Preparing the Way

John the Baptist was sent by God to “prepare the way.” His cry was for repentance—to turn hearts back to Him. Repentance is not only an initial change of direction at the time of salvation, but a life-long (even daily) discipline of turning one’s heart to God. True repentance (Greek, metanoia) embodies a change of mind, a change of purpose, and a changed life.

Solomon’s wisdom was obviously not in his own ability to make good judgments; this is apparent from the major mistakes he made when his heart veered away from God. It was in the beginning of his reign when he prayed for an “understanding heart” (literally, a hearing heart). Having a heart attuned to God made him wiser than anyone on earth. Unlike the Socratic enticement to “know thyself,” biblical education encourages us to know God and His counsel in all things. “Let not a wise man boast of his wisdom…but let him who boasts boast of this, that he understands and knows Me” (Jeremiah 9:23, 24).

Very simply, humanism says, “I can do it.” Christianity, on the other hand, says, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” The key to success in all of life is “Christ in you, the hope of glory.” A life of faith in (dependence on) Christ is paramount for instructors to be godly mentors, for He alone is the source of true character.

The goal of Christian educators is to help cultivate the minds of students, to aid them in making sound decisions, and to be effective and authentic role models; teaching them by example the value of life-long “repentance.” Our task is to guide the plow, disperse the seed, water the new crop…and most importantly, try not to eclipse the sun. “Preparing the way” is the job of educators.

Beholding and Becoming

“‘Now I know what life is!’ beamed the artist. ‘It is love! It is being lifted above yourself, the rapture of losing yourself in beauty. What my friends call life and pleasure is unreal and as fleeting as a bubble; they know nothing of the pure, heavenly altar wine that initiates us into life!’” — Hans Christian Andersen

Jesus said “he who eats Me, he also will live because of Me” (John 6:57). In the Hebrew temple, the "bread of the presence" was literally the “bread of the face.” This “showbread,” as it was called, was commanded to be unleavened.

Classical education attempts to impart character by showing students the artful beauty in paintings, statues, and the prose and poetry of Greek and Latin. The idea is that once the student acquires an appreciation of art, his or her ethics will reflect a similar beauty in the way daily life is gone about. The Greek pursuit of beauty was, at best, misguided. Being ignorant of the “leaven” (original sin) that resides in every individual heart, their appreciation of “forms” turned into lust and licentiousness. With defiled understandings, they constructed their own meaning around things, misunderstanding and misusing the beautiful stuff of creation.

While we are full of leaven, Christ is not. When Moses asked to see God’s glory, He showed Him His unsullied attributes. And it is because all have sinned, and fall short of the glory, that we must be saved—restored to the image of God’s beautiful and "unleavened" likeness. God’s absolutes are not merely commands—they are the very essence of His being. And we are called to be like Him. Sinning is in large part wrong doing, but falling short of the glory is wrong being…wrong doing is a result of wrong being. Our “doing” should come out of our “being,” and our “being” should be in Him.

Christ-centered education is the opposite of secular education; it is not about self-realization. “For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God” (Colossians 3:3). Socrates said, “One thing I know, and that is that I know nothing.” Secular academia has latched on to this notion, which seems like a humble statement at first glance. But upon closer inspection we find that Socrates was planting the seeds of finite relativism[1]—all is a matter of the way the individual sees things. “Know thyself” was Socrates’ greatest revelation. Contrast this with Jesus’ teaching to deny thyself, and the wisdom of Solomon to “lean not upon your own understanding.”

Indeed, everything is relative. But what or who is everything relative to?

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[1] What I mean by finite relativism is that all is relative to you, rather than you being relative to all. Technically, Socrates opposed relativism as the Sophists (who came up with the idea) taught it. They believed people were relative to their culture and experiences. Socrates, on the other hand, believed culture and experiences were relative to oneself—“know thyself” is finite relativism.

Inspiring Minds

Solomon writes:

“So that your trust may be in the Lord, I have taught you today, even you. Have I not written to you excellent things of counsels and knowledge, to make you know the certainty of the words of truth that you may correctly answer him who inquires of you?” (Proverbs 22:19-21).

Christian educators need to have answers for students who honestly inquire…answers that cultivate trust in the Lord, rather than undermine it. It is directly opposite of secular education. Will Durant says, “Philosophy begins when one learns to doubt.” Secular education is built around the philosophy of irrational unbelief. Secular education fosters doubt. Christian education fosters belief...faith.

Educators are called to teach “faithful men.” “Do not speak in the hearing of a fool, for he will despise the wisdom of your words” (Proverbs 23:9). Fools say there is no God—they are the atheists of today. Apologetics is not to be used on fools, but to help the seeker —him who inquires of you—to trust in the Lord.

Before Jesus ascended into Heaven, He told Peter to feed His lambs, as well as His sheep. Lambs, according to various commentators, indicate less mature believers, while sheep denote the more mature members of the Body of Christ. It is needful for Christian educators to assist, lead and guide “lambs” in the continuance of education.

The call of Christian educators in administering the continuation of education is to bring understanding to the pupil. When Christ is truly brought into view, the students, if they will see Him, are humbled. Humility is the road to understanding; fear of God is the beginning of wisdom. The acknowledgment of a higher knowledge—a higher authority—than your own is fundamental. That authority is not always right, or godly, is not the issue. Daniel was able to serve the king of Babylon because he knew God was ultimately in charge.

Because we live in a world of relativism, our anchor of truth must be set before we can weather the waves of secularism that pervade the workplace. Christian education helps to root and ground students in faith. With Christ-in-you, the foundation has been laid for the building up of every area in life. Formal education only rests rightly on Him, and by His light can we discern if the “knowledge” we are given is actually truth. The anchor of Biblical education can hold through all the storms of life; the absolute compass of His Life and Light can guide through any endeavor.

Spiritual Authority

The spiritual realm is not a sort of Neverland, as we have previously discussed. The Christian does not (at least should not) believe in fantasy. Nevertheless, C.S. Lewis conveyed the idea of another, unseen realm in his Chronicles of Narnia. Narnia is a secret land, which must be entered into through a doorway—a wardrobe, to be exact. When a person believes in Christ, he is awakened to the hidden, invisible Kingdom of God. His spirit rises from the dead, and he becomes one spirit with the Spirit. He has gone through a doorway into Christ…into another realm (John 10:7).

Adam and Eve rejected the authority of God because they did not want to submit to someone outside of themselves. The Tree of Knowledge was the tree of becoming one’s own authority. It is important for Christian educators to convey the concept of true authority. People need to know there is something beyond and above them that knows more and better than they do. Whether or not their particular authority at the moment knows more or better than they do, somebody does…even if it is only God. It is hard to imagine the Apostle Paul needing to submit to authority, yet he was not a “lone ranger.”

Censorship is not for the sane man, as the law is not for the righteous. Elders and counselors are more for the sake of unity and safety for all than they are to enlighten the enlightened. However, elders in the Body of Christ do help immature and carnal believers discern the difference between soul and spirit. They confirm and/or deny because many believers do not know the difference between radio and TV, so to speak.

A sure sign someone is not walking in the Spirit is the fact that he is not in fellowship with other believers. The Christian has fellowship with God and other Christians. We can be sectarian by fracturing off from the rest of the Body, or even by only relating to the one fragment with which we agree. But this is far too much like secularism to be taken for Christianity. Paul urged the Philippian church to strive “together for the faith of the gospel” (Philippians 1:27). Like a team, believers are called to be united in one Mind, with one Spirit, not in the sense of all being the same, as if every organ in the body were the pancreas, but in the sense of unity through diversity. Every organ in the body works corporately to sustain life. In submission to the Head, and to one another, the Body functions properly.

Daniel, too, understood the concept of authority. While he served ignoble despots, he did not bow to their gods. Daniel understood that the Sovereign hand of God used even the king of Babylon to do His bidding. God restored Israel from captivity by using Darius and Cyrus, pagan kings. In the midst of Babylon, Daniel yielded his heart to the absolute authority of God. Daniel could serve the king of Babylon because he understood authority; he knew God was the final authority, and no despot could thwart His ultimate purpose.

True Christian Science

When Jesus breathed on His disciples and said, "Receive the Holy Spirit," He was not transmitting a thought or feeling to them; He was not transmitting something imperceptible, either. He was turning the light back on inside of man…the life of God is the light by which we see! Atheistic scientists do not believe in God because they cannot perceive Him. The reason they can't perceive Him is that their spiritual perceivers (i.e. their spirits) are not working. When Adam and Eve ate from the forbidden tree, their spirits died—the light went out, and people became spiritually blind.

All around us, even now, are radio waves. One can tune into the classical station (101.1 FM) if one merely adjusts the radio dial to "perceive" the frequency. If the radio is broken, one might not ever know there is a classical station. If another person is completely ignorant of what a radio is, they might accuse someone who tunes into the radio as being "mystical" or "delusional."

Since God is Spirit, it requires that we tune into His wavelength...His frequency...to perceive and observe Him directly. This does not negate the natural world; it transcends it. To observe Him “scientifically” is possible when your spirit is alive and functioning. One must have a properly functioning instrument to see what cannot be seen with the natural senses. If we say the spiritual man is unscientific because he perceives what we cannot see with natural senses, we must also say the astronomer is unscientific because he perceives what we cannot see with the naked eye.

Telescopes, radar and radio tuners are merely tools to perceive what is imperceptible to the natural man. The spirit of man is much like this. Creatures like bats, dolphins and whales use sonar. The killer whale actually takes a sonogram of his observed subject. He can perceive its temperature and heartbeat, and whether or not it is warm or cold blooded. He knows if he does or doesn't like to eat it because of his functioning sonar. The shark, on the other hand, has no such faculty. He has to take a bite to see whether or not he likes his potential supper.

The spirit of man is the lamp of the Lord…the ignition of His Life brings light to the soul. If one’s lamp is lit, he is not in darkness. The mature Christian can know the difference between his thoughts, feelings and spiritual perceptions, just as much as he can know the difference between television and radio. He can even come to know the difference between 101.1 FM and 94.9 FM. Not many people tune into the classical station and think they are watching Good Morning America. But then, the insane person might look out the window at nature and wonder if, maybe, he has turned on The Discovery Channel.

Long ago people thought John Colter (the "white man" who discovered Yellowstone) was a liar upon his description of it. They called it “Colter’s Hell.” Atheistic scientists do not believe in God because, like Yellowstone, He is unfathomable to them.

The reason one believes astronomers when they say there are red giants in the heavens, or supernovas, is because astronomers have seen them with telescopes. To deny the instrument is an easy way to deny the discovery. Not to tune in to the classical station's frequency does not nullify the station. It merely keeps one from hearing the music.

Spiritual Education

An important principle to grasp is found in 1 Corinthians 2:14, “But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised.” Greek scholar and commentator, Kenneth Wuest, says:

“The word ‘natural’ is the translation of a Greek word which Paul uses to describe to the Corinthian Greeks the unregenerate man at his best, the man whom Greek philosophy commended, the man actuated by the higher thoughts and aims of the natural life. The word used here is not the Greek word which speaks of the sensual man. It is the word coined by Aristotle to distinguish the pleasures of the soul, such as ambition and the desire for knowledge, from those of the body. The natural man spoken of is the educated man at the height of his intellectual powers, but devoid of the Spirit of God.”

Aristotle’s “natural” man was the zenith of humanity, yet he was as an ignoramus in comparison to the spiritual man. God is Spirit. His habitat is spiritual—heavenly; His words are Spirit. To the religious relativists of His day, Jesus said, “Where I am, you cannot come.” He was speaking to them as to mere, natural men. In another place, He prays to the Father for His disciples that they “…be with Me where I am.” Jesus dwelt in two realms at once—heaven and earth.

The unbelieving secularists claim to be objective because they believe in science. To them, anything they can’t perceive is non-existent, like God. It has been said that the man with an experience is not at the mercy of a man with an argument. The secularist will undoubtedly say that it is all a matter of emotion; that God exists in one’s feelings and imagination.

My disenchanted friend claims to believe scripture, albeit, he reasons away the idea of spiritual life by saying "spirit" is a metaphor for one’s soul. He insists that Christians do not experience the reality of God’s indwelling presence. Mistaking soulful experience for spiritual experience is very common, indeed. However, the man who has seen Greece is not at the mercy of the man who thinks it is like Antarctica; the man who has been there knows better.

The relativist says it is all in the imagination, but the man who has never been to the Isle of Chios should not tell the man who has been there that it doesn’t exist. One can merely show it to another on the map, but unless a man goes for himself, he merely trusts the word of the one who has been there, that it is there, and that it is as described. The poor, unbelieving relativist will never know spiritual life unless he acquires eyes to see and ears to hear! Having never left Wisconsin, he demands that the crystal-blue waters of the Aegean are a farce; Chios is a fanciful myth to him. He is utterly content with his small world.

As "theological scientists," Christians do not merely theorize about what they believe. The Apostles, like true scientists, proclaimed what they had seen and heard (I John 1:3). Believers know they are the children of God because they perceive Him: “The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are children of God” (Romans 8:16).

The Combining of Two Realms

Pagan philosophers have long admitted to the existence of body and soul (mind, will and emotions). What they most often deny and refute—sometimes violently—is the existence of spirit (because they have no personal evidence of such). Claiming to make scientific observations, they live in the world of speculation. Without the ability to perceive God, people decide truth for themselves (based on observations made exclusively by the fallen, thus warped, body and soul). They argue that no two people see anything exactly the same way. Therefore, all is relative to one’s own standpoint. Each person is the highest authority in his own, small world; he is the center of his individual universe.

I have a friend who believes the secular idea that man is just body and soul…nothing more. He has come to this conclusion, much in the way Charles Bradlaugh came to his ideas: he witnessed people (so-called Christians) touting irrational theories and displaying unstable emotions which they insisted were spiritual…claiming the source of their ideas was God. My friend left the island of mythological madness for the more placid waters of philosophy. False representations of Christianity did not kindle the fire of doubt in him, but they did fan the flames.

My friend does not realize his erratic philosophy is merely another side of the same coin. Pagan mythology and pagan philosophy, though not identical, are nonetheless twins. Cultural and ethical differences are all that separate them. Varied opinions are equal if they are all wrong; a dead rat is just as dead as a deceased mouse. Philosophy and mythology are in the same proverbial boat.

What my friend experienced was more akin to pagan mysticism than Christianity. Claiming to be “faith,” it was a system of unbelief, fostered by the negation of creation and the insistence on fantasy. It was like the toy, plastic food offered by children playing house. There is nothing wrong with imagination, per se, but when one insists his imagination is reality, the game ceases to be innocuous.

When Christian educators teach science, math, and other wholesome subjects, the student at the natural level sees the goodness of God. This establishes and strengthens his faith. It is important to establish in the hearts of students that God is just as much God in the ordinary as He is in the extraordinary. There is a type of reverse secularism, which Christian educators should be mindful of—the defiance of common, ordinary, everyday life; the disdain of practicality. God was just as much God in the carpenter shop as He was on the mount of transfiguration. He was just as holy in the stable, among the cows, as He is in Heaven…and just as spiritual.

That God came down to earth is not the negation of spirit, nor the negation of earth, but the combining, once again, of two realms. Adam was made to be spiritual and physical. Jesus, being the Last Adam, is Son of God and Son of Man. The first Adam lost the function of his spirit, and became a creature of mere earth (soul and body alone). The Last Adam is not only the Lord of Heaven, but Lord of earth as well (1 Corinthians 15:44).

My unbelieving friend had many experiences with believers who might as well have sung Bibbety Bobbety Boo, or When You Wish Upon a Star in their worship services. To them, the Bible was treated as a book of spells; people were always trying to coax the “genie” out of the bottle to make him grant their wishes.

There is no harm in imaginary places like Neverland or C.S. Lewis’ Narnia. They metaphorically represent real places. Christ Himself was the Master of Parables. Stories can aid in getting people to see beyond the natural world. However, in my friend’s experience, it was the imaginary that was proclaimed—not as something pretend, allegorical or even metaphorical—but as reality!

Religion and philosophy outside of Christ is merely mythology and folly. The call of Christian education is to preach and teach Christ. The putting forward of cultures and creeds as absolute, unless they are rooted and grounded in Christ, is the kind of irrational idolatry that fuels the flames of unbelief. When systems of self-righteousness are built out of fragmented truth, they often look so much like Christianity that the average person cannot tell them apart. Like counterfeit currency, it takes close examination to discern sham religion from true Christianity.