Vol 62 Issue 07

David Harbach is a teacher at Adams St. Prot. Ref. Christian School, Grand Rapids, Michigan. For most of our churches, the time for the election of office bearers has taken place. According to Article 22 of the Church Order, the elders shall be chosen by the judgment of the consistory and the deacons according to the regulations for that purpose established by the consistory. Some of our churches give the members an opportunity to direct attention to suitable persons for nomination to these offices. This is also in agreement with the same article in the Church Order, where every church...

Barrett L. Gritters is pastor of the Protestant Reformed Church of Byron Center, Michigan. The following or similar events could happen in your church. Because a man of the church falls into the sin of drunkenness, drives while intoxicated, and finally slams into a parked car, he is arrested, put in jail, and the story appears in the next day’s daily paper. The elders visit the man and find that he is sincerely penitent. He even appears before the consistory out of the desire to show the elders that his repentance is sincere. But the consistory makes a public announcement...

Ronald L. Cammenga is pastor of the Protestant Reformed Church of Loveland, Colorado. Our Protestant Reformed Churches teach a distinctive doctrine concerning marriage and divorce. By maintaining the Biblical truth that marriage is for life, and by opposing divorce except on the ground of unrepented of adultery, we separate ourselves from most churches today. Not only is there an increasing corruption of the truth of marriage by the churches, but there is a corresponding disregard for the Bible’s clear teaching on the subject of divorce and remarriage. One particularly distinctive position of our Protestant Reformed Churches as regards marriage is...

jise J. Van Baren is pastor of the Protestant Reformed Church of Hudsonville, Michigan. There was but a single step from Alice’s garage apartment into the kitchen. Brother John attached handles on the door frame so Alice could hold to them while pulling herself carefully up the step. Another handle was attached to the door frame of her bedroom so that she had something on which to hold when walking into that room. Though she was still able to walk by herself, it was ever more slowly. The challenge was to find new ways of helping her help herself with...

Robert D. Decker is professor of New Testament and Practical Theology in the Protestant Reformed Seminary. Casualness and Worship Casualness and Worship. Such is the title of the editorial of the November 18, 1985 issue of Clarion, the magazine of the Canadian Reformed Churches. Editor S. Geertsema comments: A congregation comes together for worship on a Sunday morning. It is summer. The weather is warm. Those attending are dressed casually. Brothers of the church council enter, the organ is silenced, the minister walks to the pulpit. Casually he greets the people with a “Good morning, congregation.” The congregation responds with a...

George C. Lubbers is a minister emeritus in the Protestant Reformed Churches.   Chapter XXIV The Mystery of the Seventy Weeks in Daniel 9 THE HOLY OF HOLIES ANOINTED (Daniel 9:24b) The anointed Messiah came to anoint the “Most Holy”! There can be little doubt that the term for “Most Holy” in the Hebrew text should be better translated “holy of holies.” In Old Testament language this refers to the part of the tabernacle which was behind the second vail (Heb. 9:3). The writer to the Hebrews explains this as follows: “For there was a tabernacle prepared, the first, wherein...

John A. Heys is a minister emeritus in the Protestant Reformed Churches. Surely when in Psalm 14:l we read, “The fool hath said in his heart, there is no God,” we have a judgment of God that those who deny Him in their actions, as well as those who do so in words, behave in utter folly. For the psalmist speaks of those who say in theirhearts that there is no God. And out of the heart are all the issues of life. That heart determines what every part of the body will do. It says that there is no God, before...

Herman C. Hanko is professor of Church History and New Testament departments at the Protestant Reformed Seminary. In our last article, when we introduced the subject of gambling, we ended the article by calling attention to the principle of Christian stewardship, within which principle the whole question of gambling must be decided. We noticed that the idea of stewardship was very common in Scripture, but that it is also to be applied to the relationship in which the believer lives to God. Christian stewardship rests upon the fundamental principle that God is the Creator and Sovereign Owner of the entire...

What should be the attitude of the child of God toward what is called “rock music”? More specifically stated, what should be the attitude of the child of God of Reformed persuasion toward “rock music”? And more specifically still, what should be the attitude of the child of God of Reformed persuasion who holds both in principle and practice to the truth of the antithesis toward “rock music”? Perhaps you are asking, “Why make that the subject of an editorial in The Standard Bearer? Is that really a question among us? Is it a debatable subject? Is it necessary to discuss this and to point...

Although the actual occasion of New Year’s Day will be past when most of our readers receive this issue, we take this opportunity to wish you, our readers, a blessed new year. May you take to yourselves the word of Psalm 57:1a, “. . . yea, in the shadow of thy wings will I make my refuge, until these calamities be overpast.”