So Much More Than Academics

If someone were to ask you to describe education, how would you respond? I know that my own understanding about education is much more comprehensive today than it has been in the past.

In her book, Transformational Education, Marilyn Howshall describes a complete education as one that includes both individual discipleship (which is when I obey the voice of the Lord speaking to me through my conscience) and individual scholarship (which is when I engage in a process of learning how to learn with the goal of becoming skilled in the tools of learning). Scholarship and discipleship are intimately connected and neither can perform its intended function in the absence of the other. Together they provide a complete education.

Now I have to admit that this description of education was a bit strange to me at first. I had always assumed that an education consisted entirely of academics. I failed to acknowledge that discipleship – the Lord’s personal instruction to me – was necessary or even related to my education. Not only did I equate education with scholarship (separating it from discipleship), but I also had my own idea of what both the process and the end result of scholarship should look like.

As a homeschooling mom, I used to believe that the most valuable learning would take place during my children’s academic lessons as they acquired knowledge of various subjects. I was very aware of and often overwhelmed by all the information that I needed to cover with them in such a brief amount of time. I followed a content-based approach to their education because by doing so I could take full advantage of the limited window of opportunity that was available to teach my children everything that they needed to know. What a huge weight that was for me to carry on my shoulders. If I had continued on that path, I know that it would have led to my own burnout.

But God never intended for me to take on such a heavy burden. He never placed the unrealistic expectation on me to teach my children everything that they needed to learn. His desire was for me to simply come along beside them, not teaching them what to learn, but rather instructing them in how to learn, enabling them to take ownership of their own learning process. And yes, that was a very foreign idea to me. God sure did think outside of my box.

I can see why the concept was so unfamiliar to me. In all of my years of attending school, the focus had always been on the content that I needed to learn and not the process that I needed to go through in order to figure out how to acquire that content for myself. I had become quite skilled in regurgitating information in order to fulfill academic requirements, but I was not nearly so efficient in my ability to make use of the learning tools.

I had never self-initiated a process of acquiring and applying knowledge to my own life in such a way that I was transformed at the heart level. I had never come to the point of specializing in any field of interest to the extent that I could articulate what I had learned to another individual in such a way that I was able to influence them at the heart level.

My past experience had taught me that scholarship consisted of learning what to learn rather than becoming skilled in how to learn – a skill that was essential to my ongoing education. The Lord never intended for my education to ever come to an end. His desire is for me to be a lifelong learner, to enter into a Spirit-led education that has very practical applications to my life. It is for this reason that I have chosen to embrace a lifestyle of learning both for my children and for myself.

As my mind has been renewed, my definition of education has changed radically from what it once was. It has become more accurate. Looking back, I can see that my years of schooling failed to provide me with a real education. Not only had personal discipleship been removed from my educational process, but the form of scholarship that I experienced neglected to teach me what I needed to know in order to be self-educated—it failed to teach me how to learn.

Yes, I had earned a degree and entered into a respected career. I am not denying that those accomplishments were both challenging and significant. It is just that those exterior achievements were not the evidence of a real education. They did not prove that I had the ability or the motivation to take full responsibility for all aspects of my education. And those accomplishments were secondary in importance to the transformation that needed to take place within my heart.

The fruit of a real education can be seen in an individual who has acquired and become skilled in all of the tools that they need to engage in their own learning process. And a complete education – one that does not separate discipleship from scholarship – will always result in heart-level change as Christlike character (relational habits) is formed within an individual and as they apply (not just acquire) truth to their life.

In my next post, I will share an example from my own life of how I attempted to educate myself, but ended up failing miserably.

~Christi Faagau