Bible & Discipleship
Bible is one class at Agape, but discipleship runs through science, math, and history alike.
Every teacher here is a Bible teacher. The one who actually teaches Bible just makes it official.
We teach the half of the Bible most people skip.
Most Christian education leans hard on the New Testament. Agape hands its students the Old Testament — the foundation under everything else — and a teacher who’ll tell you he had to go back and study it himself to teach it.
Old Testament is taught here by working pastors, and the method is simple: every lesson asks what happened, then asks what we’re supposed to do about it.
“There’s so much spiritual application for a New Testament Christian in the Old Testament. It’s not just history. It’s something you can learn from every day.”
Curtis Smith — Pastor & Old Testament
Old Testament
Students study the foundation most schools skip, taught by teachers who make it personal rather than academic.
Taught by Pastors
Agape’s Bible teachers are working ministers who bring the pulpit’s depth into the classroom.
Every Subject
Bible is one class, but discipleship runs through science, math, and history alike.
What Discipleship Produces
One assignment. One student. One paper we couldn’t stop thinking about.
Each junior was assigned a Charles Swindoll biography of an Old Testament life. One student chose Elijah, titled the report “Heroism and Humility,” and wrote this — on his own.
Faith will not grant you a perfect life. Even the most faithful believers go through trials, doubt, and fear.
Real strength is quiet. Real leadership doesn’t always need to be recognized, and a real faith isn’t a boastful faith.
Elijah’s fear and anxiety didn’t mean that he had a worthless faith. It meant that he was human.
“I had book reports from 24 students. Most were ‘this is a book written by this.’ But this one really touched me. He made it personal. It showed me that what we do as teachers here is vitally impactful on these kids’ lives.”
Curtis Smith · Pastor & Old Testament
Our teachers aren't here because we have the highest salaries in Southern Illinois. They're here because they have a heart for it. They work hard at teaching math and history and science, but they work just as hard at integrating God's Word with it.
Vicky Restivo
See it for yourself
The best way to understand how Agape teaches the Bible is to sit in on a class. Come watch a lesson, meet the teachers, and see the kind of thinking it produces.