Instruction Class/Catechism

[Judas Maccabeus]

It is never really gone over systematically in those settings.

Why not? Does that tell us anything about perceived appropriateness/importance?

That would take about a year or so of sermons. While they are important, do you want them filling up half of your preaching schedule?

[JohnH]

It is never really gone over systematically in those settings.

Why not? Does that tell us anything about perceived appropriateness/importance?

That would take about a year or so of sermons. While they are important, do you want them filling up half of your preaching schedule?

Sunday school seems better for this so people can ask questions and participate. I think a lot of people don’t really retain much of what is spoken in sermons.

[joshuabgood]

It is sort of interesting to me that the essential doctrines/practices of what it means to be a Christian disciple, are taught 3-6 months, for a 30-60 minute session or so, primarily once in some one's life. Wouldn't there be some good in these sorts of things being the primary focus of Christian discipleship and that one "coming up" in the system would be discipled in them prior to instruction class and baptism?

I am also curious about "how one passes" instruction class? Is it a "right answers" sort of thing? Is there a test/assessment/testimony/mental statement of agreement/signing a covenant? What if there are foundational things that one is struggling with, like say, "the goodness of God" due to a parent death in an untimely manner?

[R7ehr]

Why not? Does that tell us anything about perceived appropriateness/importance?

That would take about a year or so of sermons. While they are important, do you want them filling up half of your preaching schedule?

Sunday school seems better for this so people can ask questions and participate. I think a lot of people don’t really retain much of what is spoken in sermons.

It may be. But if the doctrine is important for the whole crew, don't leave it where the Sunday School Skipper's never sail.
https://forum.mennonet.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=8984

[JohnH]

That would take about a year or so of sermons. While they are important, do you want them filling up half of your preaching schedule?

Sunday school seems better for this so people can ask questions and participate. I think a lot of people don’t really retain much of what is spoken in sermons.

It may be. But if the doctrine is important for the whole crew, don't leave it where the Sunday School Skipper's never sail.
https://forum.mennonet.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=8984

Easily fixed by simply giving an occasional sermon or inspiration, opening, etc. on why it's important to attend Sunday school.

[Judas Maccabeus]

That would take about a year or so of sermons. While they are important, do you want them filling up half of your preaching schedule?

Sunday school seems better for this so people can ask questions and participate. I think a lot of people don’t really retain much of what is spoken in sermons.

It may be. But if the doctrine is important for the whole crew, don't leave it where the Sunday School Skipper's never sail.
https://forum.mennonet.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=8984

Having a class as a prequesite for baptism insures that all who become members are exposed to a comprehensive body of Biblical knowledge, it is not at all difficult. It also shrinks the size of the class to promote ease in asking questions, which generally does not happen during services, and is more difficult in a large all church Sunday school class.

[Soloist]

Sunday school seems better for this so people can ask questions and participate. I think a lot of people don’t really retain much of what is spoken in sermons.

It may be. But if the doctrine is important for the whole crew, don't leave it where the Sunday School Skipper's never sail.
https://forum.mennonet.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=8984

Having a class as a prequesite for baptism insures that all who become members are exposed to a comprehensive body of Biblical knowledge, it is not at all difficult. It also shrinks the size of the class to promote ease in asking questions, which generally does not happen during services, and is more difficult in a large all church Sunday school class.

Wife: I would also like to point out that even though a child or young adult might have heard something preached at the pulpit for years, that’s not saying they were actually paying attention. Most of them were in a children’s Sunday school(like Junior or intermediate, occasionally youth), and some of them were drawing or whatever during church until they actually started getting interested in learning and taking notes. They also might not have had as easy of an ability to understand some of it when they were listening to those sermons because of whatever stage of development they were in.

Instruction class gives them a chance to go through the basics with the ministry and ask questions and hear explanations in a way that they can easily pay attention and not have as much problem asking.

I don’t personally know about the old orders other than stuff from Young companion and also the writings of Elmo Stoll, and it seemed like all of them went through instruction class, native or not. I think it could be shorter or baptism could be done sooner, but I do think it’s useful, even for children who have grown up in the system,.

[Ernie]

It is sort of interesting to me that the essential doctrines/practices of what it means to be a Christian disciple, are taught 3-6 months, for a 30-60 minute session or so, primarily once in some one's life. Wouldn't there be some good in these sorts of things being the primary focus of Christian discipleship and that one "coming up" in the system would be discipled in them prior to instruction class and baptism?

It's not that they only hear it once in their life. They may only hear it systematically once in their life when the teachers go over a pre-established outline that is always used. Otherwise, they get bits and pieces of the lessons over and over as part of other sermons. And as I mentioned earlier, some preachers may preach through the articles of faith every 5 or 10 years or more. But I'm not sure how common this is.

I am also curious about "how one passes" instruction class? Is it a "right answers" sort of thing? Is there a test/assessment/testimony/mental statement of agreement/signing a covenant? What if there are foundational things that one is struggling with, like say, "the goodness of God" due to a parent death in an untimely manner?

I don't know how most congregations do this, but in my experience, those leading out are looking for spiritual awakeness, spiritual interest, evidence that a person is turning his back on the world and casting his lot with the people of God.
In instruction classes where there is only doctrinal teaching and not personal discipling or mentoring, the teachers would never know whether a person is struggling with the goodness of God. But even if they were, I don't think that would necessarily disqualify them, unless they said they simply didn't have any belief.

[Ernie]

I'm curious why you would say the church should choose a different set of people, other than the ordained deacons and ministers, to teach the foundational doctrines. And I'm curious what the ministers are ordained for, if not to teach the doctrines of God.

If a church wants the ordained to do the doctrinal teaching, that is fine IMO.

If a church wants to share out the work load, I am fine with that also.
Most churches have more qualified people in the church than what are ordained, which is why they use the lot or votes to decide who to ordain.

Yes, elders/bishops are responsible to teach doctrine, pastor, administrate the church. But I don't think they have to do everything.

If there aren't enough men ordained to do the teaching then by all means learn a lesson from Acts 6 and ordain more helpers to fill in so that the "Apostles" can devote their time to prayer and ministry of the Word.

As you know, I favor more ordaining rather than less so that spiritual needs are well attended to. There are situations where this is not feasible for a variety of reasons but I won't get into that in this thread.

[mike]

I'm curious why you would say the church should choose a different set of people, other than the ordained deacons and ministers, to teach the foundational doctrines. And I'm curious what the ministers are ordained for, if not to teach the doctrines of God.

If a church wants the ordained to do the doctrinal teaching, that is fine IMO.

If a church wants to share out the work load, I am fine with that also.
Most churches have more qualified people in the church than what are ordained, which is why they use the lot or votes to decide who to ordain.

Yes, elders/bishops are responsible to teach doctrine, pastor, administrate the church. But I don't think they have to do everything.

I feel the same way, although I don't have a problem with just the ordained men doing the classes if that is what the policy is. It's not like other men in the church are looking for more work to do.

One reason I feel that it doesn't have to be only the job of the ordained men is that the classes, at least they way we do them, don't really involve a lot of teaching. It's just sitting there going through the material in the book, and offering a few comments here and there. I don't see why, instead of two ministers having to take another night out of their week, it couldn't be one minister and one lay brother running the class, for instance. But again, it's not like anybody needs more work to do.