READING REFLECTION: “TEACHING FOR RESULTS” BY FRINDLEY B.

EDGE

A Paper
Presented to
Mrs. Albert A. Abigail
ECWA Theological Seminary, Kagoro

In Partial
Fulfillment of the
Requirement for the course
Teaching Method

By
Ibrahim Solomon
B. A. Pastoral
ESK/2021048

September, 2022
 INTRODUCTION

Jesus was a teacher and on His teaching served as an example or a model to what he

was teaching. In teaching for result, teachers need to portray what they teach to the students

concern. Frindley, laid more emphasis on the Sunday school teaching, using Jesus as an

example of a good teacher. The author also tried to analyze and evaluate some of the

educational principles followed by Jesus in light with the Jewish education that was present

in Jesus’ days. Frindley, tried to figure out some ways in which Jesus taught during His time.

The reflection will be based on the importance of securing results through our teaching. The

experience of Jesus with the scribes and the Pharisees will serve to illustrate the problem the

teachers face and to indicate some of the danger points a teacher must avoid. All the element

will be discuss randomly. Jesus came teaching in several ways which include:

JESUS AND THE SCRIPTURE

Let us be reminded that there is more to the task of Christian teaching than an

emphasis on content or even on emphasis on practice. Most of the teachers fall into victim of

only impacting knowledge without being a model to the student. The emphasis here is, teach

what you observe, to enable the learner to see a need of emulating, behavior, character and

morals in the life of a teacher. Some are still holding onto the saying that “do what I say, but

do not do what I do” which is Impossible in the life of every learner. Whenever Jesus was

teaching, the scribes and the Pharisees tried to attack Him, just to find any faulty in Him but

they could not, why? Because he was living a life worth of what he teaches. “Pharisees who
known to believe on the Oral laws of Moses, outwardly memorizing them, but not keeping it

contents” they were servants to the law, but with less obedience to what the laws contained.

We see teachers today loaded with wisdom, knowledge and all the requirement of a teacher,

but keeping to what he/she teaches is nothing to take home with. Emulating the principles

that Jesus observed in light of the Jewish education is of great significance to the

contemporary teachers.

For the orthodox Jew there was only one duty “outwardly conformity” to the

commands of the law and to the traditions of the scribes. They also hold onto the outward

memorizing the law and claiming to be inwardly pure. Teacher must understand that,

teaching is good, but is not enough without the practical aspect of it for the learners to grab.

Student don’t only learn what the teacher teaches but together with how the practical life of

the teachers. At the present time, there seems to be a tending religious education back to an

emphasis on the content and message of the Bible. It would be very difficult indeed to find a

period in religious history when a greater emphasis was placed on both the knowledge and

the practice of the law than was done by the Pharisees in the time of Jesus.

JESUS AND THE SYNAGOGUE

The discussion will associate between Jesus and the synagogue on how He taught, and using

His life as an illustration of what He teaches, as a model to the contemporary teachers,

especially in the Sunday school setting. Of course the synagogue where of great help to the
Jews in the Palestine, every towns and villages had their own place of making sacrifice, fasts,

ceremonies and many among others. The synagogue was really the dynamic in the formation

and expression of Judaism. In Jesus time, he was very dedicated in going to the synagogue,

without any doughtiness, it was here (in the synagogue)as well as his home, that he received

much of his early religious training. It was a custom for Him to attend, it said that “it was

there that He began his public ministry (Luke 4:19-27). Throughout his ministry he often

taught n the synagogue (Matt. 13:54; John 6:59; 18:20). And in all, Jesus was proclaiming

His message with authority, why because the display was there for the people to adopt.

Certainly the part of it was found in the kind of Life He lived. Frindley will assert that “For

his (Jesus) life not only lent power to his teaching but provided a concrete illustration of what

he taught. One will search long and far to find a greater authority than this”1

JESUS AND FREEDOM

1
Frindley B. Edge, Teaching For Result, (Broadman Press: Nashville, 1956), 3
 Jesus never forced anybody to listen to Him, and his teachings also. Even the young

man that came to Jesus to follow Him, Jesus explained everything both the joy and suffering

aspect of following Christ, when heard all this, he rejected and went away. Jesus looked at

him sorrowing but no matter how much Jesus desired that this young man conform to his

teaching, he would will not force that conformity. So it is worth knowing that, teacher has

their own role to play in the life of the student, the approach, method of teaching can also

help to sharpen the understanding of the learner. The principles that Jesus followed in

teaching the Jews in allowing them to willingly listen to Him also, the five thousand people

that Jesus fed can reveal to us how people came from different places to sit under Him to

learn without force. Why because the people saw the value and the need to hear the word of

God, through the Son. Jesus never forced his disciples to follow him, it was a voluntary act.

One of the truly amazing features of the educational ministry of Jesus was the freedom which

he allowed his learners and the freedom which he demanded for himself. Learners are not to

be force to learn, because being free in a class makes one to be serious in studies. And also

make a student to associate with his/her teacher. Jesus was able to fit in to the context of the

people He ministered to. Jesus has the most important subject matter, education has ever

known, the message that would lead to the establishing of right relations between man and

God, He left the individual free to think for himself and choose for himself.

JESUS AND MOTIVATION

outward responses. He was constantly seeking to lead individuals into a spiritual relationship

with God that would express itself in outward acts. It was the spiritual relationship that was

important and not the outward acts alone. The types of education of his day was concerned

primarily with outward acts. It taught that the observance of the ceremonial law was counted

as righteousness regardless of the motive or spirit behind it. In one of his clashes with the

scribes and Pharisees because he failed to heed their ceremonial law, Jesus said, “Go ye and

learn what this meaneth, I desire mercy and not sacrifice” (Matt. 9:13). Jesus was here

charging the revered among pious teachers of the law with ignorance of Hosea 6:6. A. T.

Robertson says that, “the Go ye and learn was a common formula with the rabbis, and the

use of it by Jesus as rabbi to rabbis has additional force and even sting.”2 One can imagine

the consternation and indignation of these Jewish teachers as they listened to one who had

never even attended the rabbinic schools accuse them of ignorance of the law that they had

spent their lives studying. But Jesus, in teaching his followers, had to change not only the

content but the method of their thinking. According to Squires “He led their attention away

from the outward act to the inner thought an attitude which were the source of the outward

act.”3 This emphasis by the Jews on the outward act without sufficient concern for inner

motivation led to certain unfortunate and undesirable results. For one thing, it saved a system

but lost the individual. One of the main results was the preservation of traditional Judaism.

2
Robertson, A. T., The Pharisees and Jesus, (New York; Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1920), 114.
3
Squires, W.A., The Pedagogy of Jesus in the Twilight of Today (New York: FGeorge H. Doran Co., 1927), 127
Judaism, as an institution, was no longer a means to an end; it became an end in itself. It was

the object of supreme value, and the preservation of the institution came to be the all-

absorbing aim.

This type of education achieved am eternal conformity but it lost the inner

experience. In this period, religion came to be not a communion between man and God but a

conduct legally correct. This legalistic observance cared little for inward motive; it was

concerned primarily with outward observance. Since the motives were of an external nature,

the result was an externalizing of the religious and moral life. When the individual became

subject to an external authority, a legal norm, the result was inevitable a formal externalism

in life. freedom is the essence of moral action. But when the moral life of an individual has

placed under this legal norm, free moral action became completely crushed under the burden

of numberless legal requirements. In every area of life, action no longer proceeded from

inward motive, was no longer the free manifestation of a moral disposition, but resulted from

the external correctness of the action. Jesus too, was interested in “result”. On many

occasions he emphasized the importance, even the necessity, for his followers to give an

outward expression of their religion in everyday relationships. “Whoever heareth these

sayings of mine and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man.” (Matt. 7:24). The point

here is that, Jesus sought to lead men into a relationship with God so that the results came as

the outward expression of a life transformed by that new relationship. Herein is found both

the motive and the power for any results we may seek as Christian teachers.
 Obviously, the lives of all whom Jesus taught were not thus changed. But when we

look at those who did enter into this new relationship with God we are impressed by the

transformation in their lives and the depth of their conviction even on the face of the most

serious personal and social difficulties. Because of the masterful way in which Jesus taught,

men began to live abundant lives, worthy of the God whom Jesus revealed. The test as to

whether or not the teaching of Jesus was experiential is not hard to find. That his followers

learned their “lessons” is proved by the way in which they were willing to live by them and

die for them. The lessons they learned in the “classroom” carried over into everyday life.

their transformed lives were so fruitful and dynamic that people marveled at them (Acts

2;12). They grasped his teaching so their experience and considered what they had learned to

be so valuable that they felt compelled to share these teachings with others. The book of Acts

is a continuous illustration of the strong impulse to share with others the precious, life-giving

knowledge they had gained, even on the face of persecution. Men do not normally suffer

hardships fro lessons that are only half learned, nor do they die for doctrines to which they

give mere intellectual assent. However religion was no longer a matter of intellectual assent

and external obedience to a legalistic norm. Religion was now a matter of vital life

experience, and neither the might of the Roman Empire nor the wiles of Satan were able to

overcome it. Jesus taught, and men’s attitude were change and brought in line with the will

of God. This was religious education at its best. This is the kind of results that we as

Christian teachers seek toady.

Yet those who work closest with the Sunday school would be the first to admit they are not

set getting the results they desire. Christian teachers are doing the best the knowhow, but

they are conscious of the fact that there is urgent need for improvement. One of the

outstanding leaders of Sunday school work of the last generation, said, “They avowed

purpose of the Sunday school is to teach Bible.” This emphasis has been one of the strength

of evangelical Christianity. However, in spite of it, many people even those who attend

regularly, are woefully ignorant concerning Bible knowledge. In a nation-wide survey of

Bible knowledge conducted by leading magazines, the findings were tragic as well as

revealing knowledge of Biblical facts does not necessarily give an accurate measure of a

person’s spiritual development, but it is certainly a desirable objective for a Christian to be

familiar with the Bible. Although teaching Bible knowledge is not the ultimate aim of

Sunday school, it is one of its important tasks. This would seem to indicate that we are not

getting the results in Bible knowledge we would desire. 0in the area of Christian living, it is

true that Bible knowledge is not the primary objective of Sunday school teaching, Christian

living is. A mere casual observation would indicate that we are not getting the results in

changed lives that are to be expected. Teaching does not carry over sufficiently into life. too

often it dies in the classroom. In the great commission Jesus said, “go ye therefore, and teach

all nations, baptizing them in the name of the father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit:

teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and lo, I am with
you always, even unto the end of the world” (Matt. 28:19-20). Here Jesus emphasizes that

our task is not just to teach men the content of his message; he indicate also that is not

completed until until those whom we teach practice in their daily lives that which we teach.

The great problem in our contemporary is how to teach so that the great ideals of Jesus,

presented in the classroom, will carry over into the lives of those who come to Sunday

school. And every good teacher must absents themselves from teaching the concept of

verbalization, where by a learner may memorize the teacher’s words without understanding

the concepts. This is commonly “parroting.” Educators call it “verbalizing.” Teachers use

words to reach religion as learner progress from adolescence through youth into adulthood.

Learners memorize verses of scripture, doctrinal affirmations, and religious vocabulary.

That’s the problem year after yea, learners come to Sunday school. They learn the words that

describe religious experiences, and they tend to identify this with having had the experiences.

Jesus pointed out this same problem: the Pharisees verbalized the teachings of the prophets

without learning the spirit of those teaching in their own experience. How much this is

happening in our schools today, learning words that describe a religious experience is not the

same as having the religious experience. Christianity is a personal encounter with God; it is a

relationship, an experience.

In all the discussion above, Jesus is seen as a role model for the contemporary

teachers, though it may be said that, Jesus did not follow the teaching procedures as we have

now, but as far as people could understand and also practice some of the morals, one can
asserts that it was a good approach in times of teaching for result is concern. Meanwhile,

teachers are to serve as example for the learners, especially in a Sunday school setting. Not

only memorizing the scripture is desirable, but also trailing the instruction been memorized.

A lot of children learn all the memorization and live them in the classroom, why because the

proper theology or meaning of the text is well explained.

Finally, the issue of evangelism within the Sunday school setting is a recent adoption,

not even in every event. Teachers look down on the children thinking he/she is still small to

be converted. But John 3:16 assured us that, “whosoever believe in Him” children are not

exempted in this matter, so this lesson or reflection has helped the reader to see the need for

effective teaching, that transform, gives way, saves one from the bondage of sin, especially

to the little children because they too are very important.

CONCLUSION

Every teacher teaches for results, and that should be the perspective of every Sunday

school teacher, who are ready to teach the younger ones that are coming up, with the

enlightenment on salvation, faith that produces works, memorizing and puttingword into

practice, obedience to the word been memorized, and as many as the objectives may be.