All Articles For Daniel

Previous article in this series: July 2010, p. 427. With great emphasis, dispensationalists claim that the rapture can take place at any moment. By this statement they mean that there are no signs that must take place before it occurs. And if there are no signs for us to see, there is no purpose in our looking for them. Yet looking for these signs is precisely what our Lord has called us to do. If we are not watching, then we are sleeping: Watch ye therefore: for ye know not when the master of the house cometh, at even, or...

Rev. Dykstra is pastor of the Protestant Reformed Church of Doon, Iowa. Article 41 of the church order of Dordrecht sets forth some practical rules for good order in classical meetings. Recognizing, however, that the main function of classical meetings ought to be spiritual in nature, the Reformed fathers included the following in this article: . . .Furthermore, the president shall, among other things, put the following questions to the delegates of each church:  1. Are the consistory meetings held in your church?  2. Is church discipline exercised?  3. Are the poor and the Christian schools cared for?  4. Do...

Rev. Stewart is pastor of the Covenant Protestant Reformed Church in Northern Ireland. Previous article in this series: February 1, 2009, p. 206. Having considered Rome’s false ecumenism with Eastern Orthodoxy, Anglicanism, and Protestantism, as well as the principles of Roman ecumenism, it remains to examine the methods of its ecumenism. For this, the prime source is, once again, the Decree of Ecumenism (1964), produced by Rome’s last “ecumenical” council, Vatican II (1962-1965).1 Some examples shall also be given of the use of these methods (or weapons) in the slaughter of careless, apostatizing Protestants. Remember too that Rome’s labors to bring all...

Rev. Hanko is pastor in the Protestant Reformed Church of Lynden, Washington. The Second Prophecy (cont.) 3. Who is left among you that saw this house in her first glory? And how do ye see it now? Is it not in your eyes in comparison of it as nothing? God is reminding the people in this verse of the poverty of the temple they were building. He was doing that because Christ was coming soon. His coming was only a little while away, less than 500 years away. To help these Old Testament believers look for His coming, God began...

Mr. Wigger is an elder in the Protestant Reformed Church of Hudsonville, Michigan. Ministerial Calls Our Holland, Michigan congregation has called Rev. W. Bruinsma, from a trio which included also the Revs. S. Key and B. Gritters. Prof. Decker has declined the call extended to him from Faith Church in Jenison, Michigan. Mission Activities During the first week of September Rev. and Mrs. Bernard Woudenberg of Kalamazoo, Michigan, along with Dr. and Mrs. Dwight Monsma of Grand Rapids, Michigan traveled through the area of Maryland and Virginia on behalf of the Mission Committee, contacting a number of people who have...

The editorial in the January 15, 1995 issue of theStandard Bearer, entitled “Jewish Dreams,” took up the sword against postmillennialism. It contended particularly against the form that this error concerning the last things takes in the modern movement known as “Christian Reconstruction.” It called this movement’s vision and program for the earthly future “Jewish dreams.” The reference is to the illusory hopes entertained by the Jews of Jesus’ day for a carnal kingdom, as those hopes surface inJohn 6. The phrase “Jewish dreams” is borrowed from the Second Helvetic Confession (A.D. 1566). In its time, this was one of the...

The name by which the distinctively Reformed doctrine of the last things is known is “amillennialism.” This name derives from the 20th chapter of Revelation. Six times in verses 1-7 is mentioned a period of “a thousand years.” An angel binds Satan for “a thousand years” (vv. 1, 2). The result is that Satan cannot deceive the nations for “a thousand years” (v. 3). John sees certain souls living and reigning with Christ “a thousand years” (vv. 4, 6). The rest of the dead lived not again until the “thousand years” were finished (v. 5). When the “thousand years” expire,...

The Lord Jesus is coming. Our recent celebration of Christmas reminded us of this coming. His first coming points to the second, demands the second, and is fulfilled only in the second. The justification of God, the redemption of the church, and the judgment of this world accomplished by His coming in lowliness must be perfected by His coming in glory. This coming will be bodily and visible. At His coming, the Lord Jesus will raise the dead, judge all men and angels, and renew the creation. This will be the end of this world and its history. Christ’s coming...

The past year witnessed a truly significant event: the collapse of Communism. That theological-economic-political colossus reared up in world history by Marx, Lenin, and Stalin and taking form especially in the Soviet Union since the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 has fallen. Communism has proved an utter failure. History’s judgment of Communism was replete with ironies that made the fall of the house of Marx, Lenin, and Stalin even more devastating. Communism failed economically. While the capitalism of the West was bringing greater material prosperity to more people than ever before in history, Communism (funded in large part by borrowed capital...

Rev. Key is pastor of the Protestant Reformed Church of Randolph, Wisconsin.