November 16, 1899

“Christian Education” The Present Truth 15, 46, pp. 732, 733.

ATJ

THERE are thousands of persons who are surprised whenever it is said that the Bible must be the basis of all true education; that the Bible must be the text-book in every line of study. The reason of that surprise is evident; the only reason that there can be for it is that to those persons the Bible is so small a thing, so narrow and confined, that, in their estimation, to undertake to make the Bible the basis of all education, and the text-book in all studies, is like teaching nothing at all. But how much Christianity, how much confidence in the Bible, has a person to whom the Bible is so small as that? That is the question—the important question. So, one who is astonished that the Bible should be the basis of all education is Christian schools, one who is surprised that the Bible should be the text-book in every study in a Christian school, by that simply certifies to his own narrow view of the Bible, he simply tells how small the Bible is to him, and what a small place the Bible has in his life.PTUK November 16, 1899, page 732.1

Bear in mind that the Bible as the text-book in every study does not mean the Bible as the only study-book in education. To use the Bible as a text-book is literally to take the Bible as a book from which to take the text of all lessons to be given, in Christian education. Take a statement of the Bible as a text; and then use all the realm of history, literature, science, nature, and human experience as your study-book. And that is not a narrow field of study.PTUK November 16, 1899, page 732.2

THE STUDY OF BOTANY

Perhaps I had better illustrate that: Botany must be a study in Christian schools everywhere; and the Bible will be the text-book. One of the texts will be this, “Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow.” And then, the lily itself, and how it grows—what causes it to grow—all the history, the literature, and the science of the lily—will be the study-book. That will be the field of study on that text. And for that purpose? Why does Jesus tell you and me to “consider the lilies of the field, how they grow”? “Consider;” that is, to study the lily. And why?—For the reason stated in that place where it is written: “Israel ... shall grow as the lily.” You and I,—Christian,—the students themselves are to grow, under God, as the lily grows. Jesus tells every student to study the lily, to see and know how it grows, so that he may know how he himself is to grow. He is to find in the lily the life and the power of God by which it grows,—the means which God employs in the sunshine, the soil, the dew, and the rain to cause it to grow,—and the science and philosophy of the growing itself, so that he may know how God will cause him himself to “grow as the lily.” Than every student studying botany that way only, so far as the lily is concerned, will, whenever he sees a lily, get from that lily a lesson direct from God, telling him what God is doing in his life, and what God will put into his life by his believing on Him.PTUK November 16, 1899, page 732.3

Another text: “He shall revive as the corn and grow as the vine.” That is the text; and the study-book will be the corn and the vine themselves, in all the science, the philosophy, the literature, and the Scripture that can be found relating to the nature of the corn and the vine. “Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.” “I am the true vine, and My father is the husbandman.” “Ye are the branches.” Thus the corn and the vine will be the study-book for the student who has in the Bible the text, Israel “shall revive as the corn, and grow as the vine.” Then whenever he sees either corn or vine anywhere, it will speak to him lessons of experience, in the language of God.PTUK November 16, 1899, page 733.1

A. T. JONES.

(To be Continued.)