Spiritual teacher

“ The reward.—One deep and abiding satisfaction may come to the teacher who feels the burden of reaching the standards set forth in this lesson. It is all worth while. Some make the mistake of charging against their task all the time, effort and devotion that go into preparing themselves as teachers of religion. But this is a false philosophy. For a great work greatly performed leaves the stamp of its greatness on the worker. All that we do toward making out of ourselves better teachers of childhood adds to our own spiritual equipment. ”

“ The more common way that the pious teacher or parent takes, is to pass over the emblem, and at once proceed with the spiritual lesson—thus beginning at the end—without any natural picture having been presented to the mind's eye of the pupils, by which they maybe assisted to the analogy—as and so, as the Natural, so the Spiritual—which is so uniformly done by the Spirit of God in Scripture. ”

“ As to the fundamentals of teaching the Faith: know thou that delivering the Message can be accomplished only through goodly deeds and spiritual attributes, an utterance that is crystal clear and the happiness reflected from the face of that one who is expounding the Teachings. It is essential that the deeds of the teacher should attest the truth of his words. Such is the state of whoso doth spread abroad the sweet savours of God and the quality of him who is sincere in his faith. ”

“ The vision of the teacher should be at once precise like that of the scientist, and spiritual like that of the saint. The preparation for science and the preparation for sanctity should form a new soul, for [Pg 138] the attitude of the teacher should be at once positive, scientific, and spiritual. ”

“ If the teacher be able-minded, and fitly furnished with spiritual culture, starting from facts of consciousness in himself, of observation in the world of matter, aided by the history of the past and the achievements of the present, it is not difficult for him to set forth and establish the idea of God as infinitely perfect ”

“ Let the little hearts strengthen themselves with childish pleasure, warm themselves with faith in God and the world, for they may need this warmth and strength when, in later years, many things turn cold and fall in ruins about them. Their faith in God will change and become more spiritual, but if you—oh, teacher of a new school—do not instil this faith into the growing mind, then in the matured intellect there will be no room for belief in the divine, the ideal. ”

“ Do not overlook the fact that the Spirit of Truth was bestowed upon all sincere believers; this gift of the spirit did not come only to the apostles. The one hundred and twenty men and women assembled in the upper chamber all received the new teacher, as did all the honest of heart throughout the whole world. This new teacher was bestowed upon mankind, and every soul received him in accordance with the love for truth and the capacity to grasp and comprehend spiritual realities. ”

“ And yet, notwithstanding this feeling planted in our very nature, that a spiritual ministry must have a spiritual origin, it is astonishing to see the facility with which almost any professed teacher is received. Just as mere ignorance inclines the most illiterate, so the better classes are induced, by indolence or habit, to receive almost any man as a religious instructor. ”

“ The soul develops power for simple mental processes first and for the [Pg 141] complex later: interest in self first and in others later; consciousness of the natural first, the spiritual later. The teacher who knows God's order, obeys his laws and waits his time is the teacher whose seed sowing is reaped in the hundredfold harvest.
(d) It is impossible to ignore the physical and mental side of the pupil and be successful in spiritual work with him. ”

“ He classes them simply as young and old, with their respective graces of strength and knowledge. All are looked upon as "abiding"; almost the one exhortation is to abide unto the end in a condition upon which all have already entered, and in which some have long continued. We feel throughout the calmness and assurance of a spiritual [Pg 173] teacher writing to Christian men who had either been born in the atmosphere of Christian tradition, or had lived in it for many years. They are again and again appealed to on the ground of a common Christian confidence—"we know." ”

“ I cannot God the one master. bear them. The infinite Existence- Intelligence-Bliss is the one Guru for all. He trill teach everybody. I am only His child. It is a difficult task to teach others. One can become a true spiritual teacher only when Who is a true spiritual teacher? one has realized God and received a Divine commission from Him. ”

“ Teachers of Christian Science must have the necessary moral and spiritual qualifications to elucidate the Principle and rule of Christian Science, through the higher meaning of the Scriptures. “The less the teacher personally controls other minds, and the more he trusts them to the divine Truth and Love, the better it will be for both teacher and student.” ”

“ How Many Teachers of God Are Needed To Save the World? The answer to this question is--one. One wholly perfect teacher, whose learning is complete, suffices. This one, sanctified and redeemed, becomes the Self Who is the Son of God. He who was always wholly spirit now no longer sees himself as a body, or even as in a body. ”

“ He cannot get realization himself and he tries to Ordinary spir-itual teachers are blind. show the way to others. It is like the leading the blind. In this way more harm is done than good. When God is realized the inner spiritual sight opens and it is then that the true teacher can perceive the sickness of the soul and can prescribe the proper remedy. ”

“ Inferring from the nature of man what would be necessary, and trusting in the goodness of the Deity to grant the requisite aid, they expressed their belief that a Divine Teacher would come from heaven, who would restore truth and happiness to the human soul. ”

“ A serious sense of God within, and of responsibilities which transcend this life as they do the adolescent's power of comprehension; a feeling for duties deepened by a realization and experience of their conflict such as some have thought to be the origin of religion itself in the soul—these, too, are elements of the "theology of the heart" revealed at this age to every serious youth, but to the judicious emphasis and utilization of which, the teacher should lend his consummate skill. ”

“ As a student, searching for the hidden meanings and thrilling at the unfolding beauties of some field of truth which we are investigating, we may love the thing we study for its own sake; and who of us does not feel in that way toward sections of our Bible, a poem, the record of noble lives, or the perfection of some bit of scientific truth? But when we face about and become the teacher, when our purpose is not our own learning but the teaching of another, then our attitude must change. We will then love our cherished body of material not less, but differently. ”

“ As the Teacher knows, He will teach the disciple according to his capacity, and will prescribe remedies suited to his ailments, so that "There is no God except Allâh" be firmly established in his nature, and the ingress of the evil spirits be cut off from his heart. All the world seeks to tread the Divine Path. But each knows according to his inner purity, each seeks and aspires according to his knowledge, and each treads the Path according to his seeking and aspiration.—Letters 56 & 57. ”

“ What is education but a daily developing and disciplining of the mind by new difficulties presented to the pupil to overcome? The moment a lesson has become easy, the pupil is moved on to one that is higher and more difficult. With the race and the individual, it is in the meeting and the mastering of difficulties that our highest attainments are found.
It is even so in our intercourse with God. Just imagine what the result would be if the child of God had only to kneel down and ask, and get, and go away. What unspeakable loss to the spiritual life would ensue. ”

“ The life of the divine Teacher affords no countenance to this sullen and gloomy saintliness, shutting up the heart against the sweet influences of human sympathy and the blessed ministrations of Nature. ”

“ The teacher of religion who is to be something more than the expounder of a ready-prepared catechism,—who is to lead his flock not merely into one particular paddock, and to water them exclusively at one particular pond, but into every field of sweet and wholesome herbage, and beside every stream of living waters,—whose duty it will be to pluck up the cruel brambles, and clear away the piles of stones of doubts and difficulties which grow and are flung by careless hands along the path of faith and life,—such a teacher ought to be furnished with every aid which learning can offer. ”

“ Yet those in this church who have taken this course have betrayed their own weakness and folly. But as God has given us a teacher, it is his prerogative to teach in every sense of the word, and give unto us every lesson that we need. ”

“ Terrible, indeed, is the fate of such a person. How significant are the words of the great Teacher, "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God!" Another great teacher once said that pure religion was: "To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world." ”

“ It was only when God had made his thought and plan for man concrete in the person of Jesus of Nazareth that man began to understand.
The first and most difficult requirement of the teacher, therefore, is—himself, his personality. He must combine in himself the qualities of life and character he seeks to develop in his pupils. He must look to his personality as the source of his influence and the measure of his power. He must be the living embodiment of what he would lead his pupils to become. He must live the religion he would teach them. ”

“ This tendency of the unconscious self to realize without criticism a suggested end lays on religious teachers the obligation of forming a clear and vital conception of the spiritual ideals which they wish to suggest, whether to themselves in their meditations or to others by their teaching: to be sure that they are wholesome, and really tend to fullness of life. ”

“ God turns to you for help to save the world. Teacher of God, His thanks He offers you, And all the world stands silent in the grace You bring from Him. You are the Son He loves, And it is given you to be the means Through which His Voice is heard around the world, To close all things of time ”

“ To have Him for his Guide makes the human guide gentle and tender among his disciples 'as a nurse among her children,' for he remembers 'the gentleness of Christ,' and he dare not be other than an imitator of Him. A Christian teacher's spirit will always be, 'not for that we have dominion over your faith, but we are helpers of your joy' ”

“ Find the teacher, serve him as a child, open your heart to his influence, see in him God manifested. Our attention should be fixed on the teacher as the highest manifestation of God; and as the power of attention concentrates there, the picture of the teacher as man will melt away; the frame will vanish, and the real God will be left there. Those that come to truth with such a spirit of veneration and love — for them the Lord of truth speaks the most wonderful words. ”

“ The simple presence of a teacher of God is a reminder. His thoughts ask for the right to question what the patient has accepted as true. As God's messengers, His teachers are the symbols of salvation. ”

“ If the one who discovered this truth should try to convince the professor of Christianity, the minister, that God made only the good and the evil did not exist, the professor would say, thou blasphemest, God made everything—if he should advance the thought that man was wholly spiritual, the professor would ridicule him, and say you must be mistaken, my body is material. I can feel it, and every man's body has been so since the beginning of the world. ”

“ One great purpose, then, in religious instruction is to attach the stimulus and appeal of religion to the common round of daily life and experience of the child. As Christ came that we might have life, not a future life alone, but a full, happy, and worthy life in the present as well, so we come to the child as a teacher to help him in his life here and now. ”

“ From lessons in science thus given, the teacher rises easily to lessons of morality and religion. Nothing even in moral teaching impresses a child's mind like pictures, stories, or parables, or some form of "object-teaching." The modern charts and books are extremely ingenious in giving religious lessons through the senses. ”

“ The sunset took a brighter tint, the rainbow showed a deeper66 color, the pansy gave a more delicate odor, life gleamed broader and sweeter because of the unconscious inspiration of this man’s life. Cheerfulness, hope, faith, trust in the eternal triumph of right should be a part of every teacher’s faith. No carping, sour-grained, narrow-minded teacher ever did much to develop healthy, hearty, liberal views of life in the pupil. ”

“ But, then, independently of the advantages which may be expected to result from the practice of daily prayer in school, it would seem to be the imperious duty of the teacher to adopt it. So many human minds committed thus to the guidance of one, at a period when the character receives so easily and so permanently its shape and direction, and in a world of probation like this, is an occasion which seems to demand the open recognition of the hand of God on the part of any individual to whom such a trust is committed. ”