Theological Basis for Christian Education and Social Change
Church in the World
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1. Introduction
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Christian Education plays an important role in helping the Church
to understand the relationship between faith and action. The Church in the
world can be a medium of sharing God’s love to those who are unprivileged in
the society. This paper attempts to find out the theological basis for
Christian Education and Social Change and its implication for today’s world.
2. Definitions
2.1 Church
It
is defined as a building used for public Christian worship. It is also known as
the house of God, the Lord’s house, house of prayer etc.[1]
2.2 World
The world is the planet earth and all life upon it, including human civilization. In a philosophical context, the
world is the whole of the physical universe, or an ontological world. In
a theological context, the world is the material or the profane
sphere, as opposed to the celestial, spiritual, transcendent or sacred.[2]
2.3 Christian Education
Christian education is designed to help individuals, young and old
to grow in Christian likeness and to aid in realizing the kingdom of Love and
righteousness among men, its purpose is to bring about the development of
Christ like persons and a more Christian society.[3]
2.4 Social Change
According to K. Device, social change means the alternation or
modification that occur in a situation over a time in social organization i.e.
the structure and the function of society. It is the change in human interactions
and interrelations. Jones also defines it as a term used to describe variation
in social interaction, progress or social organization.[4]
Social change refers to any significant alteration over time in behaviour
patterns and cultural values and norms.[5]
3. Biblical Understanding of the Church
The word church in the Bible comes
from the Greek word ecclesia, which means a called out company or assembly.
Wherever it is used in the Bible it refers to people. The emphasis is on its
unity and the basis of this unity is made clear: “one Lord, one faith, one
baptism.” We see the word church used in three different ways: Firstly, as the
body of Christ, the church is often defined as a local assembly or group of
believers (1 Corinthians 1:2; 2 Corinthians 1:1; Galatians 1:1-2). Secondly, it
is defined as the body of individual living believers (1 Corinthians 15:9;
Galatians 1:13). Finally, it is defined as the universal group of all people
who have trusted Christ through the ages (Matthew 16:18; Ephesians 5:23-27).[6]
4. Church and the World
The same love that binds the church together as a body also binds
the church to the world. “For God so loved the world that they gave his only
son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have
eternal life. For God sent the son into the world, not to condemn the world,
but that the world might be saved through him” (John 3:16-17). There is always
a risk to the church as it seeks to live in mission in the midst of the world.
When it involves itself in social issues, it incurs the wrath of those whose
wrongs it condemns. Living in the world, it may become like the world, churches
in non-Christian cultures are confronted by a problem how much to withdraw form
society, and yet how to be identified with society enough to play a vital role
in the lives of the people. When the church, like its Lord, gives itself in
sacrificial, redemptive love to the world, it has the power and transform and
recreate. [7]
4.1 Nature and Purpose of the Church
The early Christian church recognized that four functions were
inherently essential, recorded for us in Acts 2:41, 42, as Follows: Evangelism
(vs.41), Education (vs.42), Edification (vs.42), and Fellowship (vs.42). Rooted
in the deepest tradition and practice of the Christian church is education. The
Apostle Paul likewise adopted the goal of Christlikeness as the character goal
for the church. “Christ in you, the hope of glory, whom we preach… that we may
present every man perfect in Christ Jesus (Col. 1:27, 28).[8]
The church is composed of the body of Christ, the corporate body of believers.
The goal here, therefore, is to form a great missionary society in which the
goal is to enlist every disciple of Christ in this body and develop them into
efficient Apostles. The method to be employed is witnessing and evangelism,
expressed in the Great commission. In order to facilitate this objective, the
Church, as the kingdom of Christ, moves out into society as a spiritual leaven
with a spiritual program called the kingdom of heaven.[9]
4.2 Church as the light of the world
Light is seen as an important metaphor in the Bible “God is light”
according to I John 1:5, and Christ is described in the fourth gospel as “the
light of the world” (John 8:12, 12:46). God is also described as light in
eschatological context (Isaiah 60:19-20, Rev. 21:10-11), God moreover has come
in Christ to bring light into the darkness (John 1:4-5, 12:46, Ps 27:1). Paul’s
metaphor also extends to Christians, who were described as the “Children of light”
(Eph 5:8, I Thess 5:5). In Isaiah 42:6, Israel’s mission is to be the “light to
the gentiles.”[10]
4.3 Mission and the Church
In the New Testament “Church” occurs in 115 times. Jesus said, “On this rock I’ll build my church, and the gates of the hades will not overcome it” (Matt. 16:18). The church is the household of God and the pillar and foundation of the truth (I Tim. 3:15). It is the mystery hidden form all ages; the divinely inspired organisation dedicated by God t breaking down ethnic walls so people from all backgrounds might be one in Christ (Eph. 3:10). The Church occupies central place and Christ continues to do from his position as the right hand of God. In Luke and Acts, Luke records what “Jesus continues to do and to teach until the day he was taken up to Heaven” (Acts 1:1-2).[11]
5. Role of Church and Christian Education
5.1 Church as Educator
A church is an educational institution primarily because of this
kind of fact, because, in short, by its very presence, it produces so largely
the presuppositions of social thinking, and maintains a great body of standards
that are taken for granted. The church of the spirit must therefore provide
means and measures for continual spiritual renewal at the sources of spiritual
life. The church considered as educator is primarily a fellowship of older and
younger persons, and that if this fellowship be rich and aspiring it will be
educationally effective, whatever be the material and the method of
instruction. Church education at its best in an initiation into a living
fellowship. Good fellowship in the
church is itself a process of Christian education.[12]
5.2 Church and society
The church differs from any other organization of the good will,
and why a child needs any social training beyond participation in ordinary
philanthropies and reforms, the answer is that, in spite of shortcomings, the
churches, and they only of all our social institutions, undertake to accept the
radical consequences of Jesus’ social idealism. The churches are called by
their own confirmed principles to carry this social radicalism into life.
Specifically Christian education adds to the other agencies of social progress.
Church can develop communion with God in and through growing social
intelligence and growing social purpose, as these, conversely, can be developed
through communion with God.[13]
5.3 Church
and its involvement in the world[14]
5.3.1
Liberation
The way in which the local churches move beyond their present
indecision will have profound implications for the future of the universal
church. If the church finds itself at the very heart of the contradictions
plaguing societies undergoing change, if it is involved in their fissures and
fixations, it is because the church has been in charge of their relationship
with God. The unthinkable becomes thinkable when the church, which had been
preaching resignation, begins to tell the poor that it is God who is summoning
them to stand on their own feet; that it is God who wants them to take in hand
the work of building the social organizations they need to improve their living
conditions.
The role proposed to the church is that of organizing and
mobilizing the resources at its disposal in order to conscientize those who are
ready to listen to what it has to say.
The mass movements of the first type often begin with the establishment
of basic ecclesial communities in which members try to rediscover the good news
proclaimed to the poor, they share the exhilaration of the exodus from Egypt or
the return of the Jews from exile. Even in the midst of repression they feel
themselves to be a captive people in the process of liberating itself. Calmly
and peacefully they go about the process, having no weapon but the gospel
message and its subversive, mobilizing force.
Today millions of Christians are to be found in countries that were held
under colonial and postcolonial domination for centuries. It is the church that
the cry of the voiceless oppressed has the best chance of being heard.
5.3.2 Transformation
Collective awareness in so-called advanced societies is heavily
influenced by the conviction that they are indeed in advance of underdeveloped
societies.
Christ’s followers, therefore, are
called, in one way or another, not to conform to the values of society but to
transform them (Rom. 12:1-2; Eph. 5:8-14). This calling flows from our
confession that God loves the world and that the earth belongs to
Him. According to the biblical view of human life, then, transformation is
the change from a condition of human existence contrary to God’s purpose to one
in which people are able to enjoy fullness of life in harmony with God (John
10:10; Col. 3:8-15; Eph. 4:13). This transformation can only take place through
the obedience of individuals and communities to the Gospel of Jesus Christ,
whose power changes the lives of men and women by releasing them from the
guilt, power, and consequences of sin, enabling them to respond with love
toward God and toward others (Rom. 5:5), and making them “new creatures in
Christ” (2 Cor. 5:17). We have come to see that the goal of
transformation is best described by the biblical vision of the Kingdom of God.
This new way of being human in submission to the Lord of all has many facets.
In particular, it means striving to bring peace among individuals, races, and
nations by overcoming prejudices, fears, and preconceived ideas about others.
It means sharing basic recourses like food, water, the means of healing, and
knowledge. It also means working for a greater participation of people in the
decisions which affect their lives, making possible an equal receiving from
others and giving of themselves. Finally, it means growing up into Christ in
all things as a body of people dependent upon the work of the Holy Spirit and
upon each other.
5.3.3 Upliftment
From Pope Leo XIII until Vatican II, the predominant value the
Church sought to promote in society was social stability and order. The Church
would speak out on behalf of the poor but, at the same time, exhort the poor to
be patient and not disturb the existing order. The poor were invited to follow
the suffering Christ – a call usually supported by an escapist and
other-worldly spirituality.
The mission of Church to society is neither to uphold the status quo, nor to topple it by violent
means. Its challenge is to give a deliberately chosen and lived witness of
contradiction to the unjust status quo,
and of opposition to those who seek to uphold it because they benefit from it.
The afflictions of the poor, in Jesus’ time as much as today, were in large measure caused by repression, discrimination and exploitation by the rich and powerful, the upholders of the status quo. In his ministry, Jesus focused quite deliberately on those who had been pushed aside: in his compassionate outreach to these outcasts, Jesus concretely embodied God’s reign as good news for the poor; God’s reign would mean the end of their misery and the introduction of a new order of social relationships based on the principle of inclusion. No one is excluded from the love of God “who causes his sun to rise on bad as well as good, and sends down rain to fall on the upright and the wicked alike” (Mt 5:45). What amazes one again and again is the inclusiveness of Jesus’ mission. It embraces both poor and rich, both the oppressed and oppressor, both the sinners and the devout. His mission is one of dissolving alienation and breaking down walls of hostility, of crossing boundaries between individuals and groups.
6. Theological Implications on Church
6.1 Church as People of God
The church is ‘God’s own people’ (1 Pet. 2:9). One belongs to the
‘household of faith’. Gal. 6:10, as one belongs to a family or a nation. He
inherits his membership, and yet he exerts his citizenship. This membership is
God’s gift, and yet we must accept it. God brings His people into existence
through His mercy, and in turn they declare His wonderful deeds. [15]
The people of God can come together and join their hands in the transformation
of the world. Christian education through curriculum can be implemented by the
Church in order to shape the society.
6.2 Church as community of called people
In Ekklessia, Ek = out of, klesia = call. Therefore the “called
out” ones. It is used in the new
testament in many different ways, sometimes referring to a single community, sometimes
to the whole church and sometimes to the churches (in plural) (2 Cor.1:1; 1 Cor.
10:32; 1 Thes. 2:14). It is both assembly of persons and a corporate body of
those who have been “called out.” The scriptures do focus on a calling out of
darkness into His marvelous light (1 Peter 2:9) and a calling into the
fellowship of His Son (1 Cor 1:9) and turning to God from idols (1 Thes 1:9).[16]
The Church as a community of called people, through Christian education, can
lighten the world by abolishing the evil practices, removing the oppressing
structures of the society and redempting them from the bondages of social evil.
6.3 Church as fellowship
‘Koinonia’ means fellowship, communion, community, sharing and
participation. We are told that after the first converts at Pentecost were
baptized, they ‘devoted themselves to the apostles” teaching and fellowship, to
the breaking of bread and the prayers’ (Acts 2:42). Paul speaks of ‘participation
in the spirit (Phi.2:1) and of participation in the body and blood of Christ. (1
Cor. 10:16. [17]
The Church can serve as a fellowship for those who are discriminated, hated,
and rejected by the society. The Church can open up the doors and share from
their resources towards the marginalized community of the society. The Church
can participate in the good cause of liberating the oppressed and suppressed in
the society and welcome them to be the part of the fellowship which can nurture
them through love and care.
7. Conclusion
The Church in the world is a not just a mere fellowship but the community of believers who are united in faith and joined in action for the social change. Christian education can shape the society and influence the society to be Christlike community. Church through Christian education can reach out to the world in a wider spectrum and affect the society by educating it.
Bibliography
Albert Coe, George. A Social
Theory of Religious Education. New York: Charles Scribners Sons), 1917.
Byane. H.W., (ed.,), A
Christian Approach to Education. Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House,
1971.
Cosmao, Vincent. Changing the
World. New York: Orbis Books, 1984.
Crump
Miller, Randolph. The Educational Mission
of the Church. New York,World council of Christian Education and Sunday
School Association, 1962.
Crump
Miller, Randolph Christian Nurture and The Church. New York, Charles Scribner’s
Sons, 1961.
Donald, Hagner A. World
Biblical Commentary. Texas: World Book Publisher, 1993.
Mckibben,
Frank M. Christian Education Through the
church. New York, Abingdon-Coklesbury Press, 1947.
Ranck. Allan, Education for
Mission. New York: Friendship Press, 1961.
Wright, Eric E. A Practical
Theology of Missions; Dispelling the mystery; recovering the passion.
Malta: Gutenberg press, 2010.
Ramesh, Ghanta, and B.N. Dash. Foundations of Education.
Hyderabad: Neelkamal Publications Pvt. Ltd., 2004.
Vries, Egbert De. Man in Rapid Social Change. London: SCM Press Ltd, 1961.
Online Source
“Social Change Defined,” n.d.
https://www.cliffsnotes.com/study-guides/sociology/social-change-and-movements/social-change-defined.
https://www.merriam-webster.com, Accessed on 4/7/17, at 3:30pm.
https://www.researchgate.net, Accessed on 4/7/17, at 3:30pm.
[2] https://www.researchgate.net,
Accessed on 4/7/17, at 3:30pm.
[3]
Frank M. Mckibben, Christian Education Through the church,(New York,
Abingdon-Coklesbury Press, 1947), pg 23
[4] Ghanta
Ramesh and B.N. Dash, Foundations of Education (Hyderabad: Neelkamal
Publications Pvt. Ltd., 2004), 154.
[5] “Social
Change Defined,” n.d.,
https://www.cliffsnotes.com/study-guides/sociology/social-change-and-movements/social-change-defined.
Accessed on 03/07/2017, 12:10 PM.
[6]
Randolph Crump Miller, The Educational
Mission of the Church, (New York,World council of Christian Education and
Sunday School Association, 1962), pg 6
[7] J.
Allan Ranck, Education for Mission
(New York: Friendship Press, 1961), 18-19.
[8]
H.W. Byane, (ed.,), A Christian Approach
to Education (Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House, 1971),106-107.
[9]
H.W. Byane, (ed.,), A Christian Approach
to Education (Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House, 1971), 111.
[10]
Hagner A. Donald, World Biblical
Commentary (Texas: World Book Publisher, 1993). 100.
[11]
Eric E. Wright, A Practical Theology of
Missions; Dispelling the mystery; recovering the passion (Malta: Gutenberg
press, 2010), 216.
[12]
George Albert Coe, A Social Theory of
Religious Education (New York: Charles Scribners Sons, 1917), 85-89.
[13]
George Albert Coe, A Social Theory of
Religious Education (New York: Charles Scribners Sons, 1917), 92-95.
[14]
Vincent Cosmao, Changing the World (New York: Orbis Books, 1984), 40-55.
[15]
Randolph Crump Miller, The Educational
Mission of the Church, (New York,World council of Christian Education and
Sunday School Association, 1962), pg 8
[16]
Randolph Crump Miller, The Educational
Mission of the Church,………………………pg 14
[17]
Randolph Crump Miller, The Educational
Mission of the Church,…………………..pg 9
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