"A Hopeful Heart"
Home is the Opportunity for Pursuing Excellence
Danny and I began our adventure of home educating our children in 1984 when our two sons were in second and fifth grade. Throughout the years we have marveled at God’s grace as four toddlers became teens, three teens turned twenty, and three children were married and became parents. We have experienced the highest of highs and the lowest of lows that only come through parenting. Since beginning to home school we adopted our two daughters, birthed Hope Christian Academy, two of our children revisited traditional school settings and came back home. We lost several loved ones to death, began to fellowship at a new church, watched God cause growth in us as His children and in the seeds we planted- both in the ground and in our children. We changed curriculum umpteen times, had children hospitalized, joined the Advanced Training Institute International, and gleaned lessons about God’s care from our mother hens and their chicks. We were blessed with seven grandchildren and opened our first homeschool store. We graduated our four children from Hope Christian Academy between 1991 and 2006.
Danny and I have learned new ways to structure our day, celebrated thirty-four years of marriage by God’s grace and developed treasured friendships. We added a pot-bellied pig named “Millie B. Bacon” to our menagerie and daily experienced God’s mercy. We home schooled our nephew, a niece, guided our four teens through encounters with junior college courses, trusted God to protect two of our children as we sent them to Indianapolis and Dallas for further training and obeyed God as He inspired effort and provided time to write two books. We have watched Hope grow from fourteen young and apprehensive families to over 100 families who are committed to follow God’s best for their families and work together as a team for the protection and perseverance to fulfill our calling to home educate.
In the summer of 2003 we moved the school office and library from our home to a commercial location and expanded our services to include a home educator book and country gift store. “Store” schooling three grandchildren has given us new ideas and perspective on home schooling. In the spring of 2006 God provided the quaint two-story building that now houses both Hope Christian Academy and Hope Country Schoolhouse Book and Gift Store.
If we are Christian families who desire to make a difference by raising up a foundation for future Godly generations, we must make plans and invest ourselves for eternity, taking the daily steps necessary to obtain our goal. We can not afford to focus solely on each day, each semester, or even each year, as though getting through that moment in time is our goal. We must look ten years down the road. Where, or better yet whom, do you want your family, your children, or yourself to be in the year 2020? Hope operates as a team of committed parents working toward common goals.
The vision at Hope is to offer support, guidance, and accountability to parents who desire to train their children to 1) live by Biblical principles; 2) practice responsible life skills and stewardship; 3) pursue excellence in academics; 4) be conformed to the image of Christ, and 5) be team players and good examples to others. We are training our children, especially teens, to reach beyond the desire to look for what they can get from others and Hope activities. Our children are being taught to be submissive to their parents and all authorities, and good examples to other children. We have confidence that God will develop character in our children as we follow His principles in training them to look outside of themselves for purpose in life. Let’s look to God to give us unity as conservative Christian private home educating families pursuing excellence in education.
Debe Haller
12211 Magnolia St., Garden Grove, California 92841 (714) 534-6733