Radio Commentaries

Week: February 24th-28th, 2025

2/24/25 - Ask For Open Doors

The Apostle Paul asked the Colossian church to “Continue earnestly in prayer…that God would open to us a door...” An open door implies an opening to a somewhere. When it comes to your children’s public school, an open door may involve giving to the teacher or principal information about students’ freedom of religious expression. This leads to a “place” of greater freedom for students.

A wonderful prayer to help you navigate the open doors of your schools is this: “Lord, help me align my desires with Yours for my public school. Show me what You are doing in the lives of people around me and guide me to join You in your work to bless them and help them move from fear to freedom.”

You can be a gateway to better education for your child or student. For more information, click here.

02/25/25 - The Cross & The Psalm

Easter is approaching and public schools can teach about it.

The U.S. Department of Education explains in its guidance on teaching about religion that “public schools may teach about religious holidays, including their religious aspects.” For Easter, this means telling, or reading, the story of Christ’s death and resurrection. Students can read the disciples’ account of the death of Jesus in the Gospels.

We’ve created a lesson that does this for public schools. We’ve paraphrased Luke 22 through 24, inserted cultural and literary references, and made it look like pages straight out of a textbook. Teachers can make copies of the pages and give them to students.

It also explains how to teach about Easter in a way that is legal and appropriate. To download our Easter Lesson plan, click HERE.

2/26/25 - Grading Students’ Religious Expression

Public school students can write about their faith in a homework assignment, but how are teachers supposed to grade them?

The U.S. Department of Education released new guidance on religious freedom in public schools. The guidance makes clear that students can express faith in homework, artwork, and other written as well as oral assignments. How is a teacher supposed to evaluate their work?

The guidelines make clear that “such home and classroom work should be judged by ordinary academic standards of substance and relevance...and neither penalized nor rewarded on account of its religious perspective.” In other words, the teacher can’t mark a paper down because she doesn’t agree with the student’s religious beliefs even on controversial topics. The student is protected.

For details on the new guidance, click here.

2/27/25 - Easter Textbook Lesson

Christian young people know the Easter story of Christ’s death and resurrection, but they most likely don’t know its impact on history, literature, and culture.

It’s sad that many public school students don’t know the religious aspects of the Easter story. That can be fixed if educators will teach the facts about the holiday. But it’s also important that students in our churches understand the cultural impact of the Easter story.

We’ve created a lesson that does this for Sunday schools and youth groups. We paraphrased Luke 22 through 24, inserted cultural and literary references, and made it look like pages straight out of a textbook. Churches can make copies of the pages and share them with their students and families. For a free copy, click here.

2/28/25 - Easter & MLK

Easter is coming and public school educators should teach their students the cultural and social impact of the death and resurrection of Jesus.

For example, Martin Luther King, Jr., was accused of being an extremist by local clergy after his protest in Birmingham, Alabama. In his famous “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” he wrote:

"In that dramatic scene on Calvary’s hill three men were crucified. We must never forget that all three were crucified for the same crime---the crime of extremism. Two were extremists for immorality, and thus fell below their environment. The other, Jesus Christ, was an extremist for love, truth and goodness, and thereby rose above his environment. Perhaps the South, the nation and the world are in dire need of creative extremists."

For a free copy of our public school lesson about Easter, click here.