Rev. Kuiper is pastor of the Protestant Reformed Church in Randolph, Wisconsin. The explicit teaching of Scripture regarding the office of deacon is limited to four areas: a history of the origin of the office (Acts 6:1-6), the qualifications for the office (Acts 6:3, 5; I Tim. 3:8-12), a few brief and scattered references to the work of the office (Acts 6:1-3,Rom. 12:8, as well as other passages which state general principles), and an encouraging promise to the deacons that in the way of using the office well they will enjoy a reward (I Tim. 3:13). Having finished our examination of...

Mr. Wigger is an elder in the Protestant Reformed Church of Hudsonville, Michigan. Evangelism Activities   The Evangelism Committee of the Byron Center, MI PRC recently informed their congregation of plans to proceed with the printing of two new pamphlets in the next few weeks. These include “The Sin of Gambling,” by Rev. Douglas Kuiper, and “Genesis 1-11: Myth or History,” by Prof. D. Engelsma. We believe that both of these pamphlets deal with issues to which the church must give a clear and biblical response, so we are thankful that Byron Center has taken it upon themselves to provide...

Reprinted from When Thou Sittest In Thine House, by Abraham Kuiper, Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., Grand Rapids, Michigan. 1929. (Pp. v, vi, 1-8.) Used by permission of Eerdmans Publishing Co. A Word Preliminary The family is the wondrous creation of God, from which all our human social life has of itself unfolded. Compare national existence in Israel with that in Rome and Greece, and nothing is more strikingly evident, than the far higher place of honor which the family in Israel occupies. From Israel this beautiful trait has passed over into the church of Christ, and in every land...

Prof. Engelsma is professor of Dogmatics and Old Testament in the Protestant Reformed Seminary. If eschatology has been somewhat neglected by the church in the past, this is not, and may not be, the case today. Eschatology is forced upon the church’s attention by erroneous teachings about the last things. Some of these teachings are enormously popular among Protestants. Certain of them make inroads into Reformed and Presbyterian churches.   The Optimism of Liberalism   In the late 1800s and early 1900s, theological liberalism optimistically proclaimed the gradual perfection of the human race and its world by means of natural...

Miss Lubbers is a member of First Protestant Reformed Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

Prof. Hanko is professor emeritus of Church History and New Testament in the Protestant Reformed Seminary.

Rev. Koole is pastor of Faith Protestant Reformed Church in Jenison, Michigan. God’s Wisdom and the Impaired (or: Living in Gratitude While Raising Children with Genetic Anomalies) Every now and then one comes across a book that demands attention. One such book is Genetic Ethics: Do the Ends Justify the Genes? This is a book which, because of its relevance to the issue of the day, genetic cloning, deserves a wider reading. The book consists of twenty-three articles, each written by a different author trying to bring his or her Christianity to bear on some facet of the controversy swirling...

“Alone” Amidst the Onslaught I must send this communication to you to say THANK YOU for your articles, “A Defense of (Reformed) Amillennialism” (Standard Bearer, Jan. 1, 1995 — Dec. 15, 1996), which I read on the Internet. After twenty-odd years of being beaten down by those who deride the Reformed faith and use premillennialism, and, sadly, quotations from and references to Spurgeon’s affirmation of premillennialism, in order to denigrate anything that might be termed “Reformed” or “Calvinist,” I have often begun (having stood apparently alone amidst the onslaught for so long) to doubt even my own salvation. How can...

“He Shines in All That’s Fair” is a lovely line in the well-known hymn, “This is My Father’s World.” This is my Father’s world, the birds their carols raise, The morning light, the lily white, declare their Maker’s praise. This is my Father’s world: He shines in all that’s fair; In the rustling grass I hear Him pass; He speaks to me everywhere. Dr. Richard J. Mouw has lifted this line from the hymn and made it the title of his recent book (Eerdmans, 2001). The book is of great interest to readers of the Standard Bearer. It is also...

In this issue of the Standard Bearer appears the first installment of our reprinting of Abraham Kuyper’s When Thou Sittest in Thine House. The work was originally a series of meditations in Kuyper’s religious periodical, De Heraut (The Herald). The articles were published in book form in 1899 with the title, Als Gij in Uw Huis Zit: Meditatien voor het Huislijk Saamleven. In 1929 Eerdmans published an English translation by John Hendrik DeVries with the title, When Thou Sittest in Thine House: Meditations on Home Life. The book is out-of-print. It is this translation that we are publishing serially in...