TRAINING CHILDREN & SUNDAY SCHOOLS 2/2 1886

WHAT IS ASSUMED FOR SUNDAY SCHOOLS. 

In the Christian Advocate of March 1882, and over the signature of - S. H. Lovelace, we find the following: 

"The Sunday school may be termed the primary department, where the children are prepared for the church, as clay ready to the hand of the potter. Sunday school is not an end, but a means, and its work is not accomplished until it brings the children under church agencies to be saved. "The tendency is to make the Sunday school something of itself— ending in itself. We sometimes hear it called the "child's church," and it is often run on its own merits and independently of the church. "The church is divinely conditioned to save the world, and the Sunday school is one of its important auxiliaries. The church ends in salvation, and the Sunday school ends in the church. The Sunday school is proper church work — preliminary work — getting the children ready for a hearty reception of the gospel, which culminates in salvation and eternal life." 

This is a day of progress and improvement in almost everything, but possibly some are carrying the idea of improvement a little too far. The plan of redemption by the blood of Christ, the system of salvation, and the method by which either children or older people are "made ready for a hearty reception of the gospel," cannot be improved upon. Nor is it possible for either good men or bad men to annul or make void that which God has established. It is true that men may presumptiously claim that their modern institutions and benevolent societies are improvements, and should be adopted in lieu of the divine plan, but it is quite certain that their claim will never receive God's approval. Has it ever seriously been considered by zealous Sunday school men that grown people, as well as children, were "prepared for the church and made ready to receive the gospel " many centuries before any of those modern societies were organized or known to the world? 

In speaking of the system of salvation, and the way by which sinners are saved and come acceptably to God the Father, our blessed Saviour says: "I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me." — John xiv, 6. Now, if sinners in the hands of a Sunday school are as pliant and passive as "clay in the hand of the potter," and can thereby have their minds and hearts shaped and molded into a readiness to receive the gospel which is to result in their salvation, how is it that "no man cometh unto the Father" but by Jesus Christ? This plan of bringing children to God cannot be improved upon. "Every man," says Jesus, "that hath heard, and hath learned of the Father, cometh unto me." — John vi, 45. The plain inference is that no man can come unto Jesus as a Saviour except the Father draws him. Indeed, it is more than an inference; it is a positive declaration of the Son of God (John vi, 44). In regard to the salvation of sinners, our Lord Jesus Christ is the Elect Stone which God the Father hath laid in Zion, and though he is set at naught by all the modern as well as ancient Babel builders, as a "Stone of stumbling and Rock of offense" to those who stumble at the word of God, yet the Lord hath made this living and life-giving Stone "the Head of the Corner." "Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is no other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved." — Acts iv, 12. 

All religious sects who profess Christianity acknowledge, either directly or indirectly, that the scriptures are the word of God and the only Standard of faith and practice. Any point, therefore, or principle of doctrine, society, or institution, claiming to be auxiliary to the church, but not having divine sanction and authority in the scriptures, is to be rejected as corrupt and spurious, "after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ." — Col. 2

It is not designed here to enter into any lengthy argument as to the merits or demerits of modern Sunday school teaching, but we do think that it is clearly evident to any honest Bible reader, who has never been under the bewitching influence of Sunday school teaching, and whose unsuspecting and youthful mind has not been as pliant and easily controlled as "clay made ready in the hand of the potter," that neither the modern Sunday school nor any of its teachings, as claimed in the above extract, can be found in the Bible. It is freely admitted that the Sunday school system of religious training is very popular. Thousands of intelligent and seemingly pious people, whose minds, in early youth, were as passive in the hands of some bigoted Sunday school man as clay ready for the potter, support them, honestly thinking they are "doing 'God's service," when in fact they are rejecting his word and establishing their own traditions. The masses of the people., especially in cities, towns, and villages, have become so accustomed to hearing such teachings as Mr. Lovelace sets forth,, and it is so congenial with the views of the; carnal-minded man, that its correctness is never once called in question. 

Taking the sentiments altogether, as outlined in the extract given above, it will be seen that Jesus Christ, as the only Saviour of sinners, is set aside as useless. Neither his name his holy character, nor his work, is once mentioned, but the Sunday school is enthroned as making sinners ready for the reception of the gospel, "ending in salvation and eternal life.

Elder William M. Mitchell

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