“paideia”
Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the [paideia] of the Lord — Ephesians 6:4
Paul uses the Greek word paideia here to indicate how to raise children up. It was a common word at the time used to mean “enculturation,” to be a good citizen. The church in Ephesus would have understood this word to mean that when you were raising a child, it had to be to a particular end.
What you wanted was a child whose mind, affections, imagination, thoughts, actions, were all directed towards the service of the king.
Paul was using this word that meant Hellenistic enculturation to mean Christian enculturation instead.
In doing so, they would have a shared language, history, memory, books, interests, values. They would become a good citizen of heaven and everything in their life would point to king Jesus — from their study of scripture to their ABCs to their perspective of history and politics to their awe in the intricacies of science behind the natural world.
He wanted them to linger on the question — to what king will have their allegiance, in what kingdom will they see hope and joy?
But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself. — Philippians 3:20-21
About Us
I’m Bridget — a classical/eclectic homeschool mom of two, and a pastor’s wife in upstate NY. Over the years, I have chronically said yes to to many things, taken too much on, and stretched myself so thin that my downtime is non existent.
Homeschooling has motivated me to intentionally slow down. To notice the birds in our yard. To appreciate simple pleasures in life like drinking tea while reading E.B. White aloud. To ponder questions before immediately googling them.
I don’t homeschool because I’m particularly patient. And I don’t have a PhD in Education (my background is in Marketing). We choose to homeschool because we feel deeply convicted about it, and because we see it as giving our kids the best foundation we can provide them.
I’m still figuring things out. My oldest is about to complete Kindergarten. We found a local Classical Conversations co-op, and while I am not married to the curriculum, I really love the families in our group. I am trying to figure out the best of both worlds with CC and Charlotte Mason principles.