Vol 79 Issue 15

Rev. Hanko is a minister emeritus in the Protestant Reformed Churches. In my Father’s house are many mansions…. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also. John 14:2, 3 Our Lord assures His disciples, “I will come again!” The church of the old dispensation lived in the expectation of but one coming of the Lord. Then all God’s types and promises would be realized. The believers looked eagerly for the day when...

Rev. VanBaren is a minister emeritus in the Protestant Reformed Churches.   The War Against the Family—and the Covenant   Clearly, the devil and his allies, the unbelieving world, are mounting a powerful assault against God’s law (almost successful, it would seem). Now follows the “mopping up” operations. The biggest battle focuses upon the family. If families can be destroyed, ultimately the church itself must be affected. Families are not simply wiped out—the foundation for proper family life is being dismantled piece by piece. Only about one or two generations ago, the attack began in earnest. Less than 60 years...

One way in which every member of the Protestant Reformed Churches can profitably remember the schism of 1953 is by listening to a newly available set of CD’s. The CD’s consist of sermons and lectures on the history and issues of the schism, delivered at the time of the schism. The preachers and lecturers are two of the chief protagonists, the Rev. Herman Hoeksema and the Rev. Hubert DeWolf. The sermons and lectures were of crucial importance to the struggle at the time. They were part of the history. They helped to make the history. The recorded messages shed light...

Mission Activities   In news from Ghana we found that our missionary, Rev. W. Bekkering, with help from his wife, Phyllis, have decided to start a library for the benefit of the members of the Fellowship there in West Africa. They have painted the “consistory” room in their church and have added some bookcases. The mission has a number of books that the Moores left behind after retirement, and Audra Bol also brought some books from the members of Georgetown PRC when she was there as part of a Calvin College tour. Hopefully this will give the serious reader in...

Rev. Key is pastor of the Protestant Reformed Church of Hull, Iowa. The Reformed faith insists upon the must of doing good works. That is biblical. It refuses, however, to attribute justification in any sense to those good works. That would be contrary to biblical teaching. For we have seen that righteousness is by faith only, not by the works of the law.   No Wage-Earners with God   It is impossible that our good works be a ground for our righteousness before God, in whole or in part. It is impossible, because you and I do not stand in...

Rev. Kuiper is pastor of the Protestant Reformed Church in Randolph, Wisconsin. After the deacons have been nominated and elected to office, it is necessary and fitting that they be installed into office in a ceremony during the worship service. Our Church Order, on the basis of Scripture, requires such a ceremony. Article 22 says of elders and deacons: “that they may … be installed with public prayers and stipulations … agreeably to the form for this purpose.” According to Acts 6, the first deacons were installed in a church ceremony. The congregation, having chosen seven men to be deacons, placed...

Rev. Cammenga is pastor of Southwest Protestant Reformed Church in Grandville, Michigan. “The reconciliation of all such sins as are of their nature of a public character, or have become public because the admonition of the church has been despised, shall take place (upon sufficient evidence of repentance) in such a manner as the consistory shall deem conducive to the edification of each church. Whether in particular cases this shall take place in public, shall, when there is a difference of opinion about it in the consistory, be considered with the advice of two neighboring churches or of the classis.”...

Rev. Dick is pastor of Grace Protestant Reformed Church in Standale, Michigan. The man and maid who have been led to one another covenantally, in the context of family and church, and hitherto trusting the guiding hand of God, can know for sure very simply if they are meant to be married. This is the ninth thesis of covenant marrying (cf. the April 1, 2003 issue of the Standard Bearer). These two can have such certainty because their way toward marriage together has been principled. The couple has been graced to follow God’s way of covenant marrying as revealed in...

Rev. Stewart is a Protestant Reformed minister, presently working in Northern Ireland. But what was the message that Patrick preached to the Irish? Patrick leaves us in no doubt here, giving us a simple Rule of Faith near the beginning of his Confession: There is no other God nor was there ever in the past nor will there be in the future except God the Father ingenerate, without beginning, from whom all beginning flows, who controls all things, as our formula runs: and his Son Jesus Christ whom we profess to have always existed with the Father, begotten spiritually before...