# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_December 1862_S353
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

Lehre und Wehre.

Volume VIII.    December 1862.    No. 12.

(Submitted by Dr. Sihler.)
On the Evangelical Conduct of a Christian-minded Parish
Schoolteacher, Partly toward His Pupils, Partly toward
the Congregation, Partly toward the Pastor. *)

We read in Genesis 18:19 that Abraham himself received a fine
commendation from the Lord in this, that he would command his children
and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord, and to do what
is right and good. Likewise Moses commands the fathers, in Deuteronomy
6:6, that they should not only take to heart for themselves God's Word —
which the Lord spoke especially in the holy Ten Commandments — but
should above all impress these latter upon their children as well.
From both passages, then, it is clear that, by the will of God, the
teaching and instruction of the young, especially in God's Word, is the
duty of the fathers who belong to the church. To be sure, in Israel boys
of twelve years and older also made use of the instruction of the
scribes in the synagogues, as the example of our Lord Christ likewise
shows; and from this narrative it is evident that the younger hearers,
too, were partly questioned by the teachers and partly themselves put
questions concerning the doctrine to them. Nevertheless, this public
instruction presupposed the instruction given at home, which
undoubtedly accompanied them for a good while yet, until the children
came of age and married and themselves governed their own households.
Not without reason may this preceding domestic instruction likewise be
inferred from the words of Christ to his mother and his foster-father,
Luke 2, where he said to them: "Did ye not know that I must be about
my Father's business?" — for from these first three words it follows
that at home it was chiefly from the prophetic writings that the doctrine
of the person and work of the Messiah had been treated. Further, it is
no less evident, from 2 Tim. 3:15 and 1:5 (compare Acts 16:1–2), that
Timothy had been instructed in God's Word by his believing mother
Eunice and his like-minded grandmother Lois.

*) Submitted to Lehre und Wehre at the request of the Synod's Central District.