WE OUGHT TO TELL THE WHOLE TRUTH… A quarter century ago some of us were studying the Scriptures in seminary, preparatory to becoming ministers of the Christian gospel. The temper of those times often tried our souls. The optimistic liberalism, conceived in the fertile minds of such men as Schleiennacher and Ritschl and nurtured by a […]
The history of a nation forms that nation’s people. This formation takes place in various aspects of the people’s lives. Their life, their thinking, and their beliefs are all shaped by their own history. The Japanese people are not an exception to this historical formation. They have had a long history which covers more than two […]
Church discipline, like most good things, can bear repeated emphasis, not only because of its essential significance to the church on earth but also because its glory is so great that there is no possibility of reaching the ultimate depth of the Truth which it seeks to apply! This is an introduction to a series […]
The poem “Bloedige Sweet” was written by the Dutch Calvinist poet, Jacobus Revius. It appeared in 1630 in the first volume of Over-Ysselsche Sangen en Dichten—a collection of Revius’ religious poems arranged in Scriptural order. “Bloedige Sweet” is one of those poems in which Revius contemplates the suffering Savior. The poet exhorts his “lazy soul” to do what all Christians […]
What does it mean to “offer” the benediction? To ask this question is to raise a number of related questions; Who may offer the benediction? When may the benediction be offered? What is a benediction? ‘The answers to these other questions are closely connected with the answer to the first one. Certain things seem adequately clear. […]
The sleeper, tautened in the creeping chill Of darkness, split a snore, and muttered When a sneaking, ill-clad comrade tried to snatch A ragged mantle from his dusky thighs. God in the Flesh loomed toward them, lonely In His ardent pain. The bitter breeze Expired through the olive trees. The stony soil, Baptized with blood-like sweat […]
Forty years ago the Christian Reformed Church deemed it necessary to exercise discipline against two of its ministers1 whose public writings denied the teachings of Scripture that God displays a favorable attitude, or 000redemptive grace, towards all of mankind. Today it is wrestling with the theological pronouncements of a Calvin Seminary professor who has gone to the […]
We are continuing our brief series on the inspiration of God’s Word. Our concern is not to set forth that doctrine as such; rather it is to expose some of the oft-beard caricatures of this position which the church has championed and cherished for centuries. In our first article we raised the question: How reliable is […]
Forty years ago (1924) the Christian Reformed Church, in synodical session at Kalamazoo, Mich., adopted the well-known “Three Points,” declaring its conviction that Cod manifests “a certain kind of grace” to all men. What seems to be less well-known is the serious pastoral warning which the synod appended to its declaration. Herein we find a deep awareness […]
These are crucial times for everyone who loves the Reformed Faith. The Kingdom of God is being devaluated to little more than a socialized welfare state; Freudian ethics are replacing the positive demands of God; the promise of the Gospel is but a womb fantasy. With these and the many other aggressions by liberalism it is […]