PHILOSOPHY
God, in the Holy Scriptures, reveals Himself as a Triune God. The Father is revealed as Creator, Preserver, and Governor of the universe and the affairs of men. Jesus Christ, sharing in the Trinity, is revealed as the Redeemer of the world, and personal Savior, our substitute, to whom we owe loyalty in a life of submission and service. The Holy Ghost is revealed as the Sanctifier upon whom we rely for faith and a new spiritual life.
Man was created with a free will. He chose to sin and lost god's image. Man's disobedience brought sin into the world. Man by virtue of his sinful nature, is a lost and condemned creature, destined for an eternity in hell. The law gives man an ever-deepening consciousness of his sin and the inability of working out his own salvation.
In the Gospel, man is led by God the Holy Spirit, to faith in the resurrected Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord Jesus lived, suffered and died to atone completely for all men's sin. The Holy Spirit uses the word of God and the Sacraments to affect a rebirth. After rebirth in Baptism, and knowing God's love, the Holy Spirit moves him to praise and serve God and to love and serve his fellow man.
Man is involved in changes in knowledge, attitude, and conduct. This is the learning process. The Holy Scripture, reason, and experience help to understand this learning process. Man uses his mental processes to gain knowledge. His emotions cause him to choose that which he desires. His will cause him to respond by attempting that which has been desired.
God gives man his innate equipment and abilities. Environment helps determine to what extent his innate equipment and abilities will be used. Readiness, individual differences, motivation, purpose, meaning, interest and repetition are factors which affect or facilitate learning.
Man must learn that he is first and finally held accountable to God for his actions.
The children come to school similar in sin, but unique as human beings, in their own physical, social, intellectual, and emotional development. The school must be cognizant of these individual differences and seek to develop and expand them. The child learns best when his curiosity and desire for learning are satisfied through experiences that provide for knowledge and understanding.
All that natural man is and does is completely sinful. In contrast, the Christian reflects partially the love of Christ in whatever he is and does. Each individual Christian is a dual personality - sinner and saint - natural and regenerate. The philosophy of Christian education is to aid the child of Christ in realizing more fully, through divine revelation and through the development of reason, to lead a Christ-centered life on earth with a glorious hope for a blessed life in eternity.
