Education

00:01 We greet you this morning in the name of Jesus. It's good to be in the house of the Lord. Welcome all the visitors that are here this morning. We're glad for the presence of each one. I am a little bit off my feed this morning. 00:13 I was sick during the night, and so I'm going to kind of keep my distance from people this morning and maybe make my exit afterwards so I don't give you what I had or have or whatever. It's a little bit better this morning. But if you would turn in your copies of the Scripture, leave them there at Proverbs chapter 3, verse 13 and following. 00:34 I want to share with you this morning on our core values messages that we preach from time to time on the subject of education and the subject of teaching and training, and especially when it comes to teaching in a Christian education environment. 00:52 And we have in our 00:57 church covenant this statement that we agree that since the church is the pillar and guardian of the truth, it has a vested interest in the education of the children in its member families. 01:10 Since Christ is the fountainhead of all true knowledge, every effort should be made to provide a complete Christ-centered, high-quality education for the children of our congregation. The believing father is primarily responsible to prepare his child or children for all of life. 01:30 Therefore, in the interest of our accountability to the Scriptures, we expect to assist and encourage fathers in this responsibility. And this is one of our core values as a congregation, and that is fathers teaching their children and taking responsibility for the teaching and training fathers and mothers, 01:50 for that matter, of their children. And so very, very not often enough do we do a message on Christian education. And I do this this morning. I sat down a little bit just briefly, took out the church directory, and said, I thought, wonder what we're doing with education in our living water families. 02:13 And it was interesting to me. At one point, we were I would have said without an official review a number of years ago, we would have been about a third Christian school, a third home school, and a third public school. And that has changed and shifted. If I'm right, 02:32 we are just a few families on public school, and then we have more home school children or families than Christian school families. But it's almost neck and neck. It's about, well, some families have maybe one in Christian school, 02:53 another in home school, and/or it's divided up somewhat that way. And so really, a home school and Christian school is predominantly what we have today of those who have children in school right now, not what we had or what we're going to have. 03:11 But so this is a message to try to encourage 03:17 families and children, parents in the education of their children, whether that be in a home school or a Christian school setting or a public school setting. We as parents are primarily responsible for the teaching and training of our children and of our families. 03:36 And so I want that to be first and foremost understood this morning. And so I'd like to just look at a few things this morning before we actually look into the Scriptures further. But we could ask the question, what is education? And many have asked that question. 03:56 Some of many have tried to answer it. There's a lot of different questions, a lot of different answers given to that. One answer that goes back to my Christian school administration days, and that is this from Dr. 04:09 Donald Howard who started the ACE program: "Education is life, or it is the communication of life from the living to the living." I found that to be a very interesting definition, one that has stuck with me for years and years, for 35 years. 04:32 Education is life. It is the communication of life from the living to the living. And really, that education is life. It is all the way through life. If you stop learning, you stop growing. If you stop growing, you stop living, really. 04:52 If you stop learning, you stop living. Then there are other educational definitions. One is education can be thought of as the transmission of the values and accumulated knowledge of a society. Now, this is a secular definition, and it should make your ears prick up a little bit. 05:12 It is 05:15 the transmission of the values and accumulated knowledge of a society. How many of you don't have to raise your hand actually think that education is about transmitting knowledge? Well, it is that, but that's only part of it, especially when you come to Christian education. It's about transmitting values, 05:35 a Christ-centered education. If you're talking about a worldly education, the government education is the transmission of the values, the values that it places on society. Values. Whose values? Whose values? 05:54 That's a good question. Then another definition is essentially education socializes children into society by instilling cultural values and norms. Now, that ought to make the hair stand up on the back of your neck. Instilling cultural values and norms. 06:12 Do you understand why there is a fight today for the educational soul of America? Because it is about transmitting values and norms. And by the way, we as Christians, our values are not mainstream anymore, and they are not norms. 06:33 So when it comes to secular education, whose values and whose norms are being promoted? Equipping them with the skills necessary to become productive members of society. Now, skills, yeah, we can get that. And so it's a combination of knowledge and values. Well, you can combine that or compare that with a different perspective. 06:54 I ran across this in my research. Christian education invites young people to see and understand the world through the perspective of God's truth. Now, that's quite different than a secular education. The Bible becomes the lens in which students view what they are learning. 07:14 The lens focuses their thinking on ultimate truth, a biblical vision for life where the world is created and sustained by God, where God has acted in history to deal with the distortions of creation caused by human rebellion, 07:31 and where history is advancing towards a new creation in which all things are reconciled to God through Jesus Christ, who is not only the climax of the biblical story but is also the focal point of the lens. Wow, that's quite a description of Christian education. 07:50 It doesn't end there. It is a way of living. However, Christian education is not just about a Christian way of understanding. It is also about a Christian way of living. When Jesus said, "Follow me," he was expecting people to dedicate their whole lives to serving God. Christian education informs, invites, and inspires young people to live this way. 08:12 The Christian school offering Christian education seeks to teach this way of life every day through all that is done and taught. It does this in a setting of unified community of love and learning between parents, children, and teachers. 08:31 And I've said it many times before through the years that you may not be in a Christian school. You may be in a public school, but it's still our responsibility to provide a Christian Christ-centered education. However that gets done, that is our responsibility. So education is the communication of life from the living to the living. 08:51 Proverbs 1:5 says, "A wise man will hear and will increase learning, and a man of understanding shall attain unto wise counsels." This is a lifelong pursuit where we learn wisdom and understanding all of our life. A fellow by the name of Broughen Brenner of Cornell University says, 09:13 "Apart from the family, the school is the fundamental institution where children learn to be human and acquire unique values of our democratic society. The evidence indicates that schools are doing a poor job of transmitting such skills and values to our children and adolescents." Well, I would take a little bit issue with Mr. 09:35 Broughen Brenner. Depending on what those values and skills are and what they think that they should be, they're probably doing a pretty good job. Because if the values of the culture, the larger culture, are the purpose of the educational system, and that is to provide a secular, 09:55 atheistic education that is set on transforming American culture for the negative, then they're doing a pretty good job while they're doing a failure job of reading and writing and arithmetic and English and the humanities. And so it depends on what those values are. And so wherever we are, 10:15 we need to look at what are the values of the society that is in charge of the educational system, 10:21 whether that be a school board or whether that be a board of education or National Board of Education or National Association of Educators, which are all ungodly institutions there on a national level. 10:37 So the fact of the matter is that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and knowledge. 10:46 Chapter 1:7 of Proverbs says this: "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and instruction." And then Chapter 9:10 of Proverbs we'll spend a little time in Proverbs here this morning. Chapter 9:10: "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, 11:06 and the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding." So we want to not only teach children how to read, write, and do math and all those things that are skills that are necessary to get along in life to some degree, but we also want to teach them how to live, 11:27 how to live, the communication of life from the living to the living. What is the primary goal of education? 11:37 Well, years back when education began to be a priority in American life, it was the purpose and the goal was to read the Bible, to teach people how to learn to read so that they could read the Bible and so that they could preach and teach the Scriptures. 11:55 You can't teach and preach the Scriptures if you can't read the Scriptures and you don't know the Scriptures. And so the educational institutions in early America were designed to train preachers. The only problem is they took off on a wrong direction already there and became secular in their perspectives. 12:17 And now today, those Ivy League institutions, which were created for the purpose of teaching to read the Bible and preach the Bible, now are bastions of liberalism, progressivism, and atheism. The primary goal beyond that is to impart wisdom and skills training. 12:36 Now, this is an important part. Everybody needs a skill. Everybody needs to be able to make a living. Everybody needs to be able to do something that's productive in our society. And so that should be a part of an education process in a family, to teach our children how to develop the skills that they need. 12:56 Character training. Character training. That's an important part of a biblical Christ-centered education and loving God with the mind. Some people have this idea, well, when it comes to loving God, and we preached on that last Sunday, loving God with all the heart, soul, mind, and strength. Well, 13:16 we'll love God with all of our strength, and we'll love God with all of our heart. But then when we go to the mind, well, we're not sure if we ought to develop the mind and love Him with that as much as because maybe that'll take us somewhere we don't want to go and shouldn't go. 13:34 And it can if you're involved in wrong forms of education. However, to love God with the mind means that every part of our mental capacity should be developed in relationship to loving God and using our minds and our brains for His glory. 13:55 And some people are particularly gifted with that, to use their brains and their minds in remarkable ways to glorify God. So we think about those as being the goals and then perfecting the saints for ministry. 14:16 Yes, all of us are to have a ministry. We're to all have a ministry. We all do have a ministry as believers. And so this takes us to Ephesians Chapter 4, where we are there for the perfecting of the saints. One of the five giftings of leadership is the gifting of teaching. 14:37 Teaching. And what do you teach? What do you teach? Well, we teach Sunday school, and we teach Monday school. Some of you do that, Monday through Friday school. Some of you do that at home. Some of you delegate a teacher in a school to do that. 14:57 But all of life is a 15:02 perfecting of the saints for the work of the ministry. He gave teachers. He gave teachers. Why don't you go to well, let's just look at Proverbs 3 here, what Ryan read this morning. 15:21 "Happy is the man who finds wisdom." Well, this is one thing people want in education. They want to be happy. They want to find happiness. They want to find be able to pursue their goals and their dreams and their aspirations. Well, how do you do that best? Is the one who finds wisdom. 15:42 To find wisdom is the way to find happiness. And the man who gains understanding. There's wisdom, knowledge, understanding. Those three things are so important. "For her proceeds are better than the profits of silver." By the way, this passage here, I think, 16:01 can give us a reason for 16:05 a Christ-centered education. Because you look at different disciplines of education here in this passage, you look at the profits of silver and her gained and fine gold. You think about part of education, learn how to do profit and loss. 16:25 That's arithmetic. That's math. 16:26 That's ciphering, I guess they used to call it. The profits of silver and gold. 16:35 And then you do percentages, and you learn how to compare different incomes and outgo and read financial statements. Does Jesus have anything to say about arithmetic, math? Yes, He does. 16:54 The reason He does is because He made it in an orderly world. 16:57 Math can only work if you have an orderly world where 2 plus 2 is always 4 and never 5, and where the reason we can even have jets that fly across the skies or telescopes and 17:17 satellites that go out into orbit and spaceships is because they can predict where those things are going to be because we have an orderly universe. God has created an orderly universe. If that order were to disintegrate, nothing would work. Amen? And so we have math here in this passage of Scripture. 17:38 "She is more precious than rubies, and all the things you may desire cannot compare with her. Length of days is in her right hand. In her left hand, riches and honor. Her ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace." I was looking at this passage, wondering, well, I wonder where English is in this or languages. 17:58 How to well, it's all the way through here. In fact, the Scripture is about communication. I remember when I was teaching school, oftentimes the students would say, "What do I have to do this for? I'll never use this." Anybody ever heard that before? Anybody ever said that? "What do I have to do this for? I'll never use this. 18:16 What do I have to know how to diagram a sentence or do algebra or geometry or whatever?" Well, to communicate, to communicate, 18:27 to communicate in a way that we can take the Word of God and proclaim it and communicate it in all of its power and all of its authority and all of its accuracy. 18:42 I'm thankful when people come to interpret the Scripture and when they come to 18:51 apply the Scriptures and when they come to translate the Scriptures, they just say, "Well, I think we'll just take whatever comes here. We'll just kind of make a haphazard attempt at translating the Bible." No, it's accuracy. God is a God of accuracy. And so these things are important, important. 19:10 So where I was going with that is the whole thing of communication. And did you realize that the book of Proverbs, much of it is written in poetry? Now, I'm not a poetic kind of fellow. I don't know much about poetry except maybe a Hallmark card or something like that where if something rhymes, I can figure it out. 19:31 But poetry, a lot of the Scripture is written in poetic form. Did you know that? 19:37 And so these are written by inspiration, but also with giving the message to men of God who had a certain amount of knowledge on how to write and how to express God's Word. And so we have poetic form here. 19:59 And then the Lord, by wisdom, founded the earth. By understanding, He established the heavens. By His knowledge, the depths were broken up, and the clouds dropped down the dew. Wow, that's quite a verse there about science, verse 19 and 20, figuring out God's world, figuring out God's world, 20:19 what it's been founded on, and understanding His world and the knowledge of the depths being broken up and the clouds dropping down their dew and sometimes more than dew, floods and torrents of water from hurricanes and so on, and studying God's creation. 20:39 It's a fascinating world we live in. Why would we study it without giving God the glory and the recognition of Him being the Creator and the Sustainer of all things? "My son, let them not depart from your eyes. Keep sound wisdom and discretion so they will be life to your soul and grace to your neck. 21:00 Then you will walk safely in your way, and your foot will not stumble." Oh, world history would be something quite different if men of wisdom, godly wisdom, had been making the decisions in world history. 21:16 When I see this passage here about your foot stumbling and being afraid when you lie down and sleep, that is sweet, and be not afraid of sudden terror nor of trouble from the wicked when it comes. 21:30 I think about world history and the relationships of nations and geography and geology and all the things that cause terror. We have a fascinating world in which we live. But God must be factored into it in order for us to make sense of any of it. 21:51 By the way, the biblical worldview, the Christian worldview based on Scripture, makes more sense than anything that the world has concocted. You believe that? What is the goal? Go over to Ephesians Chapter 4, if you would. We refer to this on a semi-regular basis, 22:11 Ephesians 4. And it has to do with the teaching and training aspect and the development aspect of the church. But I'd like to apply it to educational process this morning. 22:29 Verse 11, "He gave some apostles and prophets and evangelists and pastors and teachers, teachers, teaching the Word of God, teaching the world around us from the perspective of God's world and God's Word, for the equipping of the saints for the work of the ministry, 22:49 for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to unity of the faith, the knowledge of the Son of God, learn maturity and wisdom, character development, proper beliefs, godly thought patterns, mastering skills, spiritual development, 23:06 preparation for a place in life and Christian service." It's all found right here in verses 13 to 16, "Till we all come to the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ." That's maturity. 23:22 The Bible says that Jesus increased in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and favor with man. Should we do any less? Of course not. Jesus increased in wisdom and stature and favor with God and favor with man. 23:42 He matured as an individual and as a man. And so here we have then that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine. And that doctrine can come to us through many different forms. That every wind of doctrine can come to us on the evening news. 24:02 Well, it's not just the evening news anymore. It's the news cycle 24/7. The winds of doctrine, the lies of the enemy, come to us through the news media daily. And it behooves us to have the Christian worldview, the biblical worldview, 24:22 to be able to tell the difference between the lie and the truth so we're not tossed around with every wind of doctrine by the trickery of men in cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting. Discernment, discernment, maturity measured by wisdom, 24:42 becoming more like Jesus, verse 15, "But speaking the truth in love." There's that communication, speaking the truth. We need to learn how to communicate well. He said, "Well, speaking isn't my thing." Well, it wasn't Moses's thing either. But God used him anyway. 25:03 God used him anyway. "Speaking the truth in love may grow up in all things into Him who is the head Christ, from whom the whole body joined and knit together by whatever joint supplies according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love." We think about that in relationship to the church. 25:24 But I think we can also apply this in relationship to our roles as godly men and women in the world around us. So the goal ultimately is the perfecting of the saints. We're not really prepared to live until we have developed character. 25:44 And we can't really develop character until we have learned wisdom. And we can't learn wisdom until we have developed spiritually. And we really can't develop spiritually until we have practiced right thinking. And we can't practice right thinking until we have believed the truth. And we can't believe the truth until we had mastered God's Word or understood God's Word. 26:05 So it all comes together. You see, God never intended an education to be an end in itself, nor has He ever intended it to contribute to the pride, glory, and glory of man. 26:19 Nor has He intended it that that education be by what we judge a man. So we judge a man to be worthy if he has a fine education, and we judge a man to be unworthy if he has an eighth-grade education. That's not what God intended. 26:37 God intended to learn about His world in the best way that we can and be the best at character and wisdom and discernment. And that may mean you have a first-grade education. 26:48 It may mean you have if that's all you can have, it may mean you have a doctorate in some discipline. But learning to love God with our mind and taking what He has given us to the best that we can. So the next question is, who is responsible for education? 27:08 Well, parents, especially fathers. Go back to Proverbs. Now, how many of you would say that Proverbs has a lot of education going on in it? Godly wisdom, godly knowledge, godly understanding. And what was the setting by which it is given? It's as a father to his son, 27:30 as a father to his son. "My son," Chapter 1, verse 8, "Hear the instruction of your father. 27:36 Do not forsake the law of your mother." Chapter 2, verse 1, "My son, if you receive my words and treasure my commands within you." This father is imparting wisdom and understanding and knowledge to his children. 27:58 Chapter 3, verse 1, "My son, do not forget my law, but let your heart keep my commandments." Chapter 4, verse 1, "Hear, my children, the instruction of a father and give attention to no understanding. For I give you good doctrine. Do not forsake my law." Chapter 5, 28:17 verse 1, "My son, pay attention to my wisdom. Lend your ear to my understanding that you may preserve discretion, and your lips may keep knowledge." Chapter 6, verse 1, "My son," again talking about the practical things of life. "My son," Chapter 7, 28:36 verse 1, "Keep my words and treasure my commands within you." Fathers, the New Testament says, "Provoke not your children to wrath, but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, 28:51 the training and instruction and admonition of the Lord." Deuteronomy Chapter 6, we referred to it last Sunday as the Shema. 29:02 That is the rallying cry of the Jewish people. "Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one. And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, with all thy strength." And then it says, "And you shall teach these diligently unto your children and shall talk of them while you walk in the way, 29:23 while you sit, while you lie down, and when you rise up." Fathers, teaching and training. Psalm 78, verse 5 and 6, "That the generation to come might know them." That is the instructions of the Lord. "The children who would be born, that they may arise and declare them to their children, 29:42 that they may set their hope in God and not forget the works of God, but keep His commandments." And so it's a long-term goal. And that is parents teaching children who will teach their children and the grandchildren and the great-grandchildren and the great-great-grandchildren. 30:01 There's about five generations mentioned and listed in Psalm 78. And so who else has responsibility? I believe the church has responsibility. 30:09 Because if you look at this thing of teaching and training as not just transmitting spiritual values or spiritual doctrines, but if you talk about it as being training and disciplining people in how to live. I've learned in prison ministry that's so important, training people how to live. 30:30 I remember meeting a man in prison one time. I had probably met many of them, but this guy particularly stood out to me because he said, "When I get out of here," he said, "I don't even know how to run a lawnmower." He grew up probably in a city somewhere, probably didn't have a lawnmower, didn't need a lawnmower. 30:50 And he said, "I don't even know how to run one." I thought, "Wow." Just because a person comes to the Lord and gives his life to Christ doesn't mean he knows how to run a lawnmower or doesn't mean he knows how to balance a checkbook or doesn't mean he has the skills necessary to support himself and thereby glorify God by working instead of stealing. 31:12 And so part of the mission of the church is not just the transmission of sound doctrine, but the discipline and the discipleship of helping people learn how to live. 31:23 And if we know how to live and God has given us that information, that ability, because we stand on the shoulders of our parents and our grandparents and our great-grandparents who developed a fine way of living, fine communities, fine understanding and skills, we stand on their shoulders. 31:45 Many people don't have that. 31:46 And so is it the role of the church to just teach Christian doctrine? No. It's to disciple so that people know how to live and how to trust God and how to have relationships and how to grow and be productive and flourish. 32:07 The church then, if we look at it in that way, Matthew 28:19-20, "Go into all the world and preach the gospel, teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit." Those are certainly spiritual evangelistic objectives. 32:22 But then it says, "Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you." And I think that all things also includes on how to live, how to take care of the world that God has put us in, how to take care of the family that God has given to us, how to take care of the little piece of property, 32:43 whether I rent it or I own it or I buy it or I give it away or whatever. That's all part of living. These older women, Titus 2 says, "Must train the younger women to love their husbands and their children, to live wisely and be pure, 33:03 to take care of their homes, to do good, and to be submissive to their husbands. Then they will not bring shame on the Word of God in the same way encourage the young men to live wisely in all they do." See, it's about living. It's about communicating life from the living to the living. 33:26 Ezekiel 44:23, "Spoken to the priests, and they shall teach my people the difference between the holy and the profane and cause them to discern between the clean and the unclean." That's one of the roles of teachers, of Christian teachers, 33:46 Sunday school teachers, Monday through Friday teachers, pastors, parents, to teach the difference between the holy and the profane and cause them to discern between the clean and the unclean. That's our responsibility to help people discern. 34:06 What has ruined public education is the government has taken over public education. There was a day when our public schools were almost Christian schools. I went to school for six years in a little two-room schoolhouse. Probably two-thirds of the kids were Mennonites, 34:27 and most of them I was related to. Two-room schoolhouse. I don't remember. I think we said the Pledge of Legion sometimes. So that was part of it. But then, and I don't know. I think we were on the edge of prayer in school. So we kind of bumped over that. But my dad went to the same school, and they had prayer in school. 34:50 But the government got involved in education instead of the community, the public. So we have to be aware of that, that when we look at government schools that. And by the way, that has to do with money, money coming from the Department of Education, 35:11 which, by the way, interesting, is still a debate in our presidential election. One candidate says, "I'm going to get rid of the Department of Education." The other candidate will be a servant of the Department of Education. It is a godless organization because it comes from the world. 35:31 And it has fed dollars into our local schools. And where dollars get fed, control comes. It's just the way it is. Government money brings government control. And so while there are good Christian teachers in the public school system, 35:52 I would never want to imply otherwise. And yes, you can be in a public school system and still love God with your mind and your brain, but it takes a lot of work. It takes extra work because you have to not only you have to overcome some of the garbage that comes with the system. 36:11 Because they will not teach young folks the difference between the holy and the profane and the clean and the unclean. So I don't see any place in scripture where government is given a mandate to teach children. 36:28 Now, they have an interest in that because a government needs to have a society of citizens that know how to read and write and have skills. Yeah. 36:40 So they do have an interest in that if they would stay in their lane instead of getting out into the values of a godless culture that they try to instill on the church. So who is responsible? 36:58 I'd like to give you just a couple of educational affirmations this morning that I think we, as a church, 37:05 no matter where you're at on the spectrum of educational endeavors. Number one, I think we can strive for excellence. I think we must strive for excellence. 37:19 One of the things that's happened in the homeschool movement, I thank God for, and in the Christian school movement, is that there has been an emphasis on excellence in the last 20 years that may not have been there 30, 40, 50 years ago. I think just because we're Christians doesn't mean that we have to have a sub-excellent education. And then secondly, 37:39 parents taking primary responsibility. Wherever your children go to school, parents have to be involved. They must be involved. A lot of times that's mom because she's the one who's closest to the children coming and going. But dad must be involved as well. Thank God for the times when I could come home and dad would help me with my homework. 37:59 Wasn't often, but he was there. And there were checks and balances built into the school that dad was involved. And my dad had an eighth-grade education, but he recognized the value of excellence. Making biblically based education available. Make it available. 38:19 We've worked at that through the years. We don't have our own Christian school, but we do have options that are available. And then part of the reason for this message this morning is to encourage you that are making tuition payments. You are investing in your children. You're investing in the church. 38:39 You're investing in your families. And when you write out that check every month, just be encouraged. Be encouraged because there is a freebie out there that would not cost you anything or very little. 38:58 By the way, I like to see this whole thing of school vouchers. I had said that where government money comes, there's government control. But the voucher system here in Indiana does not have government control because it goes it does not it's supposed to be no strings attached. 39:18 So there's some good things happening in that school choice. But making biblically based education available. And then lastly, connecting education and life so that we're not just learning in sterile environments, but we are learning how to live. 39:37 Let's pray. Father, we thank You for this day, and we thank You for the day in which we live. Many challenges face us. We're faced with challenges from the world. We're faced with challenges from within and without. 39:57 We're faced with challenges with our own sinful nature and pride and selfish desires. Lord, help us to learn how to live in the fear of the Lord, to learn how to live in wisdom, knowledge, 40:17 and understanding about life, about living to the best of our faithfulness and ability in faithfulness to God, who has put us here and given us a world to have dominion over. 40:36 You gave us that dominion in Genesis chapter one and two. And so, Lord, whatever our level of responsibility is for the world around us, let us exercise that well and learn to love God with our minds as well as with our hearts and our soul and our strength. 40:57 And so, Lord, I pray that You will give us encouragement today in this area. And then, Father, I pray for those who are investing their lives in education, whether it be Sunday school or Monday through Friday school, that You would bless them in whatever setting they find themselves in, 41:17 wherever it is that they're called to serve and to grow and to participate. Lord, may we do so with our hearts set on Christ, our minds and our eyes set on eternal values. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.