Part of the current push for big government includes more government control over your kids. For several decades in America, the family has been under attack. Much of it was subtle, sneaked into the government (public) schools and universities, and through sinful suggestiveness in the "entertainment" industry. Now, it is reaching critical mass and many parents are reeling.

One defense that Christian parents have long used against the influences of a pagan culture is home schooling their children. This allowed them to channel their formative years toward a heart for God and delayed the lying influences of the culture until they were mature enough to deal with them.

The American freedom to home school your children is almost unique in the Western World but is under assault continually. The Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA) is increasingly having to run defense for parents being threatened by intrusive government officials.

A look at where the battle is likely to go involves a home schooling family who fled from Germany to the U.S. to keep the state from removing their children and forcing them into the government school system. The Romeike family was initially granted asylum in the U.S. as political refugees. After several years, the U.S. government is trying to deport them back to Germany to face huge fines, jail, and loss of custody of the children.

When HSLDA went to their defense, it uncovered an alarming argument that the office of the U.S. Attorney General, Eric Holder, was using. When stripped of its legalese, it came down to a question of an individual`s fundamental rights as opposed to the rights of the state. And the Department of Justice (DOJ) argued that the Romeike`s case was not religious persecution and asylum in the U.S. should be denied.

The Supreme Court of Germany declared that the purpose of the German ban on homeschooling was to "counteract the development of religious and philosophically motivated parallel societies." This essentially declares that the state`s religion and philosophy is the only one that is permitted. Although the state is supposedly "secular," without religion, it has become anti-religion by pushing the philosophy of humanism. In this environment, anyone, primarily a Bible believer, is the enemy, who doesn`t believe in evolution, social engineering such as abortion and euthanasia, and Marxist politics. HSLDA discovered that the U.S. government now basically agrees with this approach in its attempt to return the Romeike family back to their German nightmare. This is further proof that America is rapidly losing the Biblically based freedoms established by the sacrifice of our founding fathers and the blood of millions of "our finest" fighting men since then.*

They depended on the soul winners to be diligent in spreading the gospel of salvation and righteousness. The fact that godless humanism, unbelief, selfishness and outright paganism has come to dominate our culture does not speak well of our efforts to preserve our freedom. The liberty that they provided has become freedom to sin and God is lifting His hand of blessing.

Our only hope is for Bible believers to get back to work until repentance and revival sweeps our land. Most revivals in history have grown out of a spiritual awakening fostered by a saturation with gospel tracts. Today, we have many more ways of spreading the gospel, but paper tracts are still a most convenient form. A no-nonsense gospel tract will wait as long as it takes, sometimes years, for a hungry heart to come along.

Soul winners, we have a lot of work to do!

*For info on HSLDA and the Romeike case, visit www.hslda.org and search Romeike.