By Van Yandell
John 1:17 “For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.”
In the fall of 1991, I was teaching industrial arts. One cold early winter morning the school principal walked into my shop and told me the state had approved the plan for the construction of our new school.
The challenge was that traditional industrial shops were no longer approved. Technology labs would take their place. At the time I wasn’t too disturbed over that circumstance. Having already explored computer aided drafting, computer graphics and other applications, I saw the change as an opportunity for my personal learning as well as my students.
The next four years (beginning in August 1992) I taught technology education. Many of the students were excited, I was excited, and our lab was one of the first three in the state and set an example for others developing such facilities.
There was a constant flow of visitors from other schools, the State Department of Education and even schools in surrounding states. Being afforded the ego-pleasure of expounding my knowledge of the transition was a thrill and of course I am always eager to teach. Adults also benefit from teachable moments.
However, as the years passed we became aware of what the youth were missing by not having the traditional subjects normally taught in industrial education.
Classes in woodwork, metals, architectural and engineering drafting and design, electricity/electronics provided a value to students that apparently few had realized in past years.
Was it assumed fathers would teach their children how to repair furniture, change electrical switches and receptacles, or install a float valve? And more pressing, where would the next generation of tradesmen come from?
We were raising a generation of mechanical and practical illiterates but were preparing a generation of video game professionals! Where were the future carpenters, cabinet builders, electricians, welders and block/brick layers to develop?
They certainly are not going to come from history or music class. The studies of history and music are needed (I wish I knew more) but these areas do not build buildings, bridges or needed consumer products.
Change is not always good. Other subjects suffered as well. Home economics is another example. Are life skills and home skills in budgeting, planning and child rearing no longer important?
We are constantly seeing failures in parenting. A child bringing a weapon to school and injuring or taking the life of another child or teacher is a parenting failure. Many of the behavioral problems teachers face every day are parenting failures.
The constant need for more prisons and juvenile detention centers are partly the results of poor parenting. But many thought vocational home economics was not needed?
The technology lab served a purpose but its worth compared to the industrial arts shop is certainly debatable.
Here we are one-third of a century later and the topic of technology is an ongoing debate. Technology definitely has its good points but it also creates problems.
We are being watched constantly. Conversations in our homes are being heard to bombard us with commercials for products we may mention. Greed has smothered free enterprise and consumer needs.
We have no privacy, no secrets; our computer searches are recorded to monitor our shopping and buying habits. AI does our thinking rather than the human brain creating a farther dumbing down of the population.
I mentioned to wife Margie the possibility of replacing a bathtub with a shower. By the end of the day we were receiving ads for shower installers. What was listening; the TV, phone, computer, possibly all three?
The church has a similar problem. I usually ask, when called to substitute preach, “Do I need to bring a children’s sermon?” Two of the last three times I’ve asked, I was told “We don’t have any children.”
Where are the young people with children? Do they have no need for God? This is serious and urgent!
Also recently we’ve become aware of a severe shortage of pastors, missionaries and evangelists in America. In one area we frequent, one-third of the churches in a denominational group are without pastors. We have a problem and when the time comes and someone wakes up and realizes this, it will be like dropping a bomb.
If there are so many churches without young adults with children, where will be found the next generation of pastors? The simple answer to this is, there won’t be any and there appears to be already a shortage! And consequently the church will continue to decline.
It is time to start taking the Great Commission seriously! Acts 1: 8 “But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.”
The uttermost part of the earth is no longer the other side of the planet. It is here! It is inside the walls of the church and in the communities! The church has a problem and as a matter of survival, it must be addressed and action taken.
We must always teach that eternal salvation is attained by a faith based belief (Ephesians 2: 8) in Christ Jesus crucified (Matthew 27: 35) for the remission of sin (1 John 1: 9), resurrected (Matthew 28: 6) and ascended alive in to Heaven (Acts 1: 9).
Acts 4: 12 “Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved.” Christians must take this seriously! If we do not tell the world about Jesus, who will?
“Out with old, in with the new” sounds good, but is it?
Van Yandell is a retired Industrial Arts teacher, an ordained gospel evangelist and commissioned missionary. His email is vmy3451@gmail.com.
