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If Jesus is the Master Teacher, what content are we learning? How does the Holy Spirit fit into the mix? This devotion looks at how much Jesus taught us (or didn’t) and how the Holy Spirit helps fill the gaps.

Nuggets

• Jesus knew we could only take so much at once.
• Jesus did mostly do His teaching in groups, but He realized that believing is personal.
• The Holy Spirit can personalize our learning.
• Both the Old and New Testament center on Jesus — His coming, His work here, and His second coming.

Devotions in the What I Believe series

www.seekinggodwithelaine.com/what-i-believe

Devotions in the Religious Education category

What Is Religion Instruction (www.seekinggodwithelaine.com/what-is-religious-instruction)
Jesus as a Teacher (www.seekinggodwithelaine.com/jesus-as-a-teacher)
Learning about Jesus from the Holy Spirit
Learning to be a New Creation
Using Worship to Educate Our Thoughts

I was so hoping that my technology problems would have been fixed by now. Unfortunately, I think the update that was pushed through last week blew up on many more people than just me. I know for me, this is much harder for me to read. I can’t wait to get back to normal. Thank you for your patience.

In the last devotion, we talked about Jesus being a Master Teacher from whom we could learn. But He is more than that, isn’t He?

Jesus is the subject matter we are to study. Luckily, we have another Teacher to aid us.

Let’s Put It into Context

What is the purpose of education? The Holman Bible Dictionary wrote, “The primary purpose of education among the Jews was the learning of and obedience to the law of God, the Torah.”

Resource
Holman Bible Dictionary’s definition of Education in Bible Times
https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/hbd/e/education-in-bible-times.html

To me, religious education is instruction to teach us about the plan of salvation and the character of God, in order to build relationships so that we can imitate Him.

Did Jesus Teach Us Everything?

“I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come” (Jn. 16: 12-13 ESV)

Wait! What? Jesus didn’t teach us everything we need to know????

Okay, let’s start off by seeing what Jesus did teach. Liddon wrote, “Our Lord spoke about Himself, His sinlessness, His claims upon human thought and human affection, His power of enlightening and saving human beings, His future coming to judge all human beings …” That makes sense. He talked about being Savior of the world.

Resource
Liddon’s Divine Teaching Gradual
https://biblehub.com/sermons/auth/liddon/divine_teaching_gradual.htm

Liddon also gave us another list of nuggets from Jesus’ teachings.

Politics shouldn’t lose morality.
Duties are more important than rights.
Impurity brings ruin.
Righteousness is the road to success.

Resource
Liddon’s Christ’s Gradual Teaching by His Providence
https://biblehub.com/sermons/auth/liddon/christ’s_gradual_teaching_by_his_providence.htm

It took Paul, in Romans, to really flesh out what the plan of salvation is and compare grace and the law. That wasn’t going to happen in an oral presentation. It needed to be written down and digested.

Coupled with that is the fact that the Holy Spirit hadn’t come yet. I know, I know. Jesus was right there in front of their eyes. You would think that would be enough.

We’ve talked before about the role of the Holy Spirit. “But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and remind you of everything I have told you” (Jn. 14: 26 CSB). The Spirit will help us put it all together.

To read Holy Spirit in the glossary, access www.seekinggodwithelaine.com/holy-spirit-glossary

But that still doesn’t answer the question as to why Jesus didn’t teach everything. We have to look at verse 12 to see the reason. “I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now” (Jn. 16: 12 ESV).

Jesus knew we could only take so much at once. He was well aware that sanctification is a process.

To read Sanctification in the glossary, access www.seekinggodwithelaine.com/sanctification-glossary

Liddon put it this way. He wrote, “He taught men gradually, and as they were able to bear the strong light of His doctrine, because He loved men too well to shock or blind them by a sudden blaze of truth, for which they were as yet unprepared.”

Sanctification is a life-time process. It isn’t something that can be rushed. God’s ways are occasionally polar opposite to the world’s ways.

Resource
Liddon’s Divine Teaching Gradual
https://biblehub.com/sermons/auth/liddon/divine_teaching_gradual.htm

Resource
Liddon’s Christ’s Gradual Teaching in the Church
https://biblehub.com/sermons/auth/liddon/christ’s_gradual_teaching_in_the_church.htm

Jesus also knew that we would have to revisit some lessons over and over. Let’s face it. His ministry was only three years long. He had a lot of ground to cover and a short time to get there. While He constantly had audiences of people who had never heard the gospel story, He didn’t have time for some repetition.

The Holy Spirit Gets the Job Done

“When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth. For he will not speak on his own, but he will speak whatever he hears. He will also declare to you what is to come. He will glorify me, because he will take from what is mine and declare it to you. Everything the Father has is mine. This is why I told you that he takes from what is mine and will declare it to you” (Jn. 16: 13-15 CSB)

Liddon also gave us another reason the Holy Spirit was needed. We’ve talked before how believing is all in the mind.

To read How Can We Corral Our Thoughts?, access www.seekinggodwithelaine.com/how-can-we-corral-our-thoughts

Resource
Liddon’s Teaching Should be Adapted to the Condition of the Mind
https://biblehub.com/sermons/auth/liddon/teaching_should_be_adapted_to_the_condition_of_the_mind.htm

That shows us the individuality of our relationships with God. Yes, Jesus did mostly do His teaching in groups. But He realized that believing is personal.

That doesn’t even get into our differing capacities to learn. I once used a fictional example of Tom’s and my differing abilities to do economics.

To read How Are We to Be Inclusive in Our Worship?, access www.seekinggodwithelaine.com/how-are-we-to-be-inclusive-in-our-worship

Some of us may be able to understand certain aspects better than others. It doesn’t mean one person is better than another. It means we have differing mental capacities.

The Holy Spirit can personalize our learning. He can spend the time with us that we need to learn.

Teaching is all about condition. Learners have to be in the right condition to learn, but learning is also about conditioning. Conditioning takes time.

What? Are you questioning my use of the word conditioning. But isn’t that what the sanctification road is — a process of training us to improve?

Six paragraphs ago, we said that God’s ways are opposite to the world’s ways. We have to train ourselves to operate under His ways. God’s ways are different at minimum, scary at a maximum.

What all is the Holy Spirit telling us?

• Truth (verse 13)
• The future (verse 13)
• What is Jesus’ (verse 14)

That is a lot. Parker wrote, “All that we know of truth, holiness, destiny, we know directly or indirectly from Christ.”

Resource
Parker’s Human Capacity the Measure of Divine Communication
https://biblehub.com/sermons/auth/parker/human_capacity_the_measure_of_divine_communication.htm

The only way we are going to get all of that is walking with the Spirit. Walking is the term used to describe how we live our lives. It is going to take a while.

That is the Spirit’s mission: showing us Christ.

What We Are Taught

Let the word of Christ dwell richly among you, in all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another through psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts” (Col. 3: 16 CSB)

The Word of Christ is the Scriptures. Both the Old and New Testament center on Him — His coming, His work here, and His second coming.

Look at John 1: 1. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” (Jn. 1: 1 KJV). That is the textbook that the Holy Spirit uses to teach us.

What do we do with this Word? “I have stored up your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you” (Ps. 119: 11 ESV). We have to use it to transform our character so that we are imitating God.

To read Imitate in the glossary, access www.seekinggodwithelaine.com/imitate-glossary

I love how Sydnor put it. He wrote, “Let it dwell in you. It is not enough that it be in our house, study, pocket, and so at hand. It must be in our heart, pervading our whole spiritual nature, directing and controlling all our life and conduct.”

Resource
Sydnor’s The Word of Christ
https://biblehub.com/sermons/auth/sydnor/the_word_of_christ.htm

To read Heart in the glossary, access www.seekinggodwithelaine.com/heart-glossary

What does it mean when it says “… dwell richly among you …” (Col. 3: 16 CSB)? Candlish wrote that it had to be used as a fertilizer.

Resource
Candlish’s The Indwelling Word of Christ
https://biblehub.com/sermons/auth/candlish/the_indwelling_word_of_christ.htm

Now, when I was younger, my family went to a customer appreciation thingy, where I won the door prize of having fertilizer spread on 25 acres for free. (I traded Dad for the plastic pitcher and four tumblers that he won. Can we say I got the short end of the deal?)

The fertilizer, when applied to plants, helps them grow. The chemicals replace the nutrients that are washed away by the rains.

Ooo, baby! What washes away our obedience to God? Sin.

And you know what they say. When it rains, it pours. Satan tries to flood us, so we take our eyes off God and drown.

The Word of Christ is to teach us how to live for Christ. This instruction can come through psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs.

To read How Does Wisdom Lead to Praise?, access www.seekinggodwithelaine.com/how-does-wisdom-lead-to-praise

Making the Connections

Even though Jesus didn’t teach everything while He was here, we can’t think that He added to it. The opposite is true. “Beloved, although I was very eager to write to you about our common salvation, I found it necessary to write appealing to you to contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints” (Jude 1: 3 ESV).

We’ve talked before about God revealing Himself more fully to us after we make a profession of faith. God reveals the meat of His Word only to His children. “For what seems to be God’s foolishness is wiser than men’s wisdom, and what seems to be God’s weakness is stronger than men’s strength” (I Cor. 1: 25 TEV).

To read Why Should We Study the Scriptures?, access www.seekinggodwithelaine.com/why-shold-we-study-the-scriptures
To read How Do We Renew Our Minds?, access www.seekinggodwithelaine.com/how-do-we-renew-our-minds

All in all, we have to remember what the purpose of teaching is. Yes, it is to get us to where we will make the profession of faith. But it is also so we can grow in grace and knowledge (II Pet. 3: 18).

We have to be growing closer to God. He is looking for sincere disciples.

To read What Do You Mean All Disciples Won’t Get into Heaven?, access www.seekinggodwithelaine.com/what-do-you-mean-all-disciples-wont-get-into-heaven

Making the Connections to Self-Discipline

I have to admit, it was kind of a kick when I first read that Jesus didn’t teach us everything while He was here.

We’ve been looking at defending our beliefs when we are witnessing. That means we have to be secure enough to convince someone to accept our beliefs.

Our questions should still serve us to determine on what we need to focus.

• What does the Scriptures say?
• What do I believe?
• Why do I believe the same/differently than the Scriptures?
• What are the talking points when witnessing to a non-believer?

Related Links
I have created a worksheet of the questions above. Access it through https://seekinggodwithelaine.com/what-i-believe-worksheet

How Do We Apply This?

Repetition is a good thing. Once and done is gone in my mind. (Yep, that is one reason I repeat myself.)

We have to talk our learner’s language. When I was getting my Bachelor’s degree, I was in class with one of my coworkers. Sally was having a really difficult time understanding the concepts. At one point, I stopped the instructor, turned to her, and said, “Remember when we were in that meeting and discussing this (and explained it in the language we used in the meeting)? That is what the professor is talking about.” She asked some questions, which I answered. She understood the concepts, then. Everyone in the room was looking at me, and I said, “What? I talk Sally.”

We have to connect with the learner in their language, based on where they are at in their lives. No, not to stay there. Our goal is to grow them to where God wants them to be.

As we teach others, we have to remember it really isn’t us doing the teaching. The Holy Spirit is talking Fred.

Jesus was not only the Teacher, but He was also the subject matter. We are taught and assisted by the Holy Spirit.

Father God. We choose to imitate Jesus. We want to know Him better and teach His ways to others. Thank You for sending the Holy Spirit to teach us and assist us. Lord, we pray that we do our part in leading others to You. Amen.