Thoughts from Mark "Hat" Rackley

So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.

• Matthew 7:12

“One summer day in 1818, Rev. Thomas Hughes was riding his horse down the road when he heard Mrs. McGuffey in a garden and out of his sight, plaintively praying that her son could receive a better education. Hughes stopped at the next log cabin to inquire as to the woman’s identity. He retraced his steps and invited William to enroll at his Old Stone Academy.
“McGuffey thrived on education, and in 1826, he was named professor of languages at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, and soon became known for his lectures on moral values and biblical themes. On April 23, 1833, he made an agreement with Cincinnati publishers Truman & Smith to produce a set of textbooks for America’s schoolchildren.“He initially produced a series of four Readers, which were published in 1836 and 1837, and in the Fourth Reader he wrote, ‘From no source has the author drawn more copiously, in his selections, than from the sacred Scriptures   That man is to be pitied, who at this day, can honestly object to imbuing the minds of youth with the language and spirit of the Word of God.’
“According to John H. Westerhoff III, ‘McGuffey’s interest in teaching children to read is directly related to his conviction that knowing the contents of the Scriptures is of ultimate significance.’”

• Robert J. Morgan, 100 Bible Verses That Made America

In my recent trip to visit the grandchildren, the oldest of them went with me to Nashville, to sell used books and games.  One of the books that I purchased in return was 100 Bible Verses That Made America by Robert J. Morgan.  As we approach the 250^th anniversary of the birth of the USA, I thought I would do a condensed mini-series on some of these verses, four posts per week for a few weeks – maybe not all 100 verses.

Maybe not a schoolmaster of the nation, but his readers were widely distributed.

The Ivy League schools and many other schools were created to prepare pastors for the field.  The school system was developed early in the history of the USA to teach children how to read.  And for most families, the only book that they had in their homes was a Bible.

Yet, just like the history of the Israelites, the USA strayed from their God-fearing beginnings.  As the old saying goes, they read their own press clippings.  There were three editions of the McGuffey readers.  With each edition, the focus on biblical teaching lessened.

But what struck me about the story of Dr. William Holmes McGuffey is that his mother was praying out loud while working in the garden.  A passing pastor overheard her prayer and inquired about her and her son at his destination.  And then the pastor took action.

How many parts of the previous paragraph make no sense at all in today’s society?

First of all, there was a modification proposed to the first amendment.  It presently reads, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

The idea was to change the preposition.  Our freedom of religion would become freedom to worship.  This meant what went on inside the church was your business, but if it spilled outside the doors of the church, you were in big trouble.

This proposition never had much support, but the way of Satan is to get a germ of an idea into people’s heads and eventually, it will go through to become law.

If that were to happen, the mother praying in the garden, out loud, would then be unlawful.

But before we get off the first amendment, the background was that the king established what would be preached in the pulpit, what would be the hymns sung, everything.  Of course, the king simply signed what was offered to him.  Underlings made those decisions, cookie cutter fashion, one size fits all.  The money gathered in the pews went to the king and then distributed back to the churches.  Jefferson’s amendment was to not let the government dictate to us how to worship or to whom.  Yet, we have created an atheistic religion that everyone is to worship.  It just has no offering plates to take money from you. Prepositions are important. It does not say, “freedom from religion.”

But thinking of a government-controlled religion, when my wife and I were in Germany, we were told not to belong to a local church.  We went to a military chapel for our services instead.  If you join a German church, the German government takes a percentage of your pay as withholding and gives that to the church.  That takes care of your tithe, whether you could afford it or not.  But when you pass away, if you are not a member of any church, you are placed in a pauper’s grave.  Only church members went to the church graveyard with a headstone.

But to get back to Dr. McGuffey, he loved school.  He loved learning.  We have lost our love for both of these things.

But Dr. McGuffey used his love of learning to become a teacher to pass that love onto others.  His readers were filled with moral teachings, mostly about loving one another.

The verse above, from the Sermon on the Mount, talks about doing.

If the pastor listened to Mrs. McGuffey’s prayer and said “Oh, how sad” He would not be showing love.  It was the follow up that made all the difference.  He inquired.  Then he took care of the situation.

Back to my original question, those things would be rare today, if done at all.  I heard of a pastor removing someone from their home because the home was considered unsafe.  It was their solemn duty to do so.  But what if the elderly person did not have the funds to move?  And why could not the elderly person’s home be retrofitted to become elderly friendly so that the elderly person could remain on familiar ground?

We should not hide our love behind laws that prevent us from loving.

Love is a lot of things, but one of them is an action verb.  What Jesus told us in the verse above is to DO.  What He told His disciples was to love one another.  These are two sides of the same coin, and with each person, we need to understand their needs rather than fit their needs into our idea of what is right.

Soli Deo Gloria.  Only to God be the Glory.