Methods in Primary Schools by V. B. WATTS.

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Jun 6, 1907

Methods in Primary Schools

By V. B. WATTS.

The Support of the Church-Schools

The financial problem of our church-schools is one that puzzles our churches. Many of our teachers receive but scanty living wages, and often go without their pay. There are several reasons for this:—

First, as a usual thing, it is not run as a church-school, but as a subscription school for the church. Second, there is not co-operation on the part of the church to make it a success. Third, there is not a burden for the children we see around us every day and mingle with on the Sabbath.

Christ says, “The children of this world are in their generation wiser than the children of light.” Will not this apply to our present system of supporting our church-schools? The children of this world come together as a body and form what we call a civil government. For the education of their children they tax every man according to his wealth, and not according to the children he has.

A subscription school is not a public school, or a school run by the government. A subscription school is not a church-school, or a school run by the church. A public school is one run and supported by the public. A church-school is one run and supported by the church. Our present system is to tax every patron according to the children he sends, and then in the name of the church call

it a church-school, when in reality it is not a church-school, but a subscription school. Let us call it by its right name.

John the beloved has given us a rule that is a thermometer in every church. “If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?” Let us apply this rule to our work and ourselves.

We are sending scores of teachers to the foreign fields, and supporting them by our offerings, for the purpose of educating children whom we have not seen. Such schools are real church-schools. And this is as God would have it. Now do you love these children? Some of them are in Africa, India, and China. Perhaps you would say, “Yes, I love them, and I am helping to support those teachers who are laboring over there.”

Now let us apply John’s rule by a few questions. Do you live where there is a church? Is there a church-school? Are you helping to support it? If not, why not? Do you love the children you mingle with every Sabbath? Where is the proof that you love the children in the foreign fields whom you have not seen? Will it not be found by your support of the home church, and by your effort to save the children you see?

If we are to be the light of the world, we must follow the commission our Saviour has given in Acts 1:8: “Ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.”

In Acts we find the disciples carrying out this commission. How?—“And the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul.” They sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as every man had need, and had all things common.

When we walk by these principles, we shall surely have church-schools in the true sense of the word.

V. B. WATTS.