Parent, child, and church

Front matter

Class "BV^^^

Book

CopyiiglifN^.

Contents

CHAPTERS PAGE

Preface 7

I. The Child and Church Organizations ... 9

Preface

The following pages have been written with the conviction that others have experienced perplexities similar to my own in passing from a reUgious childhood, through a reUgious youth, to a reUgious manhood without ever having consciously experienced conversion, and still finding no place for that sort of reUgious development in such preaching as I was permitted to hear; and instead of deriving comfort from reUgious services, being, rather, made miserable, lest my reUgious life was seriously at fault somewhere without being able to discover just where. Since working in the pastorate I have made the acquaintance of several young people aU of whom were trying to fit the experience of conversion, as popularly preached, into their Uves with the same unsatisfactory results that I had experienced in my youthful days. Their Christian lives were of a high prder^ and conversation with them along

PREFACE

lines similar to what follows seemed to meet a great need in their lives. My personal experience, coupled with this pastoral observation, suggested the need of a book written in simple language calling attention to a very vital religious principle, in no way newly discovered, but rather under-emphasized in general preaching. The subjectmatter has been used largely in a series of sermons leading up to and culminating in Children's Day. The results have been gratifying in some respects in that young Christians have been helped and parents led to a more serious consideration of their opportunities and responsibilities in training children. These results have prompted me to put the thoughts into a more permanent form for perhaps a larger audience. There is no attempt at critical and exhaustive treatment. This is left for the extended works on systematic theology. The one thought is that perhaps a few pastors, Sunday school teachers, and parents may profit somewhat by the reading, and give unfolding childhood a better chance.

Charles Clark Smith.

Chapter I The Child And Church Organizations

CHAPTER I

THE CHILD AND CHURCH ORGANIZATIONS

The organized church is manifestly a development from very humble beginnings to its present very large proportions, and because it is a development we may conclude that it is not of necessity a perfect piece of ecclesiastical machinery, but, rather, an institution calculated to grow still larger and become still better fitted to serve the needs of mankind. It is very plain that there has been a human element in the development of this great organization, or perhaps it would be more accurate to say these organizations, because viewed as ecclesiastical bodies we have several distinct churches. The writer believes heartily in the church as an institution, and believes that we should continue to study, as have our forefathers, that we may continue to show ourselves workmen that do not need to be ashamed. We are not as

a perfect as we may become. Because there has been and is the human element in the church, there are for that reason imperfections and weaknesses. In the very rapid growth of the modern Protestant Church with its spirit of revolt from the ancient established church, it is not at all unlikely that we have overlooked some important principles, or in our revolt swung the pendulum of reform too far aside, and now that we have come to rather a more considerate day we will need to look over the past and see what we have neglected in our hurried advance. Principles are sometimes condemned when the defect is in the form of expression and not in the principle, and what we need to do, instead of condemning them, is to sift them and retain whatever is good. One may easily be deceived in studying the history of the church and be led to overestimate the value of certain activities a century ago because time has a fashion of exaggerating the luster of the good and diminishing the shadows of the manifestly bad. So we need always to be guarded in comparing the past, with its dim recollections of detail, with the present, in which everything is clearly seen. But something of comparison will surely be helpful and will lead us to the conclusion that all that has passed is not useless, but, rather, constitutes the foundation on which the present is building. It appears that in at least one particular we of this generation are not on a par with the church workers of perhaps fifty years ago. Generally speaking, love for and devotion to the church is not so strong to-day as it was formerly, not so strong surely as it should be to-day in order that the church may do her best work. I am not pleading for a return to the sectarianism of the former age — far from it. True devotion to the church is as much above narrow sectarianism as true patriotism is above partisan politics. But I would plead for a return to that intense devotion to the church which our forefathers knew, and I believe such a return to be a great good which may be accomplished in this generation.

We may well be very hopeful for the future. The church was never better, on the whole, but it is destined to become still better. If we can intensify the powers already in our possession and utilize the wasting forces, we will greatly increase our efficiency. Therefore, without any disposition to glorify the past unduly, let us admit that the past can be our teacher in some particulars still. We greatly deplore some present-day tendencies which seem to manifest themselves among our young people. Every conference, convention or informal church assembly brings out this discussion. There is generally a lack of a sense of responsibility to the church, and often a disregard of those principles for which the church has long stood. We have lots of machinery planned to meet the needs of these young people, but we cannot refrain from asking whether we are doing as much for our youth with this machinery as the church of another generation did without it. If we are not doing all that we might, the remedy is not to be foimd in a criticism of the young people for their disregard of the church, nor in a decrying of the fact of much machinery in the church, but, rather, in educating parents so that they will work with the church in correcting the wrong conceptions and conduct. The secret of strong devotion to the church lies with the parents. The Protestant

Church must turn its attention to home training rather than to organizations of the church for a solution to this very obvious weakness in our practice. The church can help, but it cannot do the chief work. This means that the pastor must engage the assistance of the parents in the religious training of the children. How strange it soimds to imply that it is difficult to enlist the sympathies of the parents in the training of their children. And yet pastors will testify that this is one of the most difficult of all pastoral problems; difficult, not because the parents are really indifferent to the reUgious welfare of their children, but, rather, because they do not, as a rule, understand what is involved and what great things can be done. It is a question, then, first of educating the parents. The pastor must study this subject and preach it to his people until their thought is fixed upon it and their sjonpathies fully enlisted. He must convince and lead the parents until once again we have religious training in the home.

The church is largely to blame for conditions existing. Our theology of childhood has been wrongly preached, and the now prevalent inactivity with regard to our children's religious life is the result. It is time to quit preaching an antiquated theory of the origin of sin that contradicts both the Bible and reason and to begin to preach what Christ taught with reference to the child and what modern pedagogic principles have made very plain to us. Our public school methods are much more intelligently applied than our religious methods, When the pulpit presents to the people a conception of child religion that fits the conditions and shows the possibilities of religious activities for the youth, then the parents will become interested in the proper development of their children.

Perhaps, then, I should revise a statement made above and say that the education must begin with the pulpit. The prevailing conception as it has been preached is that a child is a sort of religious nonentity until he comes to the age of accountability, when he must be converted before he can have a religious life. Naturally, from this conception there will spring no motive for early religious training. The parent who believes what has been preached generally will say: "What is the use? We will wait till the child is a little older, and some time when there is a special opportunity we will seek to get him converted, and then he will be all right." Parents have been known to object to their children being catechized along religious lines because they were grounded in the belief that the child is a sort of zero quantity religiously. At least one case is known to the writer where parents, who were themselves members of the church and of average intelligence, objected to their children, aged ten and twelve years respectively, being taken into the church because, as they said, such children could not understand what was implied by coming into the church. Many other cases, perhaps not so extreme, have come to our attention, and it is the common experience of pastors. Such ignorance must somehow be dispelled and the pulpit must show that, according to Christ's own words, the fittest subject for the kingdom of heaven, and therefore for the church, is the little child. To this end we must bend our teaching and the offices which the church intrusts to us.

What pastor is there who has not been greatly perplexed over the common distinction between church and Sunday school? What preacher has not had a suggestion of heartache as he was compelled to stand by Sabbath after Sabbath while his Sunday school filed out and his church filed in, or the reverse, as the hours may alternate? How he has longed for the opportunity of preaching regularly to that group of young people. I am not unmindful of the various devices employed to keep this youthful audience in the church, but at best such schemes are temporary and do not get at the heart of the difficulty. The child trapped or baited to attend church is not the ideal. The child loving to attend church is what we need, and this is not impossible of attainment. If parents and church will work together wisely, this good end can be accomplished, not only to the blessing of the young, but as well, a benediction to the older ones. There is no mistaking the two congregations in most instances. Here are the mature and elderly people who, as they wrongly suppose, have outgrown the Sunday school. The church is their special zone of influence. Here are the children and young people, who feel that they have no connection with the church, which, of course, belongs to the older folks, while the Sunday school belongs particularly to them. This idea is as strong with the elders as with the juniors. They talk it in that way and live according to that plan, and what wonder that the young people have no other thought.

We are of the second generation trained somewhat according to this notion. We must be rid of it before our children perpetuate our error. Some elders are not above resenting as a sort of encroachment upon their particular prerogatives any entrance of the young people into church leadership, and particularly so, if these young people are given places on the official board. They are at once accused of trying to run the church and of displacing the venerable brethren who have borne the burdens all through the years. The pastor may know that such a complainant ought to be removed from the board at once, but the accusation indicates a condition that is more serious than the complaint itself. It is a symptom of internal disorder that should be corrected. On the other hand, some young people think, and are not slow in expressing their thoughts, that the older people should stay out of the Sunday school, or at least be very humble members. If they attend the young people's society, they must be silent spectators only. There is no need to discuss the relative merits of these two positions. They are both wrong, and if reduced to matter of debate we will all agree. It is our practice rather than our theory that is at fault. It is seriously to be doubted whether we ever outgrow the need for the Sunday school, and equally so whether we are ever too young to derive benefit from the church services. This telescoping of audiences cannot be other than painful to the thoughtful pastor, and anything which will help to stop it even a little is to be welcomed. The final solution lies with the parents. When they are brought to understand how important it is that the child shall be consciously related to the church, they will then quite easily effect the cure of the now too prevalent evil.

If the observation and reading of the writer have not misled him, this telescoping of audiences is not peculiar to one part of the country but is general in all sections and in all denominations and with practically all sorts of preachers. We must make only one class of exceptions: the Catholics, Episcopalians, and Lutherans, churches who train their children, do not offer this problem to any great extent. The fact itself is serious enough, because these young people are missing the greatest opportunity which the church has to offer them. Serious indeed and difficult of approach is the cause which lies back of that. A very serious phase, perhaps the most serious, is that we quite generally assume that a highly organized church, such as we have to-day, can take care of all the spiritual needs of the child. The whole religious nature of the infant and adolescent is committed to the various children's and young people's societies. The home shirks its duty and the church proper gets little chance at the developing child. We have no complaint to lodge against the various departmental organizations as such, but the misuse of them as is common to-day must be corrected. We should bring the strongest possible protest before the parents against intrusting to the church auxiliaries the tremendously important work of training the child rehgiously. We can in no wise follow the line of least resistance in this matter. It may be easier to send the child to the Sunday school and to the junior society than it is to give him the time in the home and to take him to church, but yve must know that the former method of farming out his religious training is inadequate and will bring him to young manhood knowing nothing of the church and caring nothing for it. He will need these auxiliary aids, but he will need much more than these. We have come to place the secular education of the child wholly with the public school, and it is doubtful whether this is altogether wise. In accord with this same idea we place the religious education and training also with outside parties, very much to the child's disadvantage. The public school has the advantage generally of trained teachers, while too often the Sunday school teacher, while the best that is available, is unqualified to teach the children great religious truths. This is an easy method by which parents may be led to think that they have done their duty by their children, but it will not meet the needs of the child, no matter how efficient these auxiliary societies may be. The home must ever be the center of the rehgious training of the child. The home atmosphere must be conducive to religious growth. It must be the place where good church habits are established.

The young people of to-day, with noteworthy exceptions, attend worship, if at all, as a matter of social convenience rather than as a duty and as an opportunity, and have little thought of sacrifice on behalf of the church. Only the occasional young man or woman, reared in our church homes, will assume responsibility when asked, and very few indeed think of giving of their substance to the support of the church, although they have means in abundance to spend on pleasure. This may sound rather like a sweeping indictment, but unless we are greatly misled by our observation and reading it is true. At least it is too generally true to be passed over lightly by church leaders who desire genuine progress in future years. It proves beyond doubt a fimdamental defect somewhere in our methods. Whether it proves too much dependence in church auxiliary societies or not may be debated, but it most certainly proves a defect. Any system of church work that disassociates young people from the church proper needs to be corrected. The writer cannot escape the conviction already expressed that the home more than any other one thing must determine the spirit of loyalty to the church. The conception which the parent embodies into action will work itself out largely in the child. If church worship is looked upon by the parent as a convenience rather than a sacred obligation, if social functions and fraternal life and Sunday visiting and Sunday picnics and Sunday sports are allowed to take precedence over the church, it will be idle for the parent so involved to try to teach the child that the church is sacred above these things. The child will conclude, and rightly, that first things come first, and that for his parents the church is only a third or fourth-rate institution.

In the church of which the writer is pastor there is at least one remarkable case of loyalty to the church. It will serve to illustrate what has gone before. The young lady who is church pianist has held that position for seven consecutive years, and during these years of service she has been absent from her post of duty only four times, and for each of the absences had a good excuse and had already provided for a substitute organist to take her place. During most of the time she has been a high school student and since graduation a teacher, but the church has learned to expect her services every Sunday, and for special meetings and often for funeral occasions, and she very seldom fails. The record is all the more remarkable when it is added that she was elected to the position when only twelve years old. This is a record of fidelity which will be hard to surpass. It should be said also that the young lady receives no remuneration for her work, which is more than average in quality, except an occasional present at Christmas time or on her birthday. Now, the explanation of this very remarkable case of fidelity lies not wholly with the young lady herself, but partly with the good mother who has spent much time training the daughter in fidelity to the church and in planning with her that she should not be hindered in the performance of her duty to the church. What this mother has accomplished other fathers and mothers can do, and this sort of work with the young people in the home will give us many who are thoroughly devoted to the church.

If these pages have any excuse for having been written, it is the hope that they may contribute in some small way to the proper upbuilding of a home sentiment concerning the church and thus cause to develop early in the minds of the young people a sense of responsibility to that institution which has brought to them the good news of salvation and has made their day the most opportune of all the ages. The book is an appeal largely to parents, Sunday school teachers, and also to pastors looking to a saner view of child religion than is generally held and hence to a more practical view of what may be done for the child. That the present indifferent attitude of parents is due to a wrong theological viewpoint may be rather a bold assumption, but I cannot escape the conviction that such is the case and, furthermore, I can see no hope for a large betterment, to say nothing of a complete solution of present-day conditions, until popular sentiment and opinion are changed.

The lines of thought which are to follow are in no sense new, for a careful study of the church and of theological thought reveals the fact that they have been held all along throughout the development of our great ecclesiastical bodies, but the principles have been overshadowed and have had no adequate opportunity to make themselves powerful. It is time to emphasize the Christ view. We have turned decidedly in that direction, and never before in the history of thought have we been looking so earnestly toward a solution. But we leave old thought positions slowly and accept different conclusions with difficulty. But Christ taught very plainly, and, surely, he is the authority. Our chief difficulty is that we have started our theology with man the sinner and have sought to work backward to the child and forward toward man redeemed. We must learn to start with the child, as Christ did, and turn our vision wholly forward. The parent must be awakened to the appalling fact of loss from our good homes and shown how much of this loss may be averted. He must be shown that he has intrusted to his keeping not a soul bhghted in sin, but a soul pure as heaven itself, pronounced by Christ to be the type of those who are fit for the kingdom.

The biggest business we have in all the world is not the accumulation of wealth, the attainment of fame or position or the acquirement of ease and luxury; our supreme task is to bring up our children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. Such words are easy to write, and will receive a ready assent, but do we really believe it? Let us compare a couple of homes which may be found in any community. Here is a home where the passion for wealth and social position predominates, where the religious life of the children receives but slight attention. The husband, having inherited considerable wealth, thrives in business and acquires positions of influence by reason of the prestige which his wealth gives him. The wife wins a high place in the social circles and because of her elegant home and elaborate entertainments is highly regarded in the community. On the other side of the street is a home where the predominating thought is character development. The father is industrious, but his initial capital was small and his code of honor forbids him doing a questionable thing in business to increase his capital, and so perhaps he does not become wealthy. There is, however, a high mental and spiritual atmosphere in the home, and much is said about honor and righteousness and religion. The family are devoted to the church and use their influence for good in the conmiunity. The father and mother teach their children not only by precept but also by example. They are genuinely Christian parents and count their gain not only in dollars and cents, but more particularly in the unimpeachable characters forming in their children.

Their home is moderately humble and the father's political and social influence is small. The mother is not known socially in any large way. Which home will the average citizen point out as the more successful? Which home does popular judgment pronounce the better? Which home do we Christian parents deem the better? We will have no difliculty in learning the consensus of opinion in the average community with reference to this comparison. Community life in general will pronounce in favor of the man who amasses wealth, paying little heed to the character forming in his children. But when we reflect we must admit that the family atmosphere where good character is formed, and from which children go out to found Christian homes, and in turn hand down Christian ideals to their children and grandchildren, is worth more to society and to the church and to God. We must reverse popular judgment and convince our young people that the greatest business on earth is not financial and social success, but, rather, right living. "We have but one great problem before us : How shall we best transmit to our children the fruits of our effort?" (Frank Crane.) There is only one answer: By transmitting good character bred to do the right and steeped in loyalty to the church and the propagation of righteousness. It is not implied by the contrast that wealth and attainment are necessarily in antagonism to good character development. It is implied only that we must keep them in the right relative proportions. The contrast is drawn to emphasize the assertion that our biggest business is to build Christian character in ourselves and in our children. All other worthy ends must be related to that and not allowed to take precedence. It is a calamity when we miss the main end of life and follow a side issue. Very few will dispute this position, but too few make it a working principle in their everyday lives. If parents can be brought to realize the religious possibilities of the child and learn to work out those possibilities, much will be gained every way. We must preach conservation even more emphatically than we preach reclamation. "Keep the children," should be the keynote of all our preaching.

Chapter II The Mission Of The Little Child

And there shall come forth a shoot out of the stock of Jesse, and a branch out of his roots shall bear fruit. And the spirit of Jehovah shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of council and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of Jehovah. And his delight shall be in the fear of Jehovah; and he shall not judge after the sight of his eyes, neither decide after the hearing of his ears; but with righteousness shall he judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the earth; and he shall smite the earth with the rod of his mouth; and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked. And righteousness shall be the girdle of his waist, and faithfulness the girdle of his loins.

And the wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them. And the cow and the bear shall feed; their young ones shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. And the sucking child shall play on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the adder's den. They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain; for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of Jehovah, as the waters cover the sea. — Isa. 11. 1-9,

CHAPTER II

THE MISSION OF THE LITTLE CHILD

It surely will be no reflection on the true doctrine of the inspiration of the Scriptures to say that often the words of the prophets are more far-reaching than they themselves knew. Moved by the Spirit of God, they have uttered some profound truth concerning human events, but, meeting its immediate intent, the prophecy has swept on and out and has reached vastly larger realms than they in the nature of the case could have foreseen. Truth is eternal and springs from the very nature of God himself. A truth meeting one condition in one age will quite surely have application to phases of life in all ages. ,The prophets saw the situation immediately involved in their pronouncements and had indeed marvelous outlook toward the future, but the eternal truths to which they have in some cases given expression have outreaehed even their fondest expectations. This will be found true, I believe, of the prophecy of Isaiah which I have quoted on the preceding page and which forms the basis for succeeding thought. The prophet was applying a great truth to a particular setting, and because truth is eternal it is not exhausted in use, but is, rather, accentuated and expands more fully with the years. I would not agree with those exegetes who see in this prophecy only the possibility of a literal fulfillment, and assume that, among other things, our Lord's influence is to extend to the animal world and eventually work out an equilibrium among all his creatures. It may be that such an equilibrium is yet to be; that some day the lion, the wolf, and the leopard, together with the cockatrice and the asp, will be so transformed in nature as to eliminate all possibility of struggle and conflict, and that man will become so saintly that he will be in harmony with everything in creation; that the animal of the jungle will be so transformed as to be a safe playmate for our children, and man will have no aversion to the so-called lower animals, but will receive them as companions.

This is conceivable under God's infinite power. It is rather enchanting to think of a great process of evolution working in all the universe by the power of God which is destined to eliminate all friction from the earth; but to stop here is to fall far short of the concept of the great prophet and to forestall the great onsweeping of the prophecy. The elevation of the animal world up to a plane congenial to the best estate of the animal in man is not the chief work of the Messiah. Rather and far more important is his mission of subduing the animal nature in man and making it subservient to the higher spiritual nature. The viciousness of the lion, the cruel cunning of the wolf, the treachery of the leopard, the deadly venom of the cockatrice and the asp are all, besides many other animal characteristics, revealed in the human heart, and the crowning work of the Infinite is to subiue these and harmonize the warring elements in the kingdom of the soul so that the peace of heaven may abide there. As between the task of conforming the animal kingdom to a human ideal and that of eliminating the animal traits from the soul of man, there is no common ground of comparison. One is entirely in the realm of the material and therefore wholly subject to the will of God. The other is in the realm of the spirit and, by divine appointment, not necessarily subject to the will of God. God himself is not equal to this task alone, for it is such a task as to require the power of the Infinite and the power of man. Infinite power is in no sense taxed when dealing with the material universe or with the lower animal orders, which are all subservient to the Maker. He can shut the mouths of the lions and bring a Daniel out of the lions' den unharmed if it meets his divine purpose. But man, by reason of the nature which God has invested in him, is a different type of subject and is not always so obedient.