Vol 71 Issue 03

(This is the text of the speech given to faculty and students of the Protestant Reformed Seminary on the occasion of registration at the beginning of the 1994/1995 school-year.) The work of the seminary that we take up again this morning is preliminary and basic to the call to the ministry of the gospel. You young men who study for the ministry are not yet called. You believe yourselves to have the inward aspect of the call. But God has not yet called you by His church, so that you are commissioned officially to bring His Word to His people....

Mr. Wigger is an elder in the Protestant Reformed Church of Hudsonville, Michigan. Evangelism Activities The Consistory of Georgetown PRC in Bauer, MI has appointed five men to be the initial members of their newly created Evangelism Committee. Their mandate, in part, is to lead their congregation in reaching out into the community and to help equip each member with the knowledge and or materials with which to give witness to their faith. The Reformed Witness Committee, comprised of members from our Doon and Hull, IA, and Edgerton, MN PRCs; has started yet another new and exciting venture, a call-in...

Rev. Woudenberg is pastor of the Protestant Reformed Church of Kalamazoo, Michigan. Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others.  Philippians 2:4 For some time now we have been dealing with the relationship between the Protestant Reformed Churches in America and the Liberated (Vrijgemaakt) Reformed Churches in the Netherlands. I have enjoyed doing this since it touches on the life and development of that part of church history in the middle of which I was privileged to live as a maturing child and young man; and my sense is that what...

Prof. Decker is professor of Practical Theology in the Protestant Reformed Seminary.

Mr. Bodbyl is secretary of the Board of the RFPA. Members and Friends of the RFPA: As we conclude another year of publishing theStandard Bearer, we are reminded of the words of David in Psalm 127, “Except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it.” Yes, truly, we are involved in the building of the spiritual house of our God through the instruction and faithful witness of theStandard Bearer. It has been our distinct and great privilege to testify of our covenant-keeping God and His sovereign work in salvation. We give thanks that God has been pleased to...

Rev. Hanko is a minister emeritus in the Protestant Reformed Churches. Address to the RFPA Annual Meeting This is an important occasion, since tonight we celebrate the 70th anniversary of the Standard Bearer. On October 1, 1924 the first issue of theStandard Bearer appeared in our homes. At that time it was predicted that the magazine would have a speedy death. Maybe it would last five years, at the most ten. Later it was said that it would die out with our churches when Rev. Hoeksema passed away. Today the Standard Bearer is still coming to our homes and has a wider distribution than...

Samuel Miller was one of the founders of Princeton Seminary in 1812. He himself taught at Princeton for 36 years. The article we publish is part of the sermon that Miller preached at the installation of Archibald Alexander as first professor at Princeton in August, 1812. The full sermon has been published by Presbyterian Heritage Publication, P.O. Box 180922, Dallas, TX 75218. The excerpt reprinted here is taken from this publication with permission. . . . A further means which the Church is bound to employ for providing an able and faithful ministry isfurnishing a seminary in which the candidates...

October 10, 1994 Dear Brothers and Sisters, By this time we are well into the work of the first semester of the, new school-year. Classes began at Protestant Reformed Seminary on August 30. On the evening of September 7, at Hope Church in Walker, Michigan, Professor Hanko gave the convocation address to a large and appreciative audience. His topic was, “Our Church-Governed Seminary.” God has blessed the churches with eleven seminary students. Two are in their fourth (and final) year and will graduate in June, 1995, God willing. Both are doing their internships. One is working in the Doon, Iowa...

Prof. Hanko is professor of Church History and New Testament in the Protestant Reformed Seminary. Introduction Both in Presbyterian and Reformed circles in the last three quarters of this century the tendency has been to establish independent seminaries which are governed by boards of directors who are in some instances answerable to societies of one sort or another, and who are, in other instances, answerable only to themselves. Most seminaries organized within the last seven decades or so are such independent seminaries. The seminary of the Protestant Reformed Churches has become something of an oddity in this respect. In the...

The Apocrypha Doctors “She suffered Many Things of Many Physicians” (Standard Bearer, Sept. 1, 1994) dealt with one of my favorite Scripture passages from Mark 5:21-34. Perhaps the saddest commentary in verse 25 is the observation that she “had spent all that she had, and was nothing bettered, but rather grew worse.” How terrible of those doctors to take this poor woman’s money without truly healing her. It is certainly quite possible that some of those physicians were “faith” healers who claimed to her that they could produce a miraculous healing when they really did not possess that power. I would,...