Exploring an Adventist Philosophy of Education

Why teach in an Adventist school? Is it worth the trouble? Do you know what you are supposed to accomplish?

Such questions are at the heart of George R. Knight’s Educating for Eternity: A Seventh-day Adventist Philosophy of Education. The book starts out exploring basic issues related to the meaning of life, moves into an Adventist approach to those issues, and then examines what that means in terms of the student and the aims of education, the ministry of teaching, the shape of the curriculum, teaching methodologies, and the social function of the Adventist school.

Even though Adventists have more than 8,000 schools, Educating for Eternity is the first book dedicated to a specifically Adventist philosophy of education. As such, it is long overdue.

Lisa Beardsley-Hardy, Director of Education for the General Conference, sums up the contribution of the book nicely when she writes that “Knight’s book is brisk, clear, and engaging. It brings the reader directly to the point of each issue discussed. Seventh-day Adventist education deserves to exist only when it is both Christian and Adventist. Its biblical philosophic foundation determines who should teach, why students are there, and what they should learn. It conserves cherished values in order to produce students capable of changing society. Otherwise change would be flowing in the other direction. There is a ‘message of the coming of Christ who will not only feed the poor but abolish hunger; who will not only comfort the grieving but eradicate death.’ Everyone should read this book.”

Order Educating for Eternity from Andrews University Press

Author

George Knight

Dr. George R. Knight has taught at the elementary, secondary, and university levels, and has also served the Seventh-day Adventist Church as a school administrator and pastor. He has written widely in the areas of Adventist educational philosophy as well as Adventist educational and church history. He continues to write and speak in retirement.