California Gov. Jerry Brown (D) signed a bill into law Wednesday that requires public schools to teach kids about the historical contributions of gays and lesbians. Local school districts will be adopting new social studies curriculum as early as the 2013-14 school year.

Supporters say it’s a triumph that makes history books “more honest” and will help curb bullying by making kids more understanding of their classmates.

Opponents equate it with brainwashing, saying it will sanction, normalize and exalt an immoral lifestyle.

So what’s a Christian parent to do? Is it time for a mass exodus toward home schooling?

I’d argue that it’s a time for parents to sit down and think hard about their children’s education — specifically, how they as parents are going to teach gay history.

Christians shouldn’t simply retreat from the topic of the gay rights movement, in the same way we shouldn’t retreat from sex education. While my parents didn’t pull me out of my 9th grade health, public school health class during lessons about birth control and STDs, they also made sure I got a much more comprehensive lesson on the issues from them and my church.

I remember annual True Love Waits all-nighters in the church gym. There were hours of frank — sometimes cringe-worthy — discussions about sex so we teenagers understood about this wonderful, God-given gift and the pitfalls of abusing it.

Combine it with regular Wednesday night youth group sermons on the topic, and it was almost to the point of overkill. But I began to recognize the church as an honest, open source of information on the scientific and biblical facts about sex. The church just covered the issue so much better than the awkward, one-hour lesson in my freshman health class, and I felt equipped to discuss my perspective on sex with people who felt differently about it.

Churches should look at this new California law as an opportunity to do one better. Rather than ignoring history, Christian parents should educate themselves about the key developments in the gay rights movement so we’re not blindly lashing out at a nebulous “cultural shift.” They should be prepared to take the lessons their children are learning, and parlay them into meaningful discussions about the biblical perspective on homosexuality.

Perhaps churches can teach gay history, in the same way churches host lectures about Mormonism or Jehovah’s Witnesses — so important developments aren’t missing.

But before that, parents should take an active role in how this curriculum takes shape. Local districts will be deciding over the next year or two which textbooks end up in classrooms. Parents should talk to teachers, school board members and administrators and take an active role in reviewing the curriculum. How will the lessons be framed? In which grade will they be introduced? What dates are the lessons taking place? All these are still open questions under the new law.

I think pulling kids out of public school should be a last resort, not a first resort. The first resort should be preparing kids who can respond to the mixed messages they’ll face for the rest of their life from peers and the media. Some parents might decide one or all of their children aren’t mature enough to sort out those mixed messages just yet; I respect their choice to keep their children in a private school or at home until that changes.

I hope Christians seize this new law as an opportunity to better understand and biblically, graciously respond to the cultural changes of the gay rights movement. I hope it doesn’t become a public school exodus, because Christian parents and students have something vital to add to this conversation. They have relationships to build within school communities; they have the Gospel to share with fellow moms, dads and classmates.

They have lights to shine.

There was a time in my life when I absolutely hated reading! I couldn’t stand it, and I was really bad at it. It’s not that I couldn’t read or pronounce the words—because I could—but it was more that I couldn’t (or wouldn’t) force myself to sit down and read a book from cover to cover. To me, it was the most painful and arduous task and largest waste of time that I could possibly imagine. I was a math guy (I actually like it; so, I studied and became a mechanical engineer). But, rarely would you find me near a book, except for maybe my nightly Bible reading.

It wasn’t until about the age of twenty that I fully realized—as Mohler points out—that God has chosen to teach His people through the discipline of reading! From the inception of the Church, and throughout the Old Testament, God has instructed His people through the written Word. I had to do a heart check; I realized that God’s Word was available to me, that I was responsible to know it, and that I had to read it in order to know it. My heart and mind were awakened to the majesty of God and His Word. Have you come to this point in your life? Has the Bible gripped you in such a way that you cannot not read it!? If you are a Christian and you don’t like reading, then you need to do a heart check. To use Mohler’s words, “We’re not going to grow if we’re not reading and studying.”

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Not too long ago I read a passage of writing about the state of modern academia. It was a short narrative that followed a man as he wound his way through a war torn-city, destroyed by bombs and littered with the corpses of the city’s inhabitants. At one point he rounds a pile of rubble which was once a church and finds himself at the base of a tall, lean, and beautiful ivory tower. As he surveys the world around him, he finds the lure of the gleaming white building standing tall among the surrounding rubble to be irresistable.

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