True Education by F. G.

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D.C. · Nov 7, 1907

True Education

By F. G.

True education is that which develops in the individual a life of unselfish service. All the powers of his being — body, mind, and soul — are to be so trained that they will work normally and in perfect harmony. The moral faculties are to be supreme over all others, but they are so only when fully co-ordinated with them. To educate the physical and the mental without the co-ordinate education of the spiritual, tends directly to a one-sided development of the individual. God made man upright, and placed all the powers of his being in perfect balance, but selfishness destroyed their harmonious working. It is the work of true education to assist in the restoration to this normal and perfect condition.

But it is in the province of education to do no more than to assist in this work. There is no process of education in itself, apart from divine power, by which the individual can be restored to the image of God. All that can be done is so to present facts, in relation to the principles underlying them, as to lead the individual to a desire to co-operate with the Spirit of God in his work. The facts revealed in all fields of study are the same, whether they are taught the child by the Christian or by the agnostic, but their explanation of the causes and effects of these facts — that which gives them their real meaning and force in their relation to the life of the individual — must differ as widely as do the views of the Christian and the agnostic.

When facts are taken apart and considered by themselves, their meaning is of no real value to the student. The Christian finds no explanation of the meaning of creation and life, other than that given in the inspired Word of God. But he who does not believe in the Scriptures as being holy and inspired, must seek in his own mind for some cause by which the wonderful phenomenon of life can be explained. The Holy Scriptures offer as an explanation of the marvels of creation and life, the fact that there is an all-wise and all-powerful Being above and entirely outside of all created things, who, through his Son, Christ Jesus, created and upholds all things that are. The Scriptures themselves teach that for one to know this philosophy there must be an exercise of abstract faith — simple belief. Nor is it sufficient that we see in nature alone this creative power. The facts of creation and life are given us to teach us of redemption. One and the same power is manifested in both creation and redemption. We are to study the work of God in nature to understand better his work of grace in our hearts.

This childlike faith in an all-wise, kind, and all-powerful Jehovah, who has vested in his Son, Christ Jesus, “all power in heaven and in earth,” is the only philosophy — is the only source of that education — which will bring into perfect co-ordination all the faculties of the individual, thus producing a perfect system of education.

F. G.