02. Chapter 2: An Object Lesson in Teaching

Chapter 2 An Object Lesson In Teaching

Later we shall take one principle of teaching and seek illustrations of it in the work of Jesus. Now we propose at the outset to take one section of his work, a unity in itself, and find in it some of the principles and methods of teaching he utilized. It will give us an aviator’s view of the field. Not that Jesus ever taught to give us an object lesson in teaching, though he did wash the disciples’ feet to give them an object lesson in humility, but that we can use such masterly lessons as he gave his pupils as models for our own study.

What would be a good illustration to take? Select your own and find in it all the principles of teaching you can.

Let us choose John 4:1-43.

Topic: How Jesus Taught the Woman of Samaria.

1. Here we have a complete teaching situation, with master, pupil, environment, subject matter, aim, and method. Jesus is the master, the woman of Samaria is the pupil, Jacob’s well is a part of the environment, the water of life is a part of the subject matter, the transforming of a life is the aim, and what are the methods?

2. The Master utilized an occasion as it arose, though he was weary with his journey, and it was the noon-hour, and she was a Samaritan and a woman, and sinful.

There were several reasons why he might have let this occasion slip, but not so. “There cometh a woman.”

3. He established a point of contact. She had evidently come to draw water. “Jesus saith unto her, Give me to drink.” He was thirsty; it was a natural request.

4. He had her attention and interest from the start. He had done an unexpected and unusual thing. He utilized “surprise power.” Though a Jew, he had spoken to a Samaritan. This attention and interest are sustained throughout, even increasing in concentration and intensity as slumbering impulses are awakened.

5. He used the conversational method. Seven times he addressed her and six times she replied, the arrival of the disciples interrupting the conversation.

6. He was here dealing with an individual, though thereby the way was opened to deal with the crowds of the city for two days.

7. He exemplified the principle of personal association, for a brief time, by intimate converse with a woman who was a sinner, thereby causing his disciples to marvel.

8. He asked her no question, but he answered three of her explicit questions, as well as the deepest longing of her nature. He built upon her answers and made the most of them: “In that saidst thou truly.”

9. There are problems at the basis of this teaching. First, there is the personal problem of the woman’s life. Who was more conscious of this at the first, the woman or Jesus? It was his object to awaken her conscience. Then there is the theological problem, felt and stated by the woman: Where shall God be worshiped? She seems to have introduced this problem as a distraction from the personal issue, but the answer of Jesus, “in spirit and in truth” reopened the personal problem. Are there still other problems here? What?

10. His reply concerning the nature of worship and God is perhaps long enough to be regarded as the nucleus of a private discourse, with a single auditor. How did John learn about this conversation, do you suppose?

11. There is the use of apperception in passing from water to “living water,” yet it is clear that even so the woman did not understand. (See John 4:15.) There is apperception also in Jesus declaring himself to be the Messiah to one who said she knew that Messiah cometh (John 4:25-26), and this time she evidently understood.

12. His use of the concrete appears in “to drink,” “this water,” “thy husband,” “five husbands,” “this mountain,” “Jerusalem,” “I am he.” The concrete water of Jacob’s well was used to illustrate the abstract water of life.

13. His use of contrast appears in the difference between “this water,” after taking which one thirsts again, and his living water, after drinking of which one shall never thirst (John 4:13-14). Also between the ignorant worship of the Samaritans and the intelligent worship of the Jews (John 4:22).

14. His use of motivation appears in the awakening first of interest and then of conscience and finally of service. The conversation concerning water awakened interest, that concerning the husband awakened conscience, that concerning true worship awakened service. She carried back in haste to the city not the water pot she had brought forth, but the living water.

15. Jesus secured expression from this voluble, motor-minded woman, first in words and then in deeds. He pierced the crust of her encased conscience by a command to act: “Go, call thy husband, and come hither.” A motor command which could not be executed is the profound way in which the Master threw this precipitate will back upon itself in shame and confusion. Unintelligently she said: “Sir, give me this water”; intelligently she said: “Sir, I perceive "that thou art a prophet.” From superficial questions of curiosity her self-expression passes to serious concern in personal and religious matters, and finally to the ministry of Sychar.

16. Some striking characteristics of Jesus as a teacher appear in this incident, such as his disregard of current conventionality in talking with a Samaritan and a woman and a sinner; the absence of false modesty; intimate knowledge of his pupil (how did Jesus know the woman had had five husbands?); profoundest knowledge of his subject—the nature of God as spiritual; the demonstrated ability to teach; prophecy—“the hour cometh”; and self-assertion: “I that speak unto thee am he.”

What impressions do you get from this evidence of teaching method in a single incident? Do you feel that any one of these sixteen points is not really to be found in the case? Would you add still other evidence of teaching method? Take another one of the several longer conversations of Jesus, and see what principles of teaching you can find there also. Is it better to study one teaching incident in the light of the principles or to study one principle at a time in the light of many illustrative incidents? In the former case there is repetition of principles as we pass from incident to incident; in the latter case there is repetition of references to the same incidents as we pass from principle to principle. Which method does this book mainly follow?

Take the conversation with Nicodemus and work out results similar to the ones above.