An Address to Sunday School Geaebers.

Waiapu Church Gazette, Volume IV, Issue 9, 1 March 1914, Page 117

An Address to Sunday School Geaebers.

By the Very Rev. j the Dean <tf WellS: The importance of the work m which you are engaged may be measured by the extraordinary anxiety which is being shown throughout the whole country as to the teaching of religion to children. I will not enter into that controversy further than to say that to me the vital point is to secure that whoever teaches the Gospel story to. children shall believe that Christ is what the Gospel represents Him as being. The religious lesson should be given by a teacher who believes what he is to teach. I do not m the least wish to substitute a clerical for a lay teacher. Whatever part may be taken by a clergyman, the main work should rest with the school teachers. It is their great privilege, and they must not be robbed of it. Whatever may be the issue as to the teaching of religion m the Day School, the work, of the Sunday School teacher will still be necessary, and every year seems to make it more important. But every year also mgkes it more difficult" Questions arise now which an earlier generation was not called upon to face m the same way. A higher standard of knowledge and of thoughtfulness is required, and you do well to fit yourselves as fully as you can for your work. The Book which you hold m your hands as teachers has not changed. We have changed. Much new light has been given to us by God m regard to our own constitution and the constitution of the world m which we live ; and m this new light, which is shining all around us, and which comes to all of us at least m scattered rays here and there, we read the Bible differently. Our whole conception of the method of its inspiration has been altered. A great deal which our forefathers tooik literally we cannot take literally to-day. The first chapter of Genesis no longer means to us that the world was made m six days. The second chapter #f Genesis no longer means to us that God moulded clay into a human figure and breathed upon it, or that He took a rib from Adam and made

Eve. These are allegories and par- 1 ables to us. • They still proclaim their original spiritual lessons. They teach that ( God is the source of all creation ; t that God works m patient, slow , development ; that the lower comes : before the higher ; that the highest and the best is man ; that man is akin to the beasts that perish, but ( also akin to God; that he is God's image m the world. All this is. untouched by modern discovery ; it is the underlying spiritual truth, ( taught m the form of what was at first literally believed, but for us is a parable. And so, again, we ■ believe that God made man out of dust, not by moulding clay, but through a long process of development which followed a course which He had marked out, and m every step of which He was working His will. So we believe that through holy marriage man and woman become intimately one, m a union which God has made and which man must not break. This is the underlying truth of the oldworld story which makes Adam say, " Bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh." .These and many other stories, like that of the talking serpent and the talking ass, we do not now take (or, at any rate, most of vs — I do not) as literal statements of historical facts, but as imagery which clothes certain spiritual lessons. For ourselves this is not, perhaps, vety difficult ; but when we come to teach it is not easy. With quite young children there is very little difficulty, for stories are the natural vehicles to them of moral lessons, and they do not often ask, Is it true ? or, Did it really happen ? But older children want to know, ■ and we must be prepared to give them an honest answer. It is not merely at the time that we must retain their confidence, their confidence m us as teachers and confidence m the spiritual truths we 1 are teaching them ; but we must so teach them that when they go away from us they will not be . overthrown by the. first question i they hear, as, for instance, where Cain got his wife from. We must tesdi them m such a way that they will not at any time have to unlearn their lessons. We must be prepared to say to them that these are the old-world stories which God allowed to be told, to teach certain great lessons, which were ; easiest learned and easiest reiwem-

bered so: for us they^are parables; -^earthly stories, with a heavenly meaning. I give these as illustrations of difficulties that are to be met with, There are many more and many greater difficulties m connection with the Old Testament and the New Testament than these. . I have spent most of ray life m the study of these matters, and I feel ■ that there is a mass of difficulty which has not yet been solved ; but those other difficulties do riot so directly concern the teaching of children, and even our learned theologians are not clear about a good many. What I would say to you is. Do not expect that everything is going to be cleared up and made absolutely plain. The Bible is a much more wonderful book than we have sometimes thought. Much of it is plain and stands out clearly, but much is difficult of interpretation. Welcome all the light from nature and from study, from science and from criticism ; and do not despair because the problems will not come out. After all, your chief work is not with the difficulties of the Bible. It is to teach Christ to the children ; to take the incidents of the Gospel, and show what Jesus was like, what He did for people to help them and give them new hope and save them from their weaknesses and sins ; and then to say, He is the same yesterday and to-day and for ever ; He loves you, gs He loved children then ; He has shown His love even unto His death upon the Cross; He ever lives to help and save you. This is your message, and no new difficulties need obscure it. If you can say, It is not only m the Book, . but I know it m my own life — then you will carry conviction, and your work will live m the lives of others.