Sunday-School Success: A Book of Practical Methods for Sunday-School Teachers and OfficersWells, Amos R. (Amos Russel)
Religion
Sunday-School Success: A Book of Practical Methods for Sunday-School Teachers and Officers
Wells, Amos R. (Amos Russel)
Sunday schools
Though of ages so unequal, "S. S." and "C. E." are sisters. Both are
international and interdenominational. Both apply the principle of age
classification to religious work. Both are strongly evangelical, and
earnest seekers of souls. Both are held in strictest subordination to
the church. And both are Bible lovers; for the Christian Endeavor
pledge requires daily reading of the Bible, and the weekly
prayer-meeting topic calls out no slight amount of Bible study.
Moreover, this topic is usually in line with the week's Sunday-school
lesson,--not the same as the latter, but suggested by it. The two
agencies are at work in different fields. The one puts in, the other
draws out. The one studies, the other practices. The Christian
Endeavor society affords an excellent test for the Sunday-school, and
is its complement. Whatever helps the one aids the other, and the two
should labor hand in hand.
There are even some things that the Sunday-school might learn from its
little sister. The principle of the pledge has proved attractive and
powerful in the Christian Endeavor society. Why not adopt it in the
Sunday-school, asking the scholars for voluntary vows that they will
attend regularly and will spend fifteen minutes a day in studying
their lessons? The monthly consecration meeting maintains wonderfully
the spirituality, zeal, and discipline of the Christian Endeavor
society. Why not a monthly consecration and experience meeting of
Sunday-school teachers? Three or four Christian Endeavor societies
cannot exist in the same town without forming a local union for mutual
encouragement and consultation. Sunday-schools have their county
conventions, but why not also this beautiful interdenominational
fellowship among the Sunday-schools of every community? A large part
of the remarkable success of Christian Endeavor is due to its being a
work of the young people for themselves. There is close pastoral and
church supervision, and it is welcomed; but the Endeavorers feel that
it is their society, for whose honor they are responsible, and whose
victories depend upon themselves. As far as possible, this spirit
should be incorporated in the Sunday-school, so that the Bible study
may not seem a work impressed on the scholars, but elected by
them,--_their_ work, and not their teachers'.
How can the Christian Endeavor society help the Sunday-school? Greatly
in its prayer-meetings, by remembering the allied Sunday-school topic
of the morning. Here is a chance for the teacher to enlarge upon some
theme treated too hurriedly in the lesson hour, and for scholars to
show their appreciation of their teacher by repeating some thought he
brought out in the morning. If rightly managed, the Christian Endeavor
meeting furnishes an admirable opportunity for advertising the
Sunday-school, and practically applying the truths there taught.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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