Ok now I see. I've heard these same complaints for longer than you have been alive. These schools have rules to govern the conduct of the students. Many of the students have never experienced rules governing their conduct before they arrived at the school. They are perhaps a little overly strict but you must realize that they are dealing with a large number of people from widely divergent backgrounds. The military has very strict rules of conduct that many find objectionable but it cultivates good personal discipline.
I think it wise to discern the difference between rules to govern conduct at school and true legalism from a biblical doctrine perspective. I do not know of anyone at these schools claiming that you would lose your salvation if you violated a rule of conduct. You might get shipped if you lied or stole and were unrepentant but you would still be seen as a saved person. I'd have to check but I'm not familiar with either teaching the legalistic doctrine of loss of salvation if one fails to keep all the law.
For the cause of Christ
Roger
Roger,
I can see where misty is coming from. I also grew up in a Baptist church and attended their School until the 8th grade. The church and school was very legalistic as far dress codes, hair styles, make up, watching TV, going to movies, music, etc. TO enforce the laws/rules, they had a demerit system in school and even a quasi demerit system for church members and their families. Like Misty said, this church also promoted PCC, BJU, Chattanooga Christian College and a host of other like colleges and ministries.
The issue is not with the rules, but with enforcement and power and eventually Religious Ritual Abuse, such legalistic systems create. Many colleges, churches and k-12 schools created by these people tend to dehumanize women and enforce the teaching sof Paul on women keeping quiet, etc. By changing the outside appearance they are attempting to change the inside and you can never do that. Likewise by sheltering kids from the real world, you take away any ability for those kids to discern things on their own or let the Holy ghost work through them at that level.
I remember my parents joining that hell house called a church back in 1975 and away went the TV, my blue jeans, any secular magazines, books, etc, including things like Highlights and Heaven forbid any Disney related was in the house! Dad stopped using the belt and he bought a 2" in diameter dowel rod and I was punshied with the Rod of correction!
I never got to watch TV again until 1981 and I was no better for it. The education system was suppossed to be far better than those dreaded "public schools", yet I could not read at the 8th grade level, do math at the 6th grade level or write at the 6th grade level. I had no idea abut basic chemistry, the physical sciences or contemporary events. I had no idea about modern literature, but I could smoke you on anything related to the Bible or Biblical rules!
The first year I attended public school I was flunked back to 7th grade and almost back to 6th...to be clear, I had attended a Baptist Christian School, whose teachers gradiuated from plaes like pCC, BJU and other Christian COlleges and we used the famous Becka curriculum and the public school pulled me back, because I could not master the basics of 8th grade reading, writing or mathematics.... Yeah so much for the lie that your kid will be a great scholar.
The only kids that got scholarships were to places like PCC and BJU...They would go and by the summer of their sophmore year they were pregnant, drunks, strung out on drugs or dead...yeah I said DEAD! Dead by suicide because their world view was so limited to the legalism of Baptist men running amok they had zero clue about real life.
We left because my parents began to see through the whole LIE. My mom started a ministry for women that were physically, sexually and emotionally abused from churches like this one.
It stunned her and my Dad to the lengths these men would go , including elders , Pastors and deacons to cover up their sinful lives. Wife swapping in the name of Jesus...physical abuse because a women spoke during church....her husband was told by church leadership "to take care of the rebellion" of his wife with the rod of correction, so the guy beat his wife with the dowel rod of correction. The women nearly died and then church leadership cowered and covered their butts when the law got involved...the sick thing is the guy who did this awful thing, said he did it in a fit of anger, he could not bring himself to tattle tale on the leadership. 2 years later the guy left the church and was found living in a million dollar house, divorced and living in sin with another woman, etc...It was discovered the church paid him off...
The Baptists like to point fingers at everyone but themselves, and have some very warped people, who have warped theology, which produces warped interpretations. These fools make the charismatics/Pentecostals appear normal.
This is not the exception its the rule in several baptist churches....its the elephant in the room, they refuse to talk about!
