For the first time in seventy years my wife and I visited the land of our fathers. What we found there was decidedly different from what we had pictured in our minds. The Netherlands is a beautiful country. That is more apparent in its historic buildings, arts, etc., than in its natural features. And we found the people very friendly. Relatives whom we had never seen or even heard of gave us a royal welcome. We went to see as much of the country as we could, and, thanks to them, saw much more of it than we would have considered possible in our three and a half–week stay.
The Plight of the Churches
In that short time we made some acquaintance with the church life. We attended five different churches in our four Sundays there and heard eight different ministers in the Gereformeerde Kerken in Overijssel and Friesland. We also had occasion to speak with a number of people, most of them relatives. What we heard and saw surprised us. We had heard much about conditions in the Gereformeerde Kerken, but had not realized the extent to which apostasy had worked itself out in the churches. Because three and a half weeks was hardly long enough to become thoroughly acquainted with the church life, we can only speak of our impressions of it.
What we saw and heard was alarming. Of the eight sermons we heard, only two met somewhat the requirements of preaching. Most were what one visitor aptly described as “essay type lectures” that dealt more with social issues than with the clear call of God: Word to repentance and holy living. And one got the impression that most of those attending did not much care what was brought from the pulpit. Church attendants were mostly older people, a few families with children, and very few young people. That young people attended so poorly has the attention of the Gereformeerde Synod, which is asked to make an in-depth study of why only two out of five young people still come to church. There are still people who are concerned about conditions in the churches, but there seems to be nothing that they can do to correct it. We were told that it was a commonly accepted practice in the congregations for young couples to live together in “common law” before marriage. Consistories are afraid to exercise any form of discipline for fear of losing members. In one of the churches which has a membership of 1200, attendance is considered good if 400 appear at a worship service. In such conditions the extremely weak sermons are the more tragic for the life of the congregations. This, we suspect, points to the heart of the churches’ prob!em. God’s Word has, for them, lost its power and its meaning. Then the question asked is no longer, “How must we serve God and keep His commandments?” but, “How can we please men in order to keep them on the church membership list?” Where the first consideration is missing, the second loses its meaning. This, we judge, is the heart of the Dutch churches’ problem.
How Did This Begin?
How does such a condition originate in a denomination? It begins with the ignoring of God’s Word. We were informed that one rarely heard a sermon on the epistles ofPaul. That was understandable. If what the apostle wrote concerning the role of women in the church and concerning the required qualifications of elders and deacons are not valid today because what he wrote was culturally conditioned to his time, everything else that he wrote becomes similarly suspect. Thus God’s Word spoken through the apostle is annulled. One sees clearly where this tampering with God’s Word has brought the churches in the Netherlands. And we will experience exactly the same results in the United States and Canada. The decisions of our last synods to open the office of deacon to qualified women are extremely serious, because those decisions are based on exactly the same kind of grounds as those that were used to justify the Dutch churches’ course. In both cases, ignoring God’s Word leads eventually to completely annulling it.
Church Admonitions
This severe judgment is right, although colleagues, in the Netherlands as well as here, are angered by it. In Kerk lnformatie, the official publication of the Gereformeerde Kerken in Nederland (#160, April, 1985), we find an answer to the charges of the Consistories (Verontruste Kerkeraden) against the synods’ deviations from God‘s Word. That answer, printed in its entirety, expresses anger at the charges. De Generale Synod of Dokkum pleads with the concerned churches to be careful with their judgments, since we as church members need one another in our search for the Truth. It argues that we must avoid distrust and must realize that the promise of Christ to His Church, that He would give the Holy Spirit to lead it into the Truth, is a promise that we can trust. This means that when fellow members of the same church discover that Scripture allows different roles to women in the church today than what was allowed to them in the past, we must listen to one another. We must together listen with due reverence to the Word of God and our confession (“Samen eerbiedig luisteren naar Schrift en belijden,” p. 5).
That sounds appealing. Who in a true brotherly spirit doesn’t want to do that? But when God’s Word is being annulled, may we refuse to judge that action completely wrong? Where must we draw the line? When we hear such pleas as this, we wonder how Dr. Arminius would fare if he were living today! Was he not concerned to present what he saw God’s Word to be teaching concerning our salvation? On the synod’s basis, would there ever be or have been in the past, any heretics in the church? The synod warned against judging one another’s motives (saying, “Binnen de gemeente mogen wij elkaars goede bedoelingen niet in twijfel trekken”). Although we must not judge one another’s motives, we must have the courage to call that unbiblical which conflicts with the clear teachings of God’s Word. When fellow members introduce and push erroneous teaching and practice, should we not say a word about it, lest we cast doubts and distrust on others’ good intentions? We can and must judge and reject another ‘s wrong views as wrong without judging motives.
Who’s “Polarizing?”
In discussions with our Dutch relatives a familiar word surfaced, the accusing word “polariseren” (polarizing). That prejudicial word points a finger straight at you and says, in effect, “You are a troublemaker! Shame on you!” How do you become such a troubler? By taking a stand. If you don’t like the direction your denomination is going, you may indeed talk about it, but, please, don’t take a stand, for then you polarize. Taking a stand is drawing a battle front and causing a division. And who wants to do that? We are called to peace, are we not? Don’t take a positive stand!
That word “polarize” irritates me not a little at times. Who is doing the polarizing? Does the one who contends for the truth and upholds it at all costs? Or do they who are introducing teachings and practices that conflict with the clear teachings of Scripture? Just who is judging whom, and just who is driving a wedge between church members? The answer should be crystal-clear. When someone accuses us of polarizing, that amounts to saying, “Be a nobody! Just run with the crowd and trust your leaders.” We may not be such characterless people in God’s Kingdom. We must contend for His truth, cost what it will. We must do that if we would save the church from apostasy.
Time for Action!
To such contention we are being called today in the Christian Reformed Church. We must not only speak; we must also act. In the Netherlands the Concerned (“Verontrusten”) have done much talking and writing, and they still do so today. But they have lost the battle. In the time when they tried to correct things by talking and writing, more members were slowly getting accustomed to inaction and to going along with what they knew was completely wrong. We must learn from that tragic Netherlands experience. We have done the necessary talking and writing and more. Now we must act, and that, immediately. Those who see the unbiblical actions and trends in our denomination must stand up and be counted. They must return to and uphold the historic Christian faith in teaching and practice. If that means a parting of the ways, which we think that it does, then we must be ready to pay that price. If we are not ready to do so, I submit that, like members of the Dutch churches, we will lose everything.
Our trip to the Netherlands further opened our eyes to see what is going on among us. We were previously in a measure aware of it , but now we see how we as a denomination are literally “running to catch up.” Apostasy always runs fast. Do we panic in the face of this evidence of crisis? Up to a point, we do . That is because so many among us do not see the urgency of the present situation, and many of those who do are leaving to join other denominations, especially the Canadian Reformed Church. We are called to support all our other concerned members and to help lead them in the way of Truth as we have always understood and confessed it. We have reached the time for vigorous action . For the sake of fellow members and for the Lord’s kingdom on earth, let us not dilly-dally, but take action. It is urgent! Very urgent!
Cecil Tuininga is a retired Christian Reformed minister living at Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.