A recent Gallup Poll® reported that 88% of the people in America are religious, meaning that they practice a religion. This is the highest level recorded in our nation’s history. Yet, 80% of these same people do not believe that Jesus Christ is the only way to heaven. There has never been a time when the need was greater for Christian schools and Christian education. But what is it that makes a school “Christian?” The Bible warns us in Colossians 2:8, “Beware, lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.” Notice the last two words in that verse, “after Christ.” We are either “after Christ” or we are not after Christ. The Bible says, “Beware, lest any man spoil you...” The word spoil means “to rob, to steal from, to plunder.” One of the things that is most heartbreaking in our society is a generation of “cursed children,” as the Bible calls them in II Peter 2:14; cursed because they have been robbed. It is not that their homes or possessions have been stolen. Infinitely more tragic, it is their minds and hearts that have been robbed. We are warned to beware, lest anyone rob us through “philosophy and vain deceit.” Philosophy is what one thinks, what one believes. If you want to affect the behavior of a person, change what that person believes. People behave a certain way as a consequence of how they believe. “Vain deceit” speaks of the idols we take for ourselves. The Bible goes on to say: “...after the tradition…after the rudiments...” This is the thinking process of man without any regard given to God. The verse concludes the thought with the phrase, “...and not after Christ.” On one side we find “philosophy, vain deceit, the traditions of men, the rudiments of the world”; on the other side “...after Christ.” A Christian School Ought to be Patterned “After Christ.” We say we have a Christian school. This is a meaningful statement. This conviction should be held an