(December 8, 2007)
Greetings fellow members and guests.
When you start a new job, the quicker the boss can use you to generate income the better. If you already have a working knowledge of your job it is of great benefit to the company. In order to be prepared for a job you need some education. Otherwise, you need some on the job training. On the job training can be more specific and practical but can also take longer and might mean slower increases in responsibilities and promotions.
My first civilian job was as a member of a survey crew for the City of Bathurst N.B. It was a summer job and I attended university the rest of the year. I knew very little about surveying. After a couple of summers I decided that I would switch to the surveying in engineering at university. So I ended up getting some education as well as some on the job training in the same field early in my career.
My best friend in those days, had been in a competition for years with some old classmates from his former town, to see who would get top grades in school. It seemed like a very healthy and worthy goal. They all got passionately involved in this competition and it carried on to an extent into university. The three other boys were pointed out to me there. Some of them had stopped being friends. I don’t know why but two of them committed suicide before graduating. The last graduated with very high marks and committed suicide shortly after starting work. My friend is still alive and is a city planner in Vancouver.
You can see that education is not necessarily a good or safe way to go and that competition can be dangerous. My mother tried to instill in me a highly competitive spirit from the start of schooling but I rejected it. I’m glad I did, I might have ended up like those boys, dead young. I believe in paying attention and learning as much as I can in all aspects of life not just school courses. It is often better to make your friends look good than taking the spotlight and laughing at them. The same is true in team sports, it is often better to be a team player than a stand out star, ask Isaiah Thomas or his coach.
There are more ways to get an education than to attend college or university, though some careers require a formal education and certification. Your family doctors and your mechanics are examples. You can be self taught if you have a good reasoning mind. You need to know what you want to learn, then search out the materials or books you need and start experimenting and learning. Dr. Moller is mostly self taught and designs and builds vertical takeoff and landing aircrafts. You can learn a lot from the internet and may not even need to buy a single book these days. That is how I learned to program and manage my website.
When it comes to the scriptures I find the Bible of tremendous value to learn the way of God but it does not end there. For example I find some of Paul’s writing difficult to understand so I have to figure some things out for myself. Some things that Paul says I disagree with and so I have to justify my beliefs, for example the ideas behind competition just mentioned. Very few of us are miracle workers but we still need to be effective Christians in life. There is much to learn from life itself that is not well explained in the Bible or in words. Sometimes silence is more effective than anything.
Growing up in a family environment is an education. I learned to deal with different characters. I also learned that I function better on my own but it took a while to become effective. Jesus had to leave His family but some of them ended up following Him. I always tried to stay active at something throughout my life. For years it was physical fitness then it was studying the scriptures, then writing and I was employed full time through most of the years. It’s been an education.
Education by itself is not very effective. You need goals to put what you learned to use, perseverance in applying it, resourcefulness to continue to learn more and to find more applications, good health to stay active, drive or ambition to keep going, and the love of God to sustain you and encourage you through it all.
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