A child, not even one millimeter in length. Living in the uterus of his mother. Another child of the covenant, though nobody knows him yet. Sharing the guilt of his parents. Also sharing the grace God gave to them. When this child is born, he has already been sharing in God’s grace for nine months. […]

An address given at Golspie, Sutherland, on August 12, 1953, and subsequently published — expanded at certain points and abbreviated at others — by the Lord’s Day Observance Society, London. The questions relating to the weekly day of rest and worship are of perennial interest and concern. The circumstances in connection with which these questions […]

The Synod of the Christian Reformed Church meeting in the year 2000 will be faced once again with the issue of Women in Office. This matter will be on the agenda because the decision, taken by Synod 1995, which opened the offices of elder, minister, and evangelist to women, is to be revisited in five […]

Only a couple that has been emboldened by their escape from impeachable offenses would try to spin God. But Hillary Rodham Clinton — veteran of cattle future profiteering, a failed attempt to nationalize health care, champion of children raised by the government village and not parents — has done just that and more in an […]

American consumers today face a dazzling and dizzying array of choices. Companies are constantly creating new products. Giant chains are building huge stores all across the landscape. Video stores provide thousands of movies for home viewing, competing with the 500-station cable networks. Is anything wrong with all of this? The promised land into which we […]

Revelation 5:1–10 No teaching is more vital to the Christian faith than that of the ever-blessed Trinity. Unless it is believed and sincerely confessed, so the Athanasian Creed affirms, one cannot be saved. No other doctrine, however, has been so much misunderstood and maligned. Jews and Muslims continue to spew on it all the venom […]

People, old as well as young, often tell me they don’t like history at all. Of course not, when we remember how it is too often taught in schools. Teachers demand that the pupils memorize an endless array of persons, events and dates which have little meaning for our everyday life. Even some Christian teachers […]

Revelation 6:9–17 Does heaven seem far away; at times even somewhat unreal? Then learn from this book — not from a mystical poet who claims to see heaven in climbing ivy or fragrant rose — how heaven and earth are always connected by God’s appointment in the created order. When anything happens above, consequences for […]

In quite a few commentaries this chapter is called the first of several “interludes.” This would be a literary device in which the writer’s flow of thought is interrupted by something different. With the term we shall not quarrel. But it can easily be misunderstood. If pressed, much of the beautiful unity of this writing […]

Now we are all here in the presence of God to listen to everything the Lord has commanded you to tell us (Acts 10:33). A preacher once complained that his congregation was being eaten alive by boredom. He lamented what he perceived to be a twofold problem — himself and his church. As for himself, […]