Chauncey C. Riddle
c. 1984
I. What is the Relationship of Education to Living the Gospel?
Repentance in the Restored Gospel can be viewed as the process of change. Specifically, it is the change from being a natural man to becoming one who possesses the divine nature of the Savior. To endure to the end is to repent so completely that we become new creatures, just men made perfect, even as our Savior is perfect.
Seen this way, repentance is an educational process. It involves comprehending something that is better, then achieving that better condition. Line upon line, precept upon precept, the servant of Christ is taught to understand and then to exemplify a new mode of being and living.
To construe repentance as education is not to construe all education as repentance, for one can learn to become evil as well as good. But viewing education in this manner does help us better to promote repentance. We see clearly that repentance is the process wherein gospel principles are progressively taught and learned, thus enabling the faithful to govern themselves correctly.
The principle reason for the existence of The Church of Jesus Christ in every dispensation is to promote repentance. Members of the Church do this first by teaching and preaching the gospel to all to whom the Savior sends it. The gospel is the basic message as to how to repent. Then, for those who accept the gospel, the authorities of the Church assume the responsibility of assisting in the perfecting of the Saints, encouraging all who desire to do as to endure to the end. In this process, everything in this world that is virtuous, lovely, of good report, or praiseworthy is sought after for the children of Christ in order that they may come to the fullness of Christ.
While it is the principle responsibility of church leaders to promote repentance, gospel education in the full sense, that opportunity is shared by every member of the kingdom. Apostles, prophets, and presidents are set to teach, preach, expound, and exhort as they lead the house of Israel to become like the Savior. But it is a wicked and slothful servant that must be commanded in all things. Each covenant servant has within him the gift of the Holy Ghost, that precious pearl of great price which empowers each to be an agent himself, to receive knowledge and direction from heavenly sources, and to bring to pass much righteousness by careful, repentant obedience.
Every faithful person in The Church of Jesus Christ thus ought to be engaged in the process of education. Each one should be seeking, searching, learning from those who are above him in the stewardship structure of the kingdom. Each should be teaching those in his stewardship, and each person should be humble enough to learn from those under him in stewardship.
The thesis here maintained is that repentance will be enhanced in the Church by seeing it as a species of education, and that education will be enhanced in the Church by seeing it as a species of repentance. Such a view would promote the following consequences:
- It would become plain that knowing the gospel is not enough; that it is doing what we know which fulfills both repentance and education.
- It would be more easily recognized that telling people what they ought to do is only the first step of leadership; helping them to learn to do what they ought to do is also required for repentance and for education.
- Seen this way, repentance would lose the negative connotation it has for some (that which sinful people need to do) and would become the way of life for all church members who are not yet perfect.
- Seen this way, education would become a lifelong way of living for all church members—learning to know and being able to do every good thing, and thus becoming able to help others in every way possible, as did the Savior.
- Just as repentance is seen to be a means, not an end, linking it with education would help all to see that education is not an end but a means to greater service to others, a preparation for righteousness. This would tend to cure one of the persistent perversions of the “civilized” world: the idea that education is an end, sometimes help to be the ultimate end, in itself.
- If the additional idea of hungering after excellence is added to education, quality added to quantity, then education as repentance, clearly centers on the Savior. For it is he who is the spirit of truth and the light of the world, showing the world a more excellent way. Only in and through Jesus Christ is quality education fulfilled, just as only in and through him is repentance fulfilled. He is the fountain of all truth and of all righteousness.
Conclusion: Greater emphasis on lifelong education in the Church and linking it to repentance would enhance both education and repentance.
II. What is the Mission of Latter-day Saints in This World?
The life mission of any member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is identical to that of any other member in its general features. Those features are that:
- The whole of each person’s life is seen to be a mission in the cause of Jesus Christ from the time one receives the covenant of baptism until one is released with his final breath. This means that one is on a mission twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, at home or abroad, in sickness or in health, and in whatever marital state or church calling one is found.
- Each person’s daily assignment in that mission is to turn his assigned portion of evil into good. Defining evil as that which is not good as it could be and taking the Savior as the standard of good, the life goal of a Latter-day Saint is to do that which the Savior would do as if he had our stewardship as his own. Our life should be one continuous labor to uplift, to enoble, to beautify, to instruct, to correct, to celestialize all around us, when, where, and how it is appropriate to our stewardship and as directed by the Holy Spirit.
A child forlorn, frightened, sobbing is an evil of this world: it is the mission of a Saint to hold that child, to administer comfort, security, and understanding as the manifestation of a pure and inspired love, thus turning an evil into something better. A ward choir which sings grudgingly, mechanically, egotistically is an evil; with skill, sensitivity, and love an inspired director can lift every participant to praise God in voice and song, to bear witness and gratitude through the meaning of the lyrics, to sing to bless rather than for recognition or reward. A widow’s home is unpainted, with sagging doors, cracked panes, and drafty casements; brethren of the priesthood who are skilled and who care descend upon that home and leave dignity in place of deterioration. There are children of an Andean village who have no opportunity for education; a low-cost, locally administered self-help program is designed, embodied, and delivered, giving those children access to the modern world. A people languish in ignorance of their true spiritual heritage: their need is assuaged by the teaching of the Restored Gospel in their midst.
Every father, mother, builder, teacher, chemist, administrator, repairman who is a covenant servant of Christ should be striving each day to make the world a better place, to uplift, encourage, and comfort not only fellow Latter-day Saints but ultimately all of the earth’s inhabitants. No one except the President of the Church carries the burden to worry about the whole world, for each of the rest of us has a more limited stewardship. Each morning each faithful servant should go to his knees in prayer to discern his assigned quotient of evil to be turned into good for that day, knowing that the powers of heaven will assist his faithful labor and that therefore his day will be “sufficient unto the evil thereof.”
Compensation is one of the last things the true servant is concerned about. He knows that he must perform honorable work and be compensated for it to provide for himself and for his family and to have a modest surplus with which to bless others. He knows that his greatest personal opportunity is to turn evil into good for which he is not compensated. Therefore, he deliberately spreads his resources of wisdom, knowledge, skill, and substance in many times and places where there cannot or should not be any return favor. He always remembers that it is to the Savior that he is beholden for his health, strength, mentality, knowledge, wisdom, and skill with which to bless, be it in compensated or noncompensated opportunities to do good.
Thus the daily mission of a Latter-day Saint is to search out the mind and will of the Savior relative to his formal and informal callings, then to turn evil into good in those callings. He does it cheerfully, gladly, and gratefully, rejoicing in the goodness of our Savior. He thinks about poverty, ignorance, disease, inferior values, and corruption in high and low places and strives to help. He may need to invent, translate, build, tear down, persuade, expose, correlate, and cooperate, but all with pure motive and under the direction of his Master, the Lord Jesus Christ.
Whatever preparation he needs to fulfill his task, he seeks; he begins with personal repentance from all sin, carries through to the acquisition of knowledge and skills, and his efforts culminate in attaining power in the priesthood to do all good things. This is the true education and repentance. It is likely that through the efforts of such servants of Jesus Christ this earth will be first terrastrialized, then celestialized and delivered spotless and whole to its worthy creator.
III. How and by Whom Should Latter-day Saints be Educated?
- Individuals ought to be motivated to learn the gospel (as opposed to emphasizing programs that teach them the gospel) and likewise motivated to do all that they can in righteousness to better themselves in the social and economic context in which they are personally located. The individual member of the Church must believe that his own efforts to learn the gospel and also all other worthwhile knowledge are efficacious. He must see that his own efforts are the most important factors which affect the quality of his spiritual and material well-being. It seems that too many of our members, especially in new and economically developing countries, are led to believe that their future well-being is unrelated to their present activity, that they are personally powerless to alter the circumstances of their lives. There seems to be a need to redirect such thinking toward personal initiative and responsibility.
- The family, headed by a righteous patriarch and faithful spouse, should be responsible for making certain that their posterity are fully instructed in all they need to know to be faithful to Christ, to overcome the world, and to subdue the earth.
IV. The Role of the Patriarch in Zion.
A patriarch is a faithful servant of Jesus Christ, a bearer of the Melchizedek Priesthood who is yoked with a faithful spouse in the temple covenants of eternal marriage.
The personal goal of every patriarch and his wife should be to endure to the end, which is life eternal. Their family goal should be to so lead and inspire their posterity that they also come to know the Savior.
The process of enduring to the end is mainly an educational process. One must be taught the gospel message and be taught to do all that it entails. The educational role of the patriarch and his wife is to assure that their children are fully instructed in all they need to know to be faithful to Christ, to overcome the world, and to subdue the earth.
If the patriarch and his wife have fully learned to be faithful to Christ, to overcome the world, and to subdue the earth, and if they have learned to do and are doing all they should do, then they can fulfill their role, which has three principle parts:
- To love purely, so that each person in his stewardship is enveloped in a spiritually oriented atmosphere of unconditional love. Giving this emotional sustenance is by all odds the most important thing a patriarch and his wife ever do.
- To instruct by example and by precept in every important matter, in order that those in their stewardship can learn all that they need to know and do, in both spiritual and temporal matters.
- To provide such spiritual, physical, social, and economic protection and support as is necessary and appropriate.
These persons thus blessed by the patriarchal order have the maximum earthly opportunity to exercise agency. For it is only this divine order coupled with the Restored Gospel and the authority of the Priesthood which provide full free agency to any person on this earth.
V. The Educational Ideal for Zion.
What kinds of education will righteous parents foster for those in their stewardship? Six kinds of education are proposed:
1- Family Education. The patriarch and his wife should assume direct personal responsibility for instructing each of their children in each of the following areas:
Personal discipline
- Emotional steadiness
- Intellectual honesty
- Physical orderliness
- Unselfishness
Language skills (including a foreign language, if possible) Spiritual matters
- The gospel
- How to receive and live by the gifts of the Spirit
- The scriptures
- The order of the Church
- The order of the Priesthood
Work (learning to do and to love it)
Ability to cooperate
Hygiene
- Cleanliness
- Body functions
- Nutrition
- Exercise
- Healing
Sex education
Family preparedness
Citizenship (opportunities and responsibilities)
Service (learning to rend it as appropriate)
Skills, basic
- Care of tools
- Safety
- Food preparation
- Household management
- Care of machinery
- Teaching
- Accounting for stewardships
Social graces
Parental influence in basic education has often done all it will do by the sixteenth year of the child’s life.
2- Basic Formal Education. The patriarch and his wife should assume guidance and quality control in the educational opportunities which their children having in schooling outside of the family to learn:
- Literary skills
- Mathematical ability
- Sciences
- Countries and peoples
- Physical education
- Arts and crafts
Basic formal education is roughly what is received in the United States in K-12 education. For this basic formal education parents should use whatever opportunities are available in their local area which do not put their children into a deadly emotional, spiritual, physical, or social environment.
3- Manual Education. The patriarch and his wife assume the responsibility for instructing or arranging for the instructing of each child in one or more manual skills by which that child could later support a family, such as:
- Administrative Assistant skills
- Auto mechanic
- Farming/ranching skills
- Clothing construction
- Building trades
Ideally this education would be substantially complete by the end of the teenage years.
4- General Education. The patriarch and his wife assume the responsibility for instructing or seeing that each child is instructed in the basic intellectual matters which a person needs to have to cope with the world. Areas which especially need to be pursued are:
- History
- Economics
- Politics
- Philosophy
- Literature
This general education is to give a person the strength to be alive to the educational, political, and economic forces of the world and to be able to influence those forces for good.
The general education is roughly equivalent to two years of college work, though many have not attained it even after two years of college.
5- Missionary Education. It is contemplated that every young person in the Church would be fully prepared to go on a mission at age nineteen, having received full-fledged family, basic, vocational, and general education, then capping that preparation with a thorough understanding and ability to use honorable proselyting techniques. It is also contemplated that every worthy young man in the Church would be called and honorably fulfill a full-time mission.
Upon returning from missionary service, every young person would be ready to marry and to enter full-time work or to enter into further education.
6- Vocational Education. The patriarch and his wife should advise, encourage, and assist as is appropriate in the vocational education of their children. Vocational education is viewed as
(1) on-the-job education for a career,
(2) technical schooling, or
(3) the last two years of college and whatever graduate training is appropriate for entry into the job market in one’s chosen work.
VI. How Can we Foster a Better Tradition Concerning Learning and Teaching?
Even the casual observer cannot help but notice the marked difference in affluence and learning attained by various social and ethnic groups in American society. Japanese, Jews, and Mormons are often cited as examples of subgroups which have, on the whole, prospered in society and have achieved high levels of formal education relative to accomplishments in these areas by other groups.
Studies have shown that the desire to excel (achievement, motivation) is generated by two kinds of cultural practices.
- Achievement training in which parents, religious leaders, and other impose standards of excellence upon tasks by setting high goals for children and youth, indicate their high evaluation of the person’s competence to do a task week, and communicate that they expect evidence of high achievement.
- Independence training in which parents, leaders, and others indicate to the youth that they expect them to be self-reliant and, at the same time, grant them relative autonomy in decision-making situations where they are given both freedom of action and responsibility for success or failure.
Essentially, achievement training is concerned with getting people to do things well, while independence training seeks to teach them to do things on their own.
The Jews, who for centuries had lived in more or less hostile environments, have learned that it is not only possible to manipulate their environments to ensure survival, but even to prosper in it. Jewish tradition stresses the possibility of the individual mastering his work. Man is not helpless against the forces of nature or of his fellowman; God will provide, but only if man does his share. Physical mobility has likewise characterized Jewish culture. The Jews have typically urged their children to leave home if in doing so they faced better opportunities.
We are culturally similar in many respects to the achievement and independence training characteristics of Jewish society.