22
THE KING’S BUSINESS
install the Bible in the minds of the people, not only as a Revelation, but also as God’s protective measure against sin and in behalf of holiness. There is enough under these headings to constitute a separate department of theo logical study; and we are constrained to believe that these things must soon assume due importance if the church is really to profit by the new and broadened aims of religious education. What the church needs is a ministry well- founded of course in scholarly knowledge of the Word of God, skilled if possible in handling the tools of criticism, and well furnished in defensive tactics—but more, a ministry imbued with an irresistible en thusiasm for the Bible as an instrument/of religious life and culture, and furnished with the beginnings at least of a training in the best methods of communicating that enthusiasm to the people. E. H. Osborne, a member of the June Class, was ordained as Presbyterial Evan gelist in Idaho a few weeks after gradua tion. He writes from Hollister of the great-opportunity and results in his work in the Twin Falls Presbytery. He writes particularly of four meetings that were held out in the cattle country as never-to- be-forgotten ones. Eight men accepted Christ upon the first invitation in one meet ing; one of them was 85 years pld; another of whom was a Jew. We know what a glorious and blessed privilege it is to win a soul to Christ, but we somehow feel that there is greater rejoicing, or greater reason for rejoicing, when that one is a Jew. Mr. Osborne asks prayer for several places in which meetings are being planned. --------- O------— L. L. Soule, Windsor, N. Y .: “Thank God for T he K ing ’ s B usiness and the straight and solid stand which it takes for Bible truths. Am more and more pleased with it and helped by it.”
of the laws of teaching as applied and adapted to the material of the Bible. -2. Definite study of the methods and problems of Christian Nurture in the church. This field in the life and work of the church is almost a new one. Many thoughtful educators are studying the problem of child nurture from the stand point of secular education; but the church is scarcely yet aware of the issue. The church has at present no logical and con nected system of Christian Nurture. It would be well for this generation to sit down again at the foot of Horace Bushnell, to learn anew the value of religious educa tion, and “the out-populating power of the Christian stock.” It is estimated that sixty per cent of the boys who are committed by circumstances to the care of the church pass out of the Sabbath School and away from the church, and are lost in the great careless world. Surely it is time in the schools of the church to give attention to the problem of Christian Nurture for the young. In such department as this the Sabbath School and the Young People’s Society should be carefully studied with the view of learning -how to build them into a constructive and systematic economy of religious education in the church. 3. Definite instruction in handling the Word as an instrument of spiritual educa tion. Here it should be, neither the He brew nor the Greek text, but the English Bible that should be in hand. For this purpose the tools of criticism contribute here to practical ends. What is needed, however, is to give the student skill in handling the Book, and even more, to give him a sympathetic feeling for the Book and a buoyant confidence in its power for life. The things to be taught here have some of them been suggested in previous chapters; for example, the interest of his tory, the grasp of the books, the value of imagination, the charm of letters, the fine ness of the form, etc. In short, what ever will contribute to interest, whatever is really educative, whatever will help to
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