All Articles For Lubbers, George C

In our former article on this text we noticed that the chief subject of Paul in this passage is, that, since weare the free-born sons in the Lord, we ought also to walk in this freedom, and not be ensnared in a yoke of bondage of the works of the law, For we have been powerfully and irresistibly called to freedom. 

This passage in Paul’s epistle to the Galatians reads as follows: “For, brethren, ye have been called unto liberty; only (use) not liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but by love serve one another. For all the law is fulfilled in one word, (even) in this: thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. But if ye bite and devour one another, take heed that we be not consumed one of another.” 

These first ten verses of chapter 2 of first Peter are a continuation of the apostle’s instruction in the former chapter. There the apostle had instructed the churches of their new status in Christ by virtue of God’s elective grace as this was realized through the power of the resurrection in their hearts, so that they are reborn unto a living hope. Old things have passed away and all things have become new. And in hope we look for the renewal of all things in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. 

“But Jerusalem that is above is free, which is our mother.” Galatians 4:26

In our former article we noticed how Paul enjoins Timothy to constantly keep the Church in mind of the central truth of the gospel, that Jesus Christ is indeed in a perpetual state of being risen from the dead, and that He will come again upon clouds to judge the living and the dead. That gives reason for hope and godliness to the pious and causes them, in all tribulation, to lift up their weary heads knowing that their redemption is nigh!

This essay, which I am about to write, will be a positive exposition of Romans 10:9 against the background of the “testimony” that “Classis West” purported to give Classis East in regards to the Statements of Rev. De Wolf and Classis East’s condemnation of the same. 

In these verses Paul makes clear to his readers, the churches in Galatia, what our “new ought” is in Christ Jesus our Lord. We are indeed the free-born sons in Christ, born, from above, from the heavenly Jerusalem and therefore we ought to walk also with our conversation of the heavenly Jerusalem. Hence, the very earnest exhortation of Paul “only use not your liberty as a strategic point of attack foe the flesh, but rather by love serve one another.”  We are indeed not under law! 

If there is one thing that the great apostle Paul insists on in this letter to the Galatians, it is this: as the believers in Christ, the Church in the New Testament dispensation, we are free. We are no longer “under law” but we are “under grace!” 

The Rev. J. Howerzyl is busying himself with the consideration of the question of “Our Right of Separate Existence.” It is time for a little searching of the heart. That Rev. Howerzyl had to come to this as a spokesman for the many brethren and sisters, who took ecclesiastical position with him, I had long ago foreseen to happen. And that the term the “right of separate existence” would become a “certain justification” of their existence I could too have prognosticated.

May we, and all who formulated the letter of “testimony” to Classis East, put off the shoes from our feet and submit our every thought to the instruction of Christ as this was given to a “teacher in Israel,” Nicodemus. That is, indeed, salutary and sobering, leading to the true sobriety which can compare spiritual things with spiritual. I Cor. 2:13.