UPDATE: His Faith

Our son's faith inspires me.

He has a love for Jesus and it's amazing to see.  We've done our best over the years, to teach our children about God's love.  We've encouraged them to develop their own relationship with Jesus and there have been so many times that we've seen evidence of His work in their young lives. 

Next week Christian gets to be the Expert of the Week for his third grade class.  It's his opportunity to share a hobby or an interest with his classmates and teacher.  A week or so ago, Christian told me that he wanted to share about the Bible when he was Expert of the Week.  He told me that he knew a lot about God and wanted to share what he knew with his class.  I was pretty proud of him.  We filled out his form and sent it into school today.  Then, this afternoon, when I went to pick him up I was told by his teacher that he would not be allowed to share about his religion in the classroom.  Thankfully, he wasn't bothered by this and told me that he could share about something else instead.  

I had a bit of a hard time with this though.  My kids have always come home with Hanukkah projects from their school during Christmas time.  I personally don't have a problem with this at all, and I like the fact that they learn about other holidays and their meanings.  That being said, it's difficult for me to understand why it's okay for them to learn about other people's religions, but not to be able to share about their own.  

When I shared my feelings with a good friend this afternoon, she kindly reminded me that even though Christian may not be able to share about his faith during his Expert of the Week, he shares it every day by the way that he lives his life.  She was right, and it's true.  I'm so incredibly proud of our son.  He told me tonight that he's been "getting in touch with Jesus more."  It was a joy to hear.  Jer and I love Christian so much.  His faith is an encouragement and inspiration to us and others, and that is what matters most.

UPDATE:  The Principal of the elementary school called me back today.  He said that students are allowed to talk about their own personal and family traditions concerning religious things, but that they aren't taught in the classroom.  I was able to share that our goal in Christian's project would not have been to convert his classmates, but more so for Christian to share his heart about the different activities that he enjoyed participating in through our church.  He was very kind and it was good to talk to him concerning this matter.  We also talked about the fact that our church and the elementary school have had a very good relationship for many years and how much we both appreciated that.  I'm thankful that in part, some of the problem with this situation was that it just required clarification.

I also received two emails from Christian's teacher and it was nice to be able to have good communication with her about everything.  In one of her emails, she shared that she "understands how passionate Christian is about his faith."  I was pretty excited to read this, because it shows that our son is able to be a testimony for Jesus at his school just by his words and actions.

Since the project was due this week, Christian ended up picking another topic and is excited to be able to share his presentation with his class.  I just wanted to share this update and also that we are very thankful for the school that our children attend and for the teachers and administration that are there too.