Written by Dr. Bruce Lowe |
Wednesday, June 21, 2023
One serious concern is the danger in emphasizing “classical (Christian) education” on exactly these terms, i.e., putting the “Christian” in brackets, i.e., making it secondary….We must be careful not to romanticize things “classical,” without biblical thoughtfulness and scrutiny.

The old saying that that religion and politics should never be brought up in polite society needs expanding. Don’t mention education either! In a recent article in The New Yorker (April 3rd, 2023), Emma Green showed just how much is at stake here, particularly with contemporary partisan politics in mind. She names names, stating in her subtitle that “Conservatives like Ron DeSantis see Hillsdale College as a model for education nationwide”.[1] Green carefully nuances her terms, giving voice to different groups. But in the end a term that she somewhat lands on when speaking of the whole controversy is “classical education.” As a quick aside, readers seeking an ‘on-ramp’ to this subject should read Stanley Fish’s New York Times piece of 2010, which begins with the amusing story of him wearing his high school ring until it wore out. He writes of how it “became black and misshapen,” only for Fish to replaced it with a new one. Why? “[B]ecause although I have degrees from two Ivy league schools and have taught at U.C. Berkeley, Johns Hopkins, Columbia and Duke, Classical High School (in Providence, RI) is the best and most demanding educational institution I have ever been associated with.”[2] Fish commends his rigorous classical high school education, which for him required “four years of Latin, three years of French, two years of German, physics, chemistry, biology, algebra, geometry, calculus, trigonometry, English, history, civics, in addition to extra-curricular activities, and clubs—French Club, Latin Club, German Club, Science Club, among many others.”
The phenomenon Green labels as “classical education,” therefore, is not easily type-cast. If one looks at Gerd Theissen’s wonderfully succinct analysis of European education in the 20th century, highlighting the rise of social studies and its influence, one gets a picture that this discussion is complicated and should be treated as such.[3]
The question I want to ask in this article, given that classical education, even classical Christian education has come under scrutiny, is this one: what exactly does it mean to educate someone (particularly a child) in a way that is appropriate, especially with the Jesus of Christian families in mind? What are the principles for different people at different ages? Should Christians, for example, still be using the Trivium as recommended by Dorothy Sayers in her now-famous article of 1947?[4] Should Christians follow Sayer’s lead (drawn from her own personal growth) that in early grades children’s minds are ripe for memorizing, meaning we start with grammar? Should this then be followed by logic, after which we should teach rhetoric?
This is a huge topic to tackle in a short article, and thus I make no claims to completeness. Nevertheless, I wish to attempt to contemplate all this in light of what the Bible has to say. One serious concern is the danger in emphasizing “classical (Christian) education” on exactly these terms, i.e., putting the “Christian” in brackets, i.e., making it secondary. What God wants (some would seem to say) is a classical Christian education, with the emphasis unknowingly falling heavy on the classical part rather than the Christian part. We must be aware that the first Christians were battling worldliness in their own day. And in some cases, this worldliness WAS the “classical” way of thinking—e.g. the striving for personal honor, and the thought that physical beauty was a sign of divine favor. We must be careful not to romanticize things “classical,” without biblical thoughtfulness and scrutiny.
In this article I will argue that Paul would likely not have been directly against certain educational models of his time, even a “classical education.” But I will argue that Paul always was aware of sin in the human heart and yet retained optimism too, a belief in what the Spirit could achieve in a Christian. So perhaps even while we are thinking about education in terms of grammar and logic and rhetoric, we should be conscious too of the X-factors, i.e., the power of sin (not to underestimate it) and the power of the Holy Spirit (not to underestimate this either). More than anything, therefore, I will suggest from this that Paul promoted what we might call a Classical Spiritual Christian Education.
Philemon will be our text of choice for this article, a choice that might at first seem strange. If readers know anything of Paul’s little letter Philemon, they will know that it has always attracted attention regarding the subject of slavery. Here is the story: a man called Onesimus had apparently run away from his master, Philemon. Onesimus was thereby a runaway slave. Somehow, he had come in contact with the apostle Paul and had become a Christian. Hooray! But this created a tension. Runaway slaves were subject to the most severe punishment under Roman law, meaning that if Onesimus went back to Philemon, horrible things could happen to him. But, given Romans 13, we know that Paul has a deep willingness to work within even unjust governmental frameworks. He would have been legally liable if he harbored an escaped slave, yet Philemon was a brother in Christ. How does he navigate this? For this reason, Paul sent Onesimus back with the letter we now have, a letter whose main point is to appeal to Philemon to take Onesimus back without retribution, even with hints that perhaps he should emancipate him.
The letter is therefore a powerful text for considering the issues of slavery. But the way Paul speaks to Philemon, even the way he instructs him—or not—is instructive for thinking about the general area of teaching and training, even the training of children. As we will see presently, Paul started by assuming that Philemon is mature in the Lord, and based on that he chooses simply to persuade him, not to command him. This is very relevant to our discussion, as we will soon see. But then, even though Paul assumed Philemon would act maturely in line with godliness, Paul also (just in case) instructed him as if he were not mature and might make the wrong decision.
This seems quite helpful, because as we think about different levels of maturity and how to approach them, both mature and immature people are suddenly in view. How do we approach maturity and immaturity, even when it may occur within a single person in a short space of time? This is very relevant in raising kids, particularly teens. What I hope to show is that Paul leads with an optimistic agenda, and only afterwards is he more pessimistic. But even in his willingness, this willingness to be optimistic first, Paul was still bold about his responsibilities, a theme also vital for parents to constantly have in mind.
The letter to Philemon, after a few opening niceties, moves to a thanksgiving where Paul is all about thanking God for Philemon. When was the last time you did this regarding someone else and let them know? We are often quite slow to praise, and sometimes we even see a kind of weird competition at work between people and God! Everyone (including myself), we often decide, is awful to the core, most if not all the time, always tainted by error, having nothing good to be proud of; and so, the only person in the universe we can say anything nice about is God! Paul would disagree. He is quite willing to encourage Philemon, by saying lots of nice things about his maturity:
I thank my God always when I remember you in my prayers, 5 because I hear of your love and of the faith that you have toward the Lord Jesus and for all the saints, 6 in order that your common faith with others may become even more energized by understanding from all the saints, i.e., every single person among you who is for Christ. 7 For I have derived much joy and comfort from your love, my brother, because the deep emotions of the saints have been revived through you.Philemon 4-7
Verse 6 is notoriously difficult. Translations have regularly rendered it differently. I will indulge to give my translation, one that I think best fits with a context of commending maturity. Basically, Paul starts by saying that you (Philemon) have been mature in your help to others: you are mature because you have given out faith and love to the Lord Jesus and to other Christians. Interesting…Maturity is about giving to the Lord. But maturity is also about connection with others, to love them (yes), but also to be willing to share faith with them. Now to verse 6. You have been mature and humble enough to learn from others too.
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Where did things go wrong between the genders? Not with God’s original design. God’s original design for men and women was good — not just good but very good. We dare not ignore the dignity of both men and women or eliminate the differences between them, because those differences are good. We have to look at where the problem began, and that isn’t with God but with our ancient enemy the devil. He introduced sin into the world, and as we’re going to see, sin affected the relationship between men and women.

Last summer, we were camping about half an hour east of North Bay when our car broke down. It really broke down. It was almost un-drivable.
We faced three issues:

First, the immediate issue: how to get the vehicle home.
Second, diagnosing the problem, because you have to know what you are trying to fix.
Third, actually getting it fixed.

We solved the first issue. It involved God answering prayer and some questionable driving decisions that turned out fine. But diagnosing the problem was a bit harder. We’re not mechanics, so we guessed wrong what the issue might be. But we’re not the only one. Our mechanic guessed wrong and ordered the wrong part, which we still ended up paying for, but in the end we got what we wanted. All three issues were solved. We got the vehicle home. We finally diagnosed the problem accurately. And we got it fixed at a price we could afford.
I’m here to tell you that the same three issues apply to our discussion of gender.

First, we face immediate issues. These are the real issues that we face every day: questions of singleness and marriage, gender roles and differences, tensions between the genders, and other pressing issues.
But then we face the challenge of diagnosing the problems. What’s underneath the immediate issues? This is important, because if we make the wrong diagnosis, we won’t solve the problem.
And then we actually have to take the step of getting the issue solved.

Today, I want to focus on the second stage. I want to focus on diagnosing the problem that causes many of the issues between the genders. What’s behind all the tensions between men and women — societal issues like harassment, stereotypes, and double standards? Closer to home, what makes it so hard sometimes for men and women to get along?
We’ve got to come to an accurate diagnosis of the problem if we’re going to come up with the solution.
The Wrong Diagnosis
Here’s why I think this is so important. I think we often tend to misdiagnose the problem. We think and act as if the problem is the difference between the genders, which is why we often find ourselves trying to either erase the differences between men and women, or to devalue one gender or the other. There are few more issues that get more heated than this one. As one person points out, “Few topics have generated such heat or confusion as the 21st-century debates over sex, gender and male-female relations.”
Because we get the diagnosis wrong, we also get the cure wrong.
For instance, you’ve heard the term toxic masculinity. There is such a thing as toxic masculinity. But it would be easy to think that the problem is masculinity itself. Masculinity is good! God came up with the idea. I love what one author writes: “Men become dangerous not because their masculinity is toxic but because their humanity is … In short, the answer is not to weaken men, but to help them grow stronger.” The problem isn’t masculinity in itself; the problem is sin. If we misdiagnose the problem, we’ll misdiagnose the solution.
In other words, the problem isn’t what we think it is. Last week we saw that God’s original design for men and women is good — not just good but very good. We’ve seen looked at Genesis 1 and 2 and have seen that men and women have dignity and differences that are designed for our good and our joy:

Men and women have dignity — Both genders are made in the image of God. They’re equal in personhood and importance, and and it takes both genders to represent God in this world.
Men and women have differences — Eve was created both alike and different from Adam. They correspond to each other. Men and women have both similarities and profound differences, and yet those differences are meant to be a source of joy.

Many of our problems today is because we let go of one of those truths: dignity or differences. We have to hold both together. Both men and women have dignity, but men and women also have differences. If we let go of the dignity of each gender, or ignore the differences between the genders, we will go wrong.
The problem is not God’s design of men and women. That is a very good thing. If we think that erasing the differences is the solution to restoring dignity to both genders, then we’ve misdiagnosed the problem and we’ll come up with the wrong solution.
We need to hold on to the dignity of both men and women and the differences between us. The problem doesn’t lie in our differences; the problem is elsewhere.
The Real Problem
Genesis 3 tells us what the real issue is.
Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the LORD God had made.
He said to the woman, “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?” And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, but God said, ‘You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.’ ” But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate. Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked. And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths. (Genesis 3:1-7)
I want to make two observations.
The Problem Began with the Craftiness of Our Enemy, Not with God’s Design
You find a talking serpent. Revelation identifies the snake as “that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan” (Revelation 12:9). And what did that serpent do? He tempted the first couple to question God’s word and seize something that didn’t belong to them yet. He provoked them to distrust God and to decide for themselves what’s right and wrong. Rather than submitting to God, they try to take God’s place. As Spurgeon put it, they struck a match and set the world on fire with sin.
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We tend to think that someone or something else will help in time of need, but not Jesus. Maybe we think we’ve sinned too badly, or too many times, to go to Him again. Perhaps we think we can handle our weaknesses and sins on our own, or with a little help from a friend. But the author of Hebrews provides us with every reason to confidently draw near to Jesus, “Since then we have a great high priest…Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace” (Heb. 4:14, 16). Believers can approach God confidently because of the person and work of Christ. And when we do, we can be confident that we will “receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Heb. 4:16).

Where do you turn when you have sinned? If we’re honest, it’s not always to the throne of grace. When we have grown irritated, frustrated, or angry; or when we let an entire day go by without thanking God for the many blessings He has given us; or when jealousy and envy pervade our hearts, we don’t usually feel confident about drawing near to God. Oftentimes we want to hide, make excuses, or blame another person, or circumstance. But if you, like me, have tried to go to anyone or anything except the throne of grace in the wake of sin, you know that it isn’t helpful. However, when we go to Jesus we find “a great high priest who has passed through the heavens” (Heb. 4:14).
Jesus is unlike any other priest about whom the Scriptures speak. He is not only superior to every other priest (Heb. 5:1-4), He is also from a different order of the priesthood (vv. 6, 10). Furthermore, after accomplishing the redemption of God’s people, He “passed through the heavens” (4:14) and “sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high, having become as much superior to angels as the name he has inherited is more excellent than theirs” (1:3-4). Not only this, He is a fully human and fully divine high priest. Therefore, when we are in need of grace, we have no reason to turn away from the faith, or waver from the faith, or doubt the faith that we profess and hold so dear. Instead, we have every reason to “hold fast our confession” (4:14) and go to the throne of grace.
Sometimes, in the wake of sin, it is tempting to think that God is incapable of empathizing with us. What wonderful news, then, that “we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses” (Heb. 4:15). If you read the gospel accounts, you will not only be encouraged, but will soon realize that when Jesus came to earth He experienced what it was like to be human, so that He can help us in time of need. Remember, we are too weak to carry out God’s will in our lives. We don’t have the power to persevere, but God does.
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