I have been studying as of late the ideas as to what education should look like. The Bible foretold in Revelation 12:17 that at the very end of time, God would send the prophetic gift to His church one last time. That was fulfilled with a woman named Ellen White in the mid to late 1800’s. She wrote extensively about many things but one thing that was heavily emphasized in a number of places was the object of education.
She actually calls the education that God blesses as ‘True Education’. True education is the harmonious development of the physical, the mental, and the spiritual powers of man. In fact the object of this true education is for greater joy in service in this life and even more joy and wider service in the life to come.
To restore in man the image of his Maker, to bring him back [BEGIN P.16] to the perfection in which he was created, to promote the development of body, mind, and soul, that the divine purpose in his creation might be realized–this was to be the work of redemption. This is the object of education, the great object of life. {Ed 15.2}
Love, the basis of creation and of redemption, is the basis of true education. This is made plain in the law that God has given as the guide of life. The first and great commandment is, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind.” Luke 10:27. To love Him, the infinite, the omniscient One, with the whole strength, and mind, and heart, means the highest development of every power. It means that in the whole being– the body, the mind, as well as the soul–the image of God is to be restored. {Ed 16.1}
Like the first is the second commandment–”Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.” Matthew 22:39. The law of love calls for the devotion of body, mind, and soul to the service of God and our fellow men. And this service, while making us a blessing to others, brings the greatest blessing to ourselves. Unselfishness underlies all true development. Through unselfish service we receive the highest culture of every faculty. More and more fully do we become partakers of the divine nature. We are fitted for heaven, for we receive heaven into our hearts. {Ed 16.2}
—I am sad to say that the movement that God awakened in 1844 has walked away from this goal of education. I pray that we will get back to the message of what God intended. There are small schools around the world trying to be faithful to the object of true education. May God bless those schools abundantly. For the many other schools that make up the majority, may God impress upon the leadership to get back to what God can bless.
-Jared
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