p. 3 | IN THE DAYS OF CHRIST by E. A. Sutherland

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Jun 14, 1899

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 25, No. 24.

IN THE DAYS OF CHRIST.

By E. A. Sutherland

LIKE a giant oak, broad of limb, straight, strong, and hardy, stood the true principle of education. Rooted in the soil of earth, its leaves absorbed the atmosphere of heaven. Its fruit was life; its leaves were for the healing of the nations. But like a parasitic plant, beginning with one tendril-like root buried in the bark, sapping the life of the oak, spreading stem after stem around the massive trunk, creeping higher and higher until each branch is enfolded in its grasp, hugging the tree to death and still clinging to the lifeless branches and preserving the former shape but emitting to the atmosphere around its poison breath, grew the false principles of education.

Evil does not all at once destroy the good. The thunder-cloud does not suddenly overcast the sky. There must be the gathering of the storm-cloud, the first faint mutterings before the storm bursts. So, while truth had been planted in the earth, and men had been given an opportunity to eat of its fruit, evil and death had gradually dwarfed and stung it until its nature was well-nigh lost.

It was only here and there that individuals recognized the light and were following the rays to their Source. The Jewish nation, to whom had been committed the sacred oracles of divine truth; to whom had been entrusted the principles which were powerful enough to make of them a wise and understanding nation, had been in Babylonish captivity seventy years. On their return their ideas of right were but dimly defined. Close contact with the manners and customs of the East had taken from them their strong faith, and they groped in a twilight which ever darkened instead of brightening. Nearly five hundred years served only to fasten more firmly in their minds the form of religion, and to remove them further from the truth.

As the darkest portion of the night is often just before the dawning, so do we find the mental darkness densest just before that fulness of time when God sent His Son into the world, a Light to light every other soul who cometh hither.

It was as an educational as well as a religious reformer that He came, for without the one the other could avail but little. “He came unto His own, and His own received Him not.” The peculiarity of mental and moral darkness is that those most deeply enshrouded are the most oblivious to their condition. So, while the Christ-child “grew and waxed strong in spirit, filled with wisdom,” it was not the result of earthly instruction. His mother was His first human teacher, for that was a Jewish custom, and His mother had yielded herself to the control of the Spirit of God. At the same time He wandered in the fields and through the woods, holding converse with the works of His own hands. God was His Teacher, and the “grace of God was upon Him.”

He had never attended a rabbinical school when, at the age of twelve, He visited Jerusalem for the first time since His dedication as a babe in the temple. Lingering after the multitude departed for various quarters of Palestine, He entered a school conducted in the temple court, and with other youth took His place at the feet of the learned doctors. They were surprised at the wisdom manifest in His questions and answers, which flashed into their minds truths concerning the long-expected Messiah.

But it was “His Father's business” which He had in mind, and instead of remaining for further instruction He returned to Nazareth and was subject unto His parents until the days of His baptism. The original plan was that youth should be educated by the Levites, and had this tribe remained true to their sacred trust the Son of God might have sat a learner at their feet. But their teaching had degenerated into cold formalism, and the life and spirit of a young child would have been starved instead of fed by their recitals. Of their teaching Geikie says:—

No wonder that when He had finished such an address, the multitude were astonished at His teaching. They had been accustomed to the tame and slavish servility of the rabbis, with their dread of varying a word from precedent and authority; their cobwebbery of endless sophistries and verbal trifling; their laborious dissertations on the infinitely little; their unconscious oversight of all that could affect the heart; their industrious trackings through the jungles of tradition and prescription; and felt that in the preaching of Jesus, they, for the first time, had something that stirred their souls, and came home to their consciences. One of the rabbis had boasted that every verse of the Bible was capable of six hundred thousand different explanations, and there were seventy different modes of interpretation current, but the vast mass of explanations and interpretations were no better than pedantic folly, concerning itself with mere insignificant minutia which had no bearing on religion or morals.

It was as a teacher that Christ met opposition from the world, and it is His principles of education that are to-day accepted by faith, or, being rejected, leave the educator to grope his way with naught but human invention. Should the educators, whose minds are exercised to find the best methods and the best materials for young minds, but turn to Him who held the keys to the fountain of knowledge, nay, who was made unto us wisdom, all caviling would cease, and humanity would sit at His feet and learn of Him, whom to know aright is life eternal.

That He was a Teacher was evident, for He was so recognized by the master of Israel who came to Him by night with the words, “Rabbi, we know that Thou art a Teacher come from God,” and to the mind of Nicodemus, Jerusalem's greatest teacher, the proof of His power to teach lay in the fact that miracles attended His work. The power to perform miracles was then a result of His education. Since they were always based upon faith, the secret of His education is revealed to be a faith that laid hold upon the throne of God.

Now, to the instructor in the worldly schools it may seem inconsistent to speak of faith as the basis of education; but without it you will have no learning. The only question is, In whom will you place your faith? in God, or in the words of men who speculate upon the theories of science and kindred truth? The ultimate result of faith in the latter leads to the formalism which killed the Jewish system. Faith, as taught by Christ, gives life and power to the instruction.

The contest of Christ's life was over this question. The controversy of the last nineteen centuries has been over the same question. The living connection with heaven, the life of faith,—this is what distinguished Christ and His system from all others. It is the lack of this to-day which prevents the professed followers of Christ from reaching that high ideal.

Turning to the instruction given by the master Teacher, we are surprised to note the simplicity of His manner and to find that He could choose His followers from the humble seaside fishermen. Nor were they pupils of whom He was afterward ashamed, for He sent them forth to the whole world, and they, with the truths they taught, and the methods learned from Him, shook the very foundations of the civilized world.

So nicely did He deal with the problem which to-day perplexes the educational world that should educators make His life a study and follow His methods they would find all perplexity at an end. At His ascension His last words to His disciples were that He would send them the Spirit, which should guide them into all truth. The Master left not His followers comfortless, but sent the Holy Spirit as a teacher of truth. The work accomplished at Pentecost shows the fulfilment of the promise. It was a marvelous educational movement. The power of the early Christian church as it met in almost deadly conflict with paganism in Europe, verifies the truthfulness of the promise. It was a return to the time when Israel's youth received instruction in the schools of the prophets, and for several years after the life of Christ was ended His followers maintained their steadfast adherence to these principles. The sunlight of truth had shone on the world; life sprang up at its touch, but no sooner does the herald of truth begin to sound than the enemy strikes a note lower and begins to play on a downward scale. The world remains in tune but for a moment; the discord grows more and more pronounced. The work of the last days of earth's history will be to strike that higher key of education by faith which will lift the learner to a position where all wisdom is at his command.