Faithful Teaching
A Sermon in The Other Six Days Series
Rev. Mark Schaefer
Kay Spiritual Life Center
September 18, 2005
Exodus 18:13-25; Matthew 4:23-25

Exodus 18 13 ¶ The next day Moses sat as judge for the people, while the people stood around him from morning until evening. 14 When Moses’ father-in-law saw all that he was doing for the people, he said, “What is this that you are doing for the people? Why do you sit alone, while all the people stand around you from morning until evening?” 15 Moses said to his father-in-law, “Because the people come to me to inquire of God. 16 When they have a dispute, they come to me and I decide between one person and another, and I make known to them the statutes and instructions of God.” 17 Moses’ father-in-law said to him, “What you are doing is not good. 18 You will surely wear yourself out, both you and these people with you. For the task is too heavy for you; you cannot do it alone. 19 Now listen to me. I will give you counsel, and God be with you! You should represent the people before God, and you should bring their cases before God; 20 teach them the statutes and instructions and make known to them the way they are to go and the things they are to do. 21 You should also look for able men among all the people, men who fear God, are trustworthy, and hate dishonest gain; set such men over them as officers over thousands, hundreds, fifties and tens. 22 Let them sit as judges for the people at all times; let them bring every important case to you, but decide every minor case themselves. So it will be easier for you, and they will bear the burden with you. 23 If you do this, and God so commands you, then you will be able to endure, and all these people will go to their home in peace.”
24 ¶ So Moses listened to his father-in-law and did all that he had said.

Matthew 4 23 ¶ Jesus went throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and curing every disease and every sickness among the people. 24 So his fame spread throughout all Syria, and they brought to him all the sick, those who were afflicted with various diseases and pains, demoniacs, epileptics, and paralytics, and he cured them. 25 And great crowds followed him from Galilee, the Decapolis, Jerusalem, Judea, and from beyond the Jordan.

I. BEGINNING

So. Why do people teach?

My parents are both teachers and I can tell you from first-hand experience that it’s not for the economic gain. It’s not for the overwhelming respect received in the community. It’s not for any of the perquisites of the job. I know that a lot of people talk about how teachers receive the summer off. I never really experienced that, my father had to work in the summertime to earn additional money so I was never really sure that that was any kind of great privilege for him.

I know that on many levels, we come to understand that teaching the next generation is some kind of self-sacrificial love—it could only be. There are very few people involved in the teaching of others because they expect the rewards to be great.

And so I try to figure out why Christians ought to care about education, why Christians should be concerned with teaching of the young—teaching of all ages, in fact. What makes teaching and education something that you and I as Christians should be concerned about?

There’s an old line I am sure you’ve heard about giving people a helping hand that says “Give a man to fish and he will eat for a day. Teach a man to fish and he’ll eat for a lifetime.” There's another part of that too--that way you don't have to buy him fish every day. I think something of

II. THE TEXT

A. The OT and Community

I think something of that sentiment is running through that Old Testament lesson we heard read earlier. Here we encounter Moses in the desert, leading the people Israel. It is after the Exodus, after the provision of manna for the people and Jethro, the priest of Midian, Moses’ father-in-law sees how it is that Moses is faring. He notices that Moses is sitting all day surrounded by other Israelites who are asking him things. And Jethro asks him why this is so. Moses answers that he is resolving the disputes of the people, that he is acting as judge for Israel.

Jethro's solution is simple: don't waste your time with this. Represent the people before God and find some people who are able and teach them how to do what you are doing. Teach them the law and the statutes, teach them the way that they are to go so that they will be able to help you out. They can come to you for the big questions. This way Moses is relieved of a terrible burden in having to decide every last disagreement among the Israelites.

The motivation that Moses is given is that by instructing others, Moses will relieve himself of a burden. In many ways, by instructing others we relieve ourselves of the sole burden of having the necessary information to help the community out. In a way, what Jethro is saying to Moses is: through educating others you strengthen the community. You strengthen other peoples' ability to participate in the community. You strengthen the whole system of justice in the community so that the burden does not fall solely upon you for the survival of the community--but is shared.

This idea is reinforced by the idea that the Hebrew word for the first five books of the Bible, the law, the books of Moses, the Pentateuch—is Torah. It is a word that means “instruction” “teaching”. So there is something fundamental in our religious language that the way of God involves teaching of other people, whether it is as Jethro is telling Moses to teach others so as to build up the community, or because something about God requires that we teach one another. Something about being God's people requires that we be educators of one another, we help people to learn and to study.

B. The NT and Christian Vocation

It's no coincidence that Jesus' own ministry was a ministry of healing and teaching. That passage that we heard earlier: "Jesus went throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and curing every disease and every sickness among the people." One of our models for Christ is not only that of healer and preacher, but of teacher as well--one who instructs others. We can say that to be Christ-like is to teach. To be Christ-like is to help others along the way to learn.

This lesson has been seen throughout history and some of the most Christ-like people have benefited from being taught. When Nelson Mandela was sworn in as the first black president of South Africa, he had on the dais with him his former jailer. He was asked, “How is it that you could have the man who was your jailer with you as a part of this tremendous moment?” And Mandela replied, “When I was young, I went to a Methodist school and they taught me about Jesus and about forgiveness and reconciliation." That was the reason that Mandela was able to have his former jailer with him at his inauguration.

There is something fundamental about teaching in our Christian faith.

III. UNITED METHODISM AND EDUCATION

This past week was Methodist Heritage Week during which we celebrated the United Methodist affiliation and heritage of our University. In that week we celebrated the tradition of Methodist hospitality with a tent on the quad with refreshments (and of course with our “Feed the Quad” cookout). We celebrated the United Methodist commitment to social justice, to ministries of compassion—to our commitment to social holiness as well as personal holiness. There is, however, one other tradition that bears noting: the Methodist tradition in education.

The United Methodist Church has had a long history in education. At the very beginning of our history as a church, the Methodist Episcopal Church—our predecessor church—as one of its first acts as a young denomination established a college.

Since then, the church established schools, prep schools, colleges and seminaries across the country. Every single one of our 60+ annual conferences--our regional bodies--established a college or university. A lot of them are named Something-or-Other Wesleyan. Some are more famous: Duke, Emory, Boston University, Southern Methodist. In fact, most of the 123 United Methodist affiliated colleges and universities were founded by our annual conferences—that is, by our regional governing bodies. In fact, there is only one institution of higher education in this country that was established by the national body, the General Conference. They named it, fittingly, The American University. It is, of course, the crown jewel of United Methodist education in our country.

It was built with the principle that as people of faith we were to provide education for those who would be in service to others. This school was founded with the ethic that we would train young men and women to lead in public service, and later in international service. This university would model a Christian ethic of training people to serve others. That's how the Methodist churches have seen education. Indeed, how many other protestant and Catholic churches have seen education as a way to pass not only knowledge and information but the ethic of service and compassion to succeeding generations.

A decade ago, The United Methodist Church established a university in Zimbabwe: Africa University. It, like its sister university at which you are studying, is designed to prepare leaders in government and public service, and thousands of students from across Africa are being educated to be the leaders of tomorrow by a Methodist affiliated institution of higher learning. One of the things I hope that our community here is able to do is to build some kind of relationship with students at Africa University, so that we can support one another in our work of the education of young people.

IV. THE GOOD NEWS

It is no coincidence that education and bringing of the good news come hand in hand. There is something eminently Christian about teaching and educating. It goes beyond the pragmatics of creating a functioning society by training enough people to work. It is more than simply an imitation of Jesus as a teacher. It goes to more than simply the ethic of helping people to understand what service is like. The connection between our Christian faith and education is rooted deep in how we understand justice working.

A. The poor and the weak

In the Bible we read--over and over again, like a refrain--the words about the widow, the orphan, and the stranger. How we are to do justice to them--a woman without a husband, a child without parents, and persons not in their native country--people who, in the Biblical world, are marginalized, who are disadvantaged. They do not have what it takes to succeed without help and compassion. Likewise, Jesus speaks of the poor, the sick, the imprisoned.

B. The age of information and the new poverty of info

When we think of our age as an age of information, we realize that the currency of our age is what we are able to know and the information we are able to have. It is not for our lack of stone, bronze, or iron that people are disadvantaged, it is from a lack of information and knowledge. Ignorance is the greatest enemy to our well-being as a people. It is people who do not have the tools to manage their lives and provide for their families because they lack access to education.

The poverty that we understand in the information age is a poverty of information. A poverty of access to decent education that is vitally and increasingly necessary for employment and well-paying employment. If we as Christians are committed to justice and to reaching those who are disadvantaged and marginalized, there are no more marginalized people in society today than those who are denied an adequate education, denied access to learning and sound education. We support students in their need for education--in rural counties, in inner-cities. Wherever we find students without adequate access to education we find an opportunity for Christian service and Christian witness in support of those schools and those students.

V. END

Some time ago, in one of the series of ongoing debates about prayer in public schools, a proponent of prayer in the schools argued that children should be afforded the opportunity to pray in the public school, that time should be set aside in order to provide this benefit to the students. In response, an opponent of the measure said, “No one needs to provide an opportunity for a kid who hasn’t studied for a math test to pray—that kid is going to be praying anyway.”

That’s a good line but it made me wonder: could it be that the only ones praying for academic success for students are, in fact, the students themselves? Are we as a church praying for the academic success of the students of the schools of this country? Forget prayer in the schools--what about prayer for the schools? What about action for the schools? Our pooling of material resources? Or taking the time to go read to students in an after school program? To take the time to help busy parents with their work so that they may better care for their children and their education?

Our responsibility does not end with our roles as taxpayers or even as students ourselves. Our Christian responsibility is a deep one when it comes to education. It is a deep one because the extent to which we are willing to devote our energies to teaching and instruction is the extent to which we are willing to live out a life of Christian service, a live of Christian love, and a life that, above all else, teaches what God has planned for us all.