10. By what means is true faith developed in a child?
Lesson 3
Beginners Age (Concluded)
7. Opportunities of the Beginners Age.—(1) Shaping character through influence. There are two ways of touching a life—the one through definite instruction, which must be understood to avail anything; the other through unconscious influence which is felt, not necessarily comprehended. The mind of the beginner is awake and active, but he can grasp little instruction beyond simplest facts about concrete things. Right and wrong, unselfishness, love, all the abstract standards and principles of life, he cannot comprehend intellectually, but he absorbs the influences that go out from them, and what is felt is always more powerful than that which lodges only in the head. During the first six years of life the child is peculiarly sensitive to every influence that comes to him out of his environment, and these,—not instruction,—determine what he shall be. No amount of teaching upon the subject of flowers and birds and trees can arouse the joy and gratitude which a drive through the country on a glorious spring morning awakens. No number of lessons upon self-control will make the impression upon the heart which the sight of it in another makes. The child cannot understand the nature and necessity of reverence, but he will feel it, if that be the influence of the Sunday-school hour.
(2) Shaping character through imitation. The actions in this period which result from instruction are few compared to those which come from the instinct of imitation; therefore what the teacher is unable to do through precept she can accomplish through the power of example and story.
(3) Imparting simple spiritual truths. These must be truths with whose earthly likenesses the child is familiar. This will make possible stories of God's power as Creator, his love and care as Heavenly Father, stories of Jesus as the loving Friend and Helper of little children, and the necessity of obedience to his commands.
8. Needs of the Beginners Age.—If the opportunities of this period are to be realized, four things are necessary:
(1) A Christlike teacher. While influences go out from everything,—people, circumstances, conditions, even inanimate, senseless things,—a human life radiates the strongest influence. It has a twofold effect upon a little child: he not only feels the influence, but it also moves him to imitate the person. He may forget the lesson, he may not have comprehended it at all, but he has absorbed the teacher during the hour and he will try to reproduce what she has said and done even to her very tone, expression, and manner. If his model be a gentle voice or a loving word, the very act of imitating it makes him gentler and more tender, and what exhortation may not secure, influence and imitation will bring. Therefore a teacher will do her strongest work with a beginner by being like Jesus Christ.