The Bible Has The Answers For All of Life’s Issues
We live in a world where its people struggle with so many issues. The rise of racism is an issue. Poorly educated kids are an issue. The rise in homelessness, mental illness, and fractured families are all issues. Whom we should vote for is an issue. How we identify is an issue. If we add to these things such as abortion rights, women’s rights, and what’s politically right it becomes very difficult to know what’s the right mindset and position to take on all of these. Presently in America, these are some of the most prevailing issues that divide our country. Believe it or not, the bible has the answers for all these issues. This writer has decided to embark upon a mission to prove that the Bible indeed has the answer to all the issues for which we struggle. Our greatest problem lies within trying to work out these issues apart from utilizing biblical principles that work. On the one hand this article is not for the purpose of trying to win folks to Jesus. On the other hand, this is a discourse, an apologetic to prove that the bible has the answers for all of life’s issues. So then let’s begin with education. I believe that I am qualified to speak to such a subject because I am a retired but successful educator. My success rate for state assessments in the subject that I taught maintained a better than 90% pass rate and only dipped to the 80% range. I taught at Title I schools which means that the largest population of students came from an impoverished background. While there is nothing amazing about my record, there is something to take away from my successes. I used biblical principles in managing my classroom and instructing students. I followed bible study methods to disseminate instruction and to push learning. Walk with me through this discourse and I believe you will agree with me that the bible has the answer for our ills in education. My thesis is very simple. The bible has the answers for the issues we face in education. Let’s look at…
· Biblical Principle # 1 – This principle is the principle of “Agape” love. Agape love is the act of our will to do what is in the “Biblically best” interest of the people we are loving. How does this biblical principle work in the classroom? This principle requires teachers to always and under all circumstances teach up. It requires teachers to demand excellence no matter the intellect or background of a student. This principle requires that students experience the teacher’s love by learning at a higher level than what they are used to doing. This kind of love does not pity. It inspires. This kind of love respects kids. It is the kind of love that demands better. When teachers have this approach to teaching, they do not exercise what I call “cruel compassion.” Cruel compassion is the kind of pity that looks at student’s background and determine that they are not as capable. This is when a teacher may look at what students should know but don’t and then diminish the level of teaching. Every person is born with the ability to learn. We call that capability intellect. We all have it though to varying degrees. It is an unloving act for any teacher to look at a student and decide that he or she is incapable of getting better. If teachers exercised biblical love the expectations in the classroom and the higher level of instructions would never be lowered.
· Biblical Principle of work #2- The bible lays out a principle of work. Learning is a two-way street. Information must be disseminated but students must work at it to understand it. For this writing I don’t want to get into how teachers instruct. Methods are many principles are few. Methods always change but principles never do. No matter how teachers deliver instructions students must do the work. Prov 14:23 states, In all toil there is profit, but mere talk tends only to poverty. This states that if students work at learning they will learn. If teachers are more given to passing students and make it very easy to get grades, they never experience the value, growth, and personal esteem from the principle of work. This is what the bible states in 2 Thess 3:10-. For even when we were with you, we would give you this command: If anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat. If a person in the church was able to work and would not, the people in the church were not to bring him or her food. This is a heart issue. One practice that some schools adopted that violates this scripture is not giving a student a zero, but maybe a 50 or 60. The rationale behind this practice is that a student will give up when his or her grade is so low. The desire to eat is a God given motivation to work so that a person can have food to eat. Just like the possibility of going hungry drives people to work for a living, the desire to be successful must drive our students to work at learning. My rebuttal to that practice is that a student can be given the opportunity to make up a zero by engaging in the work to earn a proper grade . If we hold to the biblical principle of work we build a proper work ethic into students. In addition, students learn a valuable lesson in life. You get that for which you’re willing to work.
The answers are right here in the bible. Our biggest problem is that we have a very low regard for God’s word even though all of our monumental efforts have failed or at best provided limited success. Some of these principles do not require salvation in Jesus though I firmly believe that a teacher would be able to better hold fast to them as a part of his or her faith. Be not deceived. The principles work! I know for certain that they work because I not only believe in them but have followed them successfully. Next week I will add to the biblical principles that have the answers for us in education.
Rev. Lawrence A. Robinson
