“Come” and “Go”, Mama
Community service can be as simple as helping your kids to rake your elderly neighbor’s leaves to helping a candidate run for office . . . from baking goods for a fundraiser to bringing a meal to a new mom in your neighborhood. Jesus was a community servant. It is Who He was and what He did. He had compassion on those in His community and fed them and healed them and taught them.
Because Jesus was a community servant, we have tried to be the same wherever possible. Over our homeschooling years, we have visited convalescent homes, served crisis pregnancy centers, fed the homeless, created events for homeless children, stood in pro-life chains and in front of clinics, passed out tracts, visited the sick in hospitals, cleaned the homes of those in need, gone to state capitols for rallies, and been a part of many church outreach events. We have visited and supported those in prison and have even taught our children about supporting their local church and other ministries with the money the LORD has provided them.
Two main commands the Lord gives us in Scripture are “Come” and “Go.” He calls us to come to Him and then to go out in His Name. We come to Him and bring our children with us. We go in His Name and bring our children with us. This is one of the beauties in homeschooling our children: we are allowed the freedom to live Biblically in our own homes and communities.
Community involvement begins at home in the talking part. We teach our children the “whys” of service, and then we live it out. We walk with our children through many areas of service in our communities, and it can start with our own neighbors. It can be uncomfortable and inconvenient, but it is what we are called to do.
Micah 6:8 tells us what the Lord requires of us: “To do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God.”
We are to do justly: Stand up for righteousness and truth in our communities.
We are to love mercy: Help the widows and fatherless which is pure religion and undefiled before God.
We are to walk humbly with our God: Where did Jesus walk when He was on the earth? Within the church and in the community, in the meeting places of sinners, and with the sick and dying. We can walk humbly with Him out into our own communities as well.
Jesus certainly didn’t just hang out at home with his disciples all the time. He took them out with Him into the community. We should do the same with the little disciples He’s given to us.
Coming and Going with You,
~Deborah
Blessings in the Community by Nancy Doran
Teaching Children to Serve by Malia Russell
Deborah Wuehler is the Senior Editor and Director of Production here at The Old Schoolhouse® Magazine. She would say she is a very ordinary homeschool mom–with one exception: she has an extraordinary God Who provides all she needs for life and homeschooling. She has eight children aged 11 to 29. Deborah’s mission is this: to point other homeschoolers to the Lord in all they do, think, and feel—and to confirm that they, too, can find everything they need for life, godliness, and homeschooling in their knowledge of Him (2 Peter 1:3-4).
