what about this "non-programmed" approach to sharing the gospel?

Nov 2, 2009

Woke up feeling much better… and more positive!

At Monday coffee there were about 15 people. Quite a lot of the conversation centered around the Lord – which was cheering and reassuring, after the questions asked yesterday by that (former) pastor who I assume feels that there needs to be a more “conscious” and “planned/ programmed” approach to “ensuring” the street people receive the gospel. It did make me kind of wonder for a bit…

(It reminds me of when we started home-schooling. The first few days were school-at-home… and the kids just said, “We might as well go back to school,” so I threw caution to the wind, and we pretty much de-schooled, and un-schooled… the kids were allowed, except for a little bit of formal math and language arts for an hour or so – hard for me to let go total control! – to do any kind of learning they wanted: reading library books, playing games, watching semi-educational TV, going for hikes, helping people, etc etc etc. Being a long-time school teacher, and a bit nervous about this experiment, I did, behind the scenes, list everything they were doing… and it turned out that they were in the end doing a lot more learning, and were a lot more excited about it, than what they had done in “schooling” … But it sure looked like chaos to my “educator’s eye” at first! The local community librarian was happy, though… our kids alone accounted for half of the library’s circulation at the time… which, as it turned out, kept the library open full time; the directors had considered cutting the hours significantly! Later, one of my kids decided she wanted the “report card” record schools offer… and arranged to challenge final exams on some courses that were actually above her theoretical “grade level” … and totally aced them, even though she’d had no “formal schooling” in those areas (secondary level sciences and technology courses)!) …. (So I’m personally quite willing to give this “non-programmed” approach to sharing the gospel a chance )!