Vol 47 Issue 13

Perhaps, youthful friend, you recall that in my contributions to this column I am attempting to answer certain questions presented to me by the young people in my congregation. It so happens in the providence of God that I have just finished a sermon for the coming Lord’s Day on the Fifth Commandment which is also, as you can gather from the title of this article, the subject of the question we wish to answer. The question reads: “How far does obedience to parents go?

6 a.m. on Tuesday, February 9, 1971. The moon was setting in the west just as the sun was rising in the east. This was the day for the return of the astronauts from the moon with the proud boast of what man had once more accomplished. This was also the day for a complete moon eclipse visible in this entire area. But something quite different became the headlines in the news and occasion for concern for many. 

A couple of our churches which are presently without undershepherds have extended calls again in the recent past. That from Doon, Iowa, has gone to Rev. G. VanBaren, while Rev. H. Veldman has received the call from Southwest.

Recently with a loud thunder and many sad faces our “old church” building was torn down. No doubt many Standard Bearer readers attended the lecture or church service in the South Holland Protestant Reformed Church. The “old church” was built in 1928, remodeled in 1933, and hit by fire in 1970. Even though the “old church” was not used for some time, many could not help but fell sad when it was no longer there.

LETTERS TO POLLY. . . on the gift of affliction; by Melvin Schoonover; Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1971; 106 pp., $3.95. 

THE ELDERS OBTAINED A GOOD TESTIMONY BY FAITH (Hebrews 11:2) 

Although one of the four freedoms that have been promised to us is freedom from fear, it is a gross understatement to say that we have not yet attained to it. Larger and larger sections of our bigger cities are being marked off as territory through which one ought not travel, not even in broad daylight, for safety’s sake. More and more college and university campuses are the scenes of the violence of riots. The number of students in certain colleges and universities that seek police protection while at school is on the increase.

We have made the remark in preceding articles that Calvin, in his discussion of the doctrine of the atonement in his Institutes of the Christian Religion, does not emphasize the particular character of the suffering and death of Christ. This, however, does not mean that the truth of the particular character of the grace of God and the sovereign character of God’s election and reprobation were not burning issues in the day and age of the Genevan reformer. They certainly were.

REQUEST FOR A NEW CONFESSION  In various Church publications it has been reported that the Christian Reformed Synod, at her next session in June, will have to deal with an overture which requests the Church to draw up a new confession. One notice of this appears in the RES NEWS EXCHANGE from which we quote. 

Dear Brethren and Sisters: