What you are doing is near to God’s heart.
When Franklin Roosevelt became president in the midst of the Great Depression, he led the federal government in starting program after program, many of which were called by their initials, such as TVA, CCC, WPA . . . . With all these initials, people started calling his efforts an “alphabet soup” of Federal agencies.
Artists working in the Works Progress Administration (WPA) created the poster above advertising a program offering free adult classes. The poster suggests that if people learn more, they will live more. I don’t know if people lived more because they learned more in those classes with those 225 teachers in 170 centers, but I do believe that in general people who “learn more live more,” in the sense that learning enhances the quality of life the learner experiences — as long as the lessons learned are worth learning, of course.
God’s word encourages people to learn. The first time the Bible uses the word learn is in Deuteronomy. Moses is speaking with the purpose of reminding the Israelites of things they have been taught before. In chapter 4, verse 10, Moses encourages the Israelites to remember the day they stood before God at Mount Horeb. God had wanted the Israelites to assemble before Him in order to hear His words. He had two purposes for this:
- He wanted the Israelites to learn to fear Him all the days they lived on the earth, and
- He wanted the Israelites to teach their children.
The first time the Bible uses the word learn involves parents teaching children. What you are doing is near to God’s heart.
Remember the day you stood
before the Lord your God at Horeb,
when the Lord said to me, ‘
“Assemble the people to Me,
that I may let them hear My words
so they may learn to fear Me
all the days they live on the earth,
and that they may teach their children.”
Deuteronomy 4:10