A few months back I heard Bruce Dipple challenged a group of mission leaders to make sure they were being effective trainers. He began with a citation from missiologist Jim Pludemann: “If your ministry is not causing someone to grow or teaching them something then you are either doing something wrong or someone else should be doing it.”
In Deuteronomy 5:1 God commands his people to learn his statutes and rules. With few exceptions the verb rendered “learn” (lamad) is associated with an action. So at 5:1 God orders, “…and you shall learn them and be careful to do them.”
At 4:1 Moses exhorts Israel to listen to the statutes and the rules he is “teaching” them. The verb “teaching” is precisely the same verb as used at 5:1 (lamad), this time used causatively: “I am causing you to learn.” When Moses teaches he is concerned about the outcome. He is not just imparting information. He is doing what he can to cause them to learn. Once again the verb is associated with action: “And now, O Israel, listen to the statutes and the rules that I am teaching you, and do them, that you may live, and go in and take possession of the land that the LORD, the God of your fathers, is giving you.”
Further, in both contexts Moses is concerned that the people learn these commands so profoundly that they will be in earnest to pass on what they have learned to their children:
Only take care, and keep your soul diligently, lest you forget the things that your eyes have seen, and lest they depart from your heart all the days of your life. Make them known to your children and your children’s children – how on the day that you stood before the LORD your God at Horeb, the LORD said to me, “Gather the people to me, that I may let them hear my words, so that they may learn to fear me all the days that they live on the earth, and that they may teach their children so” (Deut 4:9-10).
Following on from the giving of the Ten Commandments in Deuteronomy 5 we read:
And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way…. (Deut 6:6-7).
In this context Bruce indicated that educationally he is not enthusiastic about setting tests but prefers to get his students to teach someone else to see how much they have learned. Indeed, when I teach Daniel later this year I am planning to introduce a segment which requires the students to attempt to teach each other what the chapter says.
Bruce went out to point out that in the Book of Deuteronomy God always has multiple audiences in mind, right down to us as the current readers of his Word. In the immediate text of Deuteronomy God’s concern is expressed explicitly in terms of passing on his Word to the next generation.
Bruce also made the point when we as teachers and trainers succeed in going beyond the impartation of information and succeed in causing others to learn then the more they will ask us to teach them.
Posted April 24, 2009
Upon clicking 'Buy now' you will be redirected to paypal.com where you can securely and quickly complete your purchase with a few clicks.
Immediately after payment at PayPal you will be redirected to a download page which
provides you instant access to your purchase.
