All Articles For All Around Us

Rev. Nathan Decker, pastor of Grandville Protestant Reformed Church in Grandville, Michigan The purpose of this article is twofold. First, it will report briefly on key decisions taken at the 2022 Synod of the Christian Reformed Church (CRC) regarding the report on human sexuality. Second, it will reflect on a couple of the more significant immediate implications of these decisions. What occurred at this summer’s CRC synod has a history beginning in 2016. That year, the CRC synod adopted the following recommendation: That synod appoint a new study committee to articulate a foundation-laying biblical theology of human sexuality that pays...

Rev. Audred Spriensma, pastor of Cornerstone Protestant Reformed Church, Dyer, IN I along with most Americans were shocked to hear Tuesday morning (May 3) the news of the draft of a Supreme Court majority opinion concerning Roe v. Wade that was leaked to the public. What a shocking breach of Supreme Court confidentiality and secrecy! The draft was written by Justice Samuel Alito. It would strike down Roe v. Wade and abortion as a constitutional right for Americans. Chief Justice John Roberts confirmed the document’s authenticity the next day. In the draft opinion, Samuel Alito wrote that Roe “must be...

Rev. Martyn McGeown, pastor of Providence PRC in Hudsonville, MI The Florida bill On March 28, 2022 Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida signed HR-1557 into law, a bill dubbed by the liberal media as the “Don’t Say Gay Bill,” but whose actual title is “The Parental Rights in Education Bill.” The point of the Florida law, which comes into effect on July 1, 2022, is to give parents more control over their children’s education. This is a hot topic politically in the USA, where the instruction in many public schools includes lessons on critical race theory, gender studies, and the...

Rev. Nathan Decker, pastor of Grandville Protestant Reformed Church in Grandville, Michigan Around five years ago, I gave a speech entitled “Living Wisely in a Digital Age.” A central point was to highlight the importance of being proactive in knowing about technology, striving to understand the potential spiritual harm of using a device or application before jumping headlong into it. One of the greatest dangers is that we become passive by using every new device or platform without much thought. This much is clear: certain devices and apps do impact the spiritual and emotional well-being of the believer. Discernment is...

On a Saturday morning this past December, the smallest of adventures with my two-year-old daughter turned into a parental wake-up call. The adventure was her first trip to the local public library. Her eyes were wide; she had never seen so many books. She could not help but express her excitement (far too loudly for such a quiet space). After a brief lesson in library etiquette, I turned her loose to explore. I was excited for her and with her, ready to gather a stack of books to take home. She made a beeline for a small table of featured...

The passage of C-4 Canada has just banned conversion therapy with the passage of Bill C-4, which was approved unanimously by Canada’s House of Commons and Senate, and then received Royal Assent on December 8, 2021. Royal Assent means that Canada’s Governor General, Mary Simon, a representative of the Crown, Queen Elizabeth II, signed it into law. The new law took effect on January 7, 2022. Conversion therapy is defined in C-4 as follows: a practice, treatment or service designed to (a) change a person’s sexual orientation to heterosexual; (b) change a person’s gender identity to cisgender; (c) change a...

Introduction The subject of this “All Around Us” article is sexual abuse in the realm of the church, a topic about which it is difficult to write and to read. However, it is necessary to do so because, in the first place, we must have a certain level of knowledge that the terrible evil of sexual abuse is present in the church. For a member of the church of Christ to think that sexual abuse only occurs in the world is wrong. Not only does such a mentality cause the church not to take the necessary protective measures to prevent...

If this recent reference to God’s Ten Commandments were in the print news, you would not find it on the front page, nor in the religion section. It would have been the smallest of articles, buried in the back of the politics section. I would have missed it.1 The reference was published in the massive machine of self-publication we know as Twitter—just a few tweets. The author is worthy of note; her name is Dana Nessel, the Attorney General of the State of Michigan. The background Unlike Nessel’s tweets, the occasion for them was frontpage news. It begins with the...

The Texas Heartbeat Act On September 1, 2021 the Texas Heartbeat Act, which was approved by lawmakers in May, went into effect as the law of the state. Some describe this law as the toughest anti-abortion measure in the United States. The law prohibits abortionists from performing an abortion “if the physician detected a fetal heartbeat for the unborn child.” The law has a unique provision for its enforcement that is garnering much attention. It bans state officials from enforcing the law but allows for private citizens to bring charges in civil courts against anyone who performs an abortion banned...

Introduction The schism in the Protestant Reformed Churches (PRC) affects life “all around us.” Much more significant than any other issue is the rift that has taken place in our churches, separating very friends and families from one another. While the leaders of the schism call it a “reformation,” I call it what it is: a sinful division in the church of Jesus Christ. The schism is being kept active by ratcheting up rhetoric. Rhetoric is “the art of effective or persuasive speaking or writing.” To ratchet something up is “to increase repeatedly and by small amounts.” Such we have...