How can we reach the public schools?

• Paris Ragan
• Christian Living
• 0 comments
• March 15, 2018

Psalms 24:6-10 says, “This is the generation of them that seek him, that seek thy face, O Jacob. Selah. Lift up your heads, O ye gates; and be ye lift up, ye everlasting doors; and the King of glory shall come in. Who is this King of glory? The LORD strong and mighty, the LORD mighty in battle. Lift up your heads, O ye gates; even lift them up, ye everlasting doors; and the King of glory shall come in. Who is this King of glory? The LORD of hosts, he is the King of glory. Selah.”

THE KING OF GLORY CAME IN
Over the course of the last several decades we have become largely convinced that schools are considered to be religion free zones. Mainstream media has pushed that thought into our lives and we have largely accepted it without doing any real research of our own.

On Friday, March 2, God showed us that schools are not off limits to the gospel of Jesus Christ. We were able to take our Crossfire worship team and Crossfire family into Denham Springs High School, a local school on the outskirts of Baton Rouge, to host a schoolwide revival with attendees from several high schools and middle schools in the area. The service concluded with Pastor Gabe preaching an evangelistic message to see 30 to 40 young people respond to the invitation to accept Jesus Christ.

What we took away from that service was far more than just a successful evangelistic outreach—God birthed a nationwide vision to carry the gospel of Jesus Christ into middle schools, high schools, and college campuses around the country. The question is, how can this be possible?

WHAT WE NEED TO KNOW ABOUT THE EQUAL ACCESS ACT
The Equal Access Act is U.S. Code > Title 20> Chapter 52 > Subchapter VIII 4071 states: “It shall be unlawful for any public secondary school which receives federal financial assistance and which has a limited open forum to deny equal access or a fair opportunity to, or discriminate against, any students who wish to conduct a meeting within that limited open forum on the basis of the religious, political, philosophical, or other content of the speech at such meetings.”
This means that if a school allows campus clubs, such as a chess club, math club, BETA club, etc., then the school may not discriminate against a student who seeks to form a club based on— most important to us—their religious view point.

A school is property of the government, teachers and administrators are government employees, and the government cannot establish any religion, according to our Constitution. However, students are not property of the government and their rights of religious freedom and free speech are not laid down at the schoolhouse doors. Students have a right to form a club, to hand out religious material during non-instructional periods, and even to invite outside speakers to speak at their club meetings.

The key to all of this being legal is that the club is student-initiated and student-led. The responsibility on the side of the church is to educate the local body on the rights that students have in their schools to share and promote the gospel of Jesus Christ.

GOD IS NOT DONE WITH THIS GENERATION
As all of us know the generation that is coming up now has been bombarded with the power of darkness. They are faced with more temptation to do evil today than at any other time in history. There has been so much darkness hovering over this generation. They are in desperate need of the gospel of Jesus Christ. We need to begin educating ourselves on what we can do to reach the schools. Thousands of middle school, high school, and college students gather at schools throughout the year. They are in one place at one time—what better ground is there than that? Now is the time to move on this. Now is the time to prepare and educate your young people. Know your rights and use them!

https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/20/4071

• Viewed 2263 times

No one has commented on this article yet. Leave your comment below!