Sunday school last bastion for Scriptures
by John M. Drescher, Quakertown, Pa.
I appreciate the Aug. 19 issue on Sunday school and Wilbert R Shenk’s helpful response (Readers Say, Sept. 16). For a number of years I have shared wherever I can about how biblically illiterate we have become. I serve as campus pastor at a Mennonite middle school, and I am shocked that many kids don’t know the Ten Commandments or the Lord’s Prayer. Our daughter and husband were helping with conference youth and gave a Bible quiz. They asked whether the Easter story is in the Old Testament or in the New Testament. Approximately half did not know. The head of a Bible department in one of our colleges said to me, “You wouldn’t believe the difference in the students today and those 20 or more years ago. These students don’t know the simplest Bible stories.”
The Sunday school classes I’ve been in the past number of years are often a waste of time as far as teaching solid biblical truth. I told our congregational leadership we need teacher training for Sunday school teachers. Might the Sunday school be the last bastion and best opportunity for teaching the Scripture in our congregations? Solid Bible teaching can hardly be done in a 10- to 20-minute sermon.
Associated Issue: More than Sunday school - Aug. 19, 2008
Associated Article: It takes more than Sunday school
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