SUNDAY-SCHOOL SECTION.

LESSON VI.—THE TEACHER’S MISTAKES.

That they are possible is assumed. That they are probable is likewise assumed. That they are real is a fact of personal experience. Mistakes anywhere are mischievous. In Sunday-school they are often ruinous. Let us classify them. They are first, mistakes of manner and method; second, mistakes of purpose and expectation; third, mistakes of thought and action. Let us examine our classification:

I. Manner and Method.

It is a mistake (a) to recognize differences in social position or station between members of a class. In the Sunday-school all meet on a common level. There is no rank in the Christian kingdom. All are peers of the realm, and Jesus Christ is the only Lord.

(b) To be in any degree partial to any scholar. All should be favorite scholars in this school.

(c) To seem uninterested in anything pertaining to the general interest of the school. If the teacher is devoid of interest the scholar will be.

(d) To scold or threaten in the class, even under provocations such as do occur in Sunday-school. Scolding always exercises an ill effect, and a threat is but a challenge.

(e) To pretend to be wiser or better versed in Bible lore than one really is. In Bible teaching, real knowledge is real power—but a manner that assumes to know what it does not is only the lion’s skin on the ass’ head.

(f) To neglect thorough study. Wherever there is good teaching there will be at least two students. One will be the teacher. Witness Dr. Arnold, of Rugby.

(g) To neglect private prayer in the teacher’s preparation. Said old Martin Luther, “Bene arâsse est bene studuisse.”

(h) To depend upon lesson-helps in the class. Crutches are not becoming to an able bodied man. But some teachers bring out the lesson crutches on Sunday morning and hobble through Sunday-school on them.

(i) To expect the superintendent to discipline each class. He is no more responsible for class order than a commanding general for the order of a corporal’s guard.

(j) To use the lesson verse by verse, ending each with the Æsopian interrogation, “Hæc fabula docet?”

II. Purpose and Expectation.

It is a mistake (a) to seek only for a scholar’s conversion. If growth does not follow birth, death will. Upbuilding in Christ is one great purpose of the school.

(b) To seek only to create interest in the lesson. There may be deep intellectual interest created, and no spiritual interest.

(d) To teach for the purpose of inculcating one’s own peculiar religious views. Paul’s purpose was the right one—“to know nothing save Christ and him crucified.”

(e) For the teacher to expect the pupil’s interest in the Gospel theme to equal his own. It is contrary to sinful nature.

(f) To expect home work by pupils, unless it has been prepared for by patient effort.

(g) To expect conversion as the immediate result of teaching, and to grow discouraged and abandon the work because the expectation is not at once realized. God’s way and time are his own.

(h) Not to expect conversion as the ultimate result of teaching; and hence to fail to direct every effort to that end.—“In the morning sow thy seed,” etc.

III. Thought and Action.

It is a mistake (a) to think teaching easy. It has taxed the noblest powers of the noblest men.

(b) To think it an insignificant or puerile employment. The two greatest names of the ages, heathen and Christian, were nothing if not teachers: Socrates—Immanuel.

(c) To think the Sunday-school a children’s institution only. The three great Christian institutions are the home, the church, the Sunday-school, and the constituency of each is the same.

(d) To be irregular in attendance at Sunday-school.

(e) To be unpunctual.

(f) To be lax in discipline.

(g) To fail in example, whether in connection with school work or daily life.