This issue is different. The usual rubrics are missing. The articles that do appear are longer than is customary.

The explanation? You have in your hands a special issue on “Reformed Worship” consisting of the addresses given at a Protestant Reformed officebearers’ conference last September. The conference was held in the building of the Peace PRC in Lansing, IL.

Including all of the speeches in their entirety in one issue (with the exception of the one that becomes the editorial in this and the following issue) has its advantages. Each address retains its full force, something that is lost when an article is broken up and read in installments. In addition, having the complete treatment of the subject in one issue is helpful for future reference and for spreading this witness about worship to others, something that we hope our readers will do.

For “Reformed Worship,” always a fundamental topic, is timely today in the churches of the Reformation. It is controversial, explosively so.

—DJE