The Pulpit Speaks: June 14, 1958

An article written by my father, the Rev. C. Thomas Paige, as it appeared in the Tri-State Defender on the date shown.

A long time ago the old sage of Old Testament Prophecy admonished us “to seek the old paths and walk therein.” How tragic and disheartening it is that we live in a day and generation that everything old is fit got the garbage can. Yet for the most part, men in all walks of life are ready – far too ready – to always discard something for that which has only one virtue: that it is new.

Daily we see churches failing their mission because someone wants someone with new ideas that will bring a certain amount of consolation to their sinful ways. In homes, the proven pattern of discipline has been discarded for one that is allowing the child to run the home. In many of our schools we have adopted the progressive method of education where the teacher walks in each morning and starts the day by saying, “Hello children. What shall we do today?”

These are the three big institutions in every child’s life. If these become weak and distorted because they have fallen into the hands of weak people, we can expect no more than a weak generation. In the older home where stealing a slice of potato pie or an apple jack was a crime, we have come to a time where it is only a childish prank and that disciplinary method used long ago is now outmoded and unnecessary.

In our home of some years ago, honesty, truth, tidiness and dependability were strong forces. Now these things have lost their flavor.

It is too mean to make a child go out and work for his spending change. The popular trend now is to set aside a certain amount each week and give it to the youngster as an allowance.

I was talking with a man a few days ago who has successfully reared one of the outstanding families of Memphis. The conversation drifted naturally into the realm of rearing children. He was high in praise of making children industrious and self-respecting by being able to do something and do that well. This man and his thinking represents a trend of thought and a parent that is slowly and surely leaving our shores. In most instances, we find these words most popular nowadays: “I don’t want my child to go through what I went through!”

Maybe you don’t. Maybe you have conceived some better way whereby you are going to develop in our child the same concern for the basic things of life that you have. Maybe so – but I doubt it. I have watched the trend of psychology for some years now and they have moved just like the pendulum of the clock. For a while, it moved into an area of extreme liberality in dealing with children and operating the home. Now, for some apparent unfounded reason, we find the great body of psychologists saying that, in light of all of the delinquency and crime among the young people, we must – and must soon – find some way to rebuff such action. We must seek the old paths and walk therein.

We cannot think of man living or existing in an undisciplined society. There is something about us that demands that we be disciplined. In the bodies of the more intelligent of us there is a still, small voice that speaks to us and reminds us that we are behaving contrary to the will of God, and after this voice has so disciplined us, we stop and take a second thought before committing the act. Many must -through training and development – develop a method whereby we develop a concern for the higher and better things of life.

These old paths lead men to an appreciation of the better things of life and men were able to make worthwhile contributions to their day and time. But I beg of you to look and see what worthwhile contributions have these undisciplined minds of our day and time have wrought. When I was a boy, the old principal of my school was a firm believer in stick-to-it-tiveness. She believed that if you stuck to anything long enough you would eventually conquer it. Can you conceive of anyone today going though nine hundred and ninety-nine experiments before discovering an electric light like Edison and then coming out saying, “I learned nine hundred and ninety-nine ways how not to do it?” It does not take many failures to stop many people of our day and generation. But those who have walked though the valleys and shadows of death, who have had crosses upon their backs every day, and have had to walk in those old paths have come to grips with these fundamental things in life that will, in the final analysis, make them able to stand up and be something. We need just such a person today.