Date - Sept. 1/60

Contributor - T. Hogerwaard

Title - The Fear of the Lord:

Topic - Wisdom

In that same hour Jesus rejoiced in the Holy Spirit and said: "I thank Thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that Thou hast hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to babes; yea, Father, for such was Thy gracious". will". Luke 10 vs. 21 (R.S.V.)

The summer vacation has drawn to a close. Once more the schools and everything they stand for are in the centre of attention. There are children who go to school for the first time (public, highschool or university), not knowing yet what awaits them, there are others who went there already last year and carry on from where they stopped last June.

Therefore it may now be the right time to think a little about learning and teaching, about worldly knowledge, their possibilities and limitations in the light of the Word of God. Taken at their best, the schools (any type of them) try to give their pupils and students not only knowledge of facts, but what is more: insight. The book of Proverbs (3 v. 5 urges us: "Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not rely on your own insight; in all your ways acknowledge Him and He will make straight your path".

You may have noticed that there is something polemic in this text, a distinction, yes, even a contrast is made between "relying on your own insight" and "trusting in the Lord". The Word of God is not silent in matters of learning, of developing our intellect, on the contrary, many are the things which God has to say to us regarding these matters.

It is an old well founded saying that we do not learn for the schools, but for life and then the important question presents itself: In how far does all our learning and studying indeed serve life, in how far does accumulation of knowledge indeed help us to reach our goal? In how far does knowledge enable us (or prevent us from) enjoying the fulness of life the Lord wants us to have?

From many years of experience with our own children I know for example that anyway in this country the high schools as a rule do not aim to provide their students with an insight in the great issues of life, they only stress knowledge of facts, often without even mentioning the relationship that exists between one event or idea and another. The minds of the young people are not, as should be, made into a mental factory where the raw material of facts is processed into finished products of insight and wisdom, but instead into a storehouse, where facts are stored and that means: as long as the memory is able to retain them. The full, if not the exclusive emphasis is on accumulating knowledge, knowledge of facts that is. Indeed, I know that high schools pretend and claim that they develop virtues too: good citizenship being the cardinal virtue and also some semblance of Christian influence, but when you look a bit closer you discover that these are only frills, trimmings, the real school business is ': soaking up facts.'

Some years ago an authority in this field, professor Dr. Hilda Neatby (author of "So little for the mind") wrote a thought provoking article in the Canadian 'Journal of Theology (Vol. 1 No. 1, April 1955) under the title: "The challenge of education to the Christian Church". This article should make uneasy everyone who is in one way or another responsible for the Canadian system of instructing young people in this country and even more those who are concerned about the spiritual welfare of young Canadians. Among other things she claims: ,The fact remains that tens of thousands of young teachers knowing no philosophy of any kind have been introduced to an educational philosophy based on the assumption that belief in God is not only irrelevant but harmful to the educational process". The article should be studied carefully by everyone who is concerned about the future of the youngsters in Canada, but as far as my experience in the United Church of Canada goes, hardy any attention was paid to it. Sleepiness is so attractive.

Considering the state of affairs our sharp minded lady professor describes, it is a small wonder that together with other influences our young people have been led to believe that this life is the one and all. Eternity has vanished out of sight and that means that at the same time life on earth has become as empty, as senseless, as egoistic as can be. A wise man in Holland said more than seventy years ago: "For a good many people a long life is not long enough to discover that the tree of knowledge is not the tree of life". Not knowledge, but God is the source of life; to be cut off from the source of life means one thing: death.

Because of the fact that the Russians were the first to put a satellite into orbit, the western world has been scared into stepping up the scientific education of our young people; a measure inspired by sheer fear. Yes, but not the fear of Russia, but the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and that is a totally different picture.

Clearer than ever before we see happen what Amiel wrote: "Progress of things, decline of souls". It is not something new we are witnessing; it has only become worse in the last fifty years. The great German Windelband, the philosopher, said in his days: "Demokratisierung der Bildung heisst Demoralisierung der Sitten". (To make knowledge accessible to everyone means a decline in morals). Everyone can see that a bright college trained criminal is far more dangerous to society than one with only a public school education and frankly, our modern educational system has nothing in it to prevent it from being used for criminal ends. Our adoration of the false god knowledge brings in many returns of a terrible character. Once I heard a fellow minister say: "Education without religion only produces clever devils". That's why we have so many of that brand in our modern society.

Where did we start to go wrong? For it may be clear that we simply cannot do without training of the mind, without knowledge, without insight. During its centuries long history mankind has accumulated valuable knowledge and information. It is simply our task to hand this over to the next generation, so that they in their turn may extend and enrich it. Public schools, high schools, teachers colleges and universities can do a most valuable job, but the burning question is: Do they? We have to ask some penetrating questions here. For instance: What is knowledge? What are its possibilities and limitations? Is there something like rank in knowledge, so that for example a thorough knowledge of Paul's Epistles is more valuable than to know the mountain passes of the Himalaya, or is everything just as valuable as anything else? What is accessible for human intellect, what is not and never will be?

How is knowledge related to other forces of the soul: the capacity to love, to be faithful. to be honest? To come down to earth: Does senior matriculation makes it easier for you to obey God, to worship and love Him, to love your neighbour and to serve him, to make you an understanding and considerate husband or wife, or does it only help you to a better paid job at the expense of values just mentioned? Development of intellect can be useful; it is nice to have a blazing fire in your stove or furnace on a cold winter day. But if the fire starts to burn outside the stove, your house will be destroyed by it. So with knowledge: as soon as it begins to control the entire human spirit at the expense of the deeper forces of the soul the result is no less disastrous than that of fire getting out of control.

Many parents are so naively proud when the time has arrived for their children to enter highschool or college; if they knew the facts they would let them go with fear and even with trepidation, for the danger is great indeed that the children may lose more valuable things than they acquire. Later on, when the great disappointment comes, few are able to see where the road took the wrong turn.

And there is something else, for in the spiritual realm there exists a twin. The names are: knowledge and pride. Satisfaction of pride and fulfillment of the desire to know were originally offered in one package: "You will be like God knowing good and evil". This double offer still stands today and is widely accepted.

And when God performs a Miracle and opens a person's eyes to the real state of affairs, may be he too will confess:

"I had ambition: the sin by which the angels fell,

I climbed and, step by step,

0 Lord, ascended into hell".

The greatest men of the western world whose teachings have radically changed the world like the apostle Paul, Augustine, Luther, Calvin, Kierkegaard, Pascal were Christians: for them the relation to God came first and determined everything else in their lives.

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, that is why some men and women with no more than public school education have sometimes such a deep insight into the things of God's Kingdom and in human life as well, for God has it arranged that He has hidden the deepest things of His Kingdom for the wise and learned in order to reveal them to children, so that no conceited fool in empty pride should boast against Him.

In our western world two spiritual forces are in constant war with each other. The one is the old pagan Greek assumption that ignorance is the curse of mankind and enlightenment is the cure; the other is the Christian message that sin is the root of our misery and that we need God's grace always and everywhere, first and last. Everyone sooner or later has to choose on which of the two sides he wants to stand: either with the assembly of the intellect-worshippers or with the assembly of God's children.

From the day we go to public school for the first time till the day arrives that we are allowed to and in our commission to the Lord Who granted it, we should be guided by this Word of God: "Trust in the Lord with all your heart and do not rely on your own insight; in all your ways acknowledge Him and He will make straight your path."

What you learn at school, especially if you are so fortunate to have one or more good teachers who understand what they are talking about is valuable within certain limits, but see to it that the useful fire that warms you, does not get out of hand and destroys you spiritually.

Many are the examples which could be quoted about men of learning who ended their life in despair because they discovered too late that accumulation of knowledge had nothing in it to satisfy the longings of the human soul.

As Augustine said in one of his prayers:

"Thou hast created us unto Thee, 0 Lord, and our hearts remain uneasy within us till they find rest in Thee".