Evangelicals & Child-Rearing

As Christ-followers, our job is not so much to drum up controversy or hunt for things to find dissent so we can register our opposition just so we can muse on the matter. Yet the Bible enjoins us to watch as well as pray. Evangelicals are called to be bulwarks for truth and to let our light shine before men to glorify our Father in Heaven without apology.

Just this week, the SCOTUS heard a profound case, and depending on the Justices' ruling, a momentous decree will be issued dictating with full throated governmental authority how parents are understood whether to have the legal right to parent their children as they deem best.

A Maryland school board has refused to grant dissenting parents their right to opt their elementary-school-aged children out of instruction that includes LGBTQ+ themes. I have consistently postulated that God has ordained that human flourishing functions best when the lowest unit applicable has the right to govern. This concept is understood to be the Principle of Subsidiarity.

Subsidiarity is a principle suggesting that decisions and responsibilities should be handled at the lowest level possible within a system, whether a political system, an organization, or society as a whole. It emphasizes that higher-level authorities should only step in when lower-level units are unable to effectively manage matters themselves.

Thus, I submit that our Creator God has ordained that parents, not the government, which God has also ordained for human flourishing, have the paramount responsibility and authority over what is best for the child in question.

Consequently, the government should only intervene if it can demonstrate that a parent has reasonably forfeited their parental rights.

I agree with Dr. Albert Mohler, president of my alma mater: The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, when he contends that the parent, not the school board, has the child’s best interest in mind.

The mandate to train up the child in the way he should go is given to the parent, not the school board.

Not surprisingly, the tenor of the Justices' questioning indicates that it will be a likely 6-3 decision, with the three Liberal Justices deciding in favor of the school board.

Time and time again, we see the liberal voices in our culture working in explicit opposition to God’s intended purposes. Yet many in the Evangelical community, especially AAs, continue to support the Democratic Party without batting an eyelash or, as the prophet Jeremiah said, without the ability to blush.

The Democratic Party is ardently against School Choice despite the clear evidence that the current educational model, especially in our major cities, is failing dramatically.

It is the Democratic Party that supports the notion that school-age children can self-identify their gender preference to school officials and that school officials have no legal obligation to inform the parent. Just look to Governor Newsom and the great state of California as one example.

Literally, little Sally can leave her home in the morning dressed as Sally, change her appearance at school, be recognized as little Samuel during the school day, and return home as little Sally, with the parents never being the wiser.

If you read this and vote Democratic, in any shape or form or fashion, this is what you are entering into a political alliance, and believe me, there will be a Day of Reckoning for your duplicity.

Cries of Republicans being a racist party will not suffice; cries that DJT is a racist convict will not hold sway or cut muster.

If I have a choice between voting for a Democratic candidate or DJT or a DJT type, my choices as a God-fearing Evangelical are limited to three:

vote for DJT, even if I do so with great trepidation
vote for a 3rd party candidate
not vote

I most strenuously and earnestly plead with you, the reader, that the one thing you CANNOT, the one thing you MUST NOT do as a Christ-follower, is align with the Party of Death, Debauchery, and Despair.

I fear that, for many, eternity hangs in the balance. While salvation is and will forever be all about grace, it is nonetheless a grace that is not dead or inoperable.

It is a grace that removes one from the Kingdom of Darkness to the Kingdom of Light, and observable action manifests as a result and necessary consequence.

While one will never attain sinlessness while still in this sin-marred body, one will nevertheless abhor what God abhors. One will only delight in what the Bible informs them that God finds delights.

Since God ordains and finds delights in the marriage of one man to one woman for life, that will be the only concept of marriage they will endorse and support.

Since God ordains that life is precious and sacred, they will fight for the right of every life that God creates in the womb to be brought to term and cherished as the gift from God that it is.

Since God is explicitly clear that He and He alone determines the gender, gender dysphoria must be from the Adversary, and we must bend the knee to God and never the culture. We recognize that while gender dysphoria is a real condition affecting some, the only solution is pastoral care and fervent prayer, never surgery, hormones, or mutilation.

I find solace in the fact that it appears the SCOTUS will rule in favor of parental rights. What I find alarming is that there is a sufficient body of influential people working in clear opposition to God’s prescribed manner for human flourishing.

My question is, why do you continue to align with this segment of the population?

It's better to wrestle with that query now than later. Repent or perish. The choices are straightforward—at least, they are for me.

As usual, let me know what you think. Until then, keep your hands to the plow and seek to serve for an Audience of One.

With fear & trembling,

Ricky V Kyles Sr. DEd.Min