Distinctive Features of the Seventh-day Adventist Schools
By William E. Howell
I AM set a task that is both easy and difficult—to point out the characteristics of a Seventh-day Adventist Christian school that distinguish it from the secular school. It seems an easy task because as a graduate of our first college, as an educational worker for twenty-two years since that time, and having had seven years’ intimate touch with the innermost details of our educational system, I have breathed the atmosphere of the Christian school so much, and have felt and witnessed its power on young lives to such a degree, that it often seems to me that all its features are distinctive. On the other hand, it is a difficult task to make these distinctions apparent to those who have not been in our schools as student or teacher, or who have not visited them long enough to catch the spirit of their instruction and daily life. Whatever distinctions exist, are spiritual at bottom. Spiritual things are spiritually discerned. The full discharge of my task in this article can be accomplished only by persuading the reader, as Philip did Nathanael of old, to “come and see;” or still better, as the psalmist exhorts, to “taste and see.” No pupil who comes to our schools from the public elementary or high school, finds any difficulty in discovering the distinctions, even before the first day is over. No teacher from the secular school who attends one of our college sessions, winter or summer, to come into closer touch with Christian educational matter and methods, fails to find and feel the difference before he has completed the first month. No parent who spends a week at the academy with John and Mary the first time they are to be away from home, leaves with any feeling that he has misplaced them if his first ambition is that they know God better and qualify for his service. But I am set the task of pointing out on paper what some of the distinctions15are. It must be done briefly, and with the consciousness that it cannot, in the nature of the case, be adequately done. Any one would mention Bible teaching first. It is a distinction, and one of the first importance. “But,” says some one, “the Bible is taught in other schools. My son is attending a Baptist college, where the moral influences are good, and Bible is taught every day.” But how? Neither the seventh-day Sabbath nor the Adventist doctrines are taught, but the “immortal soul,” the “millennium,” and “every day a long period at creation” are taught. Take out the first two, and put in the last three doctrines, and what is your son? “But,” says another, “the teacher in my little girl’s grade in the public school is a Christian; she sings in the choir at the Methodist church.” Yet she is handcuffed and tongue-tied on teaching Bible if she wanted to. Moreover, she does teach fairies and water sprites and ogresses and mythical legends to account for the simplest phenomena in nature, God’s own handiwork. Fill little Mary’s mind with these, and give her no spiritual guidance other than the general moral standards of good society, and where is she? “God’s Word must be made the groundwork and subject matter of education.” Subject matter: a Bible class in every grade from primary to college. The groundwork: every subject in the school tested by the Bible and the positive instruction based on the Bible. This is the Seventh-day Adventist educational policy in a nutshell. History—Which Shall It Be?
Secular. “In the annals of human history the growth of nations, the rise and fall of empires, appear as dependent upon the will and prowess of man. The shaping of events seems, to a great degree, to be determined by his power, ambition, or caprice.” Seventh-day Adventist Christian. “In the Word of God the curtain is drawn aside, and we behold, behind, above, and through all the play and counterplay of human interests and power and passions, the agencies of the All-merciful One, silently, patiently working out the counsels of his own will.” Which kind of history teaching will you choose? Science—Which Shall It Be?
Secular. “Supposed conflict between science and revelation”—evolution of the earth through millions of years, instead of one week of creation; ignoring the effects of the Flood; evolution of man from germs, mollusks, and quadrupeds, instead of being created on the sixth day; attempt to explain the phenomena of nature without recognizing God. Seventh-day Adventist Christian. “The book of nature and the written Word shed light upon each other.” “The power of God is still exercised in upholding the objects of his creation.” “The whole natural world is designed to be an interpreter of the things of God.” “The most effective way to teach the heathen who know not God, is through his works.” “Only under the direction of the Omniscient One shall we, in the study of his works, be enabled to think his thoughts after him.” Which kind of teaching do you want Robert and Susan to have? Secular. Greek and Latin taught exclusively from pagan classics. Modern languages include the reading of novels, myths, and legends. Seventh-day Adventist Christian. Greek and Hebrew taught to understand the Bible in the original. Modern languages kept close to the life of the people, and legitimate selections of standard literature, and largely for missionary purposes. I must stop, though not half through. Similar comparisons can be drawn in music, in philosophy, in geography, in literature, and even in prosy subjects like mathematics and commercial studies. And this is not even mentioning the spiritual atmosphere maintained through daily devotional exercises, in and out of the schoolroom; special services connected with the Sabbath; the tone of dormitory life; work of prayer bands; missionary activities of many kinds; and above all, daily contact with the spiritual-minded teacher, in both instruction and personal counsel. Reader, which kind of school do you want, for yourself or for your children—the secular school or the Seventh-day Adventist Christian school?