nation to do that.
• 4:52
  Um, for most people, public school or government education is uh it's the only thing that we know.
• 5:00
  And so that can kind of become the norm for us until, and it was for me, because that was my own education, public school and then secular college wasn't until my master's degree at Regent University was ever exposed to Christian education.
• 5:17
  But then uh I took this course on the history of education, and I was astounded to realize that Christian education predated uh uh government education in this country by over 200 years.
• 5:31
  Uh this was just just astonishing to me.
• 5:34
  And if we don't know our history, we'll just, you know, again, we'll just think, you know, government education and the yellow school buses and the public schools that are quote free, they're not.
• 5:44
  They're very expensive, paid by taxpayer dollars.
• 5:47
  But uh we often call them, you know, call it free public education.
• 5:51
  Um we think that's all there is, or that's all that it should be.
• 5:56
  But if we look at the history of our nation from 1607, the founding here at Jamestown at Cape Henry, that I live very close to, up into the mid-1800s.
• 6:08
  We had 200 years of private, uh, mostly Christian education.
• 6:13
  Most of it was centered in uh either the home or in the local church.
• 6:19
  Pastors were often the most educated person in the community, so pastors were heavily involved in education.
• 6:25
  This was the norm for 200 years, and this produced the greatest level of education that that uh the world has ever known.
• 6:33
  If you go back and you know, try to read what they wrote, much less write what they wrote, you know.
• 6:38
  Uh you'll find that they were very, very well educated during this time.
• 6:43
  But without going into all the details, you know, we we didn't over education in this country to government starting in the eight early 1800s, and so we have had 200 years roughly now of mostly government education.
• 7:01
  But it's not the norm, it's certainly not the norm in all of human history.
• 7:05
  Uh Christian education, private education has been the norm up until recently.
• 7:11
  So I guess the thing to ask yourself as a Christian is what is what does the Bible say about education?
• 7:17
  And I want to read a couple, I've got four scriptures here if we'll allow me.
• 7:22
  Uh really important, you know, what the scriptures say.
• 7:27
  See, Ephesians 6 4 says, and you fathers do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.
• 7:36
  And I looked up those words.
• 7:38
  Bring them up is uh from the Greek word Treco, which means to nourish, promote health and strength to educate.
• 7:46
  So there's really three words here that say to educate your children.
• 7:49
  Training is the word Greek word pidea, which means instruction or discipline.
• 7:54
  And then finally, uh abonation is neuthesia, which means to give a warning to or a mild rebuke.
• 8:02
  So Ephesians 6 4 is literally telling fathers to educate, train, discipline, disciple their children and the Lord.
• 8:11
  And uh Colossians 2 3 said uh talks about Jesus that says in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.
• 8:18
  And I like to ask the question is uh just certain subjects taught in the Bible, just theology, uh and uh questions of religion, but but are uh is the subject of math and history and geography and science.
• 8:36
  Are those all treasures of wisdom and knowledge that are hidden in Christ as well?
• 8:41
  And I believe I believe that they are.
• 8:43
  I believe that every subject is a domain of Christ.
• 8:47
  And then Proverbs, you know, the Bible says what we should hear as well as what what we should not hear in Proverbs 1927 warns uh cease my son to hear the instruction that causes to err from the words of knowledge.
• 9:01
  So should we put our children under the tutelage of people that are telling them things that would cause them to err from the truth of God's word?
• 9:12
  I don't think so.
• 9:13
  I think as a parent, I shouldn't be doing that.
• 9:16
  The second Corinthians 6.14 says, do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers for what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness, and what communion has light with darkness.
• 9:29
  You know, this whole idea of you know what the teachers we choose for our children, that that's who we're we're yoked with.
• 9:36
  And uh Luke 640 says that every pupil uh after they're fully trained, will be like their teacher.
• 9:43
  And I say that they're gonna have the worldview of their teacher.
• 9:48
  So you better be choosing teachers that have the correct world view because they're imparting that to our children.
• 9:55
  You know, we have this this phrase, you know, something is caught rather than taught.
• 10:00
  And a lot of our worldview is caught.
• 10:02
  It's not directly, not like teachers sit down and say, okay, this is going to give you a class on worldview here.
• 10:08
  No, it's it's women into their, you know, their science class, math class.
• 10:15
  Even what when they're out there having research and r uh you know, PE and uh recess.
• 10:25
  So leave you with one more.
• 10:28
  This is you know, known as the Great Commission, Matthew 28.
• 10:32
  We say this is the scripture that says that we should go out there and be evangelists and be missionaries and go to other countries, etc.
• 10:40
  I think you could see that passage of scripture, but I think we could see something else as well.
• 10:45
  Matthew 28, go ye therefore and teach all nations.
• 10:49
  First of all, that word teach jumps out at me as a as an educator, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and the Holy Ghost, teaching them, whoop, there it is again to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you.
• 11:04
  This is Jesus talking.
• 11:05
  And lo, I'm with you always, even until the end of the world.
• 11:09
  So I think this is a a command to disciple our children, because we're supposed to be uh teaching them to observe all things that Jesus commanded us, and Jesus commanded us a lot of things that we need to impart to our children.
• 11:27
  I'm not saying that we're not missionary, we're certainly have a call to do that as well, but someone has uh aptly pointed out that the first people that we should uh be evangelizing and discipling is our very own children.
• 11:42
  They're they are the they're the ones that God is going to hold us in account.
• 11:46
  We're we're students.
• 11:48
  We're stewards for him of these of our children, and so their education is a huge part of our our stewardship.
• 11:55
  And I say it is, amen.
• 11:57
  Wisely after you've seen what the scriptures say.
• 12:01
  Amen.
• 12:02
  You know, um thing I wanted to to mention, I think you know this is when you look at the book of Genesis and where the serpent comes to the woman, the first thing he does is he questions the word of God.
• 12:14
  He says, Yea, as God said.
• 12:17
  And in a very subtle way, he begins to twist what God said, and so eventually he gets Eve to disobey God's commandment that she gives to her husband, he disobeys, and the human race falls falls into sin.
• 12:31
  And uh it tells me that language is critically important in terms of the advance of tyranny in our culture because deceit as I said before is really the lingua franca of tyranny.
• 12:44
  So what I would ask you is how important our language and vocabulary in our in our current cultural moment.
• 12:53
  Well, well, thank you for that question, Bill.
• 12:56
  Uh I am, you know, as a as a Christian educator, of course, you know, the I heard a long time ago, and this really stuck with me that that words are the tools that we use as as educators.
• 13:10
  And and in reality, it's it's it's the tools that everyone uses, whether you're an educator or not.
• 13:17
  Um it's what we communicate with, and uh we often don't even think about vocabulary and words and the importance of that, because uh, you know, it's like the the fish that not understanding water because they swim in it.
• 13:32
  You know, we use words every day, both written and verbally and um you know visually with everything you can do now with with pictures and communicate that way, but um everything that we do hinges on vocabulary, and especially if we're talking about you know worldview issues, if we're talking about theological or political or economic topics, right?
• 13:59
  We're we're the the vocabulary that we use with those topics are are very, very important.
• 14:06
  So um just a little history.
• 14:10
  I I have gotten into you mentioned the student worldview dictionary, and my wife and I have become lexicographers, and that that would that would have been the last thing that I would ever thought of myself doing.
• 14:24
  Um the reason I did that is because what you read in the bio was that the student worldview dictionary is the only Christian dictionary for children currently available, and I think that that's very sad.
• 14:39
  Uh I actually thought that they were there was at least one more because Bob Jones put out a Christian dictionary in 1982, but then I recently found that that that that book that's not being published anymore, it's out of print.
• 14:53
  So I I think that a lot of a lot of us think that, oh, what do we need a dictionary for anymore?
• 14:59
  You know, we've got Google, right?
• 15:01
  Or we've got AI.
• 15:03
  Right.
• 15:03
  You need the definition of a word, you reach in your pocket and you pull it out and you just say, what is fascism or what is love or what is gender or whatever, you know.
• 15:14
  And what I've discovered in this deep dive that I've done in vocabulary uh over the last uh six years, I think I think we started in 2019, is that that is actually the worst possible way that you could uh uh get a definition of a term because language has become weaponized and unfortunately those that are not on our side are the ones that uh went out with a Google search or an AI when you when you put a uh put a word in there.
• 15:47
  And often I just I'll just just for a contrast, I'll I'll put a worldview word into my phone and just say, hey, let's let's see what it what it says.
• 15:56
  And uh sometimes I'm pleasantly surprised because you don't always get the same definition, but but a lot of times I'm shocked at how secular worldly or even uh downright you know twisted, as you said, Bill, about Satan and how he uh how he how he begun his work uh with Adam and Eve by by uh questioning what what God had said.
• 16:23
  So um we we started in 2019 developing um a version of the 1828 dictionary.
• 16:34
  Well, get ready, my fellow Americans, July 2nd, 3rd, and 4th.
• 16:39
  America Outloud.news in partnership with Clear and the Wellness Company invites you to Nashville, Tennessee for our red, white, and blue celebration, you'll never forget.
• 16:51
  We're saluted 250 years of America and ten incredible years of America Out Loud News, standing strong for truth, justice, and the nation we all love.
• 17:02
  Three days of high impact speakers, powerhouse voices, delivering dynamic, unforgettable insights that will fire up your patriot spirit.
• 17:11
  And on July 4th, well brace yourself because you'll experience America's most explosive fireworks show, lighting up downtown Nashville in pure patriotic glory.
• 17:22
  You can reserve your spot with early bird fryson right now at America Outloud dot news forward slash Nashville.
• 17:30
  It's America Outloud News 25010 Nashville either.
• 17:35
  Struggling with your health, energy, and constantly feeling hungry, want to save money on the rising cost of groceries and dramatically improve your health.
• 17:43
  Go to ChemicalfreeBody.com forward slash out loud today, get nature's super multivitamin doctor formulated green eighty-five juice formula, empower your immune system, cut your grocery bill, and save twenty percent on your first order.
• 17:57
  Are you struggling with thinning hair?
• 17:58
  Try roots from the wellness company.
• 18:00
  This doctor formulated non-oily hydrogel uses seven powerful peptides and key nutrients to nourish your scalp and support visibly thicker, healthier hair.
• 18:09
  Visit TWC dot health forward slash out loud.
• 18:13
  And use code out loud for 20% off your first order.
• 18:16
  That is TWC.
• 18:25
  Welcome back to Last Hope of a Dying Republic.
• 18:30
  We are speaking with Dr.
• 18:32
  Max Lyons.
• 18:34
  And currently we are talking about the importance of language and vocabulary, and he's sharing about his uh new student dictionary that he and his wife uh recently had published.
• 18:51
  This is a very fascinating um discussion about the difference between uh definitions that we might find online versus what uh we'd actually be a definition from a b biblical worldview.
• 19:05
  So uh go ahead.
• 19:07
  Uh Dr.
• 19:08
  Lyons and continue with what you're saying.
• 19:12
  Okay.
• 19:12
  Um I had been uh an advocate for Webster's original dictionary.
• 19:18
  Webster first published the uh his dictionary in 1828.
• 19:23
  And uh that dictionary has been reprinted by the Foundation for American Christian Education, and you can reach them at face.net, F-A-C-E.
• 19:33
  Uh to obtain this wonderful dictionary.
• 19:37
  But I've been using that tool for many, many years, and um I was asked by uh teachers of young children, is there a version of that dictionary for younger children?
• 19:49
  Because as wonderful as it is, in the biblical definitions that are in there, etc.
• 19:55
  And Webster's wonderful use of language, the vocabulary is an
• 20:00
  An adult level and our first and second and third graders uh cannot uh understand it without assistance.
• 20:08
  So um after researching to see if there was something available, and realized there there wasn't.
• 20:15
  And over time God called my wife and I to do something about that, to produce a dictionary.
• 20:23
  And this we we weren't about to try to uh redefine or have a dictionary with 70,000 words like Webster's original dictionary.
• 20:32
  God did show us that we could just uh you know define worldview words, so words like sin and conscience and sadly, you know, marriage and woman now uh have become worldview words and gender, uh truth, you know, law, race, and things like that.
• 20:50
  We didn't really need to uh include in you know like horse or table, because uh you probably wouldn't see a major difference in those words between a secular dictionary and a Christian dictionary.
• 21:05
  So that's why it is a worldview dictionary.
• 21:10
  And um in this process in and studying and looking at how words were defined um as we were defining words for this dictionary, we realize that you know the the the other side, you know, there's I'm gonna read you a couple of contrasts here, but but you realize that that everybody appeals to when we when we get into worldview debates or cultural debates, everybody appeals to Christian virtues like love, caring, compassion, justice, you know, care of the sick and poor and oppressed.
• 21:44
  You know, no one today is gonna no one on either side are gonna say, oh, I stand for hate and unconcern and hard hard heartiness and injustice.
• 21:54
  You know, I don't care about the sick and poor.
• 21:57
  Everybody everybody's appealing to you the biblical worldview in this regard.
• 22:02
  But what they do is they they use words in different ways.
• 22:07
  Um for example, I'll give some of them, you know, these are these are things that we hear every day.
• 22:13
  We hear, you know, we would use the word abortion or taking a human life, and and then what do they say?
• 22:19
  They say reproductive freedom, right?
• 22:22
  Yeah.
• 22:23
  Right.
• 22:23
  No, we'll say the Bible says calls it sexual immorality or homosexuality, and they have what?
• 22:29
  They've got the LGBTQ, or you know, this freedom to love whoever you'd like to love.
• 22:37
  So, you know, it's always coached in these in these um in these wonderful sounding terms.
• 22:43
  You know, we say freedom of speech, and they'll say, Oh, words are weapons, words can be weapons, you can weaponize your words, your words hurt me.
• 22:54
  Um, you know, we say it's stealing or or redistribution of wealth, and they'll say, Oh, it's no, it's social justice.
• 23:07
  And we'll we'll use the word equality, meaning equal opportunity, and they'll say, no, it's it's a equality means equal amount of stuff, and if you're marginalized, you have to have it, you know, distributed from someone else.
• 23:21
  This whole idea about operations.
• 23:24
  Uh, we'll say that truth is fixed, and and they'll say, No, that you know, it's my truth and your your truth, you know, truth is individual.
• 23:33
  So I mean, even gender, you know, we'll say, you know, male and female, and they'll say, no, we'll just make it up.
• 23:41
  And I don't even know how many quote genders are.
• 23:45
  And then you'll have this phrase gender assigned at birth.
• 23:49
  You know, as if, you know, just someone said a certain thing when the person was born.
• 23:56
  You know, um suicide or or self-murder is now called dignity and dying, right?
• 24:05
  It's compassion.
• 24:06
  The even euthanasia sounds you know pretty innocuous.
• 24:11
  So you have these nice sounding terms, but it's not the same.
• 24:16
  You know, we're not agreeing on the definition of these terms.
• 24:21
  Um there's also made up terms or terms that have changed dramatically.
• 24:26
  If you go back a few even a few years ago, you wouldn't have even heard these terms.
• 24:31
  This is a tactic too.
• 24:33
  Christian nationalism.
• 24:36
  Yeah.
• 24:36
  You know, they take a term that once would have been considered good.
• 24:40
  Bill Federer said that originally the term was Christian patriotism, and we all thought that was a good thing.
• 24:47
  But now it's Christian nationalism, and then it's branded as something that's bad, and then it's said that this is what we all believe.
• 24:58
  Um systemic racism.
• 25:00
  I mean, where did that come from?
• 25:02
  You know, fascism outside of you know, Mussolini and real fascism, that term has become just a term of derision for the you know, the people that that you don't like.
• 25:17
  Uh no kings.
• 25:19
  Think about that.
• 25:21
  No kings.
• 25:23
  I'm like, uh, well, the last time I checked, the Republican Party was the party of limited government.
• 25:28
  They're the ones that believe in expanded government and expanded taxation.
• 25:34
  So what's all this no kings about?
• 25:36
  That's you know, is totally turning the thing on its head.
• 25:41
  Yeah.
• 25:42
  You know, hate speech, that's a term that you that is is pretty recent.
• 25:49
  And um, you know, they would say hate speech is that which they don't like, or if we refuse to affirm their immorality, that that's that we're guilty of hate speech.
• 26:02
  But how about the word woke?
• 26:04
  You know, where did that come from?
• 26:05
  Actually, awakening and and uh you know, awoke and awakening are good biblical terms.
• 26:12
  It's talking about spiritual awakening, being awake unto God.
• 26:17
  Um a term like um well, suppose one of the words you just gave us uh for uh hate speech.
• 26:26
  How would how would the dictionary address something like that that's clearly a euphemism for whatever however it's been defined in our culture?
• 26:34
  How would that dictate your dictionary define that word, the word hate speech?
• 26:39
  Yeah, I I don't know that that's in there, Bill, because I usually don't go for uh um you know words with phrases rather than then individual words.
• 26:49
  So you might have to tease that out, you know, look at the word uh speech itself and see what that says.
• 26:57
  Um that's that is the thing about using you're bringing up a good point.
• 27:02
  That's the thing about using a dictionary is some things are nuanced.
• 27:08
  Uh and one thing that I when I realized when I do my research is I started with the 1828 dictionary, and then I've got dictionary, so I trace uh I've got children's dictionary, so I trace uh the definition of the word in a uh 1914 dictionary, then a 1956 dictionary, and then several modern dictionaries.
• 27:32
  And the thing that was just shocking to me was to see the devolution, if I could use that word of language, uh in uh the 1914 dictionary, children's dictionary, actually it's Webster's, it's called uh Webster's Elementary School Dictionaries published in 1914.
• 27:51
  That actually, even though uh there are some changes that happen uh because uh Webster's family gave up the rights, and the uh Miriam brothers took over the dictionary uh in the late 1800s, uh still in 1914 that is, um a lot of the deference definitions are still based on the 1828.
• 28:15
  But then when you jump up to 1956, you see it going down a little bit, and then by the time you come to you know, to our uh time today, uh great changes in the definition of words.
• 28:30
  And missing, you know, the words that are missing from modern dictionaries or even modern talk.
• 28:36
  I mean, how much do you hear the word sin?
• 28:39
  Yeah.
• 28:40
  Anymore, except maybe it's a sin to, you know, to waste food.
• 28:43
  I think that one dictionary that was the only thing they can come up with for sin.
• 28:50
  Uh you know, holiness, uh separation from worldliness, or virginity, purity.
• 28:57
  You know, these are these are concepts that used to be very common, even you know, in my early Christian experience, and they've almost totally um gone out of the national conversation.
• 29:13
  Another word uh that's been removed in as as I noticed as a elementary public school teacher is the word obey.
• 29:24
  Hmm.
• 29:25
  Behavior modification became the um teaching in regard to disciplining children, we shaped their behavior, the behavior modification, positive rewards, um nothing negative other than maybe withholding something.
• 29:46
  You just would never hear the word obey, obey the teacher, obey who's in authority, uh obedience to the principle.
• 29:56
  That I noticed was missing way back in
• 30:00
  In the um well, let's see, I taught till nineteen eighty.
• 30:04
  So in the early eighties I noticed that.
• 30:06
  That was before I got married and had children.
• 30:08
  And um then I noticed it.
• 30:11
  I went back to teaching in um late 1990s, and um respect.
• 30:20
  They'll talk about respect, but never just the word obey is never is never there.
• 30:26
  So that's interesting, isn't it?
• 30:29
  Because when you think about we think about the Ten Commandments and obedience is a is you know, up there at the top.
• 30:39
  So and then you would look at the behavior that you have.
• 30:42
  The children from kindergarten all the way up to twelfth grade, and you can understand that their parents aren't teaching them anything about obedience.
• 30:49
  They they certainly aren't going to hear it in public schools.
• 30:52
  And it's why why we have a lot of problems that we have in the school.
• 30:57
  So anyway, that's just those words that I definitely noticed was missing when I was teaching the public school.
• 31:04
  That that's a great example, Judy.
• 31:07
  And um, you know, you could see the shift happening uh a number of years ago.
• 31:13
  This hasn't happened overnight, of course.
• 31:15
  My my wife uh had a degree in elementary education.
• 31:19
  She was um in college in the late 70s.
• 31:22
  I remember her telling me about the being trained in behavior modification, and she pushed back because she was a Christian at that point.
• 31:32
  She pushed back about these, you know, on these unbiblical ideas, and uh she was brought, she was brought before the dean of the school of education because of that.
• 31:44
  Basically told, don't bring don't bring your Christianity.
• 31:47
  Uh I guess they assume that you would teach in a public school, and they're like, you're not gonna bring your Christian ideas into public school, so you may have you better just quit talking about that and thinking about that right now.
• 31:59
  Yeah.
• 31:59
  Yeah, that's very very fascinating.
• 32:02
  Um, talking about uh these different terms and and why they would why you would need a a separate dictionary to define these words.
• 32:12
  And I I uh I'm sure sin is another word that you wouldn't hear discussed in the public schools these days either.
• 32:22
  Um I've got a lot of contrast in um the American Heritage Children's Dictionary says sin is an act that breaks a religious or moral law, period.
• 32:34
  That's an act that breaks a religious or moral law.
• 32:38
  No description of God, the Bible.
• 32:42
  Uh very generic.
• 32:43
  And if you read the definition of sin in Webster's 1828 dictionary or in the student worldview dictionary, because I I quote Webster quite a bit.
• 32:53
  Very very you'll you'll see a lot of the 1828 in the student worldview dictionary, because you just can't do any better than that.
• 33:00
  You could preach a sermon.
• 33:02
  You you as a pastor, you could preach a sermon from his definition of sin, because it it goes on and on and on.
• 33:09
  He says the voluntary departure of a moral agent from a known rule of rectitude or duty prescribed by God, a wicked act.
• 33:20
  It just goes on and on.
• 33:21
  This says sinners neither enjoy the pleasures nor the peace of piety.
• 33:26
  And I mean, and it goes on, it puts a lot of meat on on the bones.
• 33:30
  It talks about the unpardonable sin and and and how we can, you know, you could get saved from this definition of sin.
• 33:37
  You know, that's what all Americans have.
• 33:39
  You know, Webster's wasn't a Christian dictionary, it was it was the dictionary.
• 33:45
  Everybody was learning from this dictionary at that time.
• 33:49
  Right.
• 33:50
  It's shocking to see how far we've departed from that.
• 33:53
  Yes, it is.
• 33:54
  Well, new norm today is secularism, Marxism, and Islam.
• 34:01
  Yeah, it's those worldviews, it's not the biblical worldview.
• 34:05
  Well, part of that is because most people back then did go to church.
• 34:10
  So even if a person had not given their lives to Christ and actually had a born-again experience, they were at least attending church.
• 34:19
  And probably up until the 1970s, teachers would be attending church.
• 34:26
  And you maybe in i probably up until the 60s, you wouldn't even be hired if you weren't at least attending a church.
• 34:35
  And so now you have teachers that not only aren't she aren't attending church, you have um like you were saying, caught and not taught.
• 34:49
  You have so many teachers I noticed uh living with their boyfriends, not married, not only not going to church, they're not married, and are openly to talking about that to children.
• 35:02
  And so that's a good example of what's caught and not taught.
• 35:06
  They're not saying to your children, you know, little Johnny in in kindergarten, it's not important to be married.
• 35:15
  Um, but it's you know, it's okay to even be living with your boyfriend or girlfriend.
• 35:22
  So that's an example of something that's um taught and not taught, and it's also it's uh a sin.
• 35:30
  It's it you know, a sin that's um certainly not it's just acceptable.
• 35:36
  So how can we expect them to be talking about sin when not only are they living in sin, you know, they're not going to church, they're actually living in sin.
• 35:43
  So I cannot tell a lie.
• 35:45
  My sinuses are blocked.
• 35:47
  George, you crossed the Delaware.
• 35:49
  You can cross congestion.
• 35:51
  Here, try clear.
• 35:55
  Freedom smells like victory.
• 35:58
  Come celebrate 250 years of American independence.
• 36:02
  But the America Out Loud.
• 36:04
  250 10 Independence Day celebration in Nashville on July 2nd through 4th.
• 36:11
  Go to America 250.
• 36:13
  Nashville.com.
• 36:14
  Use code XLEAR for 20% off admission.
• 36:19
  Clear.
• 36:19
  Breathe in the independence.
• 36:21
  The smartest food on the planet doesn't come from a lab or in a package.
• 36:26
  It grows in a glass jar.
• 36:29
  I'm Doug Evans, author of the national bestseller, The Spout Book.
• 36:33
  Sprouts deliver up to a hundred times the antioxidants of mature vegetables.
• 36:39
  They grow in just three to five days for under a dollar serving.
• 36:43
  Get your sprouting kit at the spouting company.com slash out loud, use the code out loud for an exclusive offer.
• 36:52
  Grow smarter.
• 36:53
  Are you looking for a healthy snacks?
• 36:56
  But you've had enough of all the sweet, sugary energy bars.
• 37:01
  Good news.
• 37:02
  There's new bars to try.
• 37:05
  That savory crunchy and pack with goodness.
• 37:09
  Or based just on six simple natural ingredients.
• 37:14
  A certified organic veggie, nut and seed bar.
• 37:18
  That's low temp dried, never baked or fried.
• 37:21
  Bear bars are plant-based, gluten-free and loaded with nutrients and protein.
• 37:28
  Head over to Bearbar.com slash out loud and get the exclusive discount just for America out loud listeners.
• 37:38
  That's B E A R B A R dot com forward slash out loud.
• 37:48
  Welcome back to Last Hope of a Dying Republic.
• 37:51
  We're speaking with Dr.
• 37:52
  Max Lyons.
• 37:54
  And uh Max, can you please tell us again your website?
• 38:01
  So listeners can go and um re learn about your further about your dictionary.
• 38:08
  They can order it for their students, and um perhaps even uh purchase some of your books that you've written.
• 38:16
  So your website is the biblical thinker dot com.
• 38:22
  So all all together, the THE Biblicalth thinker dot com.
• 38:29
  And by the way, the biblical thinkers you, not me.
• 38:33
  My materials are geared toward helping you and your children and your grandchildren to think biblically.
• 38:42
  Think in terms of what God has to say about every area of life.
• 38:47
  Amen.
• 38:48
  In fact, one could ask, uh, is it possible to even think if you don't know the Bible?
• 38:53
  Uh how should we think about school choice, Max?
• 38:58
  Well, again, thank you for that question.
• 39:00
  That is all the rage.
• 39:02
  We're kind of going back to our Christian education topic now because I am as you can ascertain.
• 39:10
  I'm a huge advocate for Christian education, whether it's in the home or the church or the school, parents make different choices in that area today.
• 39:20
  There's lots of opportunity.
• 39:22
  There's there's what's called hybrids now instead of you know you're sending your child to a five day a week program, you could send them to a program that's two or three days a week, and there's one line resources, there's just lots of opportunities today.
• 39:38
  And and Judy, you're right about the growth of Christian education.
• 39:41
  I'm very excited about that.
• 39:42
  It started during COVID, of course, but it hasn't slowed down.
• 39:46
  The numbers of students coming out of government schools into homeschooling and Christian schools is um at a at a at a very uh fast pace.
• 39:58
  And there's some that are predicting
• 40:00
  Used to be that 85% were in government schools and 15% in private Christian and homeschooling.
• 40:07
  Those numbers have shifted dramatically over the last five years, and there's some that are predicted that by the year 2030 there could be as many as 50% in private education and homeschooling, and only 50% in government schools.
• 40:24
  So I hope so.
• 40:26
  I'm working with a number of organizations to help start Christian schools.
• 40:31
  That's one thing that I love to do, working with four school startups at the moment.
• 40:37
  But along with this has become this great um opportunity called school choice.
• 40:44
  And a lot of people think school choice is just talking about one or two things, but school choices is an umbrella word that has to do with all the opportunities that parents have to choose for their children.
• 41:00
  And there are at least ten types of school choice, but most people are familiar mostly, you know, the the concept of the ESA, the educational savings account, and the voucher.
• 41:16
  Most people think of school choice.
• 41:18
  When they think of school choice, that that's what they think of.
• 41:22
  We shouldn't think that narrowly.
• 41:25
  And we really ought to be thinking about a thing called tax credits, because I believe and and I'm not alone.
• 41:33
  I believe that the solution to the funding for Christian school is in the tax code, because what we really need rather than uh getting government money uh back in the form of a voucher or an educational savings account funded by the government, what we really need instead of giving the money to the government and having it come back to us in the form of some government program, is we need them to not take the money from us in the first place.
• 42:03
  That is an ultimate solution.
• 42:06
  And it's not easy to do, as you can imagine, and it's not easy to get rid of a government program, right?
• 42:13
  You know, someone said the closer you can come to eternal life is a government program, and we we know that from history, but um so so when we think about school choice, we need to think biblically, we need to think in terms of jurisdiction, like you know, whose responsibility is the education of children, and then we need to think about and advocate for and start programs that uh will actually uh solve the problem without growing government because if we're going to the government asking for money to educate our children, we're actually working against the print the very principle that we are advocating for by saying we want our children out of the government schools.
• 42:59
  So um so let's get into the details.
• 43:04
  Uh let me just uh that was kind of the overview.
• 43:06
  So we need to think very carefully about school choice, and uh research.
• 43:12
  We need to do some research, we need to do some study, just don't hear the sound bites, just don't hear, oh, you know, this state, you know, passed the school choice program, and now these thousands of children are getting money, you know, that didn't have money before, and oh how wonderful that is.
• 43:29
  We need to think about what is really going on.
• 43:32
  So the the place that I like to start is is with jurisdiction.
• 43:38
  Jurisdiction is a fancy word, but you know, there's there's two words there, juris and dictio.
• 43:43
  Juris is law and dictious is to speak.
• 43:46
  So jurisdiction is uh literally to speak the law, and it and it refers to um uh who has the authority to speak the law.
• 43:58
  Like in your home as a parent, you have the ability to speak the law to your children.
• 44:04
  You have jurisdiction over your children, you because you are stewards uh uh of them uh from God.
• 44:12
  You know, in in school, uh, you know, administrators and teachers have jurisdiction, they have authority.
• 44:19
  And um, and then we have jurisdiction uh in in business and and then we have jurisdiction in in civil government, and most Christians don't think too carefully about whose jurisdiction is uh the education of children.
• 44:36
  And I think I laid out the scriptures to you earlier, and it would make the case that therefore, uh based on those scriptures that the jurisdiction of education is with parents, period.
• 44:51
  Right.
• 44:52
  They're not co-parenting with the government, there it's not the parents' responsibility with funding from the government, it's the responsibility of parents, period.
• 45:04
  Margie and I were given four by God, and um I like to say that you know, when God gave us those children, I have responsibility to feed them, to clothe them, to shelter them, to provide for their needs, their emotional needs, their spiritual needs, and it's my responsibility to educate them, period.
• 45:28
  It's not a billion and Judy Cook's responsibility to educate my children.
• 45:33
  And if I take money from the government, I'm I'm extracting money from you to educate my children, and that's that's wrong.
• 45:41
  And just because we've been doing it for all these years doesn't make it any right.
• 45:46
  It's wrong.
• 45:47
  And and guess what?
• 45:49
  If if I didn't have to give 40 to 50 percent of my income to the government in taxes that I pay, both local, state, and federal, I would have the money that I need to educate my children as well as feed them and clothe them.
• 46:04
  So, you know, the the problem is not that you know we need to get money from the government to educate children.
• 46:13
  We need to expand vouchers and in ESAs.
• 46:15
  Now the problem is we need to get government out of the business of education and out of taking our money, uh, and then turn around and give it back to us in in some cases.
• 46:28
  You know, just don't take it from me to start with.
• 46:31
  So there's there's four ways.
• 46:33
  This is this is what I teach about this, is there's four ways that we can look for uh funds to to educate our children, and a couple of them are kind of obvious, but there's several of them that people are are they're not obvious and people are not thinking about them.
• 46:51
  The first way is obviously for us to pay ourselves because it's our responsibilities.
• 46:57
  Um not everybody's able to do that, and and that's kind of where the rub comes in.
• 47:02
  And that's often where family members help out.
• 47:05
  They're grandparents that often help pay for their children's education or pay in terms of driving them to school or helping in some way, and that's as it should be.
• 47:16
  So parents first, other family members second.
• 47:20
  Uh schools, most private schools uh have their own scholarship program, and not everybody is aware of that.
• 47:29
  And so start by asking the school what do they have that that will help?
• 47:34
  Okay, so that's the second thing.
• 47:36
  The third thing is churches.
• 47:39
  I strongly believe every church should help parents disciple their children in Christian education.
• 47:46
  So every church should have some sort of program.
• 47:49
  Uh I helped start one at my church, Council Presbyterian Church uh 20 years ago.
• 47:55
  Um it's a it's a scholarship program, and they can they can get information about this on my website.
• 48:01
  I had I had my webmaster put all this on my website, so people want to know about the details of it.
• 48:08
  Well, just go to the website and find out.
• 48:10
  But the way it works is it's simple.
• 48:13
  Church members um give to help with the discipleship, Christian discipleship of the children in in our church.
• 48:23
  And every year we have uh applications that go out and people can apply for a scholarship for Christian education.
• 48:32
  Um any level, it could be uh K through twelve, could be college, it could be graduate school, could be you know, a DTS if they're trying to do YWAM.
• 48:43
  And we have collected it and granted scholarships of over almost 450,000 in the last year.
• 48:51
  So these are significant scholarships, and guess what?
• 48:55
  It doesn't cost the church a dime because the people are giving to this program.
• 48:59
  They're not giving, they're still paying tithe, but they're giving to help their brothers and sisters in Christ that needed a extra help to be able to afford Christian education.
• 49:10
  So any church could could start this, and I think we should, because I think this is a responsibility of churches.
• 49:18
  Would you choose that over encouraging churches to have their own Christian school in their building?
• 49:25
  No.
• 49:26
  Or even you wouldn't choose that over you'd rather do you think it'd be better to have maybe that was your next suggestion.
• 49:32
  Judy, you bring up a good point.
• 49:33
  I think every church should support Christian education in some way.
• 49:37
  Some churches have Christian schools, some churches rent their building or let others use their building.
• 49:46
  The school that I'm working with now, the church lets the school use their building for for free.
• 49:53
  Um and you know, some churches open their building to homeschool co ops.
• 50:00
  Or high schools.
• 50:03
  But in some way, if you if if you're not doing that, then I would say have the scholarship program.
• 50:11
  Okay.
• 50:13
  That's that's the heart of the mission of the church is to disciple our own children before we go out and try to evangelize and disciple others.
• 50:23
  Right.
• 50:24
  There's a lot of buildings that are sitting empty from Monday to to Friday, aren't there?
• 50:31
  Absolutely.
• 50:32
  And you wouldn't believe, Judy, I'm helping uh people start Christian schools.
• 50:39
  The number one problem they have is they go to all the churches in their area, and every church says to them, no, you can't.
• 50:46
  We won't let you, we won't even let you rent our building, much less use.
• 50:51
  Yeah.
• 50:52
  Yeah.
• 50:53
  And then there's buildings that are very elaborately built instead of maybe building them a little bit more modestly, so you would have money to add classrooms for for an actual Christian school.
• 51:07
  Yeah, I should build the school with the Christian education in mind.
• 51:11
  Am I exactly go ahead?
• 51:13
  I'm sorry, I didn't need an article.
• 51:15
  The last point is tax credit programs.
• 51:18
  We have one in Virginia.
• 51:19
  There's about 20 states that have one.
• 51:23
  Uh tax credit program lets parents pay less taxes.
• 51:28
  Um it's not government funding because they're not taking the money from you in the first place.
• 51:33
  That your gift goes right to uh write to the school or write to the student.
• 51:40
  And when you when you do your taxes, uh you're able to take a credit for that money that was that was donated.
• 51:47
  We have a program in Virginia, it was it was implemented in 2012, and a lot of people don't even know about it.
• 51:54
  Um but it's a great program because Christian schools are getting money from from private donors.
• 52:02
  They're not taking government funds.
• 52:04
  And um, you know, I participate in the program, and every year when I write my check to a Christian school in the area instead of the state of Virginia, I I always say the same thing to my wife, like a broken record.
• 52:19
  Look at what I'm doing.
• 52:20
  I'm giving my money to Christian education that would have gone to the state of Virginia for God knows who what, you know, funding of abortion or you know, whatever other garbage it would have gone for, but it's going to a Christian school instead.
• 52:35
  And like what's there not to love about that?
• 52:38
  Right.
• 52:39
  Yeah.
• 52:40
  So that's what we should be pushing for.
• 52:42
  Tax credit programs, not vouchers in ESA.
• 52:46
  They both fund Christian education, but the method matters, and the tax credit program is not taking money from government, whereas the other two programs are.
• 52:58
  And we know that uh when you accept money from the civil government, whether it's a school or a home school, that they are going to put stipulations on you.
• 53:08
  They are going to control you.
• 53:10
  And uh we've seen it, and we've seen it in the past.
• 53:14
  We they have a history of doing that.
• 53:16
  And the way they hook you is there might be there might not be any stipulations at the beginning, but every time they go into session, they could change it, right?
• 53:26
  Pass a new law.
• 53:27
  Oh no, now you're not allowed to, if you take this money, you're not allowed to discriminate.
• 53:33
  And how do they define that?
• 53:35
  You know, if you're against the whole sexual revolution and all its forms, that's discrimination.
• 53:42
  If you don't take in a teacher or a student, that's that's part of the uh sexual anarchy of our today of our day, that's considered discrimination.
• 53:52
  So they gotcha.
• 53:55
  It's a gotcha movement.
• 53:56
  Absolutely.
• 53:58
  Question for you, uh Dr.
• 54:01
  Doctor, do you think that uh the NEA National Education Association will be pushing pushing back against this movement?
• 54:12
  Uh it's interesting that uh for um for the most part the NEA and the public school has always been against the school choice movement.
• 54:23
  And uh for once I find myself in agreement with them, but for different reasons.
• 54:30
  That they don't want it because they don't want any loss of control.
• 54:35
  They don't want students leaving their system to go somewhere else.
• 54:40
  Um so um but but uh but I haven't looked as specifically into the NEA uh in their position.
• 54:49
  By the way, Sam Blumenfeld's book, NEA Trojan Horse and American Education is a great yes.
• 55:00
  Well, I'm I'm I remember uh I I saw a presentation by Alex Newman about the United Nations.
• 55:08
  They believe that the government has a right to parent and educate children, and they have a goal to have uh control of all children by 2030.
• 55:22
  So that is definitely something we need to be praying against those who are Christians who are listening.
• 55:28
  Um that is their goal, and they believe it with all their hearts.
• 55:32
  And um uh Hillary, we can just think back to Hillary Clinton saying it takes a village.
• 55:38
  And I don't think that Hurt Village included Christian schools, unfortunately.
• 55:43
  So that's what we're up against.
• 55:46
  Well, Max, thanks for being with us today.
• 55:49
  We really really appreciate all things all the things you shared.
• 55:52
  It's been very enlightening.
• 55:54
  And uh just for for those who are on your website again.
• 55:59
  It is the the biblicalthinker.com.
• 56:03
  The biblicalther.com.
• 56:06
  I also want to give our website, America's Black Robe Regiment is Br R USA dot org.
• 56:13
  And uh one of the things we teach Max in our in our education with pastors is that the church really framed this country.
• 56:22
  That um if it wasn't for the preaching of of the of the 16th century, 17th centuries, America wouldn't exist.
• 56:28
  And it was the pulpit that made it a reality.
• 56:30
  So we want to encourage people to go to our website, read about the history of the pulpit, and get involved.
• 56:37
  And also wanted to share something that uh Ben Franklin is noted for saying.
• 56:42
  He said, when it was asked what kind of government do we have, and he responded and said, a republic if you can keep it.