Teaching Others To Teach

Good morning and welcome to Our Daily Walk.
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Teaching is often a very frustrating and thankless job. Whether in the public schools or in the Bible schools, teachers are often over worked and under appreciated. Finding good teachers is often a challenge. But without good teachers where would we be? We need good teachers and we need to encourage and inspire more and more people to become teachers.

If you are a teacher now or have ever been one in the past, perhaps you can remember the person who encouraged you to teach. Maybe it was your mentor, or your teacher in Bible class or at school.

Chances are that someone saw a potential in you to be able to impart knowledge to others. They encouraged you to not just learn, but also to teach. At times a teacher may refer to one of their own teachers when making a point.

Paul was a mentor to the younger preacher, Timothy. In 2 Timothy 2:2 he encouraged Timothy saying, “And the things that you have heard from me among many witnesses, commit these to faithful men who will be able to teach others also.” As Christians, we should all be interested in teaching others the things that we have learned.

Paul did not just want his instructions to be heard and understood by Timothy. He also wanted those instructions to be passed on to other faithful men so that they could pass it all on to others. Teaching others to be teachers is God’s way of making sure that the good news continues to be spread.

Of course, accepting the challenge to be a teacher can come at a price. Not only is there a greater amount of preparation on your part. But James reminds us that there is also a stricter judgment. He says in James 3:1, “My brethren, let not many of you become teachers, knowing that we shall receive a stricter judgment.” Being a teacher includes a heavy responsibility.

But still the need remains for good teachers. Paul is aware of the dangers of bad teaching when he again addresses Timothy in 2 Timothy 4:1-5.

I charge you therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who will judge the living and the dead at His appearing and His kingdom: Preach the word! Be ready in season and out of season. Convince, rebuke, exhort, with all longsuffering and teaching. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers; and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables. But you be watchful in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.

Paul’s concern wasn’t about the faithfulness of Timothy. He was a good student and an excellent evangelist. His concern was that the teaching of good things continues, especially since some would want to follow bad teachers.

Peter weighs in on this issue in 2 Peter 2:1-3.

But there were also false prophets among the people, even as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Lord who bought them, and bring on themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their destructive ways, because of whom the way of truth will be blasphemed. By covetousness they will exploit you with deceptive words; for a long time their judgment has not been idle, and their destruction does not slumber.

So what’s at stake if good teachers are not to be found? Sound doctrine may give way to heresies. Once faithful Christians may choose to lay aside God’s word and follow after some blasphemous doctrine of man. Future generations may grow up and never know what the truth really is. All of this could be the future if good teachers are not in place.

On Our Daily Walk today, may we remember the good things that we have learned from our teachers and may we determine today that we will not only teach them to others, but encourage them to teach it even more.

Our thought for the day: “To teach is to learn twice.”

May God bless you on your daily walk.

© Our Daily Walk, Mike Baker, 2007. Permission is granted to copy these articles provided they are not sold and the author's name and copyright are included.