100 Sermon Illustrations on Education

A friend shared with me a beautiful legend about a king who decided to set aside a special day to honor his greatest subject. When the big day arrived, there was a large gathering in the palace courtyard. Four finalists were brought forward, and from these four, the king would select the winner.

The first person presented was a wealthy philanthropist. The king was told that this man was highly deserving of the honor because of his humanitarian efforts. He had given much of his wealth to the poor.

The second person was a celebrated physician. The king was told that this doctor was highly deserving of the honor because he had rendered faithful and dedicated service to the sick for many years.

The third person was a distinguished judge. The king was told that the judge was worthy because he was noted for his wisdom, his fairness, and his brilliant decisions.

The fourth person presented was an elderly woman. Everyone was quite surprised to see her there, because her manner was quite humble, as was her dress. She hardly looked the part of someone who would be honored as the greatest subject in the kingdom. What chance could she possibly have, when compared to the other three, who had accomplished so much? Even so, there was something about her -- the look of love in her face, the understanding in her eyes, her quiet confidence.

The king was intrigued, to say the least, and somewhat puzzled by her presence. He asked who she was. The answer came: “You see the philanthropist, the doctor, and the judge? Well, she was their teacher!”

That woman had no wealth, no fortune, and no title, but she had unselfishly given her life to produce great people. There is nothing more powerful or more Christlike than sacrificial love.

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James W. Moore, SOME THINGS ARE TOO GOOD NOT TO BE TRUE, (Dimensions, 1994), 129.

"Only the curious will learn and only the resolute will overcome the obstacles to learning. The quest quotient has always excited me more than the intelligence quotient."

-- Eugene S. Wilson, Cited in BITS & PIECES

"In a world that is constantly changing, there is no one subject or set of subjects that will serve you for the foreseeable future, let alone for the rest of your life. The most important skill to acquire now is learning how to learn."

-- John Naisbitt, Futurist

"The time for extracting a lesson from history is ever at hand for those who are wise."

-- Demosthenes (384-322 B.C.), orator and statesman, B&P 5/30/03

"History is merely a list of surprises...It can only prepare us to be surprised yet again."

-- Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., writer, B&P 5/30/03

"Overcoming the unexpected and discovering the unknown is what ignites our spirit. It is what life is all about."

-- Daniel S. Goldin, NASA administrator

"Personally, I am always ready to learn, although I do not always like being taught."

-- Winston Churchill (1874-1965), British prime minister

"Learning does not consist only of knowing what we must or we can do, but also of knowing what we could do and perhaps should not do."

-- Umberto Eco, "The Name of the Rose", B&P 6/6/03

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[Original illustration at this number was a duplicate of HolwickID #12330]

Never try to teach a pig to sing. All you get is frustrated, and it really annoys the pig.

This can be used in: "Trying to get a sinner to live like a Christian without being born again is like teaching a pig..."

John Taylor Gatto, former New York City and New York State Teacher of the Year has compiled the following list that he calls “The 20 Qualities of an Educated Person.” In compiling this list, Gatto reviewed the answers to questionnaires given to a number of Corporate Personnel Managers and College Admission Officers. According to these two groups, an educated person will demonstrate:

1. A broadly knowledgeable mind

2. Self confidence

3. A life purpose

4. A touch of class

5. Good leadership skills

6. The ability to work with a team

7. Patience

8. Good public speaking skills

9. Good writing skills

10. Resourcefulness

11. A desire for responsibility

12. Honesty

13. A public spirit

14. The ability to work well alone

15. An eye for details

16. The ability to focus at will

17. Perseverance

18. The ability to handle pressure

19. Curiosity

20. An attractive personal style

(Do you notice how these have little to do with academic knowledge and skills, but a LOT to do with CHARACTER?)

________

The Funnies, http://groups.yahoo.com/group/andychaps_the-funnies

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[Original illustration at this number was added to HolwickID #21059]

99-0422 Email from Gary Grizzell

CHILDREN KILLING CHILDREN

Thomas F. Eaves Sr.

Our hearts weep for the families who have been touched by the tragedy which

took place at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado. (Our sympathy

goes out to all who have suffered because of the shootings in the schools

of our land). Perhaps we will never know all the facts of this tragic

episode.

Blame for this tragedy will be laid at the feet of parents, gun dealers,

young people, teachers, and many others. Perhaps all share in the

responsibility. There is one "community" which should not be overlooked,

the educators of our children. Our young people are taught the theory of

evolution which holds that,

1. There is no God.

2. If there is no God there is no hereafter - no heaven or hell.

3. If there is no God there is no absolute standard of right and wrong. Cal

Thomas wrote in his article, "These youngsters live in a society without

values. Why should young people take life seriously when their over-worked,

aborting, day-care, euthanasia culture does not? Life is so cheap,

relationships are so meaningless-children get the message." (The

Tennessean, Thursday, April 22, 1999, p. 19A)

4. Man is nothing more than an educated animal. Charles Darwin wrote that

man descended from the monkey community. He states in the sixth chapter of

his The Descent of Man, "The Simiadae then branched off into two great

stems, the New World [western hemisphere] and Old World [eastern

hemisphere] monkeys; and from the latter, at a remote period, Man, the

wonder and glory of the Universe proceeded."

5. This allows man to do whatever he is capable of doing. Our young people

are taught that man is nothing more than an animal and in our generation we

are observing and suffering because they are acting like animals.

In our crazy mixed up world it would not surprise me if the students who

prayed, while their school mates were being slaughtered, will face

prosecution for praying in their school. It reminds me of the sign which

was placed in a school, "In Case of Nuclear Attack, The Ban On Praying Is

Canceled." Maybe something similar would be appropriate, "In Case This

School Comes Under Attack, The Ban On Praying Is Canceled." America's

problems will not cease until she turns to God (Proverbs 14:34).

Thomas F. Eaves Sr.

tfeaves@multipro.com

Roughly 21 percent of Americans read the Bible weekly and 16 percent read it daily, according to surveys by George Gallup. The Bible remains the best-selling book of all time -- about 26 million copies are sold annually! No other book has the Bible's reach, nor has any book had such a profound influence on so many lives.

Still, for many Americans -- and especially the young -- the Bible is largely unknown, unfamiliar, and unread. The main reason is that, for the past forty years, the Bible has been withdrawn from our public schools.

How did this happen? In 1963, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled, in Abington V. Schempp, that reading from the Bible before the start of public school classes was devotional and, thus, unconstitutional. The ruling ended a practice that had been in place since the earliest days of this nation.

Educators then interpreted the ruling to mean that the Bible could not be read or studied in classrooms. As a result, in most public schools all references to the Bible have been removed. Today, less than 10 percent of public schools teach about the Bible in class.

Yet the Supreme Court, even as it ruled against devotional activity, has upheld teaching about the Bible in public schools as constitutional. Justice Clark, writing for the majority in that opinion, said: "It might well be said that one's education is not complete without a study of comparative religion or the history of religion and its relationship to the advancement of civilization."

"Nothing we have said here," he added, "indicates that such study of the bible or religion, when presented objectively as part of a secular program of education, may not be effected consistently with the First Amendment."

Justice Arthur Goldberg concurred: "Neither government nor this Court can or should ignore the significance of the fact that a vast portion of our people believe in and worship God, and that many of our legal, political, and personal values derive historically from religious teachings."

Goldberg continued, "Government must inevitably take cognizance of the existence of religion and, indeed, under certain circumstances, the First Amendment may require that it do so."

We can all say "Amen!" to that.

Well, in this spirit, the National Bible Association and the Freedom Forum First Amendment Center released "The Bible and Public Schools: A First Amendment Guide." This guide was endorsed by eighteen different Jewish, Christian, and Muslim groups, including: the National Council of Churches, the National Association of Evangelicals, the Christian Legal Society, the Anti-Defamation League, the American Jewish Committee, the American Jewish Congress, and People for the American Way.

The two largest teacher unions, the American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association, and the National School Boards Foundation, signed on as well.

This is a blueprint -- the first in more than 160 years of public education -- for teaching about the Bible in literature, history, and social studies -- something that surveys show three out of four Americans want.

Now, you can help advance this effort. To download a copy of this guide, visit http://www.teachaboutthebible.org, or call 1-800-830- 3733 and request Publication No. 99-F03. And when you get it, give it to the school principals and teachers in your community. Tell them the Bible is a heritage that all our children should share.

For further reading:

Gallup Poll Topics: A-Z - Religion, 6-9 October 2000.

School District of Abington Township, Pennsylvania V. Schempp, 374 U.S. 203 (1963). (Opinion of the Court; Concurring Opinion.)

___________________

Copyright (c) 2000 Prison Fellowship Ministries. Reprinted with permission. "BreakPoint with Chuck Colson" is a radio ministry of Prison Fellowship Ministries.

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Jesus was able to influence a handful of disciples who became church and mission leaders by means of a truly holistic approach to leadership training. What Jesus did in his ministry is often referred to as discipleship. It implies the biblical principle that life begets life, and therefore it is hardly possible to separate what is taught from the person who does the teaching.

We can look at education either as communication of information that returns to us during examination week, or as character formation — education for life, as some people call it. Jesus took the existing model of mentoring and apprenticeship that was extant in his context and perfected it to a level that has never been surpassed.

What we often forget, however, is that Jesus’ teaching was not sufficient in itself to guarantee that his disciples would live it out according to his expectation. They needed what he referred to as “power from on high” (Acts 1:8) to be able to fully deliver what was expected of them. Therefore, even in Jesus’ model there was an element of power that superseded, confirmed and solidified what the disciples had received from the master. Broadly speaking, Jesus’ model included the following steps or elements:

1. A mentor with a godly character.

2. A mentor with a perfect blend of word and deed in the power of the Spirit.

3. A mentor with a mission (seen as a magnetic personality).

4. A core of disciples, personally chosen by the master.

5. Discipleship through common living.

6. Participation in the mission of the master.

7. Short projects (without the master’s presence) in the context of discipleship.

8. Subsequent correction by the master.

9. A plan for the future — the true mission.

10. Power from on high — obedience in the absence of the master.

Seen from the perspective of these basic points, education goes beyond information and character formation. It is a blend of the two plus the indispensable bestowal of power of the Holy Spirit so that disciples can effect change in the world around them and thus cooperate with God in the expansion of the Kingdom.

_________________

Levi DeCarvalho, a native of Brazil, lived among the Terêna tribe in Southwest Brazil for over 20 years (his wife is from that group). Levi holds a Ph.D. in Intercultural Studies (Anthropology) from Fuller Seminary and is currently Director of Training, Latin Division, at the USCWM.

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[Original illustration at this number was a duplicate of HolwickID #2106]

Sharon works in a public elementary school in Minnesota. Each year the halls of her school are decorated with voodoo masks or images of Aztec gods that the students make in art class. In January, Chinese New Year symbols are posted on the walls of the cafeteria and the children are encouraged to figure out which symbol their birthday is attached to.

"Yet," she laments, "at Christmas, nobody can talk about Christmas or have any Christmas decorations up -- especially a tree." The children aren't allowed to sing Christmas carols. And on the last day of school before Christmas break, the school celebrates, not Christmas, but "Back to the Fifties" with decorations and clothing from that era, and fifties music blaring in the cafeteria.

Sharon asks, "Whatever happened to our American culture and national holidays?"

What happened is that fear, intimidation, and outright misinformation about what's legally permitted in public schools has created an education system that, all too often, fails to teach students about the very culture they belong to.

Eric Buehrer, the author of an article on our BreakPoint website called, "Integrating Faith and the Public Schools Without Mixing Church and State," says that legal confusion has led to mis-educating students about American culture.

For example, a school district in Wisconsin published a directive on holidays for teachers that said: "Thanksgiving is a national custom. Please try to avoid religious connotations." Imagine! It's absolutely contrary to the historical accounts of how Thanksgiving began.

The fact of the matter is that the Supreme Court believes that students are learning about the religious nature of our holidays. In the case of LYNCH V. DONNELLY, involving public display of a nativity scene, the justices commented that during Christmas "people are taking note of the season with Christmas hymns and carols in public schools." The Court assumed public school children were singing religious Christmas carols.

Beyond holidays, however, confusion about what's legally permitted to teach about Christianity has led many teachers to simply gloss over or ignore significant information about the impact of Christianity on our society.

Contrary to what most people think, it is lawful for students to learn about the Christian beliefs that motivated people like Martin Luther King, Mother Teresa, and George Washington. They can learn about the faith that motivates the men in the Promise Keepers movement; and they can learn why Prison Fellowship's faith-based approaches to prison reform have been so successful. They can read the speeches of presidents as, each year, they proclaim a National Day of Prayer and Thanksgiving Day. In other words, they don't have to pretend that we're an atheist country.

In his article, Eric Buehrer offers this rule of thumb: "When there is a legitimate academic reason and it can be done without admonishing students to accept a religious belief, educators can teach students about Christianity."

The law does not require teachers to mislead or misinform students about the significant impact Christianity has on our nation and the world. But you and I need to educate the educators. Give the teachers and school administrators in your area a copy of this article and other material we'll send you if you call us (1-800-995-8777). Christians need to help officials understand that they can teach the truth without fear.

For further information:

You can learn about Gateways to Better Education here: .

Eric Buehrer, "Keep the Faith: Integrating Faith and the Public Schools without Mixing Church and State," BREAKPOINT ONLINE, 2001.

"The Bible and Public Schools: A First Amendment Guide," published by the National Bible Association and the First Amendment Center.

Read the U.S. Supreme Court opinion, LYNCH V. DONNELLY, 465 U.S. 668 (1984), here:

_________________________

Copyright © 2002 Prison Fellowship Ministries. Reprinted with permission. "BreakPoint with Chuck Colson" is a radio ministry of Prison Fellowship Ministries.

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A third-grade girl stands before a room full of classmates. The room is silent, and their attention is hers.

For the past few minutes, the teacher has guided the students in a discussion about families. Families, they are told, are made up of all types of people. Gay and lesbian couples are one example of a family.

The girl, named Emily, is there to read an award-winning essay about her two moms.

She begins, “My mothers mean so, so, so, so much to me. I have two mothers. Two moms is pretty nice. Well, it's more than pretty nice. It's really nice. You can't imagine. Although having two mothers is a problem to others, I respect that that's the way they think and I can't do anything about it. I still think that those people think stupidly.

“This once happened with a boy in my class who could not come to my house because my parents were lesbians. One night I called their house and the mother told me their version of the Bible. I stood up for my mothers and knew that many kids of my class were supporting me and calling me to see how I was. I am proud of my moms and enjoy marching in the gay pride march every single year with my moms.”

The teacher compliments Emily on her essay, then leads the class in a round of applause.

Although the above scene may be troubling to Southern Baptists, it's one that is becoming more and more common in America's schools, Southern Baptist Theological Seminary students learned March 5 during a day-long presentation from Focus on the Family. A team from the Colorado-based ministry founded by psychologist James Dobson briefed the seminary community on current issues related to homosexuality, with an aim toward formulating a biblical response.

Troubling video clips, including the one with Emily, which came from the gay education documentary “It's Elementary,” were aired during a session led by Mike Haley, Focus on the Family's director of youth and gender studies, on gay activism within public schools.

“You can see the exploitation of a young life and how the children are being re-educated on the issue of family,” Haley said about the documentary. “... They are teaching as simple fact that homosexuality is just as genetic as race.”

Haley noted that the girl was not corrected for using “stupidly” to describe other children.

“I would hate to see what would happen if any of our children in public schools wrote that people who believe against Christianity think stupidly,” he said.

Haley, warning that homosexual activists aren't simply operating in states such as California and New York, said Christians must first be educated before they become involved.

“We talk over and over about the gay agenda, but I don't believe that many of us in the Christian realm can truly articulate what the gay agenda really is,” he said.

Haley said that activists are trying to incorporate homosexual education in public schools. They accomplish this by equating homosexuality with genetic traits, making the argument that being gay is equivalent to, for instance, being black or white. Once this is accomplished, they spread faulty statistics. Haley said two of the most popular faulty statistics are that 10 percent of the population is gay and that homosexual youth account for 30 percent of all teen suicides. Both stats, he said, have been disproved.

Once school boards believe the false arguments, homosexual activists have won much of the battle, Haley said.

He said the activists have three goals:

- Normalizing homosexuality by desensitizing students.

This can be done, he said, through the use of activist children's books such as “Heather Has Two Mommies” or “Daddy's Roommate.” The latter book is the story of a boy whose parents are divorced. His father lives with a homosexual partner. The boy asks his mother what gay is, and she responds by saying, “Being gay is just another kind of love.”

But de-sensitization can be more discrete, Haley said. In one school, a teacher came into a class and played the song “Circle of Life” from the popular children's movie “The Lion King.”

“Then they go in to educate the children about how Elton John is gay, and about [how] he sings that song,” Haley said. “Their parents have probably taken them to this movie and condoned this movie, and they're sitting in a kindergarten class and they learn that the song is from a movie that they sat and watched with their parents.”

- Equating homosexuality to heterosexuality.

Haley played another clip from “It's Elementary” in which a homosexual teacher told a gathering of young children - some appearing to be as young as 5 or 6 - how great he felt when he told people he was homosexual.

Alluding to one blond-haired boy in the clip, Haley said, “You can imagine what goes on when he goes home and says to his mom and dad, `We studied homosexuality today and I learned what gay was. Mom, what is gay?’ Parents' typical response to a child that age is, `Well, honey, that's when boys like boys and they don't like girls, and when girls like girls and they don't like boys.'“

However, that is the wrong response, Haley said.

“Think about the developmental age of that child that's there. It's the `cootie' stage. That little boy likes boys and doesn't like girls and wants nothing to do with little girls. You can already imagine the amount of confusion that's starting.

“We're getting calls at Focus on the Family from parents saying, `My daughter came home today at the age of 8 proclaiming that she realized today that she was a lesbian because she realized that she likes girls and she doesn't like boys.'

“It's truly devastating what's happening across our country” regarding children's' education,” Haley said.

- Undermining parental moral authority.

“This is where the school district is going to tell you as a Christian parent that they believe that they know what's best to teach your child,” Haley said.

He played a video clip of a group of teachers discussing an upcoming “Gay and Lesbian Pride Day” at school.

One of the teachers, obviously nervous about what she was being asked to teach, asked the group, “As a school, are we saying that kids have to support this? That's what it sounds like to me - that we're saying if a child comes from a background that says that homosexuality is not correct, are we telling that child that they're supposed to [support it]?”

The question was batted around before another teacher chimed in: “I don't know if this works for you, but I think that we are asking kids to believe that this is right ... we're educating them, and this is part of what we consider to be a healthy education.”

Haley said Christians must be armed to fight gay activism. That includes de-mythologizing popular statistics, including the error that 10 percent of the population is homosexual. Haley said it comes from a flawed 1948 study done by Alfred Kinsey. Focus on the Family contends that the number should be closer to 3 percent.

The other statistic - that gay youth account for 30 percent of all teen suicides - is just as flawed, Haley said. The statistic came from researcher Paul Gibson and was given further credibility when it was quoted by the Department of Health and Human Services.

But Haley said the total number of all teen suicides in America is less than the number of gay teen suicides cited in Gibson's study.

Haley cautioned Christians from thinking gay activism exists only in California and New York.

“Let me assure you: We're seeing this in more and more school districts across the country,” he said. “They truly are desiring to undermine the fact that God says that homosexuality is not what he intended for mankind. It's a very scary thing, and you and I as Christians have got to take a stand on this issue and begin to realize that there are very young individuals that are being led to a life that is empty, hollow and sad.”

Christians must react to the gay activist with both anger and love, Haley said.

“While watching this can incite a lot of anger in us, I'd like to caution you to remember that while you may become angry - and I hope that you will do something productive with that anger - we [must] never forget that there are lost souls on the other side of that issue that need the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ that you and I have to give to them.”

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Throughout the Scriptures, education has been a major priority. This can be traced from the teachings in both the Old and New Testaments.

Deuteronomy -- especially in chapters 4, 6 and 31 -- repeats the words of "teach," "taught" and "learn" as preparation for the people to go into the Promised Land. The prophets were more "forth tellers" than "fore tellers" as they instructed the people of God. In Nehemiah, we see Ezra the scribe reading the Book of the Law of God, making it clear so people could understand (8:7).

Psalm 119 teaches us to hide the Word in our hearts and asks the Lord to teach us to follow his ways (119:11,33). Proverbs refers to a father's instruction and the importance of wisdom.

Jesus taught the people the truth of God. The believers "continued in the apostle's teaching" in the book of Acts (2:42). The letters of the New Testament are actually teaching documents intended to build up the churches.

The biblical injunction to teach, along with the responsibility of the believer to learn, has been carried on throughout the centuries since the early church. At times, it was primarily for the clergy. And eventually, with the Reformation, it was expanded to the laity. The church was the center of education for many centuries.

The Baptist Faith and Message statement indicates that an adequate system of Christian education is necessary to a complete spiritual program for Christ's people. How then, is Christian education defined?

Perhaps the best way to answer this is to ask additional questions. Is Christian education only for Christians? How is Christian education different from "secular" education? What makes Christian education Christian? What is the purpose of Christian education? How are goals and values determined? What is the setting for Christian education?

Christian education means education for Christians, but it is much more. It includes pre-conversion, conversion and post conversion learning experiences. People come to faith in Christ through the faithful teaching of God's Word and the convicting power of the Holy Spirit. It is not a one-time learning experience, but a lifetime dedicated to learning more about God and his Word.

The difference between secular and Christian education is seen in the role of the Holy Spirit in Christian education, as well as in the content to be taught along with the different presuppositions regarding truth. Through the illumination of the Holy Spirit, believers are shown the truth of God's Word. Both secular and Christian educators may use similar methodologies, but the basic issues related to truth make them quite different.

Christian education is Christian when teachers and learners are dependent on the work of the Holy Spirit in the learning environment. It is Christian when the purpose and goals are honoring to the Lord and his kingdom. It is Christian when the curriculum is developed from the teachings of the Word of God and from an understanding of biblical theology. It is Christian when there is an overall understanding and perspective that God is in control and that teachers and learners are sincerely seeking to fulfill God's will and purpose in all things.

The purpose of Christian education is to bring people to a saving faith in Jesus Christ, to train them in a life of discipleship and to equip them for Christian service in the world today. It is to develop in believers a biblical worldview that will assist in making significant decisions from a Christian perspective.

The purpose, goals and values of Christian education are derived from a theological foundation that is biblically based. Worship, evangelism, discipleship, fellowship and service are all drawn from the Scriptures and are included in any purpose and value statement for Christian education. Goals are developed from these key functions of the church, and effective Christian education can be measured based upon the accomplishment of these functions.

The primary setting for Christian education is the church. Actually the educational ministry of the church is probably the largest educational endeavor in the world.

Christian education also takes place outside the walls of the church through Christian schools, Bible studies and other kinds of ministries. It is important to note that Christian education is not limited to just one organization or ministry and is found in many different venues.

Bible-based, theologically sound, Holy Spirit empowered, teaching-learning, growth, equipping, change, the church, evangelism and service are all elements to be included under the umbrella of Christian education.

Yes, the church is charged with the responsibility of providing adequate Christian education, and this is clearly stated as part of the BF&M.

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Full text of Article 12: Education

Christianity is the faith of enlightenment and intelligence. In Jesus Christ abide all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. All sound learning is, therefore, a part of our Christian heritage. The new birth opens all human faculties and creates a thirst for knowledge. Moreover, the cause of education in the Kingdom of Christ is co-ordinate with the causes of missions and general benevolence, and should receive along with these the liberal support of the churches. An adequate system of Christian education is necessary to a complete spiritual program for Christ's people.

In Christian education there should be a proper balance between academic freedom and academic responsibility. Freedom in any orderly relationship of human life is always limited and never absolute. The freedom of a teacher in a Christian school, college, or seminary is limited by the pre-eminence of Jesus Christ, by the authoritative nature of the Scriptures, and by the distinct purpose for which the school exists.

Deuteronomy 4:1,5,9,14; 6:1-10; 31:12-13; Nehemiah 8:1-8; Job 28:28; Psalms 19:7ff.; 119:11; Proverbs 3:13ff.; 4:1-10; 8:1-7,11; 15:14; Ecclesiastes 7:19; Matthew 5:2; 7:24ff.; 28:19-20; Luke 2:40; 1 Corinthians 1:18-31; Ephesians 4:11-16; Philippians 4:8; Colossians 2:3,8-9; 1 Timothy 1:3-7; 2 Timothy 2:15; 3:14-17; Hebrews 5:12-6:3; James 1:5; 3:17.

_________________

Williams is the dean of institutional assessment and a professor of Christian education and leadership at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky

If you read the obituaries -- and at my age I do -- you no doubt read of the death last week of Mortimer J. Adler. At ninety-eight-years-old, Adler was one of the greatest philosophers and educators of the twentieth century -- a man of remarkable wisdom and learning.

He was a hero to many in my generation for he spent much of his life battling the forces of relativism. In fact, he spent much of it undoing the pernicious influence of his former teacher at Columbia University, John Dewey, the so-called "father of progressive education," who is responsible for most of the ills plaguing public education today.

Dewey, you see, was a pragmatist who believed that schools exist to socialize children for the good of the state. Therefore, he reasoned, education can't be left to citizens but ought to be controlled by a cadre of professional educators, armed with government authority.

Adler, on the other hand, believed that education should not be determined by social engineers, but by unchanging standards of truth. "There are," he said, "universal truths about what constitutes a good education, for all men at all times and places simply because they are men." During his career -- which included twenty-two years as professor of the philosophy of law at the University of Chicago -- he was a staunch defender of classical education. He is best known, of course, for his Great Books program -- a curriculum based on the greatest works of Western literature and philosophy.

Adler was such a prominent thinker and educator that the New York Times devoted some forty column inches to his obituary. They covered his life, his writings, his teaching career, and his work as a director for the Encyclopedia Britannica.

An amazing career! Yet for all their coverage they never mentioned the most significant thing in his life.

In my book, Kingdoms in Conflict, I wrote about Adler's struggles with the claims of Christianity -- which he was inclined to accept as intellectual propositions. He believed in transcendent truth and realized there had to be a source of that truth. But for years he couldn't cross what he called the "great gulf between the mind and the heart." He resisted the moral changes Christianity would demand of him.

Adler's move from belief in "the god of the philosophers" to the God of the cross was a long time coming. But he recognized that if the God he knew must exist really did exist, he would have to make the leap from logic to faith.

In 1984 -- bedridden with illness -- Adler made that leap. Seeking solace in prayer, he received what he called the "gift of grace" and professed belief "not just in the God my reason so stoutly affirms," as he said, "but the God ... on whose grace and love I now joyfully rely."

Adler showed us that faith does indeed have its reasons -- and in that he was a wonderful model for worldview thinking.

Maybe that's why the media ignored his conversion. The idea that the Christian faith is logically coherent and reasonable was too great a leap for secular-minded journalists to make.

But it's something we are to remind our neighbors of and ourselves every day -- even as we rejoice that one day we'll see Mortimer Adler again studying his beloved Great Books in the presence of the author of all.

_________________________

Copyright (c) 2001 Prison Fellowship Ministries. Reprinted with permission. "BreakPoint with Chuck Colson" is a radio ministry of Prison Fellowship Ministries.

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Whenever I start despairing over defeats in the culture war, I hear a story like this one and it renews my hope. Ani Seromik is a high school senior in the Midwest and she's a Christian. A few months ago Ani's teacher assigned the class an oral report: It could be about anything regarding health care.

Ani decided to talk about abortion, but that didn't sit well with her teacher -- who told Ani she'd have to get approval from the school's Health Education Committee. Fine, Ani said, who do I see to get on the agenda?

Taken aback by Ani's bold reply, the teacher suggested she talk about teen pregnancy instead and mention that abortion is an option that many teens choose. Ani says, "I told her I wanted to do my presentation on abortion, and that I would present it very objectively, because in my opinion the facts about abortion speak for themselves. Nobody," she added, "needs someone to [explain] that there is something morally wrong about abortion once they hear the facts."

Ani's teacher was very upset and over the next few weeks she made several more attempts to change Ani's mind. Ani's parents -- concerned that the conflict might hurt her final grade -- urged her to choose another topic.

Ani prayed about it, then told her parents she was going to stick to her guns. So she spoke with her school's principal, who told the teacher that Ani's topic was fine. Unbelievably, the teacher still didn't give up. She told Ani to get her research materials from Planned Parenthood. Instead, Ani went to local pro-life sources and borrowed models of fetuses at different stages of development.

On the day of the talk, Ani described abortion procedures from RU-486 through partial birth abortion. She described the stages of development during each abortion procedure, and she talked about post-abortion stress and the abortion-breast cancer link.

When she finished, Ani asked if there were any questions. "I expected people to try to argue with me," she said, "because there were a few very vocal pro-choice girls in the class." But no one had any questions. "I had covered all the points that people normally try to argue, from the humanity of the unborn child, to issues of overpopulation and the well-being of the mother so thoroughly that nobody could argue with me." In fact, several classmates thanked her later because they had no idea what abortion was all about.

"I'm glad I fought to do this presentation," Ani concluded, "not only because [my classmates] were able to hear the truth, but because hopefully it will encourage students who come after me to stand up for what is right."

What a terrific story! And Ani is correct: Properly presented, science is our friend. It's the secularists who have the most to fear from what science reveals -- whether it's the humanity of the unborn child or the evidence that points toward a divine Creator. The facts, as Ani noted, always point toward moral truth.

Ani's story is a reminder that we can stand up for the truth without hitting people over the head with our Bibles. Sometimes -- as Ani puts it -- all we need is the courage to stand up for what's right.

_________________________

Copyright (c) 2001 Prison Fellowship Ministries. Reprinted with permission. "BreakPoint with Chuck Colson" is a radio ministry of Prison Fellowship Ministries.

*

In his unforgettable address on April 3, 1968, Martin Luther King, Jr. said: "We've got some difficult days ahead. But it doesn't matter with me now. Because I've been to the mountaintop ... And I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land."

The next day he was assassinated -- a horrific national tragedy. But to grasp the full significance of those famous words, you need to know about the book that inspired them, the Bible.

In most classrooms today, the Bible is mostly unknown. Mountaintop? Promised Land? Students don't get it. Without knowledge of the Bible, students will never understand the Civil Rights movement, the Mayflower Compact, or Ronald Reagan's "Shining City on a Hill" address. In fact, little of our history can be understood without reference to the Bible.

Nor can our literature. Try reading Milton's Paradise Lost, Camus' The Fall, or Leon Uris' novel Exodus without it. How do you grasp references to Adam and Eve, Cain and Able, or the Last Supper? For Christians and Jews, the Bible is sacred. But for anyone, regardless of faith, it's essential for a good education.

A survey of English teachers in Oregon found that 81 percent agreed that the Bible ought to be taught in their schools. Sadly, only 10 percent were actually doing it. So why did they think it was important? Listen to one teacher's statement:

"Today we discussed [Hemingway's] Old Man and the Sea..... When he lies spread out on the mast, it's just like Christ crucified..... Most of the class didn't have any idea. Tale of Two Cities -- Sidney Carton walks through the garden before he decides, just as Christ walked through the garden. I tell the students, I'm not a Christian. You just have to know the Bible."

He's right. As E. D. Hirsch writes in Cultural Literacy, "All educated speakers ... need to understand what is meant [by] a contest ... between David and Goliath or ... whether saying 'My cup runneth over' means a person feels fortunate or unfortunate. Those who cannot use or understand such allusions cannot fully participate in literate English."

But if this is so, why isn't the Bible taught? Some people think it's illegal. Not so. The same 1963 Supreme Court ruling that banned mandatory prayer explicitly authorized academic Bible teaching. Justice Tom Clark wrote: "the Bible is worthy of study for its literary and historic qualities. Nothing we have said here indicates that such study of the Bible or of religion, when presented objectively as part of secular program of education, may not be effected consistently with the First Amendment."

But teaching about the Bible requires training, and good curricula are hard to find. Well, the Bible Literacy Project has a curriculum I gladly recommend, vetted by professionals from many fields. And the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty has agreed to defend (at no cost) any school district sued for using it.

There's no excuse for ignorance of this great book. As E. D. Hirsch says, "Far from being illegal or undesirable, teaching about the Bible is not only consistent with our Constitution, it is essential to our literacy."

I couldn't agree more.

_________________________

Copyright (c) 2001 Prison Fellowship Ministries. Reprinted with permission. "BreakPoint with Chuck Colson" is a radio ministry of Prison Fellowship Ministries.

*

Five percent of the people think; ten percent of the people think they think. The other eighty-five percent would rather die than think.

-- Thomas Edison.

**************************************

So... which category are you??

[See an urban legends researcher's comments on this at http://www.snopes.com/language/document/1895exam.asp]

Remember when our grandparents, great-grandparents, and such stated that they only had an 8th grade education? Well, check this out. Could any of us have passed the 8th grade in 1895? (LOOK CLOSELY... THAT'S EIGHTEEN-NINETY-FIVE)

This is the eighth-grade final exam from 1895 in Salina, Kansas, USA. It was taken from the original document on file at the Smokey Valley Genealogical Society and Library in Salina, KS, and reprinted by the Salina Journal.

8th Grade Final Exam: Salina, Kansas -1895

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Grammar (Time, one hour)

1. Give nine rules for the use of Capital Letters.

2. Name the Parts of Speech and define those that have no Modifications.

3. Define Verse, Stanza and Paragraph.

4. What are the Principal Parts of a verb? Give Principal Parts of lie, play and run.

5. Define Case, Illustrate each Case.

6. What is Punctuation? Give rules for principal marks of Punctuation.

7 - 10. Write a composition of about 150 words and show therein that you understand the practical use of the rules of grammar.

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Arithmetic (Time, 1.25 hours)

1. Name and define the Fundamental Rules of Arithmetic.

2. A wagon box is 2 ft. deep, 10 feet long, and 3 ft. wide. How many bushels of wheat will it hold?

3. If a load of wheat weighs 3942 lbs., what is it worth at 50cts/bushel, deducting 1050 lbs. for tare?

4. District No. 33 has a valuation of $35,000. What is the necessary levy to carry on a school seven months at $50 per month, and have $104 for incidentals?

5. Find cost of 6720 lbs. coal at $6.00 per ton.

6. Find the interest of $512.60 for 8 months and 18 days at 7 percent.

7. What is the cost of 40 boards 12 inches wide and 16 ft. long at $20>per metre?

8. Find bank discount on $300 for 90 days (no grace) at 10 percent.

9. What is the cost of a square farm at $15 per acre, the distance around which is 640 rods?

10. Write a Bank Check, a Promissory Note, and a Receipt.

********************************************

U.S. History (Time, 45 minutes)

1. Give the epochs into which U.S. History is divided.

2. Give an account of the discovery of America by Columbus.

3. Relate the causes and results of the Revolutionary War.

4. Show the territorial growth of the United States.

5. Tell what you can of the history of Kansas.

6. Describe three of the most prominent battles of the Rebellion.

7. Who were the following: Morse, Whitney, Fulton, Bell, Lincoln, Penn, and Howe?

8. Name events connected with the following dates: 1607, 1620, 1800, 1849, 1865.

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Orthography (Time, one hour) I don't even know what this is!

1. What is meant by the following: Alphabet, phonetic, orthography, etymology, syllabication?

2. What are elementary sounds? How classified?

3. What are the following, and give examples of each: Trigraph, subvocals, diphthong, cognate letters, linguals?

4. Give four substitutes for caret 'u.'

5. Give two rules for spelling words with final 'e.' Name two exceptions under each rule.

6. Give two uses of silent letters in spelling. Illustrate each.

7. Define the following prefixes and use in connection with a word: bi, dis, mis, pre, semi, post, non, inter, mono, sup.

8. Mark diacritically and divide into syllables the following, and name the sign that indicates the sound: card, ball, mercy, sir, odd, cell, rise, blood, fare, last.

9. Use the following correctly in sentences: cite, site, sight, fane, fain, feign, vane, vain, vein, raze, raise, rays.

10. Write 10 words frequently mispronounced and indicate pronunciation by use of diacritical marks and by syllabication.

********************************************

Geography (Time, one hour)

1. What is climate? Upon what does climate depend?

2. How do you account for the extremes of climate in Kansas?

3. Of what use are rivers? Of what use is the ocean?

4. Describe the mountains of North America.

5. Name and describe the following: Monrovia, Odessa, Denver, Manitoba, Hecla, Yukon, St. Helena, Juan Fernandez, Aspinwall and Orinoco.

6. Name and locate the principal trade centers of the U.S.

7. Name all the republics of Europe and give the capital of each.

8. Why is the Atlantic Coast colder than the Pacific in the same latitude?

9. Describe the process by which the water of the ocean returns to the sources of rivers.

10. Describe the movements of the earth. Give the inclination of the earth.

**********************************************

Gives the saying"he only had an 8th grade education" a whole new meaning, doesn't it?

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Under the old Maoist regime, the Chinese built their own farm tractors. They were designed by engineers who had been trained in the functions of engines, transmissions and chassis. But, these engineers had never worked on a farm, had never driven a farm tractor, and had never watched a farm tractor at work. So the tractors arrived without drawbars -- which made them useless for pulling plows and other equipment.

Episodes such as this angered Mao Zedong, the founder of the Chinese Communist Party, who had been reared as a peasant and who knew much more about farming than the tractor engineers did. But Mao didn't know much about how to free up the creative energies of the billion or so people he ruled. The government he instituted was a huge, bureaucratic machine that ran by rigid rules established by Mao himself. People could interact only along lines laid down by the Communist party.

The American political system has demonstrated that the best governments function like living organisms: they are flexible and adaptable to the changing needs of the people. The same goes for good churches. [1]

Do you think of your church as a machine or as an organism?

The way you think about it has a great deal to do with the way you pastor it. A machine can be dealt with one part at a time. An organism demands an integrated approach, because its parts are interdependent and complementary.

A machine is inanimate. It has no control over itself. It can respond only to outside controls.

An organism is a living thing. It has the power to transform itself, to change from within.

Organisms can adapt to their environments. Machines can function only in fixed patterns.

Organisms can learn. Machines can't.

If you expect your church to survive in an era of rapid change, you must transform it into a living, thriving, evolving organism. You must equip it to adapt to its changing environment and, indeed, to take the initiative in changing the environment itself.

A thinking organization must be able to do five things very well. It must be able to:

1. Solve problems systematically.

2. Develop new services and new approaches.

3. Learn from experience and from an examination of its own past.

4. Learn from others.

5. Spread what it learns to others.

When your church has made the switch from machine to organism, here's what it can do:

A. Mobilize the expertise of people at all levels in responding quickly to changing conditions in society.

B. Turn every member into an agent of excellence, with a commitment to ministry.

C. Enable the entire church to benefit from the expertise of the leaders.

D. Unite all members behind a common set of values, a common vision and mutually supporting goals.

Maintaining your church as a healthy organism requires an integrated educational approach. You can't educate just part of your church, any more than you can educate just part of an individual.

In football, kicking specialists are often referred to as having “educated toes,” but the toe is only a minor part of the complex process that produces a successful field goal. The eyes, brain, legs, ankles, knees -- practically every muscle and joint in the body -- must know precisely what to do and the precise moment at which to do it if the kick is to split the uprights at the proper elevation.

A church body requires a similar coordination among its members. Each member must know not only what it is doing, but also what the other members are doing and what the body as a whole is doing -- and why. Otherwise, you get tractors without drawbars.

This pervasive knowledge enables all individuals and all ministries to be mutually supportive. Such an environment can't be achieved through segmented training efforts.

A good education and development system overlooks no ministry and overlooks no facet of member development.

__________

[1] Original has “business organizations;” the text from this point on has been adapted for churches.

*

A good story is told of the Methodist Bishop Ames, that, while presiding over a certain conference in the West, a member began a tirade against universities and education, thanking God that he had never been corrupted by contact with a college.

After proceeding thus for a few minutes, the bishop interrupted with the question, “Do I understand that the brother thanks God for his ignorance?”

“Well, yes,” was the answer, “you can put it that way if you want to.”

“Well,” said the bishop in his sweetest musical tones, “all I have to say is that the brother has a good deal to thank God for!”

________

Source: Signs of the Times, August 14, 1893, Copyright (c) Pacific Press, http://www.signstimes.com

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After reviewing his teenage son's report card, an irate father exclaimed, “Five Fs? How could you make five Fs? This is the worst card you've ever had!”

“What do you think it is, Dad,” the boy asked, “heredity or environment?”

________

From 'It's Always Too Soon To Quit', by Lewis R. Timberlake, p36; submitted by Kiri Christina Hyatt

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[Original illustration at this number was a duplicate of HolwickID #25291]

Last month, Dartmouth's student body president, Noah Riner, delivered a convocation speech to this year's freshman class. When he was through, he had ignited a much-needed debate on what it means to be truly educated.

Riner spoke about the importance of character. He told incoming freshmen something that they had probably already heard from others: They were “the smartest and most diverse group of freshmen [ever] to set foot on the Dartmouth campus.”

Then Riner told them something they probably hadn't heard: Without character, none of these qualities matters. He quoted Martin Luther King, Jr., who once said, “Intelligence plus character — that is the goal of true education.” He cited examples of Dartmouth grads who had done terrible things, not because they were stupid or incompetent, but because they lacked character.

Then, as an example of character, Riner, the son of a Baptist minister, cited — who else? — Jesus. As he told his audience, “the problem is me; the solution is God's love: Jesus on the cross, for us.”

As you can well imagine, Riner's use of JESUS didn't go over too well. One student said he was “appalled and disappointed” at Riner's actions. Others added that Jesus himself would have disapproved of Riner's invoking Him at the convocation.

Jesus was the offense, but as one student noted, had Riner instead “espoused the virtues of Muhammad, Buddha, or any other religious figure, he would be applauded.”

Most of the controversy in the press has centered on the question of religious discrimination. That is unfortunate in a way because it detracts from what Riner considered to be his main point: the neglect of character in higher education. This is a big issue.

Can anyone seriously doubt that our colleges and universities are neglecting and even undermining character? Take the example of Bates College in Maine. In Maine, as in the rest of the country, drug use and underage drinking is illegal. Yet in spite of the school's stated policies, a young friend at this prestigious liberal arts college requested to live in what the school calls a “chemical-free” dorm to avoid the drugs and alcohol.

And Bates is not unique. Most colleges and universities have given up trying to regulate student morals. Even more than that, what the WEEKLY STANDARD calls the “Left University” promotes and embodies the “cultural radicalism of the 1960s.” This radicalism values “alternative lifestyles” to the point of denying the existence of norms. It emphasizes personal autonomy to the point of viewing any limits as “oppression” and “tyranny.”

Well, no wonder, then, that the word CHARACTER makes the folks at Dartmouth and elsewhere nervous. American colleges and universities today cannot educate for character because they have abandoned the necessary values and standards. And they have abandoned the long, rich tradition of the university, which has historically been, first, to develop character, and second, to promote learning.

Instead they are doing what Teddy Roosevelt called the most dangerous thing you can do: giving people the power of an education with nothing to keep them from putting that power to evil use. By pointing this out, Riner has done us a great service, forcing a debate on the purpose of higher education. It's long overdue.

________

Copyright (c) 2005 Prison Fellowship Ministries. Reprinted with permission. "BreakPoint with Chuck Colson" is a radio ministry of Prison Fellowship Ministries.

*

Margaret Metzger has been a high school teacher for many years. When she began, she had a hard time controlling her students. After a while she became more confident, even to the point of letting the students take over her class. On these rare occasions she will let them decide what the homework will be, or the topic of the next day’s class.

Students take over class in funny ways. One class went on strike, refusing to work on Fridays. The administration wouldn’t allow this, so she compromised by letting them play a 10-minute game the end of class. Another year, a class said to her, “We hope you don’t mind, but we’ve ordered Chinese food for the entire class tomorrow. We’re bringing it by your room for lunch. You’re invited.” Another class wrote on the board on a glorious spring day, “We’re meeting at Friday’s for ice cream today. See you there.”

It’s an argument that has gone on almost as long as we have had public schools: What makes children succeed in school — and what makes them fail?

In a recent NEW YORK TIMES column, David Brooks offers a big part of the answer: If kids have a chaotic home life, he writes, it is much harder for them to succeed in school.

Brooks mentions programs in which mature women visit mothers under stress to offer “the sort of cajoling and practical wisdom that in other times would have been delivered by grandmothers or elders.” If we want better students, Brooks concludes, the government ought to fund more of these programs. The next president, he suggested, could win on such a platform.

I admire David Brooks, but he is dead wrong on this. He is addressing symptoms, not the sickness: The sickness is broken and unformed families.

Instead of relying on a government program to fix families after they break, wouldn’t it be better to keep families from breaking in the first place? Wouldn’t it be better to find ways to encourage parents to marry before having children, instead of telling them — as our cultural elites often do — that marriage does not matter?

Second, when it comes to families, government itself is often the problem, promoting policies destructive to families. For example, courts that force states to accept same-sex “marriage” are redefining true marriage out of existence. That’s not good for kids.

And many studies have shown that kids do best in married, two-parent families. Yet some states now force adoption agencies to send kids into the homes of homosexual couples.

No-fault divorce laws allow one parent to abandon the family with impunity. Welfare programs provide support for moms so long as they do not get married to their child’s father.

Even worse, our political leaders do not support programs that would mean the most to help kids — including kids from healthy families — who languish in bad public schools. If they really cared about kids, they would support school choice — allowing kids to move from failing public schools into private ones.

Sometimes we forget that, often, the best solutions do not involve the government at all.

A story in the WALL STREET JOURNAL this week revealed that one 16-year-old South Carolina boy is not waiting for “the government.” Last summer, Rontrell Matthews walked into Capers Preparatory Christian Academy in a poor rural community with terrible public schools. Rontrell held out a check for $32.86 — his first paycheck from his after-school job. If they would let him in, Rontrell promised, he would give them every paycheck from then on.

Rontrell — who is willing to literally work his way out of a bad public school — is now excelling at Capers. God bless him and the school that was willing to take him in.

The story made me wonder: What if more kids were willing to do this — to simply abandon bad public schools and work their way into good ones?

So sure — let’s helped stressed-out moms form healthier attachments to their kids, as David Brooks proposes. But better for politicians to work to prevent problems from forming in the first place.

And we should celebrate when kids like Rontrell Matthews find their own solutions — solutions that show that individual ingenuity always trumps the best government program.

________

Copyright (c) 2007 Prison Fellowship Ministries. Reprinted with permission. "BreakPoint with Chuck Colson" is a radio ministry of Prison Fellowship Ministries.

Already this year, we’ve seen a lot of evil: suicide bombings, the attacks in Paris, religious persecution, Boko Haram and ISIS. These have all outraged the world — and rightly so. But here’s a question worth pondering: Will our kids be able to recognize evil when they see it? Do they even believe in moral facts?

Well, that’s the question one educator asked recently in The New York Times after making a surprising discovery about what his child was learning in school.

Justin McBrayer, an associate professor of ethics at Fort Lewis College, says he couldn’t figure out why the high school graduates showing up in his classroom had no concept of moral truth. The overwhelming majority of freshmen, he says, “view[ed] moral claims as mere opinions that are not true,” or are true only in a relative sense.

McBrayer was puzzled about this until he visited a school open house with his second-grade son. It was there that he encountered a pair of signs hanging prominently in the classroom. The first read, “Fact: Something that is true about a subject and can be tested or proven.” The next one said, “Opinion: What someone thinks, feels, or believes.”

Startled by this oversimplification, McBrayer was sure it must be a fluke. So he went home and Googled “fact vs. opinion.” And sure enough, he found lesson plans from educators around the country that alarmed him.

“ ... students are taught that claims are either facts or opinions,” McBrayer writes. “They are given quizzes in which they must sort out claims into one camp or the other but not both.”

The problem with this, he explains, is that many claims don’t fit nicely into either category. Many claims are both facts and opinions, because opinions, of course, can be true or false. And he decided to test whether his son understood this.

“I believe that George Washington was the first president,” he said to him. “Is that a fact or an opinion?” And the second-grader’s blank expression when the statement didn’t fit his categories, McBrayer writes, said it all.

But it gets even worse. A little digging reveals that public schools today teach, as a matter of course, that all value claims are opinions, not facts. One grade-school worksheet, for example, categorized the statements “copying homework is wrong,” “cursing in school is inappropriate,” and “all men are created equal,” as opinions — not facts.

“This is repeated ad nauseum,” McBrayer writes. “[A]ny claim with good or right or wrong, etc. is not a fact.”

But if value statements are always opinions, why should anyone believe them? For that matter, why should kids believe a teacher who tells them that hitting is wrong? Or a college ethics professor who tells them murder is wrong?

It’s a problem that’s not restricted to second-grade classrooms. As Jamie Condliff writes at Gizmodo, researchers at Google have reportedly pioneered a new algorithm that ranks Web pages by how well their claims stack up against a library of established so-called “facts.” That library, known as Google’s “Knowledge Vault,” is programmed to sort claims into facts and opinions — just like McBrayer’s son.

“If web pages contain information that contradicts the Vault,” writes Condliff, “they slide down in the ranking.”

Unlike Common Core standards, Google’s system hasn’t been implemented yet. But if it is, our world’s most sought after source of information will be silencing dissent on controversial topics, like origins, climate change, and sexuality.

Now we need to know all of this not so we can panic, but so that we can counteract the false dichotomy so many of our kids are learning. There are moral facts.

________

Copyright (c) 2015 Prison Fellowship Ministries. Reprinted with permission. "BreakPoint" is a radio ministry of Prison Fellowship Ministries.

Roughly 21 percent of Americans read the Bible weekly and 16 percent read it daily, according to surveys by George Gallup. The Bible remains the best-selling book of all time -- about 26 million copies are sold annually! No other book has the Bible's reach, nor has any book had such a profound influence on so many lives.

Still, for many Americans -- and especially the young -- the Bible is largely unknown, unfamiliar, and unread. The main reason is that, for the past forty years, the Bible has been withdrawn from our public schools.

How did this happen? In 1963, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled, in Abington V. Schempp, that reading from the Bible before the start of public school classes was devotional and, thus, unconstitutional. The ruling ended a practice that had been in place since the earliest days of this nation.

Educators then interpreted the ruling to mean that the Bible could not be read or studied in classrooms. As a result, in most public schools all references to the Bible have been removed. Today, less than 10 percent of public schools teach about the Bible in class.

Yet the Supreme Court, even as it ruled against devotional activity, has upheld teaching about the Bible in public schools as constitutional. Justice Clark, writing for the majority in that opinion, said: "It might well be said that one's education is not complete without a study of comparative religion or the history of religion and its relationship to the advancement of civilization."

"Nothing we have said here," he added, "indicates that such study of the bible or religion, when presented objectively as part of a secular program of education, may not be effected consistently with the First Amendment."

Justice Arthur Goldberg concurred: "Neither government nor this Court can or should ignore the significance of the fact that a vast portion of our people believe in and worship God, and that many of our legal, political, and personal values derive historically from religious teachings."

Goldberg continued, "Government must inevitably take cognizance of the existence of religion and, indeed, under certain circumstances, the First Amendment may require that it do so."

We can all say "Amen!" to that.

Well, in this spirit, the National Bible Association and the Freedom Forum First Amendment Center released "The Bible and Public Schools: A First Amendment Guide." This guide was endorsed by eighteen different Jewish, Christian, and Muslim groups, including: the National Council of Churches, the National Association of Evangelicals, the Christian Legal Society, the Anti-Defamation League, the American Jewish Committee, the American Jewish Congress, and People for the American Way.

The two largest teacher unions, the American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association, and the National School Boards Foundation, signed on as well.

This is a blueprint -- the first in more than 160 years of public education -- for teaching about the Bible in literature, history, and social studies -- something that surveys show three out of four Americans want.

Now, you can help advance this effort. To download a copy of this guide, visit http://www.teachaboutthebible.org, or call 1-800-830- 3733 and request Publication No. 99-F03. And when you get it, give it to the school principals and teachers in your community. Tell them the Bible is a heritage that all our children should share.

For further reading:

Gallup Poll Topics: A-Z - Religion, 6-9 October 2000.

School District of Abington Township, Pennsylvania V. Schempp, 374 U.S. 203 (1963). (Opinion of the Court; Concurring Opinion.)

___________________

Copyright (c) 2000 Prison Fellowship Ministries. Reprinted with permission. "BreakPoint with Chuck Colson" is a radio ministry of Prison Fellowship Ministries.

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Nathan Ausubel, in TREASURY OF JEWISH FOLKLORE, reminds us of the young Talmudic scholar who had just completed a learned work and came to the rabbi begging him for a testimonial. The rabbi regarded his visitor with gentle compassion. "My son," he said, "you must face the stern realities. If you wish to be a writer of scholarly books you must be resigned to peddle your work from house to house like a vendor of pots and pans, and suffer hunger until you are forty." "And what will happen after I am forty?" asked the young writer hopefully. The rabbi smiled encouragingly. "By the time you are forty, you will be used to it."

WHEN CHILDREN LEARN

===================

When children learn that happiness is not found in what a person has but in who that person is,

When they learn that giving and forgiving are more rewarding than taking and avenging,

When they learn that suffering is not eased by self-pity, but overcome by inner resolve and spiritual strength,

When they learn that they can't control the world around them, but they are the masters of their own souls,

When they learn that relationships will prosper if they value friendship over ego, compromise over pride, and listening over advising,

When they learn not to hate a person whose difference they fear, but to fear that kind of hate,

When they learn that there is pleasure in the power of lifting others up, not in the pseudo-power of pushing them down,

When the learn that praise from others is flattering but meaningless if it is not matched by self-respect,

When they learn that the value of a life is best measured not by the years spent accumulating possessions, but by the moments spent giving of one's self - sharing wisdom, inspiring hope, wiping tears and touching hearts,

When they learn that a person's beauty is seen not with the eyes but with the heart; and that even though time and hardships may ravage one's outer shell, they can enhance one's character and perspective,

When they learn to withhold judgment of people, knowing everyone is blessed with good and bad qualities, and that the emergence of either often depends on the help given or hurt inflicted by others,

When they learn that every person has been given the gift of a unique self, and the purpose of life is to share the very best of that gift with the world,

When children learn these ideals and how to practice them in the art of good living, they will no longer be children - they will be blessings to those who know them, and worthy models for all the world.

_____________________

by David L. Weatherford (c) 1996, from A 5th Portion of Chicken Soup for the Soul by Jack Canfield and Mark Victor Hansen.

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