THE FORM IS SECONDARY The traditional Sunday worship service as we have known it and still know it today, is coming under increasing attack. The most vocal of these attacks come from inside the church itself, particularly from the side of certain leaders and (some) young people. There is a call for more “involvement” in […]

QUESTION: In our high school catechism class we have had a boy who got on everybody’s nerves. His misbehavior finally exhausted the teacher’s patience and the boy was ordered to leave the class and not to return again. He is now telling it around that he is through with Sunday School and the church as well as catechism. […]

Over the years of my ministry, I have prayerfully tried to be a teacher. In previous congregations, I was grateful to have been able to teach most, if not all, the catechism classes for the students who spanned the range from Grade 3 through Grade 12. I was grateful for the opportunity to establish good and […]

You arrive at the elder’s meeting to discover everyone talking about Sittema’s article in last month’s issue of The Outlook. (Allow me a little fantasy, OK?) In it, he argued that every elder must be able to disciple someone, and some should be active in the church’s teaching ministry. He even suggested that the time-honored […]

After church was over, the routine was predictable. The adults went outside, stood on the sidewalk surrounding the church on the comer, and talked. The kids ran off energy, chasing around the lot, slowing down periodically when scolded by a watchful parental or other adult concerned about skinned knees and torn “Sunday clothes.” Then the […]

Using the Heidelberg Catechism in Pastoring, Training and Evangelism When the editors asked me to write on the uses of the Heidelberg Catechism, I was grateful for the opportunity for two reasons. First, I love the old Catechism so very much. It is a tender yet strong articulation of the Biblically Reformed faith, and my […]

There has never been a time in world history when people in developed countries have been so carefully and well fed physically. Nutrition is a subject which fills pages of every homemaker’s magazine and captures the spotlight of many television ads. Careful studies and experiments have been conducted by experts in many professions, and a […]

This is the first half of an article reprinted from the July-August 1968 issue of The Outlook (then known as the Torch and Trumpet) in commemoration of the sixtieth anniversary of the founding of Reformed Fellowship, Inc. in April, 1951. The second half will appear, Lord willing, in the May-June issue. EVERYWHERE in today’s world […]

It is important to have a clear Biblical understanding of the answer to this question, for we have a tendency to lean toward the one or the other. Some assume it is the church’s responsibility, which produces the tendency for parents to draw back and leave it all up to the church. They hardly ever […]

On the first Sunday this year, I opened with interest a small insert in our church bulletin. It was a plan for a full year of family worship. I was excited. My many years of homeschooling have left me with an instinctive appreciation of ready-made plans. I studied it carefully. On one side of the […]