August 1: Who Is Teaching You?

For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept, line upon line, line upon line, here a little, there a little. Isaiah 28:10

We are getting ready for a new school year. It is a fitting time to consider the system of education that was instituted when our world began. It was to be the model for learning. The first classroom was the garden of Eden. The ‘book of lessons’ was nature. The Creator was the teacher and our first parents were the pupils.

Pause to consider that Almighty God voluntarily descended from His exalted place to spend time with the people that He created. He was the founder, principal, and personal instructor in this setting which constituted the very first school. His power was displayed everywhere: from the smallest detail of nature to the vast scenes of the sky. Because of His greatest power, that of love, He gifted His people with their own decision-making power. In spending time with them, loving and instructing them, He showed them His provision for their every need. The spectacular beauty of it all would require eternity to take it all in!

God knew that man’s greatest need was to be in a close relationship with Him. Somewhere within the beautiful garden, there must have been a special meeting place that, along with every other aspect of creation, attested to God’s purposefulness and His love for humanity.

We already know that Adam and Eve exercised their decision-making power to choose a different instructor and learn the wrong lessons. Today, in our own process of being taught, we have the opportunity to look closely at what happened and why. We are given gifts of both hindsight and foresight from the Creator whose highest hope is that each of us will choose Him, moment by moment, every day, as the only Instructor whose teaching is worthy of following. He knows our abilities better than we, and only He has the power to guide us into reaching our full potential.

As our Creator, He knows that responsibility is a character trait that is directly connected to joy and fulfillment. This is exactly why the LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it (Genesis 2:15). Adam was rapidly learning valuable life lessons as he went about his work in the garden.

Even in our fallen world of sin and death, our divine Instructor is still at work to teach us responsibility and the joy that comes through being faithful in honoring that responsibility (see Matthew 25:14-29). As you go, ask yourself if you are faithfully tending and keeping whatever He has placed under your ‘umbrella’ of responsibility.

Behold, God is exalted by His power; Who teaches like Him? Job 36:22