Biblical Readiness

“But respect Christ as the Holy Lord in your hearts. Always be ready to answer everyone who asks you to explain about the hope you have, but answer in a gentle way and with respect. Keep a clear conscience so that those who speak evil of your good life in Christ will be made ashamed.” 1 Peter 3:15-16 

What does it mean to have Biblical Readiness in your School?

The Bible gives us a standard for our lives. In this section, you will learn about true biblical readiness. You will learn that we become stronger working together. When we partner with other schools and churches, Christian organizations and media to support and hold each other accountable for readiness in the school, in the life of each staff member, and in our community emergency outreach, we become a ReadySchool.

You will train your School Emergency Team (SET) to lead in the development of a School Emergency Plan, provide training, and train in how to give oversight of emergency responses within your school as well as the School's outward responses to all kinds of emergencies near and far.

To advance Biblical Readiness in your school, you will be provided material for promoting the ReadySchool Campaign. The School Emergency Team (SET) and school leaders will pave the way by completing their personal preparedness assessment using CEN’s ReadyChristian and ReadySchool Assessments.

Biblical Readiness Requires:

• Assessment of the School and the Times - measuring the current readiness of Christians, the School, and community...and establishing a plan to be ready to respond to threats/risks in our time.  

• Activation Areas - geographic areas in which Christians, Schools and/or Christian organizations together take responsibility to approach emergencies by networking, preparing and responding. For schools, this is a suggested five-mile radius around the School. 

• Agreement between Christ-followers - covenants and commitments to care for each other in crisis and disaster.  

• Resilience - spiritual, emotional, mental and physical resilience gained through the daily practice of worship, prayer and obedience to God. 

• Pray - Care - Share Lifestyle - to live as examples of the saving grace of Jesus Christ by actively praying and caring for others, and then sharing the hope we have in Jesus Christ before, during and after a crisis or disaster. 

ACTION STEP:

The Biblical Readiness Standard provides a yardstick for unity in crisis and disaster. Apply the Biblical Readiness Standard to the suggested five-mile radius around your School answering these questions:

1. What is required for us to live up to this standard as a School?
2. Who are the other Christians we can join with to live up to this standard?

What is the Biblical Readiness Standard?

Living for Christ intentionally, giving light, hope and help to those around us in crisis takes more than physical readiness. We need to be biblically ready.

Again, Biblical Readiness is being spiritually, emotionally, mentally and physically ready to respond to emergencies as faithful Christ-followers, praying, caring for survivors and sharing the hope we have in Jesus Christ.

The practice of Biblical Readiness requires Christians to meet four standards:

• Responsiveness – assess the times, hear God and act

• Engagement – agree to help other Christians 

• Resilience – build strength to follow through

• Replication – grow capacity to respond through training and equipping others to be biblically ready

Biblical Readiness Standard

The world is changing. To dismiss this is an unhealthy denial of reality. To embrace uncertain times and trust God is healthy and mature. Our mission is to assist those who are ready to face reality, take simple basic steps to prepare for emergencies, and be ready to give an answer for the hope we have in Jesus Christ. The Biblical Readiness Standard provides a yardstick for unity in crisis and disaster and helps us understand God’s plan to be a ReadyChristian and a ReadySchool. Biblical Readiness requires:

Responsiveness – measuring personal readiness and the current readiness of Christians, the School, the community, and the times to establish a plan to be ready to respond. 

Biblical example: Jeremiah, testing the metal of God’s people.

Engagement – covenants and commitments made to care for others during crisis and disaster in defined areas of responsibility called Activation Areas. Activation Areas are geographic areas in which Christians, Schools and Christian organizations take responsibility to network, prepare and respond to crisis and disaster together. 

Biblical example: Nehemiah, rebuilding the walls.

Resilience – spiritual, emotional, mental and physical resilience gained through: keeping covenants and commitments, the daily practice of worship - prayer - and - obedience to God, practicing emergency responses of all kinds, and responding as God leads in prayer. 

Biblical example: Mordecai and Esther – for such a 

time as this and the Full Armor of God.

Replication – to live as examples of the saving grace of Jesus Christ actively praying and caring for others and sharing the hope we have in Jesus Christ…before, during and after crisis or disaster. 

Biblical example: Jesus’ life on the road to the cross and 

Paul before King Agrippa.

The steps you follow determine your own level of readiness and help you grow in areas you may be weak. God always gives you a choice. CEN prays you will follow the pathway that we have learned is effective, and that you will partner with at least one other person who will walk with you.

In the downloadable material, you will find more in-depth descriptions of the Responsiveness, Engagement, Resilience, and Replication components of the Biblical Readiness Standard. The Biblical Readiness Role Model Study Guide will encourage you to dive deep into scriptures to understand Biblical Readiness and how it was used in Bible days as well as to draw connections with how it can be applied today.

Biblical Readiness Assessment

Becoming a ReadySchool starts with a foundation of Biblical Readiness. Understanding Biblical Readiness is great! But how do we apply it? As a Christian? As a School? The first thing we need to do is understand where we currently are in the Biblical Readiness process. CEN has developed a Biblical Readiness Assessment with seven potential outcomes that will help you identify where you are in the Biblical Readiness preparedness process.

ACTION STEP: 

Take the ReadySchool Biblical Readiness Assessment  in Appendix A to determine how ready your School is biblically. Once you take the assessment, you can check the results below.

The ReadySchool Biblical Readiness Assessment assesses the spiritual, emotional, mental and physical readiness of your School and ranks your results with seven possible outcomes. Those outcomes include:

Detached - haven't thought much about readiness, not on the radar

Reluctant - you do what you have to, not a priority

Challenged - looking to do more, but what?

Responsive - you are learning how to endure and meet physical needs

Engaged - responding to crisis but are lacking structure and skills

Resilient - giving a biblical response to crisis and disaster

Replicating - reproducing results with partner Schools and building capacity in the community, maybe you have given some thought to emergencies by planning evacuation routes from the School, screening volunteers, participating in blood drives or even responding to disasters. 

But are you ready to respond biblically?

Biblical Readiness means being spiritually, emotionally, mentally and physically ready to respond to emergencies by praying, caring for survivors and sharing the Hope we have in Jesus Christ.

Ready to Respond?

The evidence is clear – God is in the process of waking up the world to the fact that it cannot live without Him. ReadyChristians face these uncertain times with faith and hope. In crisis, unprepared Christians and non-Christians come to rely on the help of the ReadySchool. Are you ready to respond when you meet people who need His mercy and simply cannot live without Him because of a financial, family or faith crisis? Are you ready to respond to a disaster?

Readiness is essential to fulfilling our mandate to share the Hope of Christ. The facts are:

• What we become before any emergency will dictate how we survive, recover and help others.

• The basis of Biblical Readiness is one's spiritual health going into any crisis.

• More and more emergencies demand our attention today whether they are economic, increasing natural disasters, or man-made threats; we live in an increasingly dangerous time.

• Community-wide emergencies, crises that affect everyone around you - like a teen suicide, public scandal by a leader, collapse of the economy, and disasters tap out the personal reserve of the unprepared, leaving the hope-filled and ready believer to lead people into recovery and restoration.

• Biblically ready people have personal resiliency and a better survival chance.

• ReadyChristians are God’s ambassadors to others in crisis, bringing hope and calm to a totally out- of-control situation.

God requires for each of us to give Him glory in all situations. Regardless of the emergency, building spiritual – emotional – mental - and - physical readiness protects our lives and the mission of the School, and positions Christians to serve others in their most desperate hour.

As you complete the ReadyChristian and ReadySchool training you will become increasingly Responsive, Engaged, Resilient and able to Replicate your faith in others.

What is the GOAL of Biblical Readiness?

The goal of Biblical Readiness is to develop resiliency. Resiliency is defined as the ability to recover. The more prepared a person is, the more resilient they are.