You are here
Humble learners
If we all saw ourselves as humble learners, we would get on together a whole lot better, says David Wardle, education officer at Booth College of Mission.
I see life as a constant learning journey. In fact, learning has been a theme of my life, having spent my career working in the teaching profession. I believe we start learning from our mother’s womb, and continue throughout life. Who we are today, is not who we were 10 years ago.
I was brought up in the very nurturing and loving environment of Oamaru Salvation Army Corps. It was a wonderful family environment and had a strong internal culture. I left to study at the University of Otago and Dunedin Teachers College. It was the first time I found myself in an environment where God did not seem to be valued or even considered.
Suddenly, I was in crisis because some of what I was being taught appeared to clash with Christianity. The wonderful, thinking people at Dunedin North Corps allowed me to wrestle with these ideas, until I realised they didn’t clash at all. Christianity actually fits really beautifully with science. But this time of questioning built a strong foundation for my faith.
As a young man, I became very interested in children’s work—I taught Sunday school and ran after-school programmes. It felt natural to become a primary school teacher, and I still feel like teaching is a calling for me.
I met my wife Caroline at my cousin’s house, literally across a crowded room. It was love at first sight. I thought, ‘Man alive, she’s nice’, so I asked her out. Caroline is a teacher, too, so our lives have really been about education and learning.
Years later, when I was working as a principal, I went through burnout. It triggered depression, which appears to be in my family line. This is something that still lingers and I deal with on a daily basis. Caroline has been wonderful, but my family have suffered with it a lot. There have been tough times. It takes its toll, but it makes you better, wiser.
It’s often the difficult things that strengthen our faith. That’s why it’s so unfortunate when churches discourage questioning. It’s vital that young people are able to seriously question the issues they are grappling with. Whether they’re social issues, science, the environment or sexuality—if we allow them to question, they can start working out their own theological beliefs and it won’t be a shock to them when they are confronted with different ideas.
Yes, there is only one truth—we understand there is a creator God, who loves humanity, who saves and redeems humanity, and indeed the whole of creation—but how do we explain that to people brought up with a different world view? The church has always used different metaphors and analogies to make theology accessible, emphasising different things according to the context it finds itself in. So we need to ask ourselves: how do we point people to God in a way that is meaningful today?
That’s what we’re trying to do at Booth College of Mission. We are strongly teaching ancient truths and Salvation Army tradition, but we’re also giving cadets the ability to learn and find solutions to these sorts of issues.
I reckon if we all saw ourselves as humble learners, trying to figure all this out together, it would solve a whole lot of problems in terms of how we get on together. We are all on the journey of learning who God is, and what that means for us.
by David Wardle (c) 'War Cry' magazine, 2 December 2017, p11
You can read 'War Cry' at your nearest Salvation Army church or centre, or subscribe through Salvationist Resources.