The Importance of the Bible School Program Cannot Be Overemphasized
March 26, 2006
By: Sellers S. Crain, Jr.
When I was just a small boy between 2 and 9 years of age, my mother and two sisters and I attended the old 12th Avenue Church of Christ in North Nashville between Buchanan and Clay Streets. Some of my earliest memories center around the Bible classes. I still remember one of the teachers there who made an impact on my early life. Her name was Etha Green, and she is the woman who gave me my first Bible. It is a small New Testament with Psalms. The covers are gone off of it but I still have the Bible. I used it when I first began to preach.
While I don't remember a lot about the activities we engaged in, I do remember the stories. We studied about the creation, Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, Noah and the flood, the Tower of Babel, Joseph's Coat of Many Colors, David and Goliath, Daniel in the lion's den, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, Jesus' Birth, Jesus and His Disciples and The Early Church. The stories were so firmly etched in my mind when I first began to preach as a young man, I relied heavily on them and the knowledge I gained early in my life from Bible Study.
When I got older, one of the methods used by many Bible class teachers was to have children memorize at least one scripture a week and recite it in class. Most of the scriptures I learned that way are still retained in my memory. They have served me well in times of need. It was in Bible classes that I first learned God's plan of redemption. Some make fun of the five steps of salvation today, but, again, they are things I learn from the Bible, and I still believe and teach them. I am firmly convinced it is God's way of saving people through the blood of Christ.
In my early Bible classes, I learned a reverence and love for God and His Holy Word. It was this love that led me to begin teaching Bible classes when I was 16 and to begin preaching at 18. Even today I enjoy studying the Bible and teaching it to others. When I see a student is understanding some truth that I am trying to get across, it is thrilling. It makes my day when a student in one of my classes tells me that my class has inspired them to want to study more.
Some people seem to think that Bible classes are just for children, but they are for teenagers and adults also. You never get too old of too smart to not need more knowledge of God's Word. Hearing God's Word will never be boring to those who love Him and who love the truth He has given to us. One of our members told me just the other day that since he has been teaching a Bible class he has learned so much more.
As a Bible teacher, never allow your lessons or your presentation of them to be boring. Do not allow yourself to fall into the trap of sitting down for a few minutes Saturday night or Sunday morning to quickly glance over the lesson book and then present it to your class. If you do that, you are cheating yourself and your students. If we as Bible class teachers are doing our job properly, we are not just imparting facts, we are helping our students gain wisdom and understanding of God's truth to prepare them for time and for eternity. Teaching God's truth to individuals is a serious responsibility, and it should not be taken lightly (James 3:1). "Study to show yourself approved unto God, a workman who does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth" (2 Timothy 2:15).
Brotherly,
Sellers
