All Articles For Vol 85 Issue 14 4/15/2009

Mr. Wigger is a member of the Protestant Reformed Church of Hudsonville, Michigan. Mission Activities Rev. A. denHartog, pastor of the Southwest PRC in Grandville, MI, joined a team including Rev. J. Laning and Mr. John VanBaren, to make a visit to the churches in Myanmar. This was done under the supervision of the Hope PRC of Grand Rapids, MI. Our Synod in 2007 made a decision to give a portion of funds collected over the years for assistance to the churches in India and Myanmar to three of our congregations for oversight and distribution. The funds being sent to...

Rev. Langerak is pastor of Southeast Protestant Reformed Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Divided by a Common Heritage: The Christian Reformed Church and the Reformed Church in America at the Beginning of the New Millennium, by Corwin Smidt, Donald Luidens, James Penning, and Roger Nemeth. Eerdmans (2006). Paper. ISBN: 978-0802803856. Reviewed by Prof. David J. Engelsma. The intelligentsia in the Reformed Church in America (RCA) and in the Christian Reformed Church (CRC) desire the reunion of the two denominations. Work goes on, mostly quietly and behind the scenes, to achieve the merger. The issues that occasioned the split in 1857...

Rev. Haak is pastor of Georgetown Protestant Reformed Church in Hudsonville, Michigan and radio pastor for the Reformed Witness Hour, on which this message was aired. What a day that had been—the day in which Jesus rose from the dead—a day of wonder and joy, and a day also of perplexity and doubt! There had never been a day like that before, nor will there ever be a day like it again—until the end, when Jesus appears yet once more, in the clouds of glory. Immortal life in the body stood upon this present earth of sin and death. For...

Reprinted from When Thou Sittest in Thine House, by Abraham Kuyper, Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., Grand Rapid, Michigan. 1929. Used by permission of Eerdmans Publishing Co. Forgetfulness Is it sin to forget? Or, when something escaped us, are we done with it by saying: I forgot it. One would almost grant the latter. For, when you have simply not thought about a matter, when remembrance of it did not come to you, and nothing whatever reminded you of it, how in the world then could you help it, and how can you be held accountable for it? In by far the...

Rev. Spriensma is pastor of the Protestant Reformed Church in Kalamazoo, Michigan. There are many wonderful new inventions that we enjoy today. One of them is the cell phone. I think that most people under the age of forty today, in our country or in any other developed nation, would be lost without their cell phones. We can let our young daughters drive their car down the highway, not afraid of what might happen if their car had a breakdown. They would be able to call us or other appropriate help to get them going again. We are able to...

Rev. VanderWal is pastor of Hope Protestant Reformed Church in Redlands, California. Who would think that, after only five years of its existence, such a word would cause such feelings at its mention?!! For some parents the word gives a feeling of helplessness about a secret world. They know very little about it except that their children (younger and older) spend a great deal of time in it. They see that their children are often secretive about their time and activities there. For young people, and maybe not-so-young people, that word elicits all kinds of different feelings. About their friends...

Mr. Kalsbeek is a teacher in Covenant Christian High School and an elder in Hope Protestant Reformed Church, Grand Rapids, Michigan. Previous article in this series: March 1, 2009, p. 258. (In our previous article on political correctness we answered the questions: What is it? and Where did it come from? We now move on to the questions: How is it being promoted? What are its consequences? and Why should modern-day Issachar be concerned?) How is it being promoted? Make love not war!” That would be the way to accomplish the cultural revolution of Lukacs, Gramsci, Adorno, Marcuse, and company....

In his editorial entitled “Creeds, the Believer, and the Sufficiency of the Scriptures” (the Standard Bearer, February 15, 2009), the Rev. Kenneth Koole takes aim at what he calls “independentism.” What comes under his fire, specifically, is an “independentism that smacks of individualism, which individualism, in the end, borders on an autonomy of self.” Included in the range of the Rev.’s editorial gun is homeschooling. It is “the simple fact,” according to the Rev. Koole, that not all, but “much of what belongs to the homeschooling movement today is infected with this same spirit.” “The spirit of individualism,” we are told,...

Previous article in this series: April 1, 2009, p. 292. Marriage is the God-ordained institution that bonds one man and one woman for life. God determined that this unique relationship of love and fellowship would picture His glorious covenant of grace between God and His chosen people in Christ. The wickedness of man has developed to the point that man despises this fundamental relationship, this “creation ordinance.” In Western countries, and increasingly about the world, divorce is common and acceptable—if young couples even bother to get married. God is not mocked. Man pays the price for this rank rebellion—the heaviest...

Rev. VanOverloop is pastor of Grace Protestant Reformed Church in Standale, Michigan. “The Lord is risen indeed, and hath appeared to Simon.” Luke 24:34 The two travelers to Emmaus had seen the risen Lord Jesus. At first Cleopas and his companion did not know it was Jesus. He appeared to them as a stranger. He had talked with them for most of the seven miles to Emmaus and they did not know Him. But as soon as their eyes were opened and they identified Him, they immediately returned to Jerusalem in order to tell the eleven. And there they found...