Agricultural Education by H. A. Washburn

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Washington, D.C. · Mar 17, 1904

Agricultural Education

By H. A. Washburn

A Means of Teaching Spiritual Truth

ALTHOUGH there are many reasons why “study in agricultural lines should be the A, B, and C of the education given in our schools,” the most important of all, in the mind of the writer, is that agricultural work may be of the greatest help in teaching the truths of the gospel. The object of our schools is the teaching of spiritual truth; and if this is not done, there is no reason for their existence. Whatever will assist in communicating the knowledge of God is desirable in our work. Christ’s example in teaching illustrates forcibly the necessity of presenting spiritual things concretely. The mind of man is slow to grasp the message of God unless it is presented illustratively. Christ’s lessons of life were associated with common objects and experiences, by which they were illustrated. It is of special interest that his most important lessons were illustrated by objects in nature, and by the operations of agriculture in particular.

Christian Growth of Students

It is noticeable in our school work that a very large proportion of the students who come to us are unconverted. Many are never converted in school. This experience is the very first lesson in importance that they are to learn. This is our first work to do for them. While our teachers fully realize this, yet they are oftentimes perplexed and burdened to know how to reach the hearts of these unconverted students, and lead them to Christ. The most earnest efforts seem to be futile. We know that our schools should be like the schools of the prophets, the atmosphere so charged with divine power as to move upon every soul who enters the school. We feel the need of a larger measure of converting power in the school. What means can we best use? what course will be most effective? we often ask.

While so large a proportion of our students come to us without a Christian experience, they are not unfamiliar with the theory of the gospel. They have in most instances heard the theory presented time and again. Presentation of abstract truth does not appeal to them with force, and it is keenly sensed that Christ and his salvation must be presented in the most practical and concrete manner. The most vivid illustrations are needed, that the interest of careless youth may be aroused and the attention secured, that the lessons may remain in the mind and receive careful consideration. Very often we feel that while there has been attention during the class recitation, little serious thought is given to the truth until the next recitation.

To secure this much-desired interest and attention, no better illustrations can be used than those found by Christ in the growing seed, the sower, etc. While allusion to these illustrations will be helpful in the winter season and behind closed doors, their power will be found in studying them where we have been instructed to do,—“where he spoke them, in the fields and groves, under the open sky, among the grass and flowers.” The lessons taught in the operations of agriculture are to be studied in connection with the performance of agricultural work. Our schools should therefore be located upon ample grounds for carrying on various kinds of agricultural work.

The Farm a Lesson Book

“The land about the school is to be reserved as the school farm. It is to become a living parable to the students. The students are not to regard the land as a common thing, but are to look upon it as a lesson book open before them, which the Lord would have them study. Its lessons will impart knowledge in the culture of the soul.” “The school farm is to be regarded as a lesson book in nature, from which the teachers may draw their object-lessons.” From first to last, the students are to see in the farm a representation of themselves. “Ye are God’s tilled land.” 1 Cor. 3:9, R. V., margin. This fact they are to have ever kept before them. Another striking rendering of this passage is, “Ye are God’s farm.” As the students till the soil, their attention can be called at every step to illustrations of their daily life, whatever their experience. We are told that the youth need an education in felling trees and clearing land. It is desirable that there be some unimproved land on the school farm, upon which the students may bestow labor. While they will derive other benefits from this work, they may also learn from the arduous labor in which they are daily engaged, as they dig out the stumps and roots, more clearly the character of the objectionable habits and traits of character that exist in their lives. The land which they are working to subdue is a visible illustration of themselves; and as they weary in their toil, a faithful teacher will be able to impress deeply upon their minds the necessity of forming right habits, and the serious work of overcoming wrong tendencies. Such lessons as these in the mind of the student as he toils will take from this oftentimes disagreeable labor the unpleasant and dissatisfied thoughts which might otherwise occupy the mind. The student may be deeply impressed with the love and patience of God with him in his sins, as he sees himself obliged to labor patiently in improving the land. Our schools which have been planted far from the cities, in the wildwoods, have had many a blessing which our sister institutions might well envy.

“Portions of the farm should be highly cultivated.” “planted with every kind of fruit tree that will bear fruit in the locality.” This highly improved land, producing abundantly of nourishing food, and responding quickly to the attention given it, will ever impress upon the student, especially if he has assisted in clearing this land from the forest, the possibilities before him of becoming a strong man in Christ, producing abundant fruit in good works. As he beholds the beautiful growth covering the land where he once toiled so arduously, he will receive encouragement, amid the trials and defeats of his undisciplined life, that He who has begun a good work in him will perfect it until the day of Jesus Christ.

Laborers Together With God

As students engage in agricultural work, and are brought into close contact with the mystery of life, their minds are drawn out to the most fascinating study in nature. “The invisible links which connect the sowing and the reaping are to be studied, and the goodness of God is to be pointed out and appreciated.” Their attention is to be called to the “unseen power constantly at work in man’s behalf to feed and to clothe him.” A vivid impression is made upon the mind of the student as he learns that “the same God who guides the planets works in the fruit orchard and in the vegetable garden;” that “it is through God’s immediate agency that every bud bursts into bloom.” As the pupil thoughtfully beholds God at work day by day, and even as his servant, he hears a Voice of greater power than his human instructors. He receives a great stimulus to mental and spiritual growth.

When the student has learned to see God intelligently at work, and holds communion with him in his work, if he is engaged daily in tilling the soil and cultivating plants, he begins to understand the wonderful way in which God co-operates with his work, and the conditions on which he secures the co-operation of God. Day by day the beautiful and solemn lesson unfolds to his comprehension. He learns what it is to be a worker together with God. The experience he will one day need as he proclaims the gospel to the heathen in the uttermost part of the earth, as a worker with God he is actually gaining in his humble work with the soil and the plants. Wonderful is the statement that “when students employ their time and strength in agricultural work, in heaven it is said of them, Ye are laborers together with God.” When the great end of our school work is to train those who will be able to co-operate intelligently with God in winning souls, we need to provide the work and study which will give them this experience in a visible way, that they may be able to labor without fainting when they must walk by faith alone.

Reaching the Heathen

Before closing our consideration of this phase of our topic, a few words may be said with reference to the great work before our students in carrying the everlasting gospel to the great heathen world. A thousand million of benighted souls are crying for help. These captives of the enemy, in their intense darkness, need a message borne to them in the most practical and concrete way possible. If such teaching is necessary for the youth in our own Christian land, what must be the need where spiritual perception hardly exists! Our youth must

be trained in the manner suggested in this article, not only that they may learn the spiritual truth, but that they may have an education in practical method in preaching the gospel. The lessons taught our students in our agricultural schools will be the most effective lessons they can give to two thirds of the human race. Then let us, with the cry of a lost world ringing in our ears, put heart and soul into the work of giving the students in our schools the very best training.

H. A. WASHBURN.