December 22, 2025 Show with George Jensen & Jill Kilker on “Options for Churches & Christian Parents to Educate Our Children”

Live from historic downtown Carlisle, Pennsylvania, home of founding father James Wilson, 19th century hymn writer

George Duffield, 19th century gospel minister George Norcross, and sports legend

Jim Thorpe. It's Iron Sharpens Iron. This is a radio platform in which pastors,

Christian scholars, and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.

Proverbs, chapter 27, verse 17, tells us, Iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.

Matthew Henry said that in this passage, we are cautioned to take heed with whom we converse and directed to have in view in conversation to make one another wiser and better.

It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next two hours, and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions.

And now, here's your host, Chris Arnzen. Good afternoon,

Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, and the rest of humanity living on the planet Earth who are listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com.

This is Chris Arnzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Monday on this 22nd day of December 2025.

Before I introduce my guests and my topic for today,

I have a praise report. I want to not only thank God, first and foremost, but I want to also thank the fine folks at heartsforthelost .com

for becoming a new annual sponsor of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

I just heard from Brian Ninde—I hope I'm not mispronouncing his last name—several days ago, out of the blue, as it were, by God's providence, and he had informed me that we had met several years ago at a

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And the check is already in the mail, as they say. So we are so delighted to welcome heartsforthelost .com

to the Iron Sharpens Iron Radio family of sponsors. But today,

I'm absolutely thrilled to have not only a returning guest to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, but also a first -time guest who both serve in the same congregation.

The first guest that I am thrilled to welcome back to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio has become a very dear friend of mine.

I am so delighted and thankful to our Lord that in his providence he guided our steps and our paths to cross, and not long after I moved to Carlisle, Pennsylvania, and relaunched

Iron Sharpens Iron Radio here after relocating from New York, I was pleased to become acquainted and now enjoying the friendship of George Jensen, who is pastor of the

Enola First Church of God in Enola, Pennsylvania. He describes himself as a plain -tee

Arminian and me as a black -coffee Calvinist, so it's a joy to have this brother back on the program.

Welcome back to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Pastor George Jensen. Thank you,

Chris. I'm thrilled to be here. And we have joining George a first -time guest,

Jill Kilter, and she is director of children and youth ministries at Enola First Church of God in Enola, Pennsylvania.

She's also an expert on homeschooling law in the

Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and both Jill and George will be addressing options for churches and Christian parents to educate our children.

And it's wonderful to have you here for the very first time on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Jill Kilter.

Thank you. It's wonderful to be here. And, Pastor George, if you could, please give a brief description of the

Enola First Church of God in Enola, Pennsylvania. Well, Enola First Church of God was founded in 1907 through what is now the

Churches of God General Conference, a Bible -believing evangelical denomination that comes out of the

Second Great Awakening. The movement was started right across the river in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and has spread across the country ever since.

We are the non -Pentecostal, I guess you'd say, and original

Church of God denomination through our founder, Reverend John Weinbrenner. Yeah, that church that's right near the

Harrisburg Amtrak, doesn't that have some kind of historic significance, that building?

Yes, sir. That was originally Salem German Reformed Church, which is now

Salem United Church of Christ, of course. And yes, John Weinbrenner was sent to preach there in the early 1800s,

I believe it was. And, well, he was just a little bit too evangelistic and on fire for the

Lord for the, I guess you'd say, at that time, for other matters that he put forth.

The congregation wasn't ready for that at that time, let's just say so. Well, I'm sure that the folks at the

United Church of Christ would be no more ready for an evangelistic sermon, although it would be wonderful for them to hear one, because that denomination, sadly, has far departed from the

Scriptures. Although there are a remnant of true believers still there, and I've even met a couple of pastors who are in that denomination that are biblically faithful, and the ones that I've met are praying for the right time to exit that denomination.

And I'm sure I'll be hearing back from them when that happens. But today we are going to be talking about opportunities for education for Christian parents that you folks are providing, and perhaps you could tell us,

Pastor George, you could start off by telling us, before we go into Jill's testimony of salvation, perhaps you could give us the framework of what you are doing there in the realm of education.

Sure. To be fair, this is a work in progress. The micro -school, if you will, the homeschool micro -school that we're looking to establish—and

Jill will talk about that too—is not a reality yet. We are very hopeful it will be this fall, but that's all up to God and His sovereign providence, of course.

But where this originated was, we were praying as a congregation to see where the

Lord was leading us to put a special emphasis in our ministry, in our direction, and the congregation sensed that there were three areas after a time of prayer and fasting and conversation.

And one was to enhance our security, of course, because every church is concerned about that now, meaning whenever there are public events in the building, what we do about that to make sure the people are safe.

The second is we do a lot of fellowship events and even some outreach events that involve fellowship in our

Fellowship Ball and Kitchen, so perhaps sprucing up remodeling the kitchen, that's something we are talking about as well and working on.

And the third is an educational alternative for Christian families. What would that look like?

And what we settled on was to start a Christian, make sure I get this right, homeschool microschool, and with anywhere from up to, you know, just a handful up to 25 students max because of our building and because of the, just we feel that that's what

God is leading us to be, a small movement, a small school. And it would be for homeschool students and homeschool families, because as you'll find out from Jill, her passion in seeing young people discipled and educated in the

Lord is the homeschool movement. She is a homeschool parent. She homeschooled both of her children,

Elena and Luke, and that was a very successful endeavor for Jill and her husband Joe to do this.

And so how can we do this in a way that would be helpful to parents? Because Jill is, and I had heard too, that parents don't know where to begin, what to do.

So we're hoping that we will have an educational model that does some instruction at the church for the children, but the bulk of the instruction would be on the parents, their homeschool parents.

They need to, you know, make sure that everything that, submit all the paperwork and everything, but also to equip those parents to know how to homeschool their children.

So that's what we're looking at, Chris. That's where the origin of this movement came from, and it is a work in progress.

Great. And if anybody listening has questions of your own, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com,

chrisarnson at gmail .com. Give us your first name at least, your city and state, and country of residence.

But Jill, as I said before, since you're a first -time guest, we have a tradition here.

Whenever we have a first time guest on Iron Sherpa and Zion Radio, that those guests give a summary of their salvation testimony that would include the religious atmosphere in which they were raised, if any, and the kinds of providential circumstances our

Sovereign Lord raised up in their lives that drew them to himself and saved them. And we would love to hear your story.

Sure. Well, I don't have a dramatic, earth -shattering story, but I do have a life -changing story, as every testimony is when someone fully surrenders their lives to Christ.

I was raised in the church. My mother saw that we were in church every

Sunday and Sunday school. My father worked at the post office nights, so he did not attend church with us.

My mother was very shy, and she had a very quiet face, but it was a strong face.

And I often saw her reading the Bible. Actually, I would see her reading the

Bible every day, and I knew that she spent quiet time with the Lord. Growing up,

I always was in church, and I felt the love of a church family, and I loved all of them.

And I had this desire to learn everything

I could about the Lord, and this was before I was really walking closely, surrendered my life to Him.

I was very interested in learning about Him. I had so much interest.

I would see signs for Vacation Bible School around the community, and I would plead with my parents to see that I could go there.

And so there was a part of me, I think, that was always hungry for the Word of God. And I really wanted to be a good girl.

I wanted to follow what God wanted me to do, and that was very important to me.

But I also was shy, and I lacked confidence, didn't really want to be seen.

In fact, as a little girl, I grew my bangs over my eyes so that I didn't have to look at people or interact.

And Pastor Jensen is probably laughing because that is not the person that I am today by any means.

But I really thought I was on a path. One weekend when

I was a younger teenager, I don't remember exactly the age, maybe eighth, ninth grade, our church had kind of a teen revival weekend, kind of like a retreat.

And one of the activities that we did, and I'm sure lots of groups have done this, but one of the activities we did was the leader asked us to write what was really standing between our relationship with the

Lord on a piece of paper, anything that we wanted, any sin that was keeping us from a relationship.

And I really thought that everything was fine, but as I started to realize that,

I think it dawned on me that really what was standing between me and God was my need to be the good girl and do things on my own efforts and not make that happen for myself and not trust what

God had already done for me. And so we were to write this on the paper and nail it to a wooden cross that they had.

And that was really the pivotal moment in my life when I realized that my own efforts were not what would put me in a right relationship with God, but that it was what

He had done for me on the cross. And I think that's when I truly surrendered my life and made a decision to walk with Jesus all of the days of my life.

And so it was really the symbolic nailing it to the cross and not in Jill's efforts, but in God's love for me.

And so there was nothing major that shifted in terms of my behavior, my habits, but my heart shifted that day.

Yes, definitely. How old were you? I think I was probably like eighth or ninth grade, so 14 maybe.

And I really grew up in a loving church that allowed me, basically, you know, the bangs were cut out of my eyes and not radically at that time, but they allowed me as a young person to start teaching

Sunday school, be involved in Vacation Bible School. I even came up with an idea to do children's musicals, and they allowed me to take that on as a teen and supported me in that.

So that was really kind of the beginning of God growing me into really what has led me to what

I'm doing today. Well, hallelujah. And when did you become aware of the homeschool movement and what was so compelling and intriguing about it to you?

Well, that's an interesting question because in my lack of knowledge, I was very against homeschooling initially.

Yeah, yeah. I always knew that I wanted to work with children from those early days after I really committed my life to the

Lord. I was serving in my church. And I knew I had gifts and talents that God had given me those to teach and to share with young people.

And so I went to college to become a teacher, and I got my bachelor's degree in elementary education.

And I took a job in a public school, a couple of public schools, and I taught for almost a decade.

While I was teaching in public schools, I didn't really, again, it was lacking knowledge, but I used to kind of make fun of the people who kept their kids at home and homeschooled them because I really thought that wasn't really even a feasible option.

And I remember even when I married my husband, I told him that I knew

I would love the children that we had someday, but if he ever thought I was going to be a stay -at -home mom, that he was crazy because I was not going to waste my life.

Those were the words that I would waste my life raising children.

And when I had my daughter after, you know, teaching for a decade, really career -focused in my 20s, going to graduate school, doing mission work overseas,

I had this baby. And even though I had the main income,

I wanted to be her mom. And I cried every day going to school to teach, having to leave her.

And I realized that I had spent 10 years seeing children who were a result of parents who didn't have time for them.

And I didn't want that to be my child. So I finished that school year, and I didn't really even have a way to do it financially.

My husband and I didn't, but I resigned and became a full -time mom, a part -time house parent at a private school with my husband on the weekends to make ends meet, but something that we could take our children with us.

Then it seemed like when it was time for my daughter to go to kindergarten,

I, the school district we lived in, had gone to full -day kindergarten, and I was not thrilled developmentally sending a five -year -old to a full -day program.

It's just a concern that I have with the maturity, the development of a five -year -old.

And so because of my job at the residential school, I decided for kindergarten,

I was just going to do this homeschool thing. And it was the only kindergarten, so I could handle it.

And so that she wouldn't get home late on a Sunday night from our job and then have to get on the bus

Monday morning. And kindergarten turned into first grade, and first grade turned into second grade, and a brother came along in kindergarten.

And so it just kind of, it wasn't out of necessarily disillusion with the public school system at that time, although I did have some, lots actually.

But it was really just something that I realized teaching was my passion. Then I had children, and they were my passion.

And homeschooling was a merging of both my passions that God had, burdens that God had put in my heart.

Praise God. And we're going to continue where you left off there when we come back from our first commercial break.

And once again, if you have questions for our guests today, Pastor George Jensen and Jill Kilker about homeschooling, about education alternatives for your children, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com.

chrisarnson at gmail .com. As always, give us your first name at least, city and state and country of residence.

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We are now back with Pastor George Jensen and Jill Kilker from the

Enola First Church of God in Enola, Pennsylvania. We are talking about options for parents in the education of their children.

And before I go to you again, Pastor George, I wanted Jill to perhaps highlight some things that she was witnessing in the public school movement as a teacher that were making you increasingly more uncomfortable to remain there.

And I know that not every public school is identical. There are some out there in our nation, different parts of our country, that are far less horrifying to the

Christian parent than many others are, and they're not as overt in teaching sheer and utter evil as some are.

But tell us about what you were experiencing. Sure. I will just start by saying that I had many

Christian friends in the public school who were sharing the love of Christ with students.

Now, I will preface this by saying I resigned in August of 2001.

My daughter is 25, so there has been a huge cultural shift since I have left the public school.

But I, you know, did work with some really great people.

I had admittedly a lot of power in my role as a third and fourth grade teacher to kind of go in the back door to show the love of Christ and to share my faith in not so obvious ways.

And that was very exciting for me as a Christian, but that is also very scary when you consider as a teacher the influence that I had for good, the influence that many other teachers could have for, as you said, for evil.

So that is one major thing that I noticed that, you know, teachers do.

Children spend more time in school with teachers and have more hours, just long more hours than they do with their parents.

So I had a lot of influence as a teacher. I also noticed that it was very much in the age of, really, as we were coming upon inclusion.

I did my master's thesis in the 90s on the inclusion movement of accepting all children in the classroom, and that kind of ebbs and flows as we go through with kind of what's going on in special education.

My master's degree is in special education, and I was finding that I was being required to tolerate lots of behaviors from children with, say, behavior disorders, and that many of the other students were suffering because of that.

The influence of their peers, just things in the classroom, and really just separation from the parents.

Children just didn't get that much time to be with their parents, and that was obvious that their individual needs weren't being met there.

Again, I enjoyed my time in public school, and I felt like I was able to make a positive impact, but I wanted to pour into my own child, and I knew if I sent her away all day,

I would not be the major influence in her life. Okay, Pastor George Jensen, what was it that rose to the surface in amongst your duties as an under -shepherd over there at Enola First Church of God that brought to your mind, there's something that needs to be added to the efforts of parents homeschooling that might require something like a homeschool micro -school, and how did that all come about?

Well, beyond the praying through what God's vision may be for us, as I explained earlier regarding this component, the educational component,

Chris, for me personally, I'll start with myself personally, and then our church leadership, my three daughters, we adopted them out of the foster care system.

My wife and I did in 2004, and they were a sibling group that came, as I said, out of the foster care system.

At the time, they were 12, 8, and 4 years old, and because they first came to us as foster children, we were pretty much required to send them to our local public school, which they were great.

The public school was very good understanding their needs, certainly they didn't preach the gospel or teach them values strictly out of God's word, we understand that, but they were good folks.

But I noticed as time went on, things started to change from 2004, certainly up until their graduation times, respectively, and it was really too late to move them either to a

Christian school or a homeschool movement. I still question if we should have, but that's water under the bridge at this point.

So they were public school only because for so long they were sent there and they made their friends there and it was doing well for them for a while.

But we saw some changes and it just seemed like so much had to be done to kind of reprogram, you know, because you become a disciple of whoever is discipling you.

And if it's the public school, you have the risk, depending on what they're teaching there, that the disciples of Caesar become like Caesar, if you will.

So seeing that and also seeing, hearing of other success stories of homeschool students, at least in the modern sense,

I changed my mind on it. I originally was leery of homeschool students and the homeschool movement,

Chris, only because my only exposure to it was from the whole

Bill Gothard era, which we understand was problematic in terms of what was happening with that model.

And that's what I thought it was all about. But obviously, frankly, Jill, through her family and showing us there's a much better way to homeschool in a godly and an efficient way, this is something that's pretty good.

So in talking with our church leadership, we believe that we need to do something or at least try to start something so that we can build good disciples of Jesus Christ, first and foremost, through an educational program that has quality academics and will prepare them for life, yes.

But secondly, yes, I will admit that it would be an alternative for those that are dissatisfied with their particular public school.

And we are not large enough in the church of our size. We are a worshiping community between the two services is about 150 persons.

You know, we're not a large church. Our facilities are certainly not large. What could we do?

We did think that a micro school, maximum of 25 students, we may be able to do that.

And we're hoping if other churches opt to do that, if every church could do that, wow, what an amazing impact that would be in the church of Jesus Christ for our students, for our kids.

Now, what exactly are the nuts and bolts involved in what you are envisioning to start there at Enola First Church of God?

And I'll start with you, George. You can continue your train of thought there, and then

Jill can jump in at any time. Well, the nuts and bolts was, first of all, to come up with the model that we have decided on, the homeschool hybrid model.

The work that we're going to do is not a private school. We need to emphasize that. It is a supplemental program for parents to educate their children.

And as I believe I said earlier, they would be here two days a week receiving instruction, three days from the parents.

Those two days they're here, the parents, usually the mom, but it could be the father, of course, would have time to do what they need to do, go to work, whatever.

And also, the other thing that we came up with too, Chris, the nuts and bolts was,

Jill gets a lot of questions. Jill is also a homeschool evaluator, okay? And she can talk more about what that is.

She gets a lot of questions from parents. How do I do this? How does this even begin? So one thing that got me impressed on our parts, if you will, is to help parents do that.

We came up with an anacronym, HOPE, H -O -P -E, for helping our parents educate.

And how can we do that to help parents educate their children? So the nuts and bolts was to establish that's the model that God's calling us to do.

Not a Christian school, not a large school, not even a small private school, but this hybrid model where homeschool students are aided and the parents are aided in the educational process.

Then the nuts and bolts go, of course, how do you do this? I want to give a big shout out to the

Herzog Foundation that many in your audience may be aware of. This is a wonderful organization that gives free educational training to anybody that either is running a

Christian school, a homeschool hybrid, like we are any kind of Christian education. It's very broad.

And we have used a lot of their information in starting up in terms of our documents and constitution, different things like that.

The other thing that we had to do, of course, was go and get the blessing of our church leadership, which was no problem, of course.

And then, you know, having a church and having a Sunday school and junior church, we know where's the school going to meet?

Where's this going to happen? Where's that going to happen? Another major nuts and bolts thing that I would recommend everybody look into, we talked to our local township to make sure that we were zoned for that because not everybody may be happy about what we're doing.

And, you know, if we weren't in the right zone and couldn't do this, and furthermore, we don't want to do what dishonors

God by trying to fly under the radar with the law, but we did talk to our local township and they said, yes, you're zoned for this.

And the guys that came out here and came to us, they were encouraged by what we're doing. So lots of little nuts and bolts like that, some alterations we're going to have to do to the building, minor things.

And that's where we're at. But there's many other things to overcome at this point, to nail down, and we're moving along the journey with God.

And just so I understand it correctly, the homeschool micro school would be a way for children who are predominantly being educated by their parents or at least one parent in their own homes, but then they would be gathering with other homeschool children for certain areas of their education that would have a hub or a headquarters, if you will, in the church.

And I'm not sure if this would involve Zoom or would they physically be gathering in a room or area of the church building?

Perhaps you can share a little bit about that. And maybe we'll have Jill jump in at this point.

Also, that's correct. It's physical. We don't anticipate using Zoom with the students, perhaps with parents, maybe.

I don't know that yet. But yes, they would be physically gathering here. You captured it very well,

Chris. And yeah, I'd love to have Jill explain more if that's OK. Yeah, sure. Over the years as a homeschool mom, really homeschooling wasn't a foreign thing at that time, but it wasn't mainstream either.

And it was a pretty tumultuous journey. It's very hard work and it's very challenging and roadblocks come up and you have to face them kind of alone.

And what we realized as we were putting this together is that there were a lot of parents out there who would love to have an option to homeschool, but they think they can't do it.

They think it's impossible for them to say, know all of the math concepts or, you know, find the resources that their child who maybe has some learning struggles needs and things like that.

I encounter that very, very frequently as a homeschool evaluator and consultant.

Parents come to me, they say, I need something different, but I can't homeschool.

There's no way I can do that. And I sit down with them and tell them a little bit about what the law says, what a day can look like, what resources are available to them, and basically offer to walk the homeschool journey alongside them, guiding them, making myself available if they have questions or problems that come up along the way.

So when our church kind of dove into this idea and we pinpointed that we would be a homeschool hybrid,

I already knew there was a great need for that because there are lots of people out there who think they can't do it and they might not be able to unless someone guides them on the journey.

And that's what at Fair Ops Academy, our school, that we will offer is that they will come to us for two days a week and the students will receive the nurture and the information, the education from the teachers, and the parents will come and they will receive the nurture and the guidance from me as the head of school.

It's kind of a natural extension of what I already do with so many families, and it will enable us to partner, and really that's what it is, it's a partnership, because the students still fall under Pennsylvania homeschool law, but they're basically bringing us on board to guide them through that process, to guide both the children through the academics, and then the children will leave with assignments to do at home, and the parents with the guidance of what this looks like to become a homeschool parent.

Now, do you envision this as something that would only exclusively include the children within your congregation, or is this something that other congregations who are at least willing to accept whatever theological framework you're coming from to have their children involved in this?

How is this envisioned to be conducted? This is for our community.

For your community. This is for our community. It is for, whether that be children in our families in our church, families in our community, offering an alternative, and really as a church, this is an extension of a ministry of our church where we want to show the love of Christ, and this just is another avenue that we can do it by making disciples of the children and of the families.

Now, Chris, I would add this. You mentioned the theological component. Yeah, no, families would not need to subscribe to churches of God, doctrine, or anything like that, but we anticipate this being a covenantal movement rather than a missional movement, and what we mean by that is by the very nature of a homeschool situation, parents have to be on board.

They're educating, so therefore at least one of the parents would have to be a professing

Christian and support the ministry that we're doing, and we have a statement of faith that is fully biblical and orthodox, but it is non -denominational.

It's basically, if you're a believer in Jesus and come from an orthodox, with a small o, we know what that means, background, then we would welcome those families into Pharos.

I'm personally not opposed to a missional school, you know, where you open it up to any families, even non -Christians, that could come, but in this situation, that wouldn't work because the parents have to be all in.

Yes, and in fact, I happen to know headmasters of classical

Christian schools, and I'm not saying that they all operate the same way, but I know that the ones that I know personally, they will have a very similar, if not identical, rule that at least one of the parents needs to be a

Bible -believing, born -again Christian, and they also do not insist that the

Christian parents from other congregations outside of the one hosting the school, they do not insist that they are identical in their theological beliefs, other than the primary pillars of the

Christian faith that all true believers embrace.

And, well, you know, it would probably be wise to at least start before a midway break.

Jill, since you are an expert on Pennsylvania law regarding homeschooling, perhaps tell us, at least begin by giving us some elements that Pennsylvania law requires for people who are just starting to explore this idea.

I think that it'd be a good idea to homeschool our kids. Maybe we can even get involved in launching one of our own homeschool micro -schools in our own church and so on, but what would be the laws, at least in Pennsylvania, because I know that they're probably not all identical in all 50 states, but in our commonwealth, what would that be?

So, interestingly, Pennsylvania homeschool law is one of the most—Pennsylvania is one of the four, the top four most regulated homeschool states in the

U .S. I say that basically, translation of that is we have more laws and requirements as homeschoolers in Pennsylvania than, you know, 46 other states.

So there are some basic things we have to do, and that seems overwhelming to a parent, and that's another thing that parents enlist my help to talk them through, is how to be compliant with the law.

As Christians, we need to be following what the laws of the land are, and so I do a lot of helping parents be compliant with that.

In Pennsylvania, the basic requirements are that at the beginning of the year, you need to submit an affidavit or an unsworn declaration to your school district of residence, and that, you know, there's some set things that have to be on that, and you submit that, and you submit objectives for your student for the school year, and then you, once that is submitted after July 1st, and if you're then returning student before, you know, you need to submit that by August 1st, but once you submit it, you may begin counting your days.

You need to have 180 days or 900 hours for primary, 990 hours for secondary students in the school year.

You need to keep a log of your days.

You need to keep, you need to instruct in all the regular areas, and the

Pennsylvania homeschool law spells that out. You need to keep a portfolio of work samples throughout the year.

You need to do an approved Pennsylvania standardized test in third, fifth, and eighth grades, and you must have proof of that, and at the end of the year, by June 30th, you need to have an evaluation done by someone like me, and there are specific regulations, what enables people to be an evaluator, and you must submit that evaluation letter to the school district by June 30th.

Now, there are states that have, you know, nothing, no requirements.

We have a law. I just named a lot of them, but I help parents to be in compliance with what the law tells them they need to do.

Okay, we're going to our midway break, and if you'd like to join us with a question of your own, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com.

As always, give us your first name at least, city and state of residence, and country of residence. Do not go away.

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Before I return to Pastor George Jensen and Jill Kilkner of the

Enola First Church of God in Enola, Pennsylvania, and as we continue our discussion on their homeschool micro school that they are developing in their congregation, before we return to that conversation,

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And that may be you too. So no matter where you live on the planet Earth, if you are without a biblically faithful church home, send me an email to chrisarnson at gmail .com

and put I need a church in a subject line. And that's also the email address where you can send in a question to Pastor George Jensen and Jill Kilkenner as we continue our conversation on providing

Christian parents with alternatives and options to educate their children.

chrisarnson at gmail .com, give us your first name at least, city and state and country of residence.

And we do have a question from Ryan in Waynesboro, Pennsylvania.

And Ryan asks, I just heard Jill say before the break that there are certain required tests that your

Commonwealth demands be given to students even in a homeschooling situation.

What kind of categories of tests are these? So they are achievement tests.

There's a list under Pennsylvania homeschool law of some approved achievement tests.

And they're only required, some parents choose to do them every year.

But a test is required in third, fifth and eighth grades.

And that is something that if a family is homeschooling and they find an evaluator, they can discuss with the evaluator or they can look up the

Pennsylvania homeschool law and see the list of approved tests. California achievement tests, the

Iowa test of basic skills. There's just some different, there's a list or the students, now that is paid for by the parents, or the students can choose to have testing done at the public school on the schedule of the public school.

But they're just a required achievement test. The law does not specify any particular standard that the child must meet, only that they take the test.

Now, what subjects would the test be involving? Generally, there's a language portion and a math portion.

Okay. Well, that we could live with. Yes. And there are some tests that can be purchased by the parents and taken at home.

When my children were little, that option was not available. And we would have certain evaluators would have, use a church basement and mass administer achievement testing and things like that.

And the parents would pay for that. But there are several options. You can have private one -on -one testing.

But it is something that parents can discuss with their evaluator or with their school district, but it is spelled out in the homeschool law.

Okay. We have, let's see, we have

Doris in Brooklyn, Connecticut. And Doris asks, are there any things that surprised either one of you about homeschooling that you did not know before?

And it's up to you, George, if you want to start this time and then have Jill pick up. Like I said, because we did not homeschool our children,

I'll defer to Jill on this one. What surprised me about homeschooling is how, what a natural extension of family life it really can be.

That is one thing. I just did life with my children. And it surprised me how much we could accomplish in less time because my children were not riding a bus.

They were not having, standing in a lunch line. They were not having to deal with other children's behavior problems.

We were able to accomplish a lot more in a condensed period of time, leaving time for my children to develop their interests.

And basically both of my children were able to have experiences and do things that led towards their future careers because of the flexibility of homeschooling.

And as I said, it could, it was an extension of our family life. There's so much value in being able to experience those things rather than just reading about them in a book.

Yeah. One of the things that I hated most about going to school when I was a kid was other kids stealing my lunch money, but I was homeschooled.

I'm only kidding. I went to parochial

Catholic school for eight years and then public school for the rest and the community college later on.

But let's see here. We have Billy in Baltimore, Maryland, and Billy wants to know, what is required legally of a parent who wants to homeschool their children?

Is there any kind of education that is necessary, et cetera? I guess they're talking about education of the parent.

I don't mean to be the main speaker here, but this is something that I deal with probably more than you,

Pastor Jensen. But each state has its own homeschool laws.

So I mean, I could check on the website for the Homeschool Legal Defense Association what each state requires.

In the state of Pennsylvania, you need to have a high school diploma. That is the education requirements.

If I could comment, the homeschooled HSLDA that you're talking about, in fact,

I'll give a shout out. Jill's daughter, Elena, works for that wonderful organization.

Would it be all right if we give the website for that so that folks can go there?

It's a wonderful. Give all the websites of anything that you believe is going to be helpful to our listeners.

The HSLDA, that is www .hslda .org.

That's the one. That's the Homeschool Legal Defense Association, I believe it is.

And that would be a wonderful resource if you're looking for anything in your particular state, because,

Jill, I don't want to insult you, but I think your expertise is mainly with Pennsylvania, correct? Yes, correct.

Correct. And when do you intend, if God, in His providence, permits you to do this, when do you intend to launch this, and what are you waiting for right now before this occurs?

We're hoping to launch this fall. Frankly, we hoped to launch last fall, but we ran into a little bit of a,

I guess you'd say, a bump in the road, if you will, and that we take that as a sign from the

Lord and His guidance and providence, and that's okay. But the concept that we came up with, we didn't even mention this too much.

Jill mentioned it briefly. The name of our microschool is Pharos Academy. That's P -H -A -R -O -S,

Pharos Academy. Very briefly, the word Pharos is Greek. It's in the classical and the koine biblical

Greek, in both, well, it's not in the Bible. The word isn't in the Bible, but in both dictionaries, if you will, it means lighthouse, and it goes along with the theme of our church.

We believe God has called us to be a lighthouse for Him, guiding people to salvation and preparing people to face the storms of life.

That's our church, so Pharos Academy is an extension of that in our mission.

I just hope people don't think it's Pharos Academy. No, it's not

Pharos. No, it's not. We don't want to be part of the biblical

Egyptians, pharaoh and his like, not at all. But if anybody wants information about what we're doing, the website is

PharosAcademy .net, that's P -H -A -R -O -S, and then academy,

A -C -A -D -E -M -Y, I'm sorry, PharosAcademy .net.

That's our website. One of the things that came as a bump in the road,

Chris, and I'll be honest with you, was, of course, how we structure the financial component of this.

We were hoping that we would be able to utilize Pennsylvania EITC funds.

Now, what that stands for is Educational Improvement Tax Credit funds that are available.

Believe it or not, in Pennsylvania, you can get scholarships for public and private schools that are paid for through Pennsylvania taxpayers.

A lot of people don't know this, but that is possible. But it is only a program that is available to private school or public school students.

And what we found out is because our students are registered as homeschool students, they are not eligible for that funding.

So, therefore, what that has done is it's taken us to go back to the drawing board to find out a different model.

In addition to tuition, we just want it to be a sustainable model. So, we're looking at different models and different ways that we can structure the financial component so that it will be feasible financially for parents.

That's the one thing that has come up. Another thing, too, is things you go through, setting up a 501c3, a non -profit status, the legal work involved in that.

Just, yeah, it's a lot, but that's okay. We're going to keep on moving on, and hopefully,

Lord willing, the fall of 2026, we will be ready to go with this movement. Pharos Academy.

Great. And we have Tammy in Elmhurst, New York, and Tammy says,

I think it is so slanderous the way that the secular society has mocked and belittled the homeschooling movement and have made claims in all forms of media, such as movies and television sitcoms, that homeschoolers are stupid.

But how did this actually come about, to your knowledge, this horrible, slanderous, false representation of homeschooling?

It's a very common thing that I agree. I've seen that myself, and in fact, the homeschool students that I have personally met tend to be a lot smarter than your average kid.

But anyway, do you have any thoughts on that, Jill? Tammy, I must admit that I am guilty of that.

In my earlier days as a public educator, I admitted early on that I was lacking knowledge about homeschooling, and I had this traditional, oh, we're just going to, you know, grow all our own food and stay on our compound, you know, kind of view of homeschooling, and that, you know, our children would be backward, they wouldn't, you know, know how to interact with other people.

And what I found is that homeschoolers and the community that I've been immersed in, my, as I said, my oldest child is 25, and we, so, you know, we were home, we've been, we started homeschooling, you know, 20 years ago.

And although it was a smaller group then, I, what

I realized is within the community itself, we had so much interaction. My children were involved in plenty of things with the outside world.

And sometimes we were running so much with those kinds of things that we needed to be home more to homeschool.

The excuse that people always use is, I want my child to be socialized, and if we just homeschool, they'll be socially awkward.

And frankly, as a homeschool mom, I took some flack for that. My son especially was very shy, very clingy to me as a young child.

And some of my closest friends would say, oh, you better be careful with that. He's never going to want to leave your side, and everyone's, he's not going to want to go away to college, and he's not going to be independent.

And if you knew my son today, you would know that he has spread his wings and achieved and flown far beyond what

I could have ever imagined for him. And I credit it to the fact that we were able to dive deep into what he needed at each stage of his life and give him a solid education where we were able to provide the opportunities that he needed to learn and to grow.

It is sad. People always, and people console themselves with me. They say, it's okay,

Jill, you can homeschool because you're a teacher. But I will say that I know so many fabulous homeschool moms who, you could put their program up against the best schools in the country, and their programs are far, far exceed what those schools can provide.

And Chris, could I add? Go ahead. Oh, Chris, if I could add too, and I think some models that we've seen in the past, there may have been some merit to some organizations that did not do homeschooling well, but what we can't do is just because somebody does something poorly, you can't extrapolate that out and believe that nobody can do it right.

And so maybe some of those thoughts come from bad actors we've seen in the past.

But I am convinced that the majority of the people that I know that are doing it now are doing it well, and it's a wonderful thing.

My wife and I were at a concert yesterday to hear a handbell choir in the town that I grew up in, and there was a family there.

And I walked up to the parents, I said, your kids are homeschooled, aren't they? They said, how'd you know? I said, I can just tell. Wow. And I'm assuming that both of you being

Christians and knowing of the pure evil that is becoming more and more dominant in public education or government education, that Christian parents should be seeking whenever possible to have their children either educated at home or in a private

Christian school. I'm assuming that that should be a goal of all

Christian parents. Would you agree with that, Jill? Well, here's the thing.

I tell parents when I meet with them about Pharos Academy, I tell them, make no mistake, your children are being discipled.

They are being discipled in school. So we make a choice what we want them to be discipled in.

Do we want them to be discipled in the ways of the world, or do we want them to be discipled in the ways of the

Lord? And so yeah, I mean, they're definitely being influenced by what they're around and what they're taught.

And as I said, our whole idea is to make disciples, to teach the children to go out and to share their faith.

I can't have the same kind of influence on a 10 -year -old that another 10 -year -old can have on them for the

Lord. And so if we equip the 10 -year -old to be strong in their faith and to understand truth from God's Word, they're going to be the ones to take it to their peers.

And they're going to be the ones who are ultimately able to shine a light in the darkness in the darkness of their generation.

Chris, if I could add, too, that one of the philosophies that was out there for many years is, well, your children should be in a public school so that they can be a beacon and a witness for Christ amongst their peers in the public school.

While that goal may sound lofty, I don't believe that a child who's at a developmental age necessarily can handle that with perhaps some rare exceptions.

Now, that may have worked years and years ago where the school was either neutral or was nominally

Christian when they said the Lord's Prayer and read a Bible verse before 1960 -something. I understand that.

Maybe that was a goal then, that the Christian kids would be a light in the schools. I don't know.

But today, seeing what we're facing and the pressures that are there, I think that's too much of a burden to put on a child to expect the child to be a successful missionary in a public school and not be discipled by Caesar.

That's my opinion. And it's also a theological error to automatically assume your children are regenerate.

It reminded me about the whole issue of Christian parents sending their children to public or schools.

It reminded me of a quote by Votie Baucom, the late

Votie Baucom, and I may not be correctly restating this word for word accurately, but it was something to the effect of, don't be shocked if you send your children to Caesar's schools, that they return home little

Romans. And I thought there was a lot of wisdom in those words, as everything

I've ever heard Votie Baucom say had wisdom saturated in the words.

And Chris, if I can just add, one of the important elements to Farris Academy is that we're offering a classical

Christian education, so we want to teach students to think and to speak.

We're going to walk them through the grammar, the dialectic, and the rhetorical stages, and equip them.

A lot of equipping them is equipping them with the truths and the ability to think about them and to defend them.

Amen. And so that will definitely involve areas that parents who are homeschooling might not feel necessarily equipped to provide those areas of education for their children.

So this micro school will be extremely valuable.

And we're going to— Willing, absolutely. Well, we're going to be going to our final break right now, and if you have a question,

I would strongly urge you to send it in immediately because we're rapidly running out of time.

ChrisArnson at gmail .com. Give us your first name at least, city and state, and country of residence.

Don't go away. We're going to be right back after these messages. I'm Dr.

Tony Costa, Professor of Apologetics and Islam at Toronto Baptist Seminary. I'm thrilled to introduce to you a church where I've been invited to speak and have grown to love,

Hope Reform Baptist Church in Corham, Long Island, New York, pastored by Rich Jansen and Christopher McDowell.

It's such a joy to witness and experience fellowship with people of God like the dear saints at Hope Reform Baptist Church in Corham, who have an intensely passionate desire to continue digging deeper and deeper into the unfathomable riches of Christ in His Holy Word, and to enthusiastically proclaim

Christ Jesus, the King, and His doctrines of sovereign grace in Suffolk County, Long Island, and beyond.

I hope you also have the privilege of discovering this precious congregation and receive the blessing of being showered by their love as I have.

For more information on Hope Reform Baptist Church, go to hopereformedli .net.

That's hopereformedli .net, or call 631 -696 -5711.

That's 631 -696 -5711. Tell the folks at Hope Reform Baptist Church of Corham, Long Island, New York, that you heard about them from Tony Costa on Iron Sharpens Iron.

This is

Pastor Bill Sousa, Grace Church at Franklin, here in the beautiful state of Tennessee. Our congregation is one of a growing number of churches who love and support

Iron Sharpens Iron Radio financially. Grace Church at Franklin is an independent, autonomous body of believers which strives to clearly declare the whole counsel of God as revealed in Scripture through the person and work of our

Lord Jesus Christ. And, of course, the end for which we strive is the glory of God.

If you live near Franklin, Tennessee, and Franklin is just south of Nashville, maybe 10 minutes, or you are visiting this area, or you have friends and loved ones nearby, we hope you will join us some

Lord's Day in worshipping our God and Savior. Please feel free to contact me if you have more questions about Grace Church at Franklin.

Our website is gracechurchatfranklin .org. That's gracechurchatfranklin .org.

This is Pastor Bill Sousa wishing you all the richest blessings of our

Sovereign Lord, God, Savior, and King, Jesus Christ, today and always.

I'm truly grateful for many things that the

Trump administration has ushered in, but here's something that seriously concerns me.

On July 18th, President Donald Trump signed the Genius Act into law.

This new law allows financial institutions to convert your hard -earned dollars into stablecoins, a digital token backed by $37 trillion in national debt.

They will not need your approval. You hand over your dollars, and they give you a trackable, programmable, freezable token.

This sounds like something out of a science fiction movie. They get control, and you get surveillance.

Stablecoins are not freedom. They're a digital leash. This is one step away from a full -blown digital currency.

How stable is a stablecoin? If your account is hacked, or if the power grid goes down for a period of time, you can instantly be locked out.

It is time to get some of your hard -earned money outside of the traditional banking system and the

U .S. dollar. If you want to have a better understanding of stablecoins and the future of money, then please call my friends at Gold Wealth Management and request your free report.

This report is a must -read. Call or text Gold Wealth Management today at 623 -640 -5911.

That's 623 -640 -5911. The report is free, and there's no obligation.

Again, call or text 623 -640 -5911.

Tell them Chris from Iron Sharpens Iron Radio sent you. Puritan Reformed is a

Bible -believing, kingdom -building, devil -fighting church. We are devoted to upholding the apostolic doctrine and practice preserved in Scripture alone.

Puritan Reformed teaches men to rule and lead as image -bearing prophets, priests, and kings.

We teach families to worship together as families. Puritan is committed to teaching the whole counsel of God so that the earth will be filled with the knowledge of God as the waters cover the sea.

We sing the Psalms, teach the law, proclaim the gospel, make disciples, maintain discipline, and exalt

Christ. This is Pastor David Reis of Puritan Reformed in Phoenix, Arizona.

Join us in the glorious cause of advancing Christ's crown and covenant over the kings of the earth.

Puritan Reformed Church. Believe. Build. Fight. PuritanPHX .com.

Greetings. This is

Brian McLaughlin, President of the SecureComm Group and supporter of Chris Armisen's Iron Sharpens Iron Radio program.

SecureComm provides the highest level of security systems for residential buildings, municipalities, churches, commercial properties, and much more.

We can be reached at SecureCommGroup .com. That's SecureCommGroup .com.

But today, I want to introduce you to my senior pastor, Doug McMasters of New High Park Baptist Church on Long Island.

Doug McMasters here, former director of pastoral correspondence at Grace to You, the radio ministry of John MacArthur.

In the film Chariots of Fire, the Olympic gold medalist runner Eric Liddell remarked that he felt

God's pleasure when he ran. He knew his efforts sprang from the gifts and calling of God.

I sensed that same God -given pleasure when ministering the word and helping others gain a deeper knowledge and love for God.

That love starts with the wonderful news that the Lord Jesus Christ is a Savior who died for sinners and that God forgives all who come to him in repentance, trusting solely in Christ to deliver them.

I would be delighted to have the honor and privilege of ministering to you if you live in the Long Island area or Queens or Brooklyn or the

Bronx in New York City. For details on New High Park Baptist Church, visit nhpbc .com.

That's nhpbc .com. You can also call us at 516 -352 -9672.

That's 516 -352 -9672. That's New High Park Baptist Church, a congregation in love with each other, passionate for Christ, committed to learning and being shaped by God's word and delighting in the gospel of God's sovereign grace.

God bless you. And folks, please don't forget that this program is also paid for in part by the law firm of Buttafuoco and Associates.

If you're the victim of a very serious personal injury or medical malpractice anywhere in the

United States, please call my longtime very dear friend and brother in Christ, Daniel P.

Buttafuoco, attorney at law at 1 -800 -NOW -HURT, 1 -800 -NOW -HURT, or visit

Dan's website 1 -800 -NOW -HURT .com, 1 -800 -NOW -HURT .com.

Please tell Daniel P. Buttafuoco, attorney at law, that you heard about his law firm, Buttafuoco and Associates from Chris Arnson of Iron Trip and Zion Radio.

I also want to remind all men in ministry leadership that you are invited to my next free biannual

Iron Trip and Zion Radio pastors luncheon, which will be held Thursday, March 5, 2026, at Church of the

Living Christ in Loisville, Pennsylvania. It will be featuring for the second time my keynote speaker,

Dr. Conrad M. Beyway, the pastor of Kibwata Baptist Church of Lusaka, Zambia, Africa, and also founding chancellor of African Christian University.

I can truly say without fear of exaggeration or flattery or hyperbole that Dr.

Conrad M. Beyway is my favorite preacher on the planet

Earth, and I believe he is the most powerful preacher alive today. And I would urge you, if you're a man in ministry leadership, if you're able to get to Perry County, Pennsylvania this

March 5, and I've given you plenty of time to prepare to get there, please make every effort to do so and send me an email if you're interested to chrisarnson at gmail .com,

chrisarnson at gmail .com, and put pastor's luncheon in the subject line. Everything is absolutely free, and not only is admission free and your meal free and your opportunity to hear

Dr. M. Beyway preach for free, but everybody that attends will receive a heavy sack, perhaps even two heavy sacks, of free brand -new books personally selected by me and donated by Christian publishers all over the

United States and the United Kingdom. So, send me that email if you're interested in attending, if you're a man in ministry leadership, chrisarnson at gmail .com,

chrisarnson at gmail .com, and put pastor's luncheon in the subject line. Also, the night before the pastor's luncheon,

Wednesday, March the 4th, 2026, Dr. M.

Beyway will be preaching at the church where I am a member, Trinity Reformed Baptist Church of Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

That's at 7 p .m., and it is open to everyone, men, women, and children, so you don't have to be a man in ministry leadership.

This event is open for all, and if you want more information about Trinity Reformed Baptist Church of Carlisle, Pennsylvania and how to get there, go to trbccarlisle .org,

trbccarlisle .org. And I happen to know that my friend who is on the program today,

Pastor George Jensen, has been to many of the Iron Shepherd's Iron Radio free pastor's luncheons, and can you give us a brief description of your experiences at the luncheon,

Pastor George? The lunch is always good. The information that we gain from the speakers, and I've heard

Dr. M. Beyway, myself, one time, I believe we were down at the Bongiorno Center in Carlisle.

Yes, wonderful. Yeah, it's great. It's a good thing you do there, Chris. And I also appreciate the different organizations and groups that you highlight, some

I've never heard of, and yes, I usually end up with quite a few books to bring out of there. Oh, you just reminded me.

I want to thank my new exhibitor booth sponsors of the biannual free

Iron Shepherd's Iron Radio pastor's luncheons, the next luncheon in particular,

I have a new exhibitor's booth sponsor that is associated with my guest,

George Jensen's, and that's the Doubling Gap Center in Newville, Pennsylvania, home of Camp Yolijua, not

Caligula, it's Camp Yolijua, and perhaps, Pastor George, you can explain what that very interesting acronym means,

Y -O -L -I -G -W, I'm sorry, Y -O -L -I -J -W -A.

Y -O is for youth, L -I is for living, J is for Jesus, W -A is way, youth living

Jesus way, Camp Yolijua, Doubling Gap VA, and I'm thrilled, Chris, that they've chosen to sponsor the luncheon.

Can you tell us very briefly what this camp is? Yes, it's a

Christian retreat center and camping program. They're in that part of Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, outside of Newville.

It's housed in a historic hotel, if you will, venue, and within a dormitory -style church camp situation.

There's also a gymnasium, lake, there's cabins, a swimming pool. It's a wonderful place.

It's our own Churches of God camping program, but other churches can apply to use the facilities for retreats and other conferences or different things like that.

Check it out. I believe it's campyolijua .org. Check it out.

You'll be pleased. Yes, that's campyolijwa .org.

And I thank them once again for generously sponsoring an exhibitor's booth for our next pastor's luncheon, and we already have received the financial support for that exhibitor's booth.

Thank you so much. Let's see. We have Amethyst in Jupiter, Florida, and Amethyst says, you said earlier that you want to abide by the law when it comes to structuring and organizing your homeschool organization, but at the same time, would you not very quickly refuse to obey a law that may contradict with Christian teachings?

Of course, yes. What I was referring to were local zoning ordinances, which I would say that the

Christian church is obligated to abide by, yes. Prince codes and different things of that matter, you know, fire code, alarms, sprinkler systems, if necessary, or security.

That's my personal belief that the Christian church should abide by those regulations. Amen. And we do have

Arnold in Rochester, New York.

And Arnold says, one of the things that I have heard from homeschooling parents is that their children have been disappointed by the limited ability to be involved in athletics.

Can you please explain how that can be overcome? And Jill, why don't you chime in?

Sure. First of all, there's so many community sports opportunities.

My children were involved in baseball and softball and soccer and basketball.

There are programs like Upward, which is a Christian -based sports program that a lot of churches sponsor.

And depending on the laws of your state, homeschooled children in some states are allowed to participate in the school -run sports programs.

So in the state of Pennsylvania, a homeschooled child can participate with their local district in the sports.

So it depends on the laws, state by state. Now, New York, I believe this was

Arnold you said, New York is the most highly regulated, I would venture to say, state in terms of homeschool law in the nation.

And he would have to check to see exactly what is allowed. But as I said, depending on the state, they may be allowed to participate in things like band and dramatic presentations, extracurricular things with the public school students.

If not, a lot of homeschool kids can participate in sporting sports programs with local

Christian schools. So they could also check with local Christian schools. It is quite a tragedy, and it infuriates me that almost every athletic program available to young people has practice and games on the

Lord's Day. And there are so many Christian parents who are pulling their children out of a worship service to be a part of these games, and it's nauseating to me.

I'm hoping, I don't know this organization that you mentioned, I think you said upwards, I hope that they do not have anything like that going on in the

Lord's Day. No, not that I know of. It's a

Christian -run organization. Well, if you could, Pastor George, give us about 20 seconds of summary of what you want to leave our listeners with, and then

Jill can follow you. Sure. As I said, it's a micro -school homeschool movement that's birthed out of a vision here at Enola First Church of God through prayer and fasting and considering the ways that God would have us to move forward.

And we're excited to see the possibilities. If you would like to see what we're doing, either if you're local and considering a school, or I'm sorry, a movement like ours, a homeschool micro -school, go to pharosacademy .net,

P -H -A -R -O -S -academy .net, and check us out, or at the very least, get some ideas in your area of how you could move forward similarly.

And Jill? I would say, first of all, that parents are commanded to train up a child in the ways of the

Lord. And we need to, as parents in this country, really take that seriously and seek the

Lord's guidance on our role in doing that, even if that means venturing into something like homeschooling.

I also would point out that all the great minds throughout history were not just thrown in a mass lecture to be educated.

They were involved in small nurturing, mentoring relationships, in apprenticeships.

If you look at Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, if you look at Da Vinci, all of these great minds were mentored and nurtured.

And as a homeschool family, that is something that we can provide, and it can be provided by the people who love the child most in the world.

Well, thank you both so very much for being such excellent guests, and I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater