A School Called “Narnia”
The Christian school called Narnia (named after C. S. Lewis’s stories) is one of God’s wonders of the 21st century – at least for us, Slovak evangelical Christians.
It was created 11 years ago as the second evangelical school in Slovakia. The name Narnia should allow the wider public to see the school as an open space, not only for children from evangelical families but any families in the city. And it is good! The primary purpose of the school is to open a new world of Christian kingdom to everybody in need. So today, the school is a second home to more than 300 children, perhaps 20% of them are from evangelical families … the rest are children from families with various backgrounds (in Slovakia there are 18 registered religious churches and religious communities).
Teaching Christian morals
So, there is a large variety among the children and their parents, but the school openly states that it will lead children to Christian morals and that is what it does. Its founders in Banska Bystrica are a very devoted, godly couple and now together with a team of more than 40 employees they all serve God, open staff meetings with God’s word and prayers, teaching the Bible to all children – leading them to pray to the Most Holy and Loving God who sent Jesus to save them from sin. The teachers pray for all the children, especially those with various problems and needs. The school is sought after because of its wonderful care for all “problematic” children, taking great care of their needs, praying not only for their minds and concentration and social skills, but also for their spiritual needs, past and future. It is a demanding ministry to be a teacher at this school, but at the same time a place of many miracles.
One of them is that in spite of taking in quite a few SEN children, the results of the school are excellent – one of the top 10 schools in Slovakia (in math and science sometimes the second-best school). The teachers consider this to be a miracle as they really do not push the children just to “academia” but they spend a lot of time talking to children, praying with them and having lots of celebration days.
Material blessings
The Lord is also blessing the school materially and financially. A few years ago there was a big financial decision; where to move the school, do we have enough money to buy a building? The church that founded the school decided to pray and after two years of praying and fasting they decided to trust the Lord and bought the property of the school that used to lend them one building for about 8 years. So, now the whole property belongs to the school and it is in a lovely area of the city. Of course, there are prayers and sacrifices to be brought to the Lord every day to be able to pay the loan, but the Lord has been blessing this decision without which the school would probably had ceased to exist. So, the parents are paying and contributing in practical ways, also the teachers help a lot.
So, we praise God that He has given in this school what the wider community needs and at the same time He leads us in such a way that every day we have to depend on him and at the same time praise Him for what He does.
