Today I want to share a word about Healthy Teaching as I comment on Mark 4:1-25.
We are in the midst of a series on the Characteristics of a Healthy Church as taught on the mission field by the International Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention.
I believe that this excellent Bible study material should be considered by the churches in North America also as we try to rebuild our ministries after a year of COVID-19.
The last time we visited the subject of a Healthy Church we focused on Healthy Giving, which is very important to our ministries, but today we want to focus on Healthy Teaching. It does little good for our churches to be well financed if we are not effectively teaching and preaching God’s Word.
An old saying goes, “Those who can do, and those who can’t teach.” That, as anyone who has ever taught knows, is a false statement. Teaching isn’t all that easy. Let me give you a couple of examples:
In every Psychology 101 course in college the students have to participate in a laboratory experience where they train a white rat. In my school, we had to train the rat to react to a light by pressing a lever to get a treat. You would think that training a dumb beast like a rat would be easy for intelligent humans, but that isn’t always the case. Every semester someone trains the rat to grab the light instead of pressing the lever. It isn’t all that easy to be a teacher.
Besides being a hard task, a teacher must be sure to be teaching the right things. They say that “practice makes perfect,” but in truth, “practice makes permanent.” If you teach the wrong things, you will cause major problems for the students! For example:
A child’s aunt was trying to encourage the boy to learn his times tables. She told him, “You need to just rattle off answers like snapping your fingers. Like, you should be able to spit out 8 times 8 equals 72!
If you didn’t understand that last part, remedial classes will be available soon!
It is not easy to be a good teacher, we today will find that Jesus was the model of healthy teaching. Today we will see Him as the Master Teacher demonstrating His craft. We need to watch Him and learn.
Let’s begin by reading Mark 4:1-9
Again he began to teach beside the sea. And a very large crowd gathered about him, so that he got into a boat and sat in it on the sea, and the whole crowd was beside the sea on the land. And he was teaching them many things in parables, and in his teaching he said to them: “Listen! Behold, a sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seed fell along the path, and the birds came and devoured it. Other seed fell on rocky ground, where it did not have much soil, and immediately it sprang up, since it had no depth of soil. And when the sun rose, it was scorched, and since it had no root, it withered away. Other seed fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it, and it yielded no grain. And other seeds fell into good soil and produced grain, growing up and increasing and yielding thirtyfold and sixtyfold and a hundredfold.” And he said, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear.”
THE MINISTRY OF THE TEACHER:
Jesus devoted much of His ministry to teaching and in fact, He was often called “Rabbi,” which means, “teacher”. He taught from the beginning of His ministry until the end, and He took every opportunity He had to teach.
Jesus took advantage of “teaching moments” the same way wise parents do. Therefore, parents are the most important teachers of young children because they have so many of these “teachable moments” together.
Jesus taught in many different situations and settings:
He taught in the synagogue, among religious Jews, and He taught as He walked and lived day by day with His disciples.
He taught large crowds who came to see Him, and He taught people in their homes at meals.
He taught in the temple, and the scholars were amazed, and He taught sinners as He showed them God’s love.
He also taught as He healed the sick and opened the eyes of the blind, He wanted them to know why these events had occurred.
Here we see Him teaching in an unusual place with an unusual technique but also with unusual profundity as well.
The exciting thing for us about the ministry of teaching is that now it belongs to the church! We are to make disciples and to do that we must teach. As we teach, others learn about the love of God, and we learn more and more ourselves because best way to learn is to teach. The teacher always learns more than the students.
Soon after I had surrendered to the call to ministry, our pastor allowed me to teach a class of “Through the Bible in One Year.” It was a tremendous experience for me because I learned so much! I was certainly blessed more than the students were!
As exciting as the ministry of teaching is, it is also a daunting responsibility. Paul taught that teachers are held to a high standard by God, and that we should not seek to be a teacher if God hasn’t called us. The good news is that the Holy Spirit has given many the gift of teaching and it is a blessing when we use it. In fact, we must use it or grieve the Spirit, and none of us want to do that!
Next, let’s consider Verses 10-12:
And when he was alone, those around him with the twelve asked him about the parables. And he said to them, “To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but for those outside everything is in parables, so that “‘they may indeed see but not perceive, and may indeed hear but not understand, lest they should turn and be forgiven.’”
THE METHOD OF THE TEACHER:
People learn in different ways and in His ministry, Jesus used the Full range of techniques. He taught didactically, like in the Sermon on the Mount. He taught by example, like when He healed the paralytic. He taught though experience, like when he sent the Disciples out two-by-two. Much of His teaching, however, was through parables.
A parable is essentially an illustrated sermon. The basic element of a sermon includes exposition, explanation, and illustration, but a parable is not a sermon illustration, but it is an illustrated sermon that uses a story to teach a truth.
The fact is we often remember stories when we don’t remember the sermon. I remember very clearly the time when the pastor of my home church made an impassioned description of the Israelites drowning in the Red Sea! Obviously, he misspoke, but the combination of his vivid description and his faux pas created a visual image that I will never forget!
Jesus often taught them based on the occasion and used events or objects in view of the listeners, such as “fields white unto harvest,” or “a sower went out to sow,” or “I am the Good Shepherd . . .”
Jesus had another reason for using parables: some people He taught were not ready to hear the truth. In fact, some people were actively working against the truth. Using parables was the way that Jesus could teach them best and this is an example to all of us as we teach God’s truth.
For example, on the mission field, workers often use the technique called Chronological Bible Storying in which they tell the stories in the Bible in the order in which they occurred. In countries with authoritarian governments or where there is a dominant, non-Christian faith group, the authorities not threatened because, “They are just telling stories.”
Let’s continue by reading Verses 13-20,
And he said to them, “Do you not understand this parable? How then will you understand all the parables? The sower sows the word. And these are the ones along the path, where the word is sown: when they hear, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word that is sown in them. And these are the ones sown on rocky ground: the ones who, when they hear the word, immediately receive it with joy. And they have no root in themselves, but endure for a while; then, when tribulation or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately they fall away. And others are the ones sown among thorns. They are those who hear the word, but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it proves unfruitful. But those that were sown on the good soil are the ones who hear the word and accept it and bear fruit, thirtyfold and sixtyfold and a hundredfold.”
THE MESSAGE OF THE TEACHER:
Jesus did many things in His ministry, but He had only one purpose.
Jesus fed people and turned water into wine. Jesus healed people and He revived the dead. Jesus also radically opposed the powers that controlled Israel and Jesus ate with sinners and tax collectors. These are many different things, but all these things had just one purpose: spreading the Gospel.
Churches, also do many things. In fact, some churches are like a kicked-over ant hill. We have devised all kinds of programs from sports to scrap-booking. Activity for its own sake is not ministry, however. Churches must focus what they do in the way Jesus did. Purpose, vision, mission, are often all missing. I think this is why Rick Warren’s book, The Purpose Driven Church became so influential. People were looking for clarity
We must make teaching and preaching the Gospel our priority! We must follow the example of Jesus and teach the Gospel. We imitate Paul as he also imitated Jesus. In 1 Corinthians 2:1-5 Paul said,
And I, brethren, when I came to you, did not come with excellence of speech or of wisdom declaring to you the testimony of God. For I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified. I was with you in weakness, in fear, and in much trembling. And my speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of human wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, that your faith should not be in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.
To allude to 1 Corinthians 13, if we aren’t teaching the Gospel, then all we are doing is just making noise and wasting time!
Let’s finish up by looking at Verses 21-25,
And he said to them, “Is a lamp brought in to be put under a basket, or under a bed, and not on a stand? For nothing is hidden except to be made manifest; nor is anything secret except to come to light. If anyone has ears to hear, let him hear.” And he said to them, “Pay attention to what you hear: with the measure you use, it will be measured to you, and still more will be added to you. For to the one who has, more will be given, and from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away.”
THE MAJESTY OF THE TEACHER:
Teaching is difficult work. In my own experience I often work a whole day or more to prepare for a three-hour class for a Bible college class that I teach. Then, after I teach the class, I am often exhausted from the emotional investment in the lives of my students. Teaching can be hard work, but teachers are glad to invest their time and effort when they see their students grow and mature.
The reward in teaching is seeing students’ lives changed. Teachers want to see that they are having an impact. They want to see growth occur.
They want to see their students be able to do what they couldn’t do before.
Jesus wanted to see the Gospel transforming lives: He wants our lives to shine out a lamp on a lamp stand. He wants our lives to be open books for God. He wants us to be growing daily in the Gospel.
Are we instruments of transformation at our church? If not, we should be.
One way we can do this is by teaching the Gospel, because when the Gospel changes lives it is a glorious thing.
Paul saw many lives transformed by his teaching, which is why he said in Philippians 4:1, “Therefore, my beloved and longed-for brethren, my joy and crown, so stand fast in the Lord, beloved.”
CONCLUSION:
Jesus is the Master Teacher, but have we been diligent students?
The most important teaching lesson we can absorb from Him is not His methods, but His motivation. His goal was not to teach facts, but to transform lives.
We need to dedicate ourselves to learning from Him, and if we do, we will have the abundant life He has promised! And, if we learn to teach like Him, our students can have that same abundant life as they transform into disciples.
Jesus is the example of healthy teaching. Let’s us follow His lead!
Every blessing,
Dr. Otis Corbitt
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