Sharing the Bread by Gladys Schaefer

“The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on me, because the LORD has anointed me to preach good news to the poor.  He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners, to proclaim the year of the LORD’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn, and provide for those who grieve in Zion- to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair.  They will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the LORD for the display of his splendor.  (Isaiah 61: 1-3)

As I reread these verses tonight, I was reminded anew of the beauty and joy of a Charlotte Mason education.  We are offering our students the very best and we receive so much in the giving.

The world can be a cruel place and students, parents, colleagues, indeed our own tired souls can come together to share the feast of real learning.

The best books the world has to offer are ours for the taking.  The most soul touching poetry can carry our souls to the heavens. Music that brings tears to our eyes and joy to our spirits is here, waiting to be bathed in.  To learn of those who have lived before us, who have struggled and endured and triumphed – how rich!  To walk in the woods, the fields, the mountains is to see manifested the beauty of the Lord.  All of this is part of the education into which we are pouring our lives.

In this day of “economic downturn,” of loss of jobs and loss of money, what is left at the end of the day?  What is eternal?  Jesus Christ, who was dead and now lives!  That is eternal.  God has anointed us to share this good news and He is allowing us to do it in a multi-faceted way, full of beauty and full of grace.

“to preach good news to the poor”
Mason’s earliest memories of seeing a schoolteacher with a group of underprivileged children impressed in her the desire to help all children, especially those in greatest need.  We should follow her example.  This philosophy of education is superior.  It offers the very best to a child.  A question ever before us is how to reach these children?  How do we pursue educating new teachers who are heading into the poorest of our nation’s public schools in this “better way?” How do we as homeschooling parents and teachers at private schools reach a greater body of children?  Does  “social justice” indicate that they too deserve the best there is to offer?  May the Lord open the floodgates before us!

“to bind up the brokenhearted”
It isn’t just the poor who deserve this education.  Our worlds, indeed our schools and our homes are filled with hearts that are hurting.  Divorce, disappointment, despair litter our lives.  Broken hearts and broken lives are spread around us like the patterns in a “crazy” quilt.
The beautiful poet, Emily Dickinson wrote with such insight in her poem “Pain Has an Element of Blank,”

Pain has an element of blank;
It cannot recollect
When it began, or if there were
A day when it was not.

It has no future but itself,
Its infinite realms contain
Its past, enlightened to perceive
New periods of pain.

Can we mere mortals heal another’s heart?  What we can do is offer to walk alongside, to share the beauty of poetry that has comforted us and lends us hope.
We can explore the creation that proclaims the glory of the Lord.   In a paper read to the Dublin Branch of the P.N.E. U. in 1930 entitled “The Charm of Nature Study,” G. Dowton explains
“Nature study as a subject is one which should be approached with great reverence, for in dealing with birds, animals, flower and all other forms of natural life, we are perhaps, nearer to the Creator than in any other branch of science; for the natural world is the expression of God’s personality in a form that is within the reach of all of us to comprehend in some measure. And is not the natural world one of the greatest proofs that there is a God?
The secret of having reverence in all branches of Nature Study lies in reverence for Life in any shape or form. In speaking of this reverence for Life, Miss Mason says, “Reverence for Life as a wonderful and awful gift which a ruthless child may destroy but never can restore, is a lesson of first importance to the child.”

“Let knowledge grow from more to more.
But more of reverence in us dwell.”
(From Ambleside Online)

“to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners”
According to a report in the BBC News, “Half of prisoners have the reading age of a child under 11 years old – and numeracy rates are even worse. But their access to education is limited and patchy, according to the Prison Reform Trust.”   Appalling truth.   What if children fell in love with reading because they were offered the best the world had to offer?  What if their best friends when they were six years old included Winnie-the-Pooh and Peter Rabbit?  If Elizabeth and Darcy or Jo, Beth, Amy and Meg were their companions as they reached the teenage years?  Would lives be changed? Would futures be altered?  Would hope prevail?
“to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes”
So much of literature today is twaddle.  It is not worth the time spent reading it or the money spent purchasing it.  Words can assault us on every front.  Checking out at the grocery has become a painful process as we are confronted with the needless excesses of gossip and trivia.  Let’s not waste time on nonsense.  Find the best, the most life-giving words that have been written and become nourished with true health.
Think of crowns of beauty instead of ashes, minds and hearts filled with truth and loveliness.   Lives can be filled with ideas, which can breed new ideas and might even germinate into new life for our souls.
A small group of friends met recently at a local bakery here in Birmingham.  One of the discussions included what everyone was reading.  Titles and authors’ names were thrown out and notes where hurriedly scribbled on scraps of paper.  Because these women admired and respected each other, this was a great way to find new books. These books had fed their friends and now offered new landscapes in which to nourish themselves.

“the oil of gladness instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair.  They will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the LORD for the display of his splendor”
This is such a beautiful passage of scripture, poetry at its finest.  It holds a promise of heaven and the everlasting peace in which we shall dwell. It is also pregnant with life here on earth, a life we can share.  Miss Mason explains “Of the three sorts of knowledge proper to a child, the knowledge of God, of man, and of the universe,––the knowledge of God ranks first in importance, is indispensable, and most happy-making.” (Philosophy of Education, page 159)

We are the beggars and we have found the bread.  It is time to let the other beggars know where the treasure is hidden.

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Flesh and Blood by Art Middlekauff

“For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.” (Ephesians 6:12)

What did Charlotte Mason believe about sanctification? How, according to Charlotte Mason, does one become more Christ-like in thought, word, and deed? Is it a “natural” process or a “supernatural” process? Does it begin with the divine miracle of regeneration? Or does sanctification begin with something else?

One might think that these questions are answered in Volume II, Parents and Children. In this volume, Charlotte Mason writes the following:

And now, at last, the miracle of conversion is made plain to our dull understanding. We perceive that conversion, however sudden, is no miracle at all––using the word miracle to describe that which takes place in opposition to natural law. On the contrary, we find that every man carries in his physical substance the gospel of perpetual, or of always possible, renovation; and we find how, from the beginning, Nature was prepared with her response to the demand of Grace. Is conversion possible? we ask; and the answer is, that it is, so to speak, a function for which there is latent provision in our physical constitution, to be called forth by the touch of a potent idea. Truly His commandment is exceeding broad, and grows broader day by day with each new revelation of Science. (volume 2, pages 160-161)

In this chapter, Miss Mason describes the power of habit to develop character. “To-day is the day of salvation, physically speaking, because a habit is a thing of now; it may be begun in a moment, formed in a month, confirmed in three months, become the character, the very man, in a year” (volume 2, page 159). After reading this chapter, one might conclude that, for Charlotte Mason, sanctification is a physical and natural process. It does not require a spiritual rebirth. The power of habit is available to all.

And yet volume II is a collection of “essays [that] have appeared in the Parents’ Review, and were addressed, from time to time, to a body of parents who are making a practical study of the principles of education––the ‘Parents’ National Educational Union.’” Should one look for a theology of sanctification in an essay for parents about education? Did Miss Mason write for any other audience in any other context?

In my own Charlotte Mason journey, I have read, studied, and pondered her first five volumes. I have also read and discussed the first six chapters of volume 6. Most of this material was written for educators. When topics such as sin and holiness are encountered, they are usually incidental and secondary to a larger educational topic. The exception is volume 4, which is a ruby among gems in Charlotte Mason’s series.

Volume 4 is my favorite. In this volume, Miss Mason changes her perspective. The other volumes are organized around the principles of education. By contrast, volume 4 is organized around the internal nature of the person. It is her systematic presentation of the soul. In my view, this “inside-out” presentation is the best place to look for Charlotte Mason’s understanding of sanctification.

Within volume 4, there shines a sparkling light which fills the heart with wonder. This sparkling light is Chapter 18 of Book II, Part I. In my view, this chapter is Miss Mason’s definitive treatment of sin and holiness. It should be the standard by which her other statements are measured. In this chapter we see, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that more is at work in sanctification than nature.

She writes about falling into sin:

“We do not intend, will, or foresee these sudden falls; we become as persons possessed, and have no power in ourselves to struggle out of the flood of malice, pride, uncleanness, greed, envy, or whatever else of evil has overwhelmed us. The fact that we have not foreseen these falls, points to a cause outside ourselves––to those powers and principalities in high places, whose struggle for dominion over us the Bible reveals; and the revelation is confirmed by our own sad and familiar experience.” (pages 115-116)

Science cannot speak to the spiritual forces at work in temptation and sin:

“But if we are aware of the movements of our own spiritual life, and observant of that life in those about us, if we have taken cognisance of how good and evil come as a flood upon the world or upon an individual soul, we shall recognise that there is a source of temptation outside of ourselves, even as there is a source of strength and blessedness. We shall know that ‘we wrestle not with flesh and blood,’ but with spiritual wickedness in high places; and we shall lay ourselves out to understand the laws and conditions of temptation, and shall look eagerly for ways of escape.” (page 116)

No regimen of habit, no physical training, can forever deliver us from the presence of temptation:

“A sense of the inevitableness of temptation, the nearness of sin, comes upon us, now and then, like a terror; and it is well we should realise that temptation is a fact of life––a fact to be faced; and, also, that we are besieged in our weak places, tempted always to those sins we have a mind to.” (p. 117)

And yet God has made provision for His children to choose holiness. Charlotte Mason quotes 1 Corinthians 10:13, which reads, “There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it.” But to whom is this provision offered? Is it available to all people? Or only to those who have been born from above?

I believe Miss Mason answers this question on page 118: “But, once we open the gates of our thought to let in the notion, why, we may conquer in the end, through the grace of Christ our Saviour, and after conflict, tears, and sore distress. But such a fight against temptation is a terror to the Christian soul.” Chapter 18 is addressed to the Christian soul. The ultimate deliverance from sin is found not in the “physical substance the gospel,” but rather in the “grace of Christ our Saviour.”

Again, she writes, “We have a Father who cares and knows. We have a Saviour who saves his people from their sins. We are not left to ourselves; we have a King who governs us, whose power upholds us, and whom we glorify by every little effort of ours not to enter into temptation.” (page 119) Christ is no mere intellectual principle or abstract idea. Rather, Christ is the Savior who knows, cares, acts, and upholds.

The proper response to temptation, according to Charlotte Mason, is to change one’s thoughts. But even this simple act should be done in faith, calling upon God for divine assistance. “When we face temptation, We just have to think of something else when an evil thought comes, something really interesting and nice, with a prayer in our hearts to God to help us to do so.” (Volume 4, Book I, page 23)

This prayer of help to God is not an empty gesture. Prayer itself is a miracle. “The Christian life is altogether of the nature of a miracle. That God should hold intercourse with man; that we may pray, knowing, with full assurance, that we are heard and shall be answered; that at our word the hearts of princes will surely be refrained; that the fit and right desires of our hearts will be fulfilled, though always in simple and seemingly natural ways––these things, which come to all of us as signs, are they not of the nature of miracles? Do they not imply the immediate and personal action of our God, not in your behalf or mine alone, but in behalf of each of the creatures of his infinite care?” (Volume 4, Book II, page 93)

If this “spiritual” account of sin and temptation is definitive, then how should one interpret the opposing account from volume II? I believe that a close reading of volume II reveals the key to harmonizing these two perspectives. Charlotte Mason wrote that “from the beginning, Nature was prepared with her response to the demand of Grace.” We are so accustomed to think of natural vs. supernatural, physical vs. spiritual, profane vs. sacred. Surely sanctification also must be one or the other…

But in “the beginning,” it was not this way. “Nature was prepared with her response to the demand of Grace.” Or, in the words of Father Alexander Schmemann: “The world, be it in its totality as cosmos, or in its life and becoming as time and history, is an epiphany of God, a means of His revelation, presence, and power. In other words, it … truly ‘speaks’ of Him and is in itself an essential means both of knowledge of God and communion with Him.”

In the beginning, according to Schmemann, “the only natural (and not ‘supernatural’) reaction of man, to whom God gave this blessed and sanctified world, is to bless God in return, to thank Him, to see the world as God sees it … in [an] act of gratitude and adoration.” In Christ, we are born from above, “and matter becomes again means of communion with and knowledge of God.” Whether invisible prayer or tangible “ruts” in the brain, all of these are from God, to sanctify us, and make us like His Son.

© 2009 by Art Middlekauff

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