              VOLUME -VII                                                                                                 .
                                                                bfAY'15,  I%1  - G&  `%PlDS,  .h'iICHIGAN                                    NUMBER 16


                                                                                         place.. No, I .do  not know where that was. I have vacillated

                                                                                         with respect to the question from the house of John Mark

                                                                                         to the temple. But at present I am inclined to think that

                                                                                         they were in a large upper room in the temple, and for the

                                                                                         same reason-that-they had to go to Jerusalem to receive the
                                       PENTECOST .'
                                                                                         gift of the Holy  Spirit. God was  going to connect the Old
                            "`And  swddenly  there came a sound from hgqven              with the Ney. And since the New~Testament  church is the
                          as of a. rush&g  mighty z&d, a.nd  it filled  all the          spiritual counterpart of the city of Go<, and that therefore
                       house where they were sitting. And,thel*e  appeared
                          unto  thevtz cloven totigibes  like as of fire, and ii sari    they Aght not go-  td, Galilee to .receive  the Spirit, so the
                       at&n  e,dch  of. them ijnd they woe all filled with               temple-at Jerusalem IS the type of the temple  of God. which
                          the Holy. Ghost, a.nd began to speak with other                is fulfilled in the-&h&&  of the New  Testament. -Which is
                          to?tgues,  a.s  the Spirit  gave them titterance.              the' veiy ;eason-  that Paul addresses the church of his day,
                                   we do hear them spea.k  in ow tongues tlq             saying; Ye are the temple of the living God ! God will connect
                       wd~~e&l  works of God." - Acts 2 12-4,  lib.                      the. hallowed temple of old with the spiritual counter-

                                                                                         part, the Church of the New Testament. The temple always
             Filled with the Holy Spirit!
                                                                                         said: God dwells with men! Well, this day, this hallowed
             Oh, that makes all the difference. If you are the happy                     day of Pentecost, the speech of the Temple of God will
         recipient of that Holy Spirit, you are filled with the love                     resound so that all hear it.
         of God ; you ark being purged of your sins; you 5x-e  filled
                                                                                            And there they are: the one hundred -and twenty. They
         with the holy zeal of God ; you are united to those that with
                                                                                         are still waiting for the promise, for the Holy.  Ghost, and at
         you received like bounty; you are filled with rejoicing unto
                                                                                         Jerusalem, and in the temple .of God.
         all eternity.
                                                                                                                  *      * * *
             If not, you will mock at the holiest of all : -you'  will  say,
         they are full of sweet wine!                                                                                                   .
                                                                                            And suddenly, miraculously, they are being filled with the
             Listen to Paul: Now if any man have not the Spirit of                       Holy Spirit.
         Christ, he is none of His! How utterly. terrible! If you
         have not that Spirit, you da11  Jesus a curse.  If you have                        Oh, that was an event of far reaching consequences. They
         that Spirit, you cry out : Jesus the Lord !'                                    were all filled with the Holy Ghost:
.`. ~
             They !                                                                         What does it mean?
                                                                       _
             Who are they ?                                                                 No, it was not a limited and individual, event of the day
            They are the one hundred and twenty who stood gazing at                      and on those one hundred and twenty persons.. It would
         the heavens, after the cloud took the Lover of their soul away                  have a broader significance  thap that. It would  mean that
         from them. They are the same company of common fisherfolk                       the Holy  Ghost was come  to stay in the Church !

         from Galilee who had followed Jesus fro&  Galilee to Jeru-                         He came upon the promise of JeSus:  I will send you

         salem. They are the witnesses of His resurrection. They                         atiother  Comforter, and He shall abide with you! It is the

         are the church of the New Testament at its inception. They                      fulfillment of Jesus' promise: And lo I am with you alway,

         are all in heaven now where they continued their song of                        even to the end of the world.

great rejoicing.                                  .'                                        Who is this Holy Ghost?
                                                                                              _
            And they are waiting t`here  for you.                                           0, He is the same Holy Ghost that visited God's people

            But about two thoustid years. ago, this. little company                      in the Old Testament, but there was a difference.           The

         of plain, ordinary people were all with one accord iti one                      difference is. so. great that the -Holy Spirit' Himself said in


362                                          T H E   S T A N D A R D   B E A R E R

John 7: "for the Holy Spirit was not yet given since Jesus            Oh yes, the Holy Spirit of Jesus was poured out. There

was not yet glorified."                                            is no doubt about that.           .

   It is the Third Person of the Holy Trinity, there can be           They were all filled with the Spirit of Jesus Christ.

no question of that. But He was more now. He brings with                                        *         * * *
Him the very flavor of Jesus Christ. He was the Third

Person as given to Jesus at His glorification at the right            But what was the meaning of these signs ?

hand of God.                                                           First, they all are from heaven. Make no mistake on

   When He was poured out on this glorious Pentecostal             that score. There is a humbling lesson in that. Learn that

day He brought with Him Jesus Christ in all His ac-                lesson and you are fortified against all heresy. It means that

complished work up to and including His sitting at the right       everything good and comely, everything holy and righteous,

hand of God, filled with all the blessings of salvation.           everything salutary (pick that word apart: the root of it

       Then too, He came also as far as the quantity is con-       means salvation) is from heaven. From that time until this
cerned to this. first New Testament Church. It was an out-         evil day all salvation from the beginning to the end is
pouring upon them, instead of a trickling as in the Old            wrapped up in the given Spirit of Christ.

Testament. Drops of that Spirit were upon Moses and                   Second, the sound of that tornado is the rushing God who
David and Isaiah, and all the prophets and Kings of God.           is in a hurry to embrace His Church. The fulness of time

But now it was as a flood:  And it touched the whole church,       had come when He would give Himself to His own people as

person for person and head for head; that is the difference.       `never before. And then God is in a hurry. You see that

   And therefore, He is the Holy Ghost of God as given to          same hurry when Jesus is taken back into heaven. Read it

Jesus, and therefore called: the Spirit of Christ.                 in that strange sign in heaven of the woman that gave birth
   And He brought with Him reconciliation, forgiveness,            to a man child. The devil stood ready to devour Him. But-
adoption, resurrection-life, access within the inner sanctuary,    God snatched Him to heaven. God was in a hurry.
knowledge and wisdom of the mysteries of God's Kingdom,               Why in a hurry ? He loves you and me. Wind is ir-
in short: the law written in our hearts. He was the entire         resistible: so is He.

realization of the great promise of God !                             A screaming and bleeding child is lying on the `sidewalk :

   Study the signs which accompanied His coming and you            it is grievously hurt in great agony. The mother spies her
will see the difference.                                           crying and miserable child from afar. I ask you: is she

                                                                   going to saunter down to that dreadful spectacle? No, she
                            * * * *                                will rush, she will run as fast, no, faster than she should

                                                                   run : she will bverstrain herself.
   They suddenly hear a sound from heaven, and what a                 God is in a hurry to enfold the church in, arms of love,
sound. It sounded like a. mighty rushing wind.                     even the love which the Spirit brings. Read Romans 5 5.
   But how strange that must have been: the sound of a                The spectacle of fire?
tornado, but not a thing stirred. I think that God so directed
                                                                      It is the fire that burns and burns in the heart of God.
the weather that on that morning all was still. There was
                                                                   He is going to give the church the zeal of His own love.
not a breeze stirring. And that terrible sound concentrated
itself in the house where they sat. Therefore the mighty              Henceforth you will note that zeal, that burning zeal of
multitude unerringly goes to the upper room.                       God;

   And then that phenomenon of' the thing that was not                Watch Stephen: he will be killed for his God. But he
fire but looked like a great column of fire, darting downward      blesses as he expires. It is because of this fire that burns
in fiery tongues and resting upon the head of each of them.        and burns.

   And then they began to speak, all of them. That too is             And the tongues ?

significant. And watch the multitude: they are in a flux, a           National Israel was at an end. The confusion of Babylon

strange flux. They mill around, they separate themselves in        is healed. It matters not that you stand with a Phrygian

definite groups, surrounding a certain speaker for each of         soul in Jerusalem. You are going to understand the Gospel.

these groups. One says: what? I hear my own dialect. And           God will accommodate Himself. He will heal the confusion

all those of the country of Elam grouped themselves about          you created while Nimrod spewed forth his pride of life.

Peter, or Thomas, or some other fisherman.                            Oh those tongues, those tongues. They sing the sweet

   All of a sudden the people that knew not how to speak in        song to me that the Promise of God is to all the elect in all

those strange languages are fully conversant in those several      nations.

tongues with the proper pronunciation, syntax, vocabulary,                                    * 9 * *

etc. You may safely believe that all these one hundred and

twenty spoke fluently and easily, and with burning hearts,            No, I have little more to say to you. My story is almost

themselves wondering what was happening to them.                   ended.


                                             T H E   S T A N D A R D   B E A R E R                                                                                                                                                                                     363


  ~ They all speak, the,  whole New Testament speaks. And

what a speech !                                                                          ,-  T H E   S T A N D A R D   B E A R E R
                                                                               Semi-monthly, except monthly during June, July and August
   They all speak the wonderful works of God.
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the Pentecostal blessings found you ?                                                                         Editor - F&v. HERMAN HOEBEMA

   Attend to this: if and when you are touched by the                          Communications relative to contents should be addressed to
                                                                                                 Rev. H. Hoeksema, 1139 Franklin St., S. E.,
Pentecostal Spirit of Christ, you conclude the whole story                                                                       Grand Rapids 7, Mich.
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   I know it, I know it: you will be interrupted and you                                         James Dykstra,  1326 W. Butler Ave., S. E.
                                                                                                                           Grand Rapids 7, Michigan
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His wonderful works to the children of men !"                                       Second Class postage paid at Grand Rapids, Michigan

                                                                G. V. .


                                                                                                                                        C O N T E N T S

                                                                           MEDITATION -
    REV. GERALD VANDEN BERG'S LECTURE                                               Pentecost                    . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 361
                                                                                                Rev. G. Vos
   The Rev. G. Vanden  Berg will lecture in Hudsonville                    EDITORIALS -
next Friday evening, May 19, at 8 :00 p. m., sponsored by'                          The Importance of Christian Discipline . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 364
                                                                                    Not Separated But Deposed . . ..__..........................-................  365
Hudsonville's Men's Society. The topic :                                                        Rev. H. Hoeksema

          "`THE RESPONSIBILITY OF MAN"                                     As To Boons -
                                                                                    Herman Bavinck als Dogmaticus __........................................ 1.365
   We cordially invite you all to come and hear this in-                            Barth             . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  _ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 366
                                                                                                Rev. H. Hoeksema
teresting lecture.                                                         OUR  DOCTRINE-
                                                                                    The Book of Revelation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  *.366

                                                                                                Rev. H. Hoeksema

                                                                           A CLOUD OF WITNESSES -
                      WEDDING ANNIVERSARY                                           Preparing the Passover . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 368

                                                                                                Rev. B. Woudenberg
   On May 28, 1961, our -dear parents,
                                                                           FROM HOLY WRIT -
         MR. AND MRS. JOHN H. VANDER VENNEN                                         Exposition of I Timothy. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      370

hope to celebrate their 35th wedding anniversary.                                     Rev. G. Lubbers

   We are thankful to our Heavenly Father, who has graciously              IN HIS FEAR -
                                                                                    God's Royal Priesthood (6) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 372
seen fit to spare them for us and for each other these many years. It                           Rev. J. A. Heys
is our prayer that God may continue to bless them in their remaining
                                                                           CONTENDING FOR THE FAITH-
years together.                                                                     The Church and the Sacraments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 374
                               Mr. and Mrs. Walter Decker                                       Rev. H. Veldman
                                 Nancy and Walter                          THE VOICE OF OUR  FATHERS  -
                               Mr. and Mrs. Henry Vander Vennen                     The Belgic Confession, _._ ._.....  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 376
                                                                                                Rev. H. C. Hoeksema
                                 Linda and Sharon
                                                                           DECENCY AND ORDER -
                             --                                                     Baptismal Records ._ ..____  ._.. . . . . . .._..........  . . . . . . . . . . . . . _ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 378
                                                                                                Rev. G. Vanden  Berg

                         IN MEMORIAM                                       CONTRIBUTIONS -
                                                                                    The South Holland Law Case Concluded . . . .._._.__.................  379
   The Consistory of the First Protestant Reformed Church of                                   Rev. H. C. Hoeksema

Holland, Mich.,  hereby expresses its sincere sympathy to Elder and        ALLAROUNDUS-
                                                                                    The Importance of Miracles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .._.._.....  ,382
Mrs. P. Schipper  in the recent death of their daughter-in-law,                     Once A Saint, Not Always A Saint . . . .._.................................. 382
                                                                                    Tram World Radio ..____....  ..r.._  . . . . . . . . ..__..  . . . . ..__......_.____...............  383
                      MRS. DONALD SCHIPPER                                          News From Ecumenical                                                        Councils . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ..____  __......  383
   The Lord grant His sustaining grace in this their hour of sorrow.                            Rev. H. Hanko

                                                                           NEWS FROM OUR CHURCHES ____...._.._......__.................................~  _._.....  384
                                  Rev. G. Laming,  President                                    Mr. J. M. Faber
                                  J. H. Kortering, Vice-President


364                                         T H E   S.TANDARD  B E A R E R

                                                                   cording to the judgment of the worldly court. But the objects
               E D I T O R I A L S                                 of the key-power are believers and their children. To them
                                                                   the kingdom of heaven is opened, for they all receive the

                                                                   sacraments : the sacrament of baptism when they are still in-
         The hnportance of Christian Discipline                    fants, the sacrament of the Lord's Supper when they come

                                                                   to years of discretion and are able to make confession of
       As we might expect, also the Church Order speaks ol
                                                                   their faith. All others are excluded. All that do not belong
Christian Discipline, and, in fact devotes several articles to
                                                                   to believers. and their children have no place in the kingdom
this subject.
                                                                   of heaven.
       Thus in article 71 :
       "As Christian discipline is *of  a spiritual nature, and       This does not mean, however, that all sinners are excluded
exempts no one from civil trial or punishment by the author-       from the kingdom of God, for then no one would be included.
ities, so also besides civil punishment there is need of eccle-    We all are sinners. But it does signify that all NZY$U~  zm-

siastical censures, to reconcile the sinner with the church        believcvs  are excluded even though they belong to the church
and his neighbor and to remove the offense out of the church       on earth. We may say, therefore, that there is only one
of Christ."                                                        sin that excludes anyone from the kingdom of heaven and
       This article speaks of the difference between the sword-    that is the sin of impenitence. No matter how great a sin
and the key-power. And there is, indeed, a principal differ-       anyone commits, whether it be the sin of adultery or even

ence.                                                              murder; and even no matter how frequently anyone sins, if
    The sword-power is given to the civil authorities and is       he repents, the keys of the kingdom of heaven open the doors
effective for all the subjects over whom they rule ; the key-      of that kingdom of God for him. On the other hand, no mat-
power is given from Christ to the apostles and through them        ter how small a sin anyone may commit, if he does not show
to the church. The motive of the sword-power is or should          repentance, the keys of the kingdom shut the doors of the
be justice and righteousness; the motive of the key-power is       kingdom of heaven for him.

or should be love, the love of God in Christ, the love of the         This is the reason why repeated admonition is, also ac-

churcl:  and the love of the sinner. One can approach the          cording to the Church Order, the first and necessary step

sword-power and say to them that exercise it: "Give me my          in church discipline.

right, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me,             Article 72 of the Church Order states: `cIn case anyone

avenge me of my adversary" ; but the motive of the key-power       errs in doctrine or offends in conduct as long as the sin is

is love and is, therefore, much more difficult to exercise. One    of a private character, not giving public offense, the rule

cannot go to the church and say: "Give me my right, my             clearly prescribed by Christ in Matth. 18 shall be followed."

money, my honour, avenge me." All he can or ought to say is :         We are all well acquainted with the rule,of  Matthew 1s.

"I am sorry for God's sake, for Christ's sake, for'the church's    It requires first of all that the sin of the brother shall not be

sake, for my brother's sake that he walks in sin." Any in-         made public, but that it shall be kept as secret as, in its very

dividual member or any church that is not motivated by             nature, it is. If the offense is known to one person the latter

love is totally unfit to exercise discipline.                      must not tell others about it. Secondly, the one that knows

    Just as there is a difference in motive between the sword-     the offense must tell the offender his fault between himself

power and the power of the keys, so there is also a difference     and the offender alone. He must, therefore, admonish him in

in purpose.      The sword-power aims at nothing but justice       love, which is the implication of the clause "tell him his

and revenge, but the purpose of the key-power is the glory of      fault." He may do this very well repeatedly. And if the

God  in Christ, the well-being of the church and the salvation     offender hear him, repents and confesses his sin, he "has

of the sinner. Hence, the article of the Church Order quoted       gained his brother." The offense still remains entirely secret.

above states that, by Christian Discipline, no one is exempted     But if the offender does not hear him, does not repent and

from civil trial or punishment. A clear example of this we         confess, he shall take along two or three witnesses. Also

have in the one murderer on the cross. He repented of his          these witnesses must not make the offense public but ad-

sins, as is evident from what he said to the other criminal        monish the offender and for the rest keep the matter secret.

that was crucified with him. And then he prayed to Jesus:          Only after all this has been done, the offended party may

"Lord, remember me, when thou comest  into thy kingdom."           "tell it to the church" which is the consistory. All this

And the Lord, as we know, answered him: "Today thou                shows clearly that, in the first place, the matter must be

shalt be with me in paradise." Evidently, the penitent thief       kept as secret as possible ; secondly, that the nature of

or murderer was not excused from bearing his just punish-          Christian discipline consists, primarily, in admonition ; and,

ment, although he was saved.                                       thirdly, that the motive is always love of God in Christ,

   There is also a difference between the sword-power and          love of the church, and love of the brother.

the power of the keys of the kingdom of heaven as far as              The Church Order continues :

the objects are concerned. The objects of the sword-power             Article 73. "Secret sins of which the sinner repents, after

are simply those that are or are supposed to be guilty ac-         having been admonished by one person in private or in the


                                           T H E   S T A N D A R D   B E A R E R                                                  365


presence of two or three witnesses, shall not be laid before         in the consistory  on this matter, the consistory can seek the

t h e   c o n s i s t o r y . "                                     advice of two neighboring consistories or of the classis.

     This article too expresses two ideas. The first is that              More on this matter next time, D.V.

any sin must be kept as secret as possible. And the second                                                                       H.H.

is that admonition is always one of the chief elements in

Christian discipline.                                                              Not Separated But Deposed
     The same is expressed in Article 74:
     "If anyone, after having been admonished in love con-                I wish to thank Dr. Jerome De Jong for sending me, in
cerning a secret sin by two or three persons, does not give         exchange of The  Standard Bearer the Uis&onary  Monthly.
heed, or otherwise has committed a public sin, the matter                 In the last copy I received there occurs an article under
shall be reported to the consistory."                                the title: "How Long Must I Be Faithful To My Church"
    Again, this mentions the same element of admonition,            written by Dr. De Jong.
only now it adds to it that the admonition must be done in                In this article he tries to answer several questions which
love. And as I said before, this element may never be ignored.      I asked him publicly in our Standard Bearer some time ago:
No person or- group of persons, not even a consistory is able             In our present issue I do not intend to go into the an-
to exercise discipline except in the spirit of love.                swers he gives to these questions. I may, however, do so
    Article 75 reads as follows :                                   in a future issue. I will, however, ask another question. It
     "The reconciliation of all sins as are of their nature of a    is this : does not Dr. De Jong agree with me, and, in fact,
public character, or have become public because the admoni-         with our Reformed Confessions, that the marks of the true
tion of the church was despised, shall take place (after            church are the pure preaching of the Word, the proper ad-
sufficient evidence of repentance) in such a manner as is           ministration of the sacraments, and the exercise of Christian
conducive to the edification of each church. Whether in             discipline ? And again, does not Dr. De Jong also agree with
particular cases this shall take place. in public, shall, when      me when I say that if the exercise of Christian discipline
there is a difference of opinion about it in the consistory,        is not maintained, not only in regard to individual members,
be considered with the advice of two neighboring consistories       but also in regard to office-bearers, and in respect to the
or of the classis."                                                 broader. gatherings, classes and synods, the pure preaching
    This article speaks of sins which are in their very nature      of the Word cannot possibly be maintained ? And in connec-
public and which are, for that very reason known to the con-        tion with these questions, I must also ask Dr. De Jong
gregation. It also mentions sins that have become public            whether what happened and is still happening in the eastern
"because the admonition of the church was despised." To             part of the church to which Dr. De Jong belongs does not
the first belong, for instance, the sin of adultery which,          bear the mark of the false rather than of the true church?
particularly in small congregations, may easily be known to               In closing this editorial I must make one remark. Dr.
most of the members of the church. To the second belong             De Jong leaves the impression that, in 1924, I became
such sins as those that are not only known to the consistory,       sectarian and established a new denomination. This is not
but have also already been made known because the sin to-           true. I never left or separated myself from the Christian
gether with the name of the offender has been announced. In         Reformed Church. On the contrary, I' was deposed from my
no other way can the church know the sin that was com-              office of the ministry of the Word simply because I could
mitted or the name of the offender. The sin itself was seeret       not and would not sign the notorious "Three Points" or
and must be kept secret as far as possible. No consistory           promise to keep still about them.                            H.H.

member may "talk out of the consistory," even though this

evil is not so very seldom practised.                                          A S   TO  B O O K S
    Furthermore, the article speaks of a sinner that, at first,                                                                     II
despised the admonition of the consistory but later repented        I'                                                              >,
and confessed his sin to the consistory. What now must be                 Hemma  Bavinck als Dogmticzts  (Herman Bavinck as
done ? Must the consistory keep the matter still secret?            Dogmatician), published by J. H. Kok, N.V. Kampen,
This is, of course, impossible, for the whole congregation          the Netherlands. Price f 15.75.

knows of the sin and of him that committed it. Besides, the               This is, for me, a very interesting book, not only because

whole congregation rejoices because the sinner repents and          the author, Dr. R. H. Bremmer, evidently made a very

therefore ought to be informed of that fact. There are various      thorough study of the subject he develops in this book, but

ways which the consistory can follow in such cases. Either          even more because he compares Bavinck with others and by

it can demand a public confession, or it can simply announce        doing so he goes into the history of the Reformed Churches

from the pulpit that N.N. repented and confessed his sin            in the Netherlands of the latter part of the nineteenth and

before the consistory. But whether the one or the other             the early part of the twentieth century.     At the time I was

method is to be followed is left to the discretion of the con-      a child and a young man and at an early age I became in-

sistory. Only, in case there should be difference of opinion        terested in that histqry. I was a son of the Afscheiding


366                                       T H E   .§T,ANDARD   B E A R E R


(Separation) but at the same time I was very much in-               inclined to agree with the author in the praise he bestows on

terested in the "Doleantie," that is, the group of Reformed         Barth in an introduction to the chapter that discusses Barth's

Churches which, under the leadership of Dr. A. Kuyper,              conception of predestination which is developed in the third

expressed their grief about the condition of the State Church       volume of his dogmatics. He, Dr. Polman, speaks of his

and organized a separate group of churches. Later (1892)            increasing admiration of Barth's originality and genius as he

these two groups of churches were united under the name             repeatedly read the monumental volume of his Church Dog-

"Gereformeerde Kerken." However, although these churches            matics concerning election. I, too, studied that volume, but I

were synodically united, locally they were not. Especially in       cannot subscribe to this praise. For fact is that Barth denies

the city in which I lived they were not really one as was           election and reprobation.                                H.H.

evident from the fact that they were designated as the Gere-

formeerde Kerken A (the churches of the "Afscheiding") and
B (the churches of the "Doleantie"). Interesting for me is          11, :: 0 U R D 0 C T R I N E 11
also the long correspondence that is quoted in the book be-         1"
tween Bavinck and Ten Hoor on the question whether Theol-
                                                                                  THF, BOOK OF REVELATION
ogy is the queen of sciences (Kampen)  or must be placed on a

par with the other sciences (Amsterdam, the Free Univers-                                     PART TWO
ity). When I came to America I attended the Theological

School in Grand Rapids where Ten Hoor was professor at                                       CHAPTER XIX
the time. He was still full of the question above mentioned                                Revelation 20 :1-1Q
and maintained that Theology was the queen of sciences. He
was a very keen mind and well able to defend his position.                The Binding of Satan With  a View to Gog a.nd  &!!agog

   However, this is not the sole reason why I was interested              But this is not the end. For "when the thousand years
in the book by Dr. Bremmer.  The author, to. my mind, also          are expired, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison, and shall
ably develops the subject on which he is writing: "Bavinck          go out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters
as Dogmatician."     I recommend this book especially to al!        of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to
students of Dogmatics.                                    H.H.      battle; the number of whom is as the sand of the sea. And

   Barth, by Dr. A. D. R. Polman, translated from the               they went up on the breadth-of the earth, and compassed the

Dutch  by Calvin D. Freeman. Published by the Baker Book            camp of the saints about, the beloved city ; and fire came

House, Grand Rapids, Mich.                                          down from God out of heaven and destroyed them. And the

   This book or booklet (GS pages) is one of a series  of "An       devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire  and

International Library of Philosophy and Theology." Anyone           brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and

that is interested in Barth, as no theologian can afford not        shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever."

to be, will do well to obtain and read this book by Dr. Pol-              What is here presented in a separate vision had partly

man. The writer, after a general introduction, discusses            been pictured in a different setting in preceding chapters.

Barth's -view on Scripture, on Predestination, and on Crea-         We may gather from chapter 16:12-16  that this deception of

tion. Barth is a very voluminous writer. His DGgtuatics             the nations that live on the four quarters of the earth by the

alone covers thus far ten volumes, each volume hundreds of          devil, to gather them together for battle, will be realized in

pages, much of it in small print. Secondly, Barth is a writer       the period of the sixth vial. This is also in harmony with

that is difficult to read. He does not mind to write  all kinds     the statement in Revelation 20 :3 that "he must be loosed

of contradictions. Besides, his language, German, is often          for a little season." Shortly before the end of this world this

dark and ambiguous and, personally, I often wondered                final deception of the nations shall take place. In Chapter

whether this ambiguity is not intentional. Thus, for instance,      16 we read this : "And the sixth angel poured out his vial

although Barth does not believe that Scripture is the written       upon the great river Euphrates ; and the water thereof was

Word of God, yet he often quotes it as if it were. The same         dried up, that the way of the kings of the east might be

is true in regard to his conception of the doctrine of predesti-    prepared. And I saw three unclean spirits like frogs come

nation: although his development of that doctrme  leaves the        out of the mouth of the dragon, and out of the mouth of the

impression that he believes in universal salvation (Christ          beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet. For they

being the sole reprobate), yet he denies that this is his con-      are the spirits of devils, working miracles, which go forth

ception. His so-called commentary on Paul's epistle to the          unto the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather

Romans, which is probably the most widely read of all his           them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty. Behold,

books, is no commentary at all. He mereiy expresses his own         I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watcheth, and keepetb

views and uses the text as a pretext.                               his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame. And

       However, it is not difficult to read Dr. Polman's  book      he gathered them together into a place called in the Hebrew

on Barth. Hence, I gladly recommend this book to all theo-          tongue Armageddon."          In this passage the reference is

logians who are interested in the study of Barth. I am not          evidently to the same going forth of the devils to the nations


                                             T H E   STAN.D.A.RD.  &EARER                                                              367


that live on the four quarters of the earth, the kings of. the           that live on the four corners of the earth. And these nations

whole world, to deceive them and gather them for battle.                 shall be civilized. They shall! become conscious of their

And we learn besides that this deception of the nations                  power. And they shall for a time join forces with the beast

through the devil shall proceed immediately from the anti-               and the false prophet to form one great world-empire. But

Christian kingdom. Unclean spirits shall proceed from the                under the intluence  of the so-called mission work of the anti-

center of the antichristian world, and they shall have their             Christian unclean spirits, they were indeed awakened out- of

influence upon the nations that live on the four corners of              their prolonged slumber, became conscious of their power,

the earth. It matters not now what is presented by these                 and quickly adopted the antichristian civilization. Neverthe-

unclean spirits. They certainly signify a three-fold influence           less, they remained pagan in every respect. Though, they

of the antichristian civilization. And the final result of this          give their power to the beast for one hour, for a little season,

three-fold antichristian influence will be that the nations thus         this cannot possibly last. The deception of the devil must

affected will unite their forces for war, the last war, that shall       work out till the bitter end. And they will ,ultimately  gather

ever be fought on earth.                                                 as separate forces for the last war, which will be a world

        Again, a similar presentation of the same period of              war in the strictest sense of the word. Looking upon the
history we find in Chapter 17:12-17.  There mention is                   nominally Christian world 2 which will in fact be antichris-
made of ten kings that as yet have received no kingdom,                  tian, though the church will still exist in her midst -as
but shall receive power as kings one hour with the beast.                the real Christian nations, as the church of Christ indeed,
The fact that they are kings in d,istinction  from the anti-             they shall do as the nations of the old dispensation did with
Christian power proper, as well as the fact that their domin-            respect to Jerusalem, and shall say: "Let us go up to Jeru-
ion shall last but one hour with the beast, that is, "a little           salem ; let Zion be defiled ; let our eye look upon Zion !" This
season," suggests that these ten kings are again the same as             shall be their guilt ; for their purpose shall be to fight against
the power of Gog and Magog in Revelation 20, and as the                  the camp of the saints and the beloved city, against God and
kings of the whole world and the kings of the east that are              His Christ and against the church. But it will also be their
mentioned in Revelation 16. If this is correct, then we learn            deception. For, as in the old dispensation God used the
from the passage in Revelation 17 that the first result of the           nations in their hatred against the Holy City to chasten and
deceptive influence of the devil through the medium of the               destroy a Jerusalem that had actually become Sodom, so He
three-fold antichristian influence will be that the heathen              will use the hostile spirit of the heathen nations to destroy
nations of Gog and Magog shall join into one great world-                the antichristian power  and eat the flesh of the great whore.
power with the central antichristian dominion. For one                   The camp of the saints they will never touch. The people of
hour, for a little season, the world-power shall realize its             God shall look for the coming redemption, which shall then
greatest ambition, and a strictly universal empire shall be              be very nigh. For it will be upon this final scene of confu-
established, of which also the heathen but civilized nations             sion and iniquity that the Lord will appear in judgment to
form an integral part. However, this cannot last. For ulti-              destroy His enemies and to deliver His saints, in order to
mately the ten kings shall hate the whore and shall make                 give them the victory forever.

her desolate and naked and shall eat her flesh and burn her                 If we thus conceive of the end of Gog and Magog, it is
with fire. Rev. 17:16.  The ultimate result, therefore, of the           needless to conclude that we are living in significant times.
deception of the devil through the antichristian influences              A humanistic modernism claims the right and title to the
upon the heathen nations shall be that they shall be gathered            name of Christianity- a religion without the Christ of the
for battle against the very center of the antichristian domin-           Scriptures, without the incarnation of the Son of God, with-
ion.                                                                     out the cross, without the resurrection, a religion of this

    If we combine these different elements, which undoubt-               world, based on human imagination rather than on the Word

edly have bearing upo,n the same historic event of the future,           of God in the Scriptures. In the meantime, the power of

we may come to the following conception. In the nominally                men develops with tremendous strides in every sphere of life.

Christian world shall ultimately be realized the final con-              And the iniluence  of this modern spirit is felt far outside of

summation of the antichristian world-power, the power of                 the Christian world. For modernism has its missionaries.

the beast and the false prophet. It will be an empire in which           The nations on the four corners of the earth are waking up.

shall be represented the highest ambitions of man ; and they             The millions upon millions in China and Japan clamor for

shall be realized to the utmost. From a purely humanistic                their own place in the midst of the nations of the world. No,

viewpoint, it will be a glorious kingdom. And thoroughly                 we do not mean ,to speak of the day and the hour when

humanistic it will surely be : religiously, scientifically, socially,    Christ shall come. But we do emphasize that God's people

industrially, and politically. But it will be anti-God, anti-            must not be deceived. They must know the times and know

Christ, and anti-church. The saints that refuse to receive the           what Israel ought to do at all times and seasons. They must

mark of the beast shall have no place in that kingdom. In                above all watch, and keep the testimony of Jesus and the

the meantime, influences shall issue forth from that central             Word of God ; and they must steadfastly refuse to worship

realization of the antichristian kingdom upon the nations                the beast and the image of the beast.                       H.H.


 368                                         T H E   STANDAED   B E A R E R

                                                                        to speak to the children of Israel. With humble fear and
A
II                                                                      wonderment, they received the news. The time for deliver-
                                                                        ance had come. They were to leave the land of their afflic-

                                                                        tion, not just for three days as might have been expected, but
                  Preparing the Passover                                forever. Pharaoh would thrust them out and tell them never

         And ithem  I see the bCood,  I will p@s.s  over yaw  . . .     to return. Nor would their departure be in poverty. They
                                                   Exodus 12 :13        were to demand (not just "borrow") everyone jewels of
      The last meeting between Moses and Pharaoh had taken              silver and gold from their Egyptian neighbors in payment
place. It had been a tense, troubled affair. How Pharaoh                for the labor which they as free sons of Abraham had ex-
had learned to hate these visits from Moses. Moses rep-                 pended. In that hour the Egyptians, humbled by the judg-
resented the God of Israel who now for many months had                  ment of Jehovah, would be more than willing to comply.
been ravaging his land. In his presence Pharaoh was torn                The children of Israel. would go forth in power and glory on
between pride and fear ; .but pride had won out. Vainly he              the tide of Jehovah's strength. In the Name of their God,
had sought a compromise, finally offering that all of Israel            they would conquer.
might go to worship Jehovah except for the cattle and sheep.               Yet, such was the Word of God unto Israel that not one
But the God of Moses would not compromise. He demanded                  reason was left for anyone to become lifted up with personal
absolute obedience to his command. In spite of his inward               pride or boasting. Israel was to be delivered indeed, but this
fear, this Pharaoh would not give. His pride had broken                 deliverance was to be through judgment. The angel of God's
forth in anger until he fairly shouted at Moses, "Get thee              judgment would visit the land, and not one household that
from me, take heed to thyself, see my face no more; for in              was yet guilty of sin would be spared. The firstborn, the
that day thou seest my face thou shalt die."                            strength of every such household would be destroyed. Could
      Moses answered, "Thou hast spoken well, I will see thy            anyone of Israel forget that in the first three plagues of
face again no more."                                                    Egypt they had not been spared ? Could anyone honestly
      It was as Moses was turning to leave that God came and           ' say that his household was free from all sin and guilt? Could
spoke to him. He said, "Yet will I bring one plague more                anyone be sure that in this final day of visitation his house-
upon Pharaoh, and upon Egypt; afterwards he will let you               hold would be worthy of being spared ?
go hence : when he shall let you go, he shall surely thrust you            With careful attention the children of Israel listened as
out hence altogether."                                                  Moses explained to them the way of deliverance. This was
      Turning once again to Pharaoh, Moses spoke his parting           not going to be merely a national emigration, nor the mere
message.     "Thus saith Jehovah, About `midnight will I go             conquest of one nation over another. The Lord God of
out into the midst of Egypt: and all the firstborn in the              heaven and earth was going to visit the land and the things
land of Egypt shall die, from the firstborn of Pharaoh                 which would transpire would be of importance for the well-
that sitteth upon his throne, even unto the firstborn of the           being of their souls. His presence would work judgment
maidservant that is behind the mill; and all the firstborn of          upon all who were not found dwelling in His favor.
beasts. And there shall be a great cry throughout all the land             "In the tenth day of this month," said Moses, "take
of E,oy-pt,  such as there was none like it, nor shall be like it      every man a lamb, according to the house of their fathers, a
any more. But against any of the children of Israel shall not          lamb for an house." The children of Israel knew well what
a dog move his tongue, against man or beast: that ye may               was the meaning of the lamb. From the time that the
know how that Jehovah doth put a difference between the                 Protevangel had been spoken in Paradise, it had been

Egyptians and Israel. And all these thy servants shall come            known. The lamb was a sign of the promised seed of the
down unto me, and bow down themselves unto me, saying,                 woman that would crush the head of the serpent; it was a
Get thee out and all the people that follow thee: and after            sign of the seed of Abraham in which they and their children
that I will go out."                                                   would be blessed ; it was a sign of the seed of Judah from
      While anger still contorted the face of Pharaoh, fear laid       whom the sceptre would never depart; it was a sign of the
its cold grip upon his heart. Through bitter experience he             promised Redeemer that would save His people from the
had learned that the warnings of Moses were not to be taken            guilt and curse of their sin. Every time a lamb was brought
lightly. The firstborn of Egypt were the strength of the land,         to the altar by a believing child of God's covenant, it was
and now their death had been foretold. He had tried to break           thereby confessed that this believer looked in faith to the

the strength of Israel, and now that very destruction had              promise of God as the only redemption from his sin.

turned back upon himself. But Pharaoh's pride would not                    Now as Moses proceeded with his instructions, it be-
allow him to submit. His hatred for Jehovah would carry                came evident to every believer that this long familiar type
him with hardened heart to the very end. For a moment the              of revelation was taking on a new dimension of meaning. The
two men stared at each other in bitter hatred and anger until          judgment of God was impending in Egypt, and, though in
Moses at last turned and went.                                         itself also only a figure and type, only through a confession

      Leaving the palace of Pharaoh, l\!loses  went immediately        of faith would anyone escape. As this way of redemption was


                                           T H E   S T A N D A R D   B E A R E R                                                    3 6 9


  unfolded, it brought new depth of understanding to those               The- meal surrounding the lamb was full of rich si.gnifi-

  who trusted in the promise of God.                                 cance.  It was to be eaten with unleavened bread and bitter

      The lamb which was taken should be without blemish.            herbs. Leaven was the old dough which was kept from one

  Although this had also been known in the past, it ,emphasized      baking to another; a small bit of it used in a new baking

  for Israel again that redemption could come only through           of bread would serve to make the new bread rise. Because it

  one that was perfect. The lamb to be slain must bear the           was saved from week to week  and because but a small bit

  believer's sins, and thus it could not be marred and in itself     of it would permeate a whole loaf of bread to make it rise,

  unworthy to live. The lamb in its earthly perfection must          leaven served well to symbolize the old way of life which in

  serve to foreshadow the promised seed who only in being            the redemption of E,gypt  had to be left behind. But a small

  perfect before the sight of God could be a substitute for          bit of the old life of Egypt taken along could corrupt the

  Israel's sin.                                                      whole life of Israel. The bitter herbs reminded Israel that

     It was the blood of that lamb which would be of utmost          the way of redemption would not be pleasant for- the flesh.

  importance to the children of Israel in the midst of the judg-     The way of God's people must pass through bitter hardships.

  ment of Egypt. The blood was to be struck upon the two                 Finally, even the manner in which this meal was to be

  side posts and on the upper post of every cloor  behind which      eaten was prescribed with careful instructions. "Thus shall

  dwelt the believing children of God. It was an open sign for       ye eat," Jehovah commanded, "with your loins girded, your

  all to see that this household felt a need of a covering for       shoes on your feet, and your staff in your hand; and ye shall

  its sins; it was a public confession of guilt in the presence      eat it in haste: it is the Lord's passover." Israel must be

  of man and of God. When God in judgment drew nigh, His             ready to go, prepared to leave the land of bondage and sin.

 promise would be faithful and true, "When I see the blood,          Even more, Israel must be willing and eager. There should

  I will pass over you, and the plague. shall not be upon you        be no desire to loiter. It was to be the deliverance of the

  to.destroy  you, when I smite the land of Egypt."                  Lord ; it should fill the whole will and desire of His people.

     Furthermore, the lamb whose blood would serve as a                  Great and unusual was the activity that filled  the land of
 atonement to turn aside the judgment of God from the house-         Gqshen.  The atmosphere was filled with the feelings of
  holds of Israel was to be taken and roasted in the fire. It        eager anticipation. With great fear and reverence, the chil-
 was not to be left raw, nor even boiled in water; the very          dren of Israel went about their preparations. -As they looked
 body of the lamb had to pass through the fire. And this was         upon the ceremonial preparations, it was almost as though
 to be done while the body was yet whole, unmutilated with           they looked directly into the face of God. The true believing
  a knife, and while the bones were yet unbroken. The fire           Israelite, though only vaguely through type and shadow,
  symbolized the righteousnesi  and justice of God through           looked ahead through the ages and saw the promised Re-
 which the lamb of atonement had to pass. It did this in the         deemer offering Himself as the Lamb on Calvary's hill that
stead of the sinners for which it was offered. The lamb had          at the sign of His blood the people of God might be re-
 to pass through the fire of God's justice, and it had to do         deemed.
 this, as closely as was possible in mere symbolism, while               The Egyptians too could not help but note the great
  still whole and unmutilated, in the strength of its being.         activity in Goshen.  The plague of darkness had departed,
  Only in this way could it fulfill the demands of substitution      but its shadows still seemed to cling to their hearts.  They saw
 for sin.                                                            the lambs being gathered and slain, and it was an abomina-
     It was at this point that this new form of atoning sacrifice    tion to their eyes. They saw the preparations for journey,
 took on an even richer and deeper meaning. The body of              and hateful anger burned within their hearts. But none
 the lamb which was slain was given to the people of God for         dared to try to make the Israelites stop. They had tasted
 food. Through the events of the approaching judgment, Is-           the power of Israel's God ; it had ruined their land. Bitterly
 rael was to be saved to the uttermost. Not only were the            they watched. the Hebrews work. Paralyzed with fear, they
 children of God to be saved negatively from the stroke of           dared not interfere.                                         B.W.

 the angel of judgment, they were also to be led forth out of

 the land of bondage into the Canaan of promise. As Israel

 went forth the very body of the lamb whose blood had re-
                                                                                             IN MEMORIAM
 deemed them would supply the nourishment and strength in

 which they would go. The flesh of the lamb was a heavenly              The Ladies' Society of the Protestant Reformed Church extends

 meal instituted and given by God. In the lamb that was slain        its heartfelt sympathy to Mrs. John Hollernan  in the death of her

 was the fulness of Israel's redemption. This lamb was to be         brother,

 eaten completely, and should any of it be left over it was to                           MR. WILLIAM KUIPER

 be burned. The nourishment of its body was only for those              "For none of us liveth to himself, and no man dieth to himself."
 who were covered by the atonement, and none might be left           Romans 147.
 for those to whom it did not belong. The benefits of salva-                                             Rev. J. A. Heys, President

 tion are only for the children of God.                                                                  Mrs. F. Van Baren,  Secretary


$71):                                           T H E   S T A N D A R D   B E A R E R


                                                                           It was even for this very purpose that Christ came into the
           F R O M   HOLY  W R I T                                         world, into this Cosmos to save it. He came to save sinners.
                                                                           Did Jesus not repeatedly assert overagainst all self-righteous

                                                                           and Pharisaical pretense : for the Son of Man is come to seek

                                                                           and to save that which is lost ? ? ! Is He not the good Shepherd

                      Exposition of I Timothy                              who came to seek his sheep and lay down His life for them,

                                                                           that might take up His life again, so that none might pluck

                          (I Timothy 1:12-17)                              these sheep out of his hand ?

                                                                               This gospel truth Christ would "show forth" in the case
                                     C.                                    of Paul, the chief of sinners. He persecuted the church of

         That salvation is by grace alone, through faith, is the           God even unto death ; he blasphemed the Christ of the Scrip-
great theme of the gospel of the glory of the blessed God in               tures and rejoiced in the death of the saints. He beat up the
Christ Jesus. It is God's honor and glory, which He gives                  very children of God for whom Christ had died. And thus
to none other, to save the sinner. For God commendeth his                  the measure of the suffering of Christ was filled up in them.
love in this that Christ died for us, in due time, when we                 Col. 1:24.  Does not Christ say to Paul on the way to Damas-
were yet sinners;          it is for the godless, the weak, the            cus : "Saul, Saul, why persecutest  thou Me?" And now, in
enemy that Christ died. Oh, to be sure, Christ died for the                this very persecutor, Christ is going to demomtrute  His
elect, and only for the elect! But even so it`was  for sinners             mercy.       What He performs in every sinner that is saved
that he died. For the `elect are by nature children of wrath               He will show so very clearly and indisputably in Paul. None
even as the others. But God being rich in mercy, for his                   will henceforth have any reason to doubt that "where sin
great love, made us alive in Christ Jesus; he raised us out                abounded grace doth much more abound." Rom. 5 :20b.  And
of sin and death. He regenerates the dead sinner, and in-                  Paul is not an exception to the rule of salvation ; his case is
corporates him into Christ.           All of the work of salvation         an extreme example, a "case study" of the great principle
must be to the praise of the glory of .God's  grace. Compare               of salvation by sovereignly free grace and love and mercy.
:Ephesians,  1 :6. Such-  is the aim of God's elective love in             It shows, that, if God can and will save ~~clz  a sinner, there
Christ before the foundation of the earth!                                 is hope for any "sinner,"who is "about to believe unto.salva-
                                                                           tion" 1 See verse 16.
   All the. blessings which Christ bestows upon us are the
`spiritual blessings in heavenly .places.  And for these bless-               There can be no doubt exegetically that the term "long-
ings we can only exclaim with great joy and gratitude,                     suffering" as here employed by Paul refers to an aspect of
"Blessed, be the God and Father of our Lord, Jesus Christ,                 the love and mercy of God as this efficaciously brings the
who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in. heavenly              "sinner,"     even the chief of sinners, to salvation and final
places in Christ Jesus, even as he elected us from before the              glory.

foundations of the earth, that we should be holy and blame-                   The term "longsuffering" is a composite noun, composed
less before him in love." Eph. 1 :3, 4.                                    of two parts in the term used in the Greek. It is the term

         It. is this truth that Paul touches upon in this first Chapter    "makro-thumia."       The term "thumia" is a word meaning:
of I Timothy in regard to the truth of the gospel, and that,               wrath, anger. It is really the explosive anger in man when
too, overagainst some who would teach a d`iferent  doctrine.               his nostrils quiver with fury and, if it is not withheld,
This different doctrine is that teaching which makes the                   there will be dire effects. Applied to God it refers to the
"law" something which man must perform as the basis of                     vengeance of God!  in retributive and punishing justice. It
salvation. That is false teaching. It intends to rob God of                would mean in the case of Paul that Christ would have come
His glory and it would take away from the true believer his                to destroy him with the breath of His mouth. Now this
boast in Christ and sovereign mercy !                                      "thumos" is long. The term for "long" in Greek is "makro."
                                                                           Instead of this wrath and indignation being poured forth
         It is in this sovereign ppzeycy  that Paul makes his boast
                                                                           upon the head of Paul, God is merciful to him. God loves
in I Timothy 1:12-17.  First Paul magnifies this mercy as
                                                                           him. He loves him zwhiZe he is persecuting the Church. He
God has so singularly shown this- in His calling him into
                                                                           loves him from eternity,       and loves him even from his
the office of an Apostle. God found him in mercy ; Christ
                                                                           mother's womb, when he was born and conceived in Tarsus.
accounted him faithful. And this accounting was not accord-
                                                                           And as Paul persecutes the church, the darling of God, God
ing to the rule of works and merit; it was solely based upon
                                                                           holds back His wrath and indignation in love in Christ, seeing
the foreknowledge of God in sovereign mercy. God made
                                                                           what Christ "finished" for Paul upon the Cross of Calvary.
Paul an Apostle. It was the grace which he received. He

works more abundantly than all the other .Apostles,  yet not                   Such is the longsuffering of Christ. Christ remembers

he, but the grace of God which he received. Secondly, Paul                 Paul in love, in His great love wherewith He loves all His

sees this great mercy in his own personal faith and salvation.             own  even to the end. John 13 :lb. Did He not love all His

He is the chief of sinners. But that is no obstacle in the way.            own as "enemies"? Were they not all `"children of wrath"?


                                           T H E   S T A N D A R D   B E A R E R                                                    371

   Behold, then, a demonstration of this love and longsuffer-        sinners! His is the kingdom, the power and glory forever;
ing in the case of Paul, the chief of sinners !                      for His sake- all things are and were created. Thus John

    Small wonder that Paul tells us, that, in his case, the          writes in the book of Revelation 4 :11 : "Thou art worthy,
"long-suffering" of Christ was f&y revealed. The text says :         0 Lord, to receive glory and honor and power: for thou
"that Christ Jesus might demonstrate in me first all the long-       hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and
suffering." The Greek text literally reads : "The all (whole).       were created.,,

longsuffering" !    The term "a.ll"  in Greek is "hapasan,"                  That God is called King of "the ages" is also significant.
meaning, "qite all," that is, altogether. A good example             This does not simply refer to God's eternity per se, God's
of this term we have in Eph. 6:13, where we read: "and               unchangeableness within the ontological Trinity, but refers
having done all to stand."                                           to the revelation of God's Kingship in and upoa the Cosmos

   We see the entire inexhaustible longsuffering of Christ           from the viewpoint of time, history in its great epochs. He
displayed toward Paul. However, it was not simply for                determines the times and bounds of the nations, numbering
Paul's sake that such a great and merciful longsuffering is          them according to the number of the children of Israel. Acts
displayed. It was the design and purpose of God that "all            17 :26 ; Deut. 32 53. He* worketh all things according to the
who are about `to believe upon him [Christ] unto life                counsel of His will. Eph. 1 :ll. And He wilt  presently "in
eternal" might be encouraged. They should see how great              the ages to come" exhibit the exceeding greatness of His
the love of God is. Forever the myths of salvation by works          goodness over His own, in a new heaven and new earth
of law must be dispelled. And Paul as a preacher must be             where righteousness shall dwell. Eph. 2 :7; II Pet. 3 :13.
an "example" in his own person of the power of free mercy            And in this dominion of grace of the King of the "ages" we
and loving longsuffering of Christ.                                  see the multiplicity of the manifestation of the great long-
                                                                     suffering of mercy, not willing that an,y of His people perish,
   Should anyone, looking at the greatness of his sin, have
                                                                     but that they are all brought to salvation. II Peter 3 :9.
"honest" doubts  about, the faithfulness and true nature of
grace, Paul can and does say : Look at me ! It is as if one steps            Highly exalted in serene majesty, this "King of the ages"
into a hospital of spiritually (mentally) disturbed people, who      performs His sovereign will in saving His church by grace,
complain of the hopelessness of salvation. In comes one who          according to the glory of the blessed God. All things are out
has been such a "patient" himself. What an advantage for             of Him and through Him and unto Him!

such a spiritual counselor and advisor and "preacher" to be                  To Him be "hono'r,"    Honor is the rightful esteem ac-
able to say to such a one: look what Christ did fo,r me ! He         corded God by His subordinates, the  subjects of His king-
lifted me out of the miry clay and set my feet upon a Rock.          dom. This is a loving service in those in whom Jhe  "end"
What can a preacher really believe concerning his message            of the commandment is wrought. It is only in those who are
if he does riot himself know that he is a poor sinner; that          righteous in faith. These serve God, the King, in a good
he comforts others with the comfort wherewith he himself             conscience and in pure hearts and in faith unfeigned. On the
is comforted? Paul says, quoting David, "I believed, there-          part .of Paul this is a sacrifice of praise, the fruit of the

fore have I spoken." He believed and it was counted to him           lips ; only such praise and honor is well-pleasing and an
for righteousness. And now he has boast, yet not in the flesh.       acceptable sacrifice to God. And thus it must be in all the

He that glories let him glory in the Lord, his Righteousness,        church, and from all the angels in all the heavens.

be he preacher or hearer of the Word!                                        To Him be also the "glory." Glory is really the ,divine
   God is faithful who has promised!                                 excellence of all His perfections, His love and mercy, His

   Wherefore this great Apostle, this redeemed sinner, upon          power and wisdom, His truth and faithfulness, His long-
whom so much mercy and longsuffering is bestowed breaks              suffering and tender compassion. Such is His glory in the
forth into singing. He utters a most sublime doxology to God.        church; such is His glory demonstrated in Paul the chief of
It is the thankfulness of a redeemed sinner who has received         sinners, and such is His praise and glory in "all who are
mercy.    He has had much forgiven him and he is thankful            about to believe upon Christ" unto everlasting life !

for much.                                                                    It shall thus certainly be. Hence, Paul adds the little

   The doxology which Paul utters here reads as follows:             but significant "Amen." That it will be thus in all the "ages

"Now unto the King of the ages, incorruptible (immortal,             of ages,`, what we might call in "time and eternity," is due
King James Version), invisible, only God, be honor and               to God's being the King of the ages ! And it will be thus
glory unto the ages of ages', !                                      far more sure than what we feel in our hearts that this shall
                                                                     come to pass, or even desire it!
   There are many names which God gives Himself in Scrip-

ture by which we may speak to Him and about Him in ador-                     Well may Timothy and all who read this letter take this

ing worship and praise. That Paul chooses the term "King"            tremendous gospel truth to heart, preaching it and believing

must be because he has in mind the dominion of God over all          it !

things  in the Cosmos into which He sent His Son to save                                                                           G.L.:


372                                        T H E   S.TANDARD.   B E A R E R


                                                                    likewise speaks of men who clamor for the lie and insist
              I N   H I S   FEA.-R                                  that their instructors and educators satisfy the lust of man
                                                                    rather than to feed them with spiritual food. In II Timothy

                                                                    4:3 we read, "For the time will come when they will not

                                                                    endure sound doctrine ; but after their own lusts shall they
                    God's Royal Priesthood                          heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears." And it

                                (6)                                 is exactly in that connection that Paul first in the preceding
                                                                    verse warns Timothy to "Preach the Word ; be instant in
       It is wonderful the way God works in our children.           season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long-

       Sinful parents that we are, weak in the faith ourselves      suffering and doctrine." And if Timothy needed to be warned

and prone by nature to seek the world and its lusts, God still      that in I%.T time yet these men with itching ears would ap-
uses us to train His covenant children, and through our feeble      pear, what are we to expect in these days of the end of the
efforts He makes sons and daughters of Zion grow in grace           age ?

and in knowledge. Stammering prpphets,  tongue-tied be-                Sound doctrine is rejected. As Paul continues to write
cause of our own shaliow insight into the wonders of His            to Timothy in the very next verse, men shall "turn away

Word, He still uses us to teach our children the everlasting        their ears from the truth, and shall be turned to fables." The
things of His kingdom. From age to age, from Paradise till          prophet of God who searches His Word and from the moun-
this very day God has been gathering His Church and calling         tain top of revelation speaks sound doctrine is called the
His children out of the children of believers. It has not           false prophet. And men think that they do God a pleasure by
failed.                                                             heaping ridicule and scorn upon those who speak the truth.

                                                                    These are persecuted as the false teachers because they do
       False prophets have risen during all these times. Men
                                                                    not satisfy the itching ears of fable lovers. Departures from.
have st,riven  to wipe out faith in Christ. Violent and brutal
                                                                    the truth are condoned. Men see them. They know that
even have  the attempts been whereby the adversary has
                                                                    they are wrong. And yet they defend the right of such who
sought to kill off the Church of God and prevent the
                                                                    teach these heresies to remain in their circles and spread
spread of the truth. And yet that Church has continued to
                                                                    their pernicious doctrines. Prophets who know the truth
press forward and has been a living testimony! in the midst
                                                                    keep silent befo,re  those who they know speak as the false
of all this opposition of the power of the Living God to
                                                                    prophets do.
gather His Church. And the present generation speaks the

same language of faith that the last generation of believers           This carries down also to the prophet in the pew. Where

spoke. It is indeed wonderful how our God works in us and           there is laxity in the officially ordained and called prophet

in our children.                                                    in the pulpit, where there are those instructed to teach God's

       However that does not excuse you and me of our calling       people and to train them to praise Him as the sovereign and
                                                                    glorious God that He is, who fail to stem the tide of false
to provide our children with the truth and to fight an un-
                                                                    doctrine, the congregation all too soon becomes indifferent
relenting battle to preserve the truth for them. In the
                                                                    to the things spiritual. There is such a lethargy. No, perhaps
prophetic phase of our office as Go&s  royal priesthood we
must reveal to them the things God has revealed to us; and          that is not the word even. Men are not simply drowsy and
we must see to it that they are taught the                          not alert to the things that are transpiring, they just do not
                                               tlwth.               care. They are indifferent. It makes little difference to them
    As we wrote above, false prophets have arisen throughout        what is taught in their hearing. And it disturbs them even
the ages. And they have been a plague upon God's royal              less what their children are taught. A little humanism, a little
priesthood and their spiritual seed. We may not keep from           man-centered, social-improvement-gospel, a little spiritual
this spiritual seed the truth which we know and believe. But        pep-talk, a few little stories about "famous" men among men
we likewise may liot allow those who pervert the truth to           and their philosophical writings, and for the rest, Why bother
try to poison their minds. If we bring them up, as we ought;,       with sound doctrine ? Those things are all right for preachers !
in His fear, we will to the utmost of our power keep them           Election and reprobation, total depravity, limited atonement,
from embracing the lie and strive to teach them the truth.          justification by faith, God's sovereign counsel and means of

       The true prophet will always be concerned with the truth.    grace are all fine subjects for a ministers' conference ; but on

And he can never enjoy or rondone  the philosophies of the          Sunday, please !, give us a little moral talk on ho'w to clean

false prophets.      He may be called narrow-minded, old-           up the social evils in our community (only not those which

fashioned, a miserable critic, a chronic fault-finder or the        we ourselves commit) and, please !, do not always remind

like. But even that is nothing strange or new. From the             us that we are conceived and born in sin, prone to hate God
mouth of the prophet Micah we learn that the true prophets          and the neighbor. Please, do not always speak about the

are hated of those who love the lie. We read in Micah 2 :6,         cross! Tell us about glory, about the street of gold, the

"Prophesy ye not, say they to them that prophesy: they shall        pearly gates, the nightless day, the water of life and that

not prophesy to them, that they shall not take shame." Paul         we are such nice people that we surely will' one day enjoy


                                           T H E   S T A N - D A R D   B E A R E R                                                    373



all these things. Remind us that OUR country is the king-           go unchallenged because we must be loyal to grandpa and

dom of God and that we ought to be thankful God did not             grandma rather than loyal to God. The little prophets like

place us somewhere else. Please, do not shatter our dreams          that kind of training. And soon enough they sing, "It was
with talk about an antichrist ! Do not throw in our faces           good enough for mother. It was good enough for grandpa

the cold water of an idea of a false prophet who serves him.        and grandma. It was good enough for pastor Tolerant. And

Be careful that you do not influence the minds of our               (with an increasing crescendo).:it  is good enough for me !"

children with the (Scriptural) idea that this antichrist and            Indeed, but is it good enough for God? He has, you

his false prophet come out of the so-called Christian nations       know, a way of being very intolerant. He has a way of in-

rather than from the professed out-and-out godless and athe-        sisting that every i be dotted and every t crossed. He is a
istic nations.    Leave me alone. Let me dream. And let my          perfectionist. And He says, Be ye holy even as I am holy.

children look out for themselves.                                   He says not only that we are His royal priesthood. He says

    My brethren and sisters in the Lord, this is not serving        also that we must show forth His praises. And the lie, no
as a prophet of God's royal priesthood!                             matter how small a departure it may seem to us to be from
                                                                    the line of the truth, always denies Him His praise. Always
    In His fear God's prophet will affiliate  with that church      it ascribes it to the creature. And our loyalty first, last and
which maintains the truth and will seek it for his own              always must be to God.
spiritual joy and for the faith of his children. It is not a
question of leaving the study of the truth and the examina-             For your own sake. For the sake of your children's faith.
tion of doctrinal matters to a few leaders in the church or         For God's sake, search the Scripture ! Study to determine
congregation. It is not faith, and it is not in His fear to say,    the truth of the Word of God as His prophets that you may
"My minister thinks this to be the truth, and my parents            speak His praises. Shudder at the very thought of being a
think so as well, and they are smarter than I am. I leave it        false prophet who ascribes to the creature that which belongs
to them. What they say and decide is good enough for me."           only to the Living God. Never mind the praise of men, of
Then you refuse to function in your office as prophet; and          church leaders, of friends in the church, of a denomination or
then you are in absolutely no position to "show forth the           sect. As God's prophet you are to show forth His praises.
praises of Him Who hath called you out of darkness into             Study then His Word. Flee from all departures from-,the
His marvellous light."    YOU must turn to that revelation          truth. Condemn them in no uncertain terms. Speak up as a
which we have in God's Word, and YOU must not repeat as             prophet ought. And in His fear sing aloud of His divine
a machine the words of other prophets (and surely not of            majesty as the only true God. Let mind and tongue be
the false prophets), but you must enter into that Word              joined in His praise.
yourself and see for yourself those praises of God. Then you                                                                       J.A.H.

will be able to show forth His praises and will reveal your-

self as a prophet of God's royal priesthood. Only what YOU

see can YOU show forth!
                                                                                               IN MEMORIAM
   Nor is it a question of loyalty to a church. It is a ques-
                                                                       On April 13, 1961, it pleased our Heavenly Father to take unto
tion of being loyal to God as His royal priesthood. To be
                                                                    Himself our dear wife, mother and grandmother,
sure, when our parents are aged and feeble, we must not

leave them alone, run away from them and let them struggle                 MRS. GILBERT VAN BAREN  (nee Anna Holleman)

along in want and misery. But let us not be so foolish as to        at the age of 60 years.

call false doctrines and evil practices nothing more than              May the God of all consolation comfort our hearts in these days       '
weakness and old age. When mother and father are rich in            of sorrow and direct our eyes to the glorious resurrection.
gold and silver, spread far and wide over a vast continent,
                                                                                                  Mr. Gilbert Van Baren
able to boast of beautiful buildings and numerous institutions,
                                                                                                  Mr. and Mrs. Arthur Zandstra
when mother and father are still able to beget many, many
                                                                                                  Mr. and Mrs. Anthony De Young
children and the family is growing fast in number, it is a
                                                                                                  Mr. and Mrs. Seymour Vroegh
rather difficult thing to get across one's conscience to say
                                                                                                  Mr. and Mrs. Eugene Kuiper
that mother and father are getting old and feeble with age,
                                                                                                  Mr. and Mrs. George Vrooni
and that son and daughter ought to stay home and help
                                                                                                  Mr. and Mrs. Gise Van Baren
these feeble old souls in the declining days of their life.
                                                                                                  Dr. and Mrs. Melvin Hugen
   But even then, when father and mother are actually feeble                                      Mr. and Mrs. Gilbert Van Baren  Jr.
and in need of physical, material help and a little tender love                                   Mr. and Mrs. Frank Van Baren
in their childishness of old age, it will not quite do to tell                                    Miss Amra  Mae Van Baren
the grandchildren that their grandfather's and grandmother's                                      Mother of the Late Mrs. Joan Vroom
sins are quite all right in God's sight, and that grandfather's                                   12 grandchildren
and grandmother's denial of the truth must be tolerated and         South Holland, Illinois


374                                            T H E   ST,ANDARD   B E A R E R


                                                                          to be omitted -that although, in the sacred writings, so
11        Contending For The Faith 11                                     much is attributed to good works, that Christ promises, that
                                                                          even he that shall give  a drink of cold water to one of his
I'                                                                  J[
                                                                          least ones, shall not lose Itis reward; and the Apostle testifies,

            The Church and the Sacraments                                 That  which is at present uiovvtenta~ry  and light of ow tf-ibibztla-
                                                                          tion,  worketh for us above measme  exceedingly an eternal
           THE TIME OF THE REFORMATION                                    weight of glory; nevertheless God forbid that a Christian

                                                                          should either trust or glory in himself, and not in the Lord,
                 VIEWS ON THE CHURCH
                                                                          whose bounty towards all-men is so great, that he will have
                  MATERIAL PRINCIPLE                                      the things which are his own gifts be their merits. And for-

                                (continued)                               asmuch  as in many  things we all off end, each one ought to

                                                                          have before his eyes, as well the severity and judgment, as

                          C                                               the mercy and goodness (of God) ; neither ought any one
                               HAPTER XVI
                                                                          to judge himself, even though he be not conscious to himself
OS The Fru& Of Jztstifi,cation,  That Is, On The Merit Of                 of anything; because the whole life of man is to be examined
       Good Works, And On The iVu.tztre Of That Merit                     and judged, not by the judgment of man, but of God, who

                                                                          will b&g to light the hidden things of darkness, a.ud will
       Continuing with our quotations from the Sixth Session
                                                                          WLake  manifest the counsels of the hea,rts,  and then shall every
of the Roman Catholic Council of Trent, devoted to the
                                                                          man  have praise f~o*p~  God, who, as it is written, will render
subject of Justification, we now quote the sixteenth chapter :
                                                                          to every man czccording  to his works.1'
"Before men, therefore, who have been justified in this man-
                                                                             In this sixteenth article, the Romish Church emphasizes
ner - whether they have preserved uninterruptedly the
                                                                          the good works which the Christian is called to perform in
grace received, or whether they have recovered it when lost
                                                                          the midst of the world, that he must fight the good fight, etc.,
- are to be set the words of the Apostle : Abound in every
good work, knowi,ng  that                                                 declaring of the apostle that he receive the crown of justice
                                your labour is not in vain irz the
Lord; for God is not unjust, that He should forget you?                   AFTER his fight and course have been completed in the
work, and the love which you have shown in His name; and,                 midst of this world. To this, of course, there can be no
                                                                          objection as such. It is certainly true that the child of God
do not lose your confidence, which hath a great reward. And,              must perform good works, and that he must fight even unto
for this cause, life eternal is to be proposed to those working
well unto tlze end, and hoping in God, both'as  a grace merci-            the end. Of this the Scriptures testify abundantly. But it is
fully promised to the sons of God through Jesus Christ, and               quite another thing to say that our good works are merito-
as a reward. which is according to the promise of God Him-                rious, that the Lord's bounty towards all men is so great,
self, to be faithfully rendered to their good works and merits.           that He will have the things which are His own be t/leir
For this is that                                                          merits.
                  crown of just&e which the Apostle declared
was, after his fight and coatrse,  laid ztp for him,  to be ren-             Of interest in this connection are also the Canons which

dered to him by the just Jatdge,  and not only to him,  bitt              the Romish Council adopted at this same Council of Trent.

also ta all tkat love  his com;ng.  For, whereas Jesus Christ             We are now primarily interested in the Romish doctrine that

himself continually infuses his virtue into the said justified -          our justification is also by works. Indeed, the Romish Church

as the head into the members, and the vine into the branches              is also peiagian in its conception of the grace of God and

-and this virtue always precedes and accompanies and                      the free will of man. This, too, is evident in these canons,

follows their good works, which without it could not in any               articles in which the Romish Church anathemizes all those

wise be pleasing and meritorious before God-we must be-                   who do not agree with its doctrine. For example, we read

lieve that nothing further is wanting to the justified, to                in Canon III : "If any one saith, that without the prevenient

prevent their being accounted to have, by those very works                ("prevenient"    means : that which precedes, goes before-

which have been done in God, fully satisfied the divine law               H.V.) inspiration of the Holy Ghost and without his help,

according to the state of this life, to be obtained also in its           man -can believe, hope, love, or be penitent .as he ought, so

 (due) time, if so be, however, that they depart in grace :               that the grace of Justification may be bestowed upon him : let

seeing that Christ, our Saviour, saith: If any one shall drink            him be anathema."      Notice, please, that the Romish Church

of the water thu.t I will give him,  he shall not thirst forever;         in this article speaks of the help of the Holy Spirit. And

bs6t it sh~a,ll  become in him  a foz6ntain  of water sfiringing  ztl)    that the Romish Church defends the doctrine of the free will

unto life everlasting. Thus, neither is our own justice esta,b-           of the sinner, is evident from Canon IV: "If any one saith,

lished as our own as from ourselves; nor is the justice of God            that man's free will moved and excited by God, by assenting
ignored or repudiated: for that justice which is called ours,             to God exciting and calling, nowise  cooperates towards

because that we are justified from its being inherent in us,              disposing and preparing itself for obtaining the grace of

that same is (the justice) of God, because that it is infused             Justification ; that it can not refuse its consent, if it would,

into us of God, through the merit of Christ.. Neither is this             but that; as something `inanimate, it does nothing whatever


                                           T H E   .-S'I?AN-DARD   B E A R E R                                                  375


and is merely passive: let him be anathema." Of course,              effected : let him be anathema."' In this fourteenth canon the

we do not believe that the sinner is inanimate, merely pas-          Romish Church denies that a man can be completely sure

sive. We do not believe that the sinner is a stock and block.        of his justification`in this life. And in Canon XV we read:

But in the article just quoted the Romish Church states very         "If any one saith, that a man, who is born again'and justified,

emphatically that the sinner can also refuse the consent to          is bound of faith to believe that he is assuredly in the number

the grace of Justification, and this Church strongly advocates       of the predestinate : let him be anathema." In this canon this

the position of the free will of the sinner. However, at             church denies that a child of God can have the assurance of

present we are primarily interested in the Romish position           his election. In this that church clearly opposes the admoni-

that man's justification is also by wo,rks. And we will now          tion of the apostle Peter when he admonishes the Church of

proceed to quote several of the canons of the Council of             God to make its calling and ,election  sure.

Trent.                                                                   Canon XVII : "If any one saith, that the grace of Justi-

   Canon IX : "If any one saith, that by faith alone the             fication is only attained to by those who are predestined unto
impious is justified, in such wise as to mean, that nothing          life ; but that all others who are called, are called indeed,
else is required to cooperate in order to the obtaining the          but receive not grace, as being, by the divine power,
grace of Justification, and that it is not in any way necessary,     predestined unto evil: let him be anathema." This is a most
that he be prepared and disposed by the movement of his              interesting canon. Here the Romish Church maintains that
own will: let him be anathema."                                      not only the elect of God receive God's grace, anathemizes
                                                                     all those who declare that the reprobate (those who are
   Canon X: "If any one saith, that men are just without
                                                                     predestined unto evil) do not receive grace. We must under-
the justice of Christ, whereby he merited for us to be
                                                                     stand in this connection that the Romish Church, when
justified ; or that it is by that justice itself that they are
                                                                     speaking of those who,  are predestined unto evil, does not in
formally just: let him be anathema." Notice, please that the
                                                                     these words give espression to its own doctrine. That Church
Romish Church in this canon declares that the sinner is not
                                                                     denies the truth of Reprobation. But it is surely true that
formally just by the justice of Christ itself.
                                                                     the Christian Reformed Church, and other churches, who
   Canon XI : "If any one saith, that men are justitied,  either     maintain that also the reprobates receive grace, here finds
by the sole imputation of the justice of Christ, or by the           itself in the company of the Roman Catholic Church.
sole remission of sins, to the exclusion of the grace and               Canon XVIII : "If any one saith, that the commandments
the chukty  z~~hich  is powred  forth in their hearts by the Holy    of God are, even for one that is justified and constituted in
Ghost, and is inherent in them ; or even that the grace,             grace, impossible to keep: let him be anathema." Here the
whereby we are justified, is only the favor of God: let him          Romish Church would lead the way to its conception that we
be anathema." In this canon it is evident that the Romish            are able to keep the commandments of God, and that our
Church confuses justification with sanctification. And the           keeping of these commandments is meritorious.
Romish Church declares in this canon that it is not true that
                                                                        Canon XXI: "If any one saith, that Christ Jesus was
man is justified solely by the imputation of the justice of
                                                                     given of God to men, as a redeemer in'whom to trust, and
God, and that it is also untrue that he is justified solely by
                                                                     not also as a legislator whom to obey: let him be anathema."
the favor of God.
                                                                     This is surely an ambiguous article. The Protestant Church
   Canon XII: "If any one saithj that justifying faith is            surely does not deny that we must also do the commandments
nothing else but confidence in the divine mercy which remits         of our Lord Jesus Christ. Again and again our Lord ad-
sins for Christ's sake ; or, that this confidence alone is that      monishes to keep His commandments. But we must bear in
whereby we are justified: let him be anathema." Notice,              mind that the Romish Church would advocate the position
please, that the Roman Church in this canon denies that              that our doing of these commandments is meritorious, that
justifying faith is nothing else but confidence in the Divine        our obeying of these precepts merits in the sight of God.
mercy which remits sins solely for Christ's sake. One may            And in this canon this Church anathemizes all those who
well stand aghast that a Church has the boldness to anathe-          would maintain that Jesus Christ was given us of God only
mize  anyone whose sole confidence is in the cross and blood         as a redeemer and not also as a legislator who gives us His
of the Man of Sorrows of Calvary.                                    precepts that we may walk in them and thereby merit justifi-

   Canons XIII-XV: "If any one saith, that it is necessary           cation in the sight of God.                              H.V.

for every one, for the obtaining the remission of sins, that

be believe for certain, and without any wavering arising from

his own infirmity and indisposition, that his sins are forgiven         BuZZetL~z  Quote (Loveland's) : All successful prayer is a

him: let him be anathema . . . If any one saith that man is          prompting from the Father. My prayer does not change His

truly absolved from his sins and justified, because that he          mind ; it is His Mind that dictates my prayer. Efficacious

assuredly believed himself absolved and justified; or, that no       prayer is not so much a petition as a prophecying.  It is my

one is truly justified but he who believes himself justified ;       Father saying to me, "This is my will -ask THIS."

and that, by this faith alone, absolution and justification are                                                       - Matheson


376                                        T H E   S T A N D A R D   B E A R E R

                                                                     unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all."
                                                                                             -
                                                                     Or, with special reference to single virtue of God's, love, we

                                                                     may mention I John 4 :8 : "He that loveth not knoweth not

                                                                     God ; for God is love." This same truth is implied when our
                    The Belgic Confession                            Lord Jesus says: "I am the resurrection and the life," identi-

                      ARTICLE I (continued)                          fying the divine nature with the life itself. John 1125.  Or
       God's oneness is that perfection of God whereby He is         again, "I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh
distinguished from all other being(s), so that no one and            unto the Father, but by me. If ye had known me, ye should
nothing is to be compared with Him. God does not belong              have known my Father also."
to a certain class of beings, of which He is one among many.            Also this perfection .of God has its practical significance
He is not God in competition with many others who also               for the believer. In the first place, the simplicity of God
claim to be gods or who are acknowledged as gods. He is              requires that we shall never think or speak of God's virtues
not even to be acknowledged as the god who is supreme                in separation from one another. We must not conceive of
among all gods. Scripture, and the Christian faith in                God's mercy and His justice, for example, as being mutually
obedience thereto, is absolutely intolerant.      God is God,        exclusive, and say, "God is merciful ; but He is also just."
and there is none beside Him. There is no being be-                  God's justice is a merciful justice ; and His mercy is a just
side Him, above Him, next to Him, or even under Him                  mercy. We must not drive a wedge between God's love and
that is in any way to be acknowledged as God. He is the              His wrath, but instead understand that just because God is
one Lord, the only Creator and Proprietor of all things. His         love, therefore he is filled with wrath against the wicked.
is the sole authority in the entire universe. He is the only         We must remember too that there is never any conflict be-
Law-giver; and He alone is Judge. His is all the power and           tween God's virtues and His works, or between the works of
the sovereignty.     "The Lord our God is one Lord." A very          God themselves. God's works are the manifestation of His
cursory consideration of this perfection of our God will cause       manifold virtues. And also in His works, therefore, there is
us to see-also the relationship of this and the other perfections    perfect unity. To teach, for example, that God blesses in
of God. That God is One implies that He is Self-existent,            time the same men whom He curses for eternity is a contra-
independent, eternal, and absolutely sovereign. More than one        diction of God's simplicity. In the second place, the Chris-
self-existent and independent being, and mor.e  than one             tian who understands that God is His virtues will see at once
eternal and absolutely sovereign Lord are inconceivable. And         that such expressions as "Goodness! Gracious! Mercy !" are
to maintain, to contrive, to have any other object instead of,       tantamount to taking God's name in vain, and should have
or besides this one true God, Who has manifested Himself             no place in a Christian's speech.

in His Word, is idolatry (Heid.  CbtschLsm,  Qu. 95).                   3. God is a spiritual Being.

       The practical significance of our faith that God is one,          "God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must wor-

therefore, is clear and simple ; and it has its ramifications for    ship him in spirit and in truth." John 4:24.  In this passage
all of life. It is this: "Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God,       God's spirituality is directly taught. This perfection of God

and Him only shalt thou serve." Matthew 4 :lO.                       is also indirectly taught in various passages of Holy Writ

       2. God is Simple.                                             which emphasize that God is invisible, since the invisibility

       The truth of God's simplicity means, negatively, that God     of God follows from the truth that He is a Spirit. Thus,

is not divided and is not made up of parts, and, positively,         when the second commandment prohibits the making of any

that God is His virtues, and that all. God's virtues are per-        graven image or of any likeness of God, this is based upon

fectly one in Him. Of the creature we commonly say that he           God's spirituality.

possesses certain attributes. He possesses strength. He has the         Negatively,- we may say, in the first place, that this

virtue of righteousness, or of mercy, or of longsuffering and        divine perfection does not have reference to, the personal sub-

patience. But God 6 pure perfection. His very Being is               sistence of the Third Person of the Holy Trinity, the Holy

virtue. And all the manifold virtues of God are one in Him-          Spirit. This is a perfection of God's Being, and therefore

self. God is righteousness, holiness, justice, power, might,         has reference to the Triune God, not merely to one of the

love, mercy, grace. These are His very Being. And all the            three Persons. In the second place, that God is a Spirit im-

virtues of God are one. There is no division and no conflict         plies that He is not material, as is the visible creation, and

in God and in His perfections. Just as God is love, light,           is not limited by form or extent. From a positive point of

life, holiness and righteousness, grace and mercy, truth and         view, the spirituality of God is closely related to the attribute

justice, so His righteousness is His love, His justice is His        of His simplicity. God's perfections do not subsist, inhere,

mercy, His holiness is His grace. In God there is most per-          in some other substance, as is the case with the creature. But

fect harmony and unity.                                              God is pure Spirit. Man's strength, for example, subsists in

       If you inquire after Scriptural proof for this perfection     his flesh, in his arm. God is power. He Is His virtues. Even,

of God, a passage such as I John 1:s may be cited: "This             therefore, when Scripture speaks of God in terms which seem

then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare          to indicate that God has form and material substance, we


                                           TH:E   S T A N D A R D   B E A R E R                                                  377


must remember that God is nevertheless a Spirit, that we            lated by.."God" in our English Bible, or whether here the

must not think of Him as a creature and as having limited           name "God" is used in the general sense of "Deity." But

form and conceive of Him materially, but are to worship             certainly no further mention is made of the various proper

Him in spirit and in truth.                                         names of God which the Scriptures give us. We may men-

    God is the one only and simple and spiritual Being !            tion, however, that in Scripture the various attributes of God

                                                                    are directly connected with one or another of these proper

God's Attributes                                                    names of God very frequently, so that in these names-

                                                                    Jehovah, Lord, Most High, Almighty, etc. -certain of the
    This first article of the Bglgic  Confession now makes men-
                                                                    attributes are in each case put on the foreground, And thus
tion of what are called the &r&&s  of God. Before treating
                                                                    it is also possible to classify the attributes of God, with no
these various attributes one by one, a few remarks must be
                                                                    small degree of success, in connection with the divine names.
made. In the first place, we may notice that our confession
                                                                    Even here, however, the truth of God's simplicity limits the
only mentions sorvte  of God's attributes. It makes no special
                                                                    success of the classification. Hence, while dogmatically we
mention, for example, of God's omnipresence or of God's
                                                                    would attempt a certain classification of God's infinite per-
knowledge or of God's holiness. Nor does it itemize the
                                                                    fections, we need not do so in our treatment of this article,
various virtues of God which are ,included  in His goodness.
                                                                    but simply give a few words of explanation of each attribute
This does not mean that our creed intends to single out cer-
                                                                    as it is mentioned by our creed.
tain of God's attributes as being outstanding and more im-

portant than others. For this would certainly be contrary to            1. God is Eternal.

the truth of God's simplicity. But we may remember; first of            Beautifully and concretely the Scriptures set forth the
all, that the very truth of God's simplicity implies that those     eternity of God in the well-known words of Psalm 90 : "Lord,
attributes of God which are not specifically mentioned here         thou hast been our dwelling place in all generations. Before
are nevertheless included in those that are mentioned. S,ec-        the mountains were brought forth, or ever thou hadst formed
ondly, the Confession does not mean to be exhaustive.               the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting,
Rather do we have in this article a very warm expression            thou art God . . . For a thousand years in thy sight are but
of faith designed to emphasize that He Who is for us the            as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the' night."
"overflowing fountain of all good" is the infinitely great and      Vss. 1, 2, 4. Again, closely associating God's immutability
perfect God, Who is really God ! And, in the third place, we        and His eternity, the Scriptures state: "Of old hast thou laid
may also bear in mind that others of God's attributes come          the foundation of the earth: and the heavens are the work of

into focus in later. articles of our Confession. Our second         thy hands. They shall perish, but thou shalt endure: yea, all
observation is that the article makes no classification of these    of them shall wax old like a garment; as a vesture shalt thou
attributes of God. Various such classifications have been made      change them, and they ~1~11  be changed: But thou art the

by theologians, none of which is without its defect. One of the     same, and thy years shall have no end." Psalm 102:25-27.
most common is the distinction between the communicable             And yet there is something paradoxical about these expres-
and incommunicable attributes. God's communicable attri-            sions as they describe eternity really in terms of time, em-
butes, as the name implies, are those which can be com-             phasizing that it is really impossible for creatures of time and

municated, imparted to the creature, or, those attributes of        in the language of creatures of time fully to express God's

God of which there is a reflection in creaturely measure in         eternity. For eternity is not time. It is not even time without

man. And the incommunicable attributes are those of which           beginning and without end. To. be sure, the Eternal One is

there is no such creaturely reflection in man. Among the            without beginning and'without  end, and He is not at all sub-

attributes mentioned in this article, then, we could classify as    ject to a succession of moments, days, years, centuries. But

incommunicable God's eternity, incomprehensibility, invisibil-      more than this, we must remember that time itself is a

ity, immutability, and infinity. And the communicable at-           creature,     and it is the very form of life for every

tributes would include God's power, wisdom, justice and             creature. The creature exists .only  at the moment. He is

goodness. We say once more that the article does not make           ever moving out of the future into the past. What he was

this distinction even though it mentions the communicable           yesterday he is no more today, and he shall not be any more

attributes last. More than a convenient and working distinc-        tomorrow. But time is not for God's Being and life. God is

tion, however, this cannot be. And the same is true of various      not bound to any time. God is the eternal I AM. With in-

other classifications which have been attempted. Generally          finite and constant and unceasing fulness God is all that He is

speaking, they all encounter the difficulty that God's sim-         and unceasingly lives His infinitely perfect life with perfect

plicity would seem to prohibit any such classification. Scrip-      consciousness. He is the uncaused, independent, unchange-

ture itself, of course, does not classify God's perfections, as     able, incorruptible Jehovah ! Comprehend Him in His eternity

might be expected. Our third observation concerns the ab-           we cannot. Confess Him with a deep sense of humble depend-

sence of any mention of God's names. It is to be questioned         ence, and completely trust in Him and hope for eternal glory

whether the article even intends to use the name "God"  in          according to His eternal promises we by His grace in Christ

the sense of the Old Testament "Elohim," which is trans-            Jesus may.                                              H.C.H.


375                                         T H E   ST:ANDARD  - B E A R E R

                                                                      by the church. Article 60 of the Church Order is meaningful

                                                                      to them and that because:
11     DiCENCY                   a n d   ORDER 11
                                                                         First of all it is the parents who make request at the

                                                                      consistory for the baptism of their children. This means that

                      Baptismal Records                               they desire that their children are received as members of
                                                                      the church through baptism and that this membership is

                            (Continued)                               recorded.

                                                                         In the second place, as the Form for Baptism stresses,
       In our last article we stated that Article 60 of the Church    baptism is not a `yMcye  custom or superstition but an ordinance
Order requires the recording of four things in connection             of God to seal unto us and our  Seed His covena.?zt.  This is
with baptism. These are: (1) the name of the one baptized,            very serious.    Parents request and express the desire that
 (2) the names of the parents, (3) the birthdate of the one           this holy ordinance of God be administered to their children.
baptized and, (4) the date of baptism. We also gave the               This, too, is recorded. What we mean by this is that the
reasons, according to Rev. G. M. Ophoff, that the recording           recording of the baptism data does not simply mean that on
of this data is important. To these reasons we will now add           a certain date certain children of certain parents were re-
a few others.                                                         ceived into the church through a mere custom but that they
       During the post-reformation years prior to the nineteenth      received the sign and seal of the covenant of grace upon
century the church kept these records not only for itself but         request of their parents and according to, the ordinance of
also to assist the civil government. The relation between             God !
church and state was very close during this time and since               Therefore, in the third place, that parents may evidence
the government kept no birth records it dependend upon the            that they are thus minded they are asked upon the occasion
church to furnish these whenever occasion arose that one              of baptism to answer in the hearing of the church certain
needed a verification of his birthdate or parentage. It was           important questions. Our readers are undoubtedly acquainted
in part, therefore, to aid the govvkrnment  that Article 60 of        with these questions and since our purpose is not to discuss
our Church Order was enacted.                                         these questions at this time we will not quote them. Wk want
       But the church also needs these records for her own use.       only to point out that when the baptism is recorded by the
 She must know who her members are for she must know                  church, this official recording is also the record before God
which persons are under her jurisdiction and care. She must           of the vows the parents speak when they present their chil-
 have the names of the parents (or in previous times the              dren for baptism. Although we are prone to forget what we
 names of the sponsors in baptism) in order that she may              have solemnly confessed and promised before God and His
know whom to hold responsible for the training and instruc-           church after the ceremony is finished, there is a permanent
 tion of the children that are baptized. The date of birth and        record between us and God, preserved in the church, and for
 baptism are important to the church because those children           which we are accountable. No action on our part can erase
 who have received baptism and do not seek admission to the           this responsibility as some seem to think. The record stands
 Table of the Lord when they reach the years of discretion            as soon as the baptism has been administered and that record
 have to be admonished and labored -with by the church. To            does not simply intend to register the name, birthdate, and
 do this the office-bearers must have accessible to them the          baptism date of the child together with the names of the
 ages of non-professing members of the church and this in-            parents but it expresses that the parents, whose names are
formation will always be available if proper baptismal records        recorded, on the date recorded, promise and oblige them-
 are kept. Then, too, when a family leaves a congregation and         selves to fulfill to the utmost of their power all the baptismal
 moves into another community, all of this information should         obligations with respect to the child whose name and birth-
 be transferred to the church with which they there affiliate.        date are also recorded on this record.
 This certification is necessary and  could not possibly take             In light of this we would digress a moment to point out a
 place unless good records are kept by the church.                    serious sin of no small consequences. I refer to the sin of

       To this may be added. that these records of the church         parents who promise before God and His church "to instruct

 are also of significance for the individual members of the           and  bring up their chi2dmn  ipb  the afpfesaid  doctrhe  (which

 church. This significance is not to be found in the fact that        is taught in the Protesta,nt  Reformed  Churches) or help  or

 these records are available and, therefore, as occasion may          cause thew to be instimcted theveh to the) utmost of their

 require they can be used by individuals to receive a certifica-      pozver,"  and refuse to cooperate in the establishment of Prot-

 tion of their date of birth, baptism, etc. Sometimes this is         estant Reformed Christian Schools where possible and when

 done when one makes application for a certain job and has            such schools are established, refuse to have their children in-

 no birth certificate. An official statement by the church will       structed in them. There can be no justification for such a

 usually suffice.  And, of course, such use of the records is also    breach of promise and if any of our readers are of a different

 proper but it is not what we have in mind. We are thinking           mind, I would like to hear how such conduct can be made to

 now of the parents of the children whose baptism is recorded         harmonize with the recorded vow of baptism. Whatever


                                            T H E   S T A N D A R D   B E A R E R                                                  379

reasons may be given must be so cogent that they would              ebar@,cr$  su& as Abraham, Daniel, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Paul,

compel God Himself to release us from the obligation of our         etc., or after certain Christian virtues as Charity, Love, Grace,

promise which we have seriously made in the hearing of His          Temperance, Hope. Sotie  of these names are still irery com-

church.                                                             mon. Selecting names from the Bible is certainly a great

                                                                    deal better than the choosing of names from present day
   Of equally serious consequence is the sin of parents who
                                                                    novels or even from among movie stars as many are inclined
make confession of their faith, subscribe to the doctrines of
                                                                    to do in our day. It is also far better to name our children
Holy Writ as taught in the church, and without ever protest-
                                                                    after Bible characters than to name them after outstanding
ing o,r attempting to show that their confession was made on
                                                                    men of unbelief such as Darwin, Marx, etc. For the rest the
the basis of misinformation concerning those doctrines, they
                                                                    Bible permits parents to choose names as they see fit. Many
will at a later date forsake the church (for fleshly and mate-
                                                                    New Testament believers had pagan names but the Bible
rial reasons) and have their children baptized in a church
                                                                    nowhere urges these converts to adopt new names. We should
that teaches diametrically opposite doctrines. This leads to
                                                                    never become overly scrupulous on this score."
the most glaring inconsistency where parents oblige them-
selves to teach their children and rear them according to               Concerning the second question we may say that the com-
doctrines which they themselves do not believe. Or it must          mon practice of using only the given name in baptism stems
bring us to the inevitable conclusion that such people do not       from the historical fact t&at years ago people had no family
believe what they themselves confess. This is trifling with         names. When family names were introduced this custom
holy things. With God, however, we cannot do this with              continued. Again we concur in the opinion of the Chzti&z
impunity. Our s&s always find us out. God visits the iniq-          Order Commentary when it states, "But we know of no
uity of the fathers upon the children in generations. He Who        serious argument by reason of which the complete name
requires integrity of heart, truth in the inward. parts, honesty    should not be pronounced at the time of baptism." In favor
in all our confession and life, cannot be mocked.                   of this practice is this that, especially in larger churches, the
                                                                    entire congregation then knows the parents of the children
   The matter, therefore, of baptism must be taken in all its       who are being baptized. Another way of attaining this same
seriousness. It is not a matter of a day or an hour or a            objective, however, is to have the minister announce the
ceremony.    It is a matter of permanent record and respon-         names of the parents who are presenting their children for
sibility. When then we inscribe our vows upon that record           baptism just before the Form is read. If more than one child
and assume that responsibility we must answer-not to                is to receive baptism, he would do this in the order they are
men- but to God !                                                   to be baptized. We are of the opinion that whichever method
   Several other matters of a sundry nature are sometimes           is followed has little if any bearing upon the significance of
discussed in connection with Article 60. Two of these we            the sacrament.                                            G.v.d.B.
shall mention here. Firstly there is the matter of the naming

of the children, and, secondly, the question whether only the

given, name or both the given and family name should be

mentioned in baptism ?

   Concerning the first we are agreed with the comments

found in The Ch.urclz Order Cowmentwy.  We quote from                          THE SOUTH HOLLAND LAW CASE
page 248.                                                                                     CCUKLUDED
   "The naming of a child has rightly always been left to the
                                                                        Following is a copy of the Final Decree (a consent de-
parents. It is their privilege to name their children and not
                                                                    cree) resolving the issues of the Bill of Complaint that was
that of the state or the church or any other agency. But this
                                                                    brought against our South  Holland Protestant Reformed
does not mean that Christian parents are not prevented by
                                                                    Church by the schismatic group in South Holland as insti-
the very Christianity which they profess from giving certain
                                                                    gated by the Rev. B. Kok, their erstwhile moderator and
names to their children. For example, no child should be
                                                                    pastor.
called by the names of God. In the past some parents have

used names as follows: Divine, Jesus, Immanuel. No one              S T A T E   O F   I L L I N O I S   )
should consent to baptize a child by one of these names.                                                > ss
Parents should also be discouraged from naming their chil-          COUNTY OF COOK                      )
dren after angels inasmuch as these names are borrowed from          IN THE SUPERIOR COURT OF COOK COUNTY,
a sinless domain, the sacredness af which would not be en-                                       ILLINOIS
hanced in our estimation and thought if its names were given        PROTESTANT REFORMED                                  >
to sinful beings. Nor would a Christian parent think of call-       CHURCH OF SOUTH HOLLAND,                             )
ing his child Cain, Judas, Jezebel, etc.                            A RELIGIOUS CORPORATION,                             )

   "Years ago, particularly among the Puritans of New               and BERNARD KOK                                      >
England, many parents named their children after Bible                                             P L A I N T I F F S   )


380                                                T H E   STA~NDARD   B E A R E R

                         -vs-                         ) NO. 58817915    or his duly elected successors are entitled to represent them-
HOMER C. HOEKSEMA, JOHN                                                 selves as ministers of the Gospel of the Protestant Reformed

VAN BAREN,  WILLIAM T.                                ;                 Church  of South Holland, Illinois.
TERPSTRA, PETER POORTENGA, )                                                9. The Court further finds that the Plaintiffs have not
ANDREW LENTING, ARTHUR                                                  maintained the allegations in their bill of complaint con-
ZANDSTRA and EDWARD                                   ,'                tained.
BRUINSMA                                              >                     It is therefore ordered, adjudged and decreed that the bill
                                 D E F E N D A N T S   )
                                                                        of complaint in this --cause be atid  the same is hereby dis-

                                                                        missed for want of equity.
                      F I N A L   D E C R E E
                                                                                            ENTER : (was signed) Samuel B. Epstein
       This cause coming on to be heard on the bill of complaint

filed in said cause, the answer of the defendants thereto and                                                     Judge
the reply of the complainants to said answer, and the proofs
                                                                        Approved this 17th day of April, 1961.
oral', documentary and written, taken and filed in said cause,

and after argument and filing of briefs by the respective                                                    Examined and Approved :
parties but before the filing of a Masters Report; and all
                                                                                                               Llewellyn A. Wescott
parties having this day appeared in court either in person or

by counsel and having consented to the entry of this decree,                                                 Master in- Chancery of the

said consent being signified by the written approval of all of                                                Superior Court of Cook

the parties hereto by their respective attorneys, and the court                                                   County, Illinois

being fully advised in the premises doth find!                                     Lyle, Havey & Gager

                                                                        By: Edward T. Havey
       1. It has jurisdiction of the subject matter of this cause

and the parties thereto and that all court costs and Master's                      Attorney for Plaintiff
fees have been paid in full.
                                                                             Orval A. Larson and John J. Moran
       2. The Protestant Reformed Church in the United States
                                                                        By: John J. Moran
has a Presbyterian form of church government wherein each

church has a consistory consisting of ministers and members                        Attorney for Defendant

who are either elders or elders `and deacons chosen by the

communion members of the church.                                        Explanatio+z  and Cowwwnt

       3. That there are two classis  in the denomination, Clas-            A wo,rd of explanation is first of all in order so that
sis East and Classis  West. Each consistory send two dele-
                                                                        this chronicle may be completed.
gates to the Classis  under which it resorts.
                                                                            This law case began in the fall of 1958 when a complaint
  .4.        That the highest assembly of said church is the Synod,
                                                                        was brought against our South Holland Church, or rather
which consists of eight delegates from each classis,  four
                                                                        against the consistory members, by the schismatic group in
ministers and four elders.
                                                                        the name of "The Protestant Reformed Church of South
       5.    That the defendants and their duly elected successors      Holland, and Bernard Kok." This was a small group of
constitute the true and lawful consistory of the Protestant             families who had. formally requested dismissal papers in early
Reformed Church of South Holland, Illinois, a religious cor-            1955 and had been organized into a schismatic congregation.
poration, and they, together with the congregation. they                Upon organization these resigned members turned around
represent, are entitled to the ownership, possession, use and           and took the name of South Holland Protestant Reformed
control of all of the property, both real and personal, of said         Church. Later, after having been warned, they changed this
Protestant Reformed Church of South Holland, Illinois.                  to "Orthodox Protestant Reformed Church," and even so

       6. That the defendants and the consisto,ry  which they           informed their classis.  In 1958 they suddenly were sending
constitute are recognized by the true and lawful Classis  West          out letters again under our name. And when their letters, in
and Synod of the Protestant Reformed Churches in America.               which they avowed that they did not want court action but
                                                                        were gracious enough to divide our property with us, had no
       7. That the defendants, their duly elected successors and        effect, Kok, who became their pastor in August, 1958, with
the congregation they represent are entitled to sole use of             his consistory brought a Bill of Complaint against us, in
the name "Protestant Reformed Church of South Holland,                  which they sought to deprive us of our name and property
Illinois" and to sole-use and ownership of the corporate name,          and even of the right to use the denominational name "Prot-
"Protestant .Reformed  Church of South Holland, a religious             estant Reformed" at all. The sole ground of this case-
corporation."                                                           brought, mind you, by the same Kok who had under oath
       8. That only the defendant HOMER C. HOEKSEMA,                    so vehemently tried to be congregationalistic in the First


                                           T H E   S T A N D A R D   B.EARER                                                       381


Church case - was the Court decision in the well-known               Holland case. For then pages would have to be written. Let

Second Church case.*                                                 me merely relate the facts in connection with Kok's return

    Because of the crowded court docket in Cook County,              to the Christian Reformed Church, and then, too, not as they
our case was heard by a Master in Chancery, a qualified              pertain to his doctrinal examination, but as they pertain to
attorney appointed by the court to conduct the hearing and           his ethical conduct. As far as doctrine is concerned, we all
file a report with the court. Our case was heard in 1959 and         have known for a long time that the schismatic movement (I
early 1960, and briefs were filed in the spring of 1960, our         do not say all their members) is principally Christian Re-
brief being a very detailed account and thorough-going treat-        formed in doctrine. But the ethical conduct of Kok  has been
ment of the issues of the case. And since that time we  had          a disgrace to the ministry of any church.
been waiting for a Master's report, hopeful that it would be             First of all, in general, would it not have been simple
favorable.                                                           moral honesty if Kok had withdrawn his lawsuit and ex-
    Before a report was issued, however, events took a new           pressed sorrow for ever having attempted to take Protestant
turn. The schismatic congregation ceased holding services            Reformed name and property the moment he had any inten-
.after  the first of the year, Kok joined. the Christian Reformed    tion of joining the Christian Reformed Church?
Church of Munster, Indiana, and sought admittance to the                 Secondly, the reader ought to know that partly because of
Christian Reformed ministry at the January session of Classis        a letter sent by our South Holland Consistory to Classis
Chicago South. This had led us to make preparations for              Chicago South, Kok  promised to have his name withdrawn
re-opening the hearing and introducing new evidence. But             from the Bill of Complaint immediately. Not only did he not
before such a new hearing could be held, our opposition              do this ; but he continued to meddle in the negotiations for a
initiated negotiations for a settlement of the case. Such a          Consent Decree almost to the very end, and long after the
settlement was possible if reached before the Master's report        classis  had accepted him.
was filed. This would not be what is known as an "out-of-                In the third place, after joining the Christian Reformed
court" settlement. But this would be a settlement agreed             Church and a&~ being admitted to the ministry, he still
upon by both parties and officially affirmed by the court. The       continued to act as president of the schismatic consistory,
form of settlement upon which we' insisted was this consent          and even signed dismissal papers as president as late as'
decree, which deals with all the issues raised by the com-           February 15.
plaint and which has the force of a final court decree.                 Such lawlessness we have learned to expect from the
   After lengthy negotiations, which centered particularly on        schismatic movement. And we can only feel sorry for their
the issue of classis  and synod (cf. paragraph 6 of the decree)      membership, which must suffer from such inept, corrupt, and
the opposition finally agreed to the above decree, which is          unethical leadership.
substantially what we had demanded from the beginning, and              But from the Christian Reformed Church, in spite of the
which justifies not only the local consistory but also Classis       differences we have with them, we do not really expect that
West and our Synod.                                                  they will tolerate actions of this kind. We had expected that
                                                                     there was more genuine ecclesiastical dignity and respect for
   Thus ends the chronicle of the South Holland case. Need-
                                                                     the "ecclesiastical manner" and desire to keep unprofaned the
less to say, the congregation there is happy and thankful that
                                                                     sacred ministry than this. I say this not with a kind of un-
at long last their name and church property are no longer in
                                                                     holy glee, but in all love. Brethren, investigate : ybu will find
jeopardy. Never has there been a doubt among them as to
                                                                     the facts as I presented them. And then undo the wrong.
what was right and proper before God in this case. Nor,
                                                                     For you can only reap foi your own denomination an evil
generally speaking, was there doubt in the community as a
                                                                     harvest from this ministry begun in falsehood.
whole as to who actually constituted the Protestant Re-
                                                                        And to those earnest-minded souls of the De Wolf group
formed Chtirch  of South Holland, Illinois. The only ques-
                                                                     that are disturbed by the recent turn of events and who may
tion was what the civil court would decide. The congre-
                                                                     have their eyes opened when they see the end of the way on
gation may now go forward without this cloud of doubt
                                                                     which they began in 1953, I would still say: Come back!
hanging over their life.
                                                                     Come back ,in  &e p?=oper  way, that is, the way of open- 4
    And thus has ended also another of these dissident               hearted repentance and confession before God and His
schismatic groups, founded on no principle but that of error,        church.                                                  H.C.H.
conceived in rebellion, and doomed beforehand to disintegrate

because of the very seeds of error and revolution inherent in
                                                                        B,uZletin  @ate  (Lynden's) : Religion germinates only
them.
                                                                     when it attains unto that which is written of Enoch,  viz.,
   And what of the chief instigator of this court action, the        that he walked z&z God. Neither knowledge nor pious
Reverend Bernard Kok ?                                               feeling by themselves can ever be called religion. Only  when
   This is a shameful story. But the)  facts are incontrover-        your God and you have met each other and associate and
tible, and they should be known by all concerned.                    walk together, does religion &ie in your heart.

   I will not go back to. the beginning even of the South                                                       - Abraham Kuyper


352                                            T H E   S T A N D A R D   B E A R E R


                                                                                the host of Pharaoh," was offered in the religious programme
                                                                                "Vi&vpoint"  on BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) tele-
liALL   A R O U N D   tiS/l                                                     vision last week.
                                                                                    According to this explanation alI  the details of the Red Sea
                                                                                crossing, as described in the  Book of Exodus, are accurate,
                                                                                except that the event actually took place not in the Red Sea
THE IMPORTANCE OF MIRACLES                                                      itself but in the Wadi  El Arish, on the northern coast of the
                                                                                Sinai Peninsula.
       The miracles of Scripture and faith in them are always                      The theory advanced by Mr. W. R. Todd, whose arguments
of essential importance for the believer. This is because the                   were based, &St, on the fact that the rendering of the Biblical
                                                                                words "yam suf' into Red Sea was mistaken, since they actually
central miracle of all time is the incarnation of Jesus  Christ.                meant "reed sea"; and, secondly, on an incident which occurred
All the other miracles from the original creation of the                        to British troops who were chasing the Turks in the Wadi  El
                                                                                Arish in 1916.
heaven and earth, through the many miracles recorded in                             Mr. Todd showed a map of the area and pointed out a
Scripture, on to the miracle of regeneration-the regenera-                      lagoon called Bardwil Fisheries. He said that what was really
                                                                                a dried mud pan, six to ten feet below sea-level, was nowadays
tion of the elect and of the whole creation, the new heavens                    kept flooded to form a mullet iishery.  But in its natural state
and the new earth, are so many manifestations of the power                      it was Ned with sea water only when th? rare gaIes  flooded the
                                                                                whole depression. In between storms the water evaporated in
of grace in the incarnation of our Lord. Miracles..are  the                     the hot sun.
essence- of the faith of the child of God. The faith of a                           When a British mounted force entered the wadi  in 1916 and
                                                                                rode across the mud pan to bathe in the sea, a wind suddenly
Christian can very well be summed up in the words, "I                           arose, clouds appeared, and the horses showed a strange reluc-
believe in miracles."                                                           tance to move on. A torrential rain broke, the troops reached
                                                                                a sand bar, where they spent the whole night. "The next morn-
       It is for this reason that it is always the miracles of                  ing they saw that the sea had broken through, flooding the
Scripture that are attacked by unbelievers. They may attack                     mud pan with water all around them, only the sand bar re-
                                                                                mainiig  dry."
the miracles recorded on the pages of Holy Writ as incredible                      This, claimed Mr. Todd, was exactly what happened when
to the enlightened mind. But in doing so they naturally                         the children of Israel fled from the Egyptians.
                                                                                    Moses, who had shepherded his father-in-law's flock for 20
also spurn the wonder of regeneration and the miracle of                        years, he argued, would have known that the mud pan was
grace in the lives of God's people. The result of this is neces-                liable to sudden flooding. "To place it between the people and
                                                                                their pursuers would be sound tactics."
sarily that they also discredit the miraculous and virgin birth                     What happened, then, was this: while the Israelites were
of Christ, the blood of atonement shed on the cross, the resur-                 on the dry sand bar (which is what the Bible meant by saying
                                                                                they were "in the midst of the sea"), the pursuing Egypths,
rection of Jesus Christ from the dead, His final coming .in                     unaware of the danger, entered what looked to them like a dry
judgment at the end of the ages-all miracles. This is al-                       mud pan. But underneath there was "a tremendous bog, in
                                                                                which they were caught." As the Bible explained: it "took off
ways the spirit of Antichrist. One cannot deny a single                         their chariot wheels."
                                                                                   In the meantime the sea waters were breaking in and raising
miracle of Scripture without denying them all. And denying                      the level of the lagoon. "And the water returned and covered
them all involves a denial of Christ. That is why the apostle                   the chariots and the horsemen, and all the host of Pharaoh. . .
                                                                                there remained not so much as one of them."
John says in his first epistle: "Beloved, believe not every
                                                                              This is not by &y means an isolated case; but it is. an
spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because
                                                                           illustration of how the miracles of Scripture are denied under
many false prophets are gone out into the world. Hereby
                                                                           the guise of faithfulness to the record of Holy Writ. Against
know ye the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesseth that
                                                                           this we must. ever be on our guard. The denial of the miracle
Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God : Arid every spirit
                                                                           of creation through an attempt to- explain it in a natural way
that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the Aesh  is
                                                                           is equally as dangerous and as wrong.
not of God: and this is that spirit of antichrist, whereof ye

have heard that it should come ; and even now already is it                ONCE i SAINT, NOT ALWAYS A SAINT
in the world." I John 4:1-3.                                                  The intricacies of Roman Catholic theology are not al-
       It is for this reason also that the Antichrist himself at-          ways easy to follow. Sometimes the absurdity of claims of the
tempts to imitate the miracles of Scripture to try to deceive              church is brought sharply into the light. This was the case
people into believing that he is indeed a prophet. The same                with a recent decision of the Vatican to de-canonize a saint
apostle John informs us in his vivid description of Antichrist             as reported in T&VU.
in Rev. 13 :14 : "And deceiveth them that dwell on the earth                  Archbishop Richard Cardinal Cushing was travelling in
by the means of those miracles which he had power to do in                 his chauffeur-driven limousine on the way to the town of
the sight of the beast; saying to them that dwell on the earth,            Dover in Massachusetts to dedicate a church which had
that they should make an image to the beast, which had the                 recently been completed, and which was to be named St.
wound by a sword, and did live."                                           Philomena's. Imagine his consternation when, as he was
       Sometimes these attempts to deny miracles are blatant and           travelling along reading a newspaper, an item informed him
coarse ; more often they are subtle pattempts  to explain the              that St. Philomena had recently been stricken from the roster
miracles in a natural way. There is a good  illustration of                of saints by the Vatican's Sacred Congregation of Rites. St.
the latter in a recent issue of The Bap&t  Bible T&ttne                    Philomena was discovered in 1802 in a catacomb in Rome.
which quotes from the Jerwislz  Claronicle.                                It was the skeleton of a young teen-age girl with a fractured

            A natural explanation.for  the miraculous escape of the &I-    skull that was found. On the basis of an apparent inscription
         dren of Israel, when the waters of the Red Sea divided to let
         them through to dry land and then closed again to drown "aII      on her grave, a glass phial containing what was thought to


                                          T H E   S T A N D A R D   B E A R E R                                                          383
                                                                        .
be blood and a few symbols (two anchors, three arrows, -a          zerland where a group of Protestant evangelicals  including

palm and a flower or torch) she was declared to be a saint         Billy Graham and Dr. Harold Ockenga decided to begin

that had no need of formal canonization for she had evidently      religious broadcasting in Europe. Rev. Paul E. Freed, a

been a-martyr. Her bones were turned over to a priest and          Baptist minister, was assigned the task of starting a religious

enshrined in a church near Naples where these bones prompt-        broadcasting station to cover Europe. Before this time there

ly produced a flood of miracles and special favors. A nun later    had been no Protestant station in all of Europe although 3/4

claimed to have had a series of revelations concerning Phil-       of the world's receivers outside the United States were in

omena's  life and martyrdom and wrote a biography of this          this continent. The station was originally built in Tangier,

youthful martyr. She was canonized by Pope Gregory XVI             but was forced to move from the north coast of Africa in

in 1837 and several years later her feast day was set for          1959 when Morocco decided to incorporate the free port of

August 11.                                                         Tangier. There were broadcasting facilities in Monaco which

   Pope John XXIII has issued orders to tidy up the litur-         were built by Adolph Hitler for propaganda purposes, and

gical calendar of the church and strike from the rolls certain     were leased by Trans World Radio from Radio Monte Carlo

saints about whom so little is known that their existence may      on a ten-year lease, automatically renewable.

be doubted. Philomena was the first to go.                            Five giant antennas already carry the station's programs

   Her de-canonization had rather wide-sweeping effects.           across Asia to the Pacific and to Spain and Latin America.

Archbishop Gushing was especially on the spot and had to           The programs are carried in Russian, Spanish, Latvian,

change the name of the church he was about to dedicate to          Hebrew, Arabic, Swedish, Portugese, French, English,

"the Church of the Most Precious Blood" during the cere-           Italian and German. Wit&in three months Armenian, Geor-

monies to the utter astonishment of the parishioners who knew      gian and Uzbec  will be added ; within a year, Chinese and

nothing about it all. The trouble was that he had also dis-        Hindustani. The group operating the station are now pri-

tributed about 800 statuettes of St. Philomena to the Catholics    marily interested in reaching inside Russia. Already they have

of his arch-diocese, and the new church he dedicated would         `a half hour program in Russian, soon tot be increased to an

have to obtain a new stained glass window since she also ap-       hour. There are regular listeners behind the iron curtain as

peared in it.                                                      far away as Siberia, and a steady stream of letters arrives out

   There was equally great consternation elsewhere. Sister         of the U.S.S.R. speaking highly of Trans, World Radio.

Marie Helene had devoted 45 years of her life to the cause         NEWS FROM ECUMENICAL COUNCILS
of St. Philomena, had written a book about her and had                There is some news from various evangelical and ecumen-
raised $10,000 to erect a shrine to her on the campus of           ical councils that have met or will meet in the near future.
Greensburg's Seton Hill College. 300,000 tourists had visited         April lo-14 was the date of the 19th annual convention of
the shrine of her bones each year and countless churches had       the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE) which met
been dedicated to her -more than 100 in the United States          in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The actions of the Convention
alone. But to those people who had faithfully prayed to her        are included in a brief quote in Christianity Today.
all these years, now in vain, there were some words of                           Delegates to the National Association of Evangelicals
comfort in the current edition of "Butler's Lives of the                     adopted a resolution urging the organization to make a positive
                                                                             approach to the problem of Communism with a "dynamic pre-
Saints" : "We do not know certainly whether she was in fact                  sentation of the Gospel rather than engage in the investigation
named Philomena in her earthly life, whether she was a                       and exposure of individual Communists.' Support was given
                                                                             governmental investigatory functions as necessary for national
martyr, whether her relics now rest at Mugano or in some                     security.
place unknown. And these questions are only of relative im-                       Other resolutions endorsed (1) tax exemption for church
                                                                             and institutional activities provided such were not of a secular
pqrtance:  the spiritual influence of her whom we call St.                   enterprise nature, (2) an appeal to the National Association
Philomena is what really matters; . . . in the words of our                  of Broadcasters to clean UD TV ilhns.  and f 3) church efforts
                                                                             to accelerate educational information on the `evils of liquor
Lord : `Is not the life more than meat and the body more than                traffic.
the raiment ?' "                                                                 The convention created a new NAB organization post, that
                                                                             of director of information. . . .
   How far from the truth and into what silly absurdities                        Building of a new headquarters building in Wheaton,  Illi-
has the Roman Catholic Church led her members through                        nois, at-a cost of $100,000 was approved. It is to be ready for
                                                                             use early in 1962.
the truth-denying doctrine of the saints !                            The World Council of Churches (WCC), another large

                                                                   group of churches throughout the world, is scheduled to meet
TRANS  WORLD RADIO
   Our Reformed Witness How  has been transmitted for              in New Delhi, India, this fall. One of the major questions

almost a year now over Trans World Radio. This is our              before this assembly will be whether to. incorporate into the
foreign broadcast in Europe which reaches throughout a big         World Council the International Missionary Council, an or-

part of the continent, but is beamed especially to the British     ganization of missionary societies and mission boards who

Isles. In a recent issue of T&ti.e  magazine, there is some in-    cooperate in world-wide mission work. It will be interesting

formation about this station which may be of interest to our       to follow developments of this meeting.

people.                                                               Currently attracting a lot of attention is a new Ecumenical

    The radio station had its beginning in Interlaken, Swit;       Council called by Pope John XXIII to meet in the near


                                             ~_ .____ _ ____-___  .__- ~~~-  ~~-- - --
 3,& _. .___ -. __ . . _ . ._    -_-_. . T-XE STANDAR'D` BEARE-R  -~
                                 _    .,(


 future. There have been many of these councils in the past,       Miss Bonnie-Bylsma, and an offertory- song selection between

 the, most -well-known' being the Council: of Trent which drew     them.    "The Lord's Prayer" was an arrangement by Rev. J.

 up the Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent in 1563         A. Heys of our South Holland Church, and, "Leaning On

 as part of the counter-Reformation. The Reformation had           His Everlasting Arms" was a delightful arrangement by

 gained such sweeping victories on the continent of Europe         James Jonker,,  of First Church. This Bmcorz  Lights spon-

 that the Roman Catholic Church called this council into           sored concert was very worthwhile to all those who were able

 being as part of its attempt to define Roman Catholic dogma       tb come out to it.       .

 and purify the church in the hopes of stemming the tide
                                                                        The announced topic of Doon's  Sunday afternoon sermon,`
of the Reformation.
                                                                   April 30, suggests that Rev. Van Bar-en intends to preach:a.
    To the newest council several Protestant and non-Catholic
                                                                   series of sermons on the Epistle to the Ephesians.  The first
 bodies have been invited: The Greek Orthodox Church has
                                                                   chapter alone, with its -23 verses wrapped up in 5 sentences,
 been asked to come as well as the Anglican Church and.
                                                                   contains a wealth of doctrinal truths concerning election and
 representatives from the World Council of Churches. `They
                                                                   adoption. Surely the congregation and its pastor will benefit
 will not participate, but come as observers. Many students of
                                                                   from a study of that Spirit-written letter to the church at
 ecumenicism view this coming council as a giant step towards
                                                                   Ephesus.
 healing the breach struck between Protestantism  and Roman

 Catholicism by the Reformation. It is important to watch               The Hope School Ladies' Circle entertained a capacity

 closely events lead,ing  up to and development of the meeting.    audience in the. Hudsonville Church auditorium, May 4, with

                                                    H. Hanko       a Stereophonic program with slides. Mr. Brower, the pro-

                                                                   ducer has recorded many fine songs upon his stereo tape

                                                                   recorder which accompanies the projection of, beautiful slides

                                                                   showing the marvelous creation in which God has placed us.

                                                                   And, as Rev. H. Hanko confessed in the closing prayer, when

                                                                   we see the beauty which still remains in this sin-cursed world

                                                                   we eagerly await the unimaginable beauty which will be ours

                                               May 5, 1961         to enjoy in the New Heavens and the New Earth which we

     The Adams St. School Spring Concert, sponsored by the         shall inherit after our Lord's Coming.

 ninth grade, was given April 27 at First Church. The pro-              The individ,ual members of Hope's congregation were
 gram featured the school choir under the direction of Miss        taught to judge whether they were loved of God as delineated
 Hulda &riper,  accompanied by Miss Lois Schipper at the           in 2nd Cor. 9 17, for their pastor preached on that text in
 piano.    The audience ,was welcomed by a very young duo,         the evening service of April 16, under the theme, "God loveth
 Debra DeVries  and James Kuiper.  Between groupings the           a cheerful giver." `Well may we all examine our own giving
 choir was assisted by a brass quintette which rendered two        whether it be "grudgingly or of necessity" heeding the
 numbers, and by an acrostic presented by children, from           promise given in the preceding verse: "he which soweth
 grades 3 to 6, and by an organ solo, Handel's Largo, by Don       bountifully shall also reap bountifully."
 Moelker. One does not go to school programs expecting the
                                                                        .A11 of the Western bulletins remind the ,people  to send
 robust singing of adults, but rather comes to enjoy the fresh
                                                                   their. donations .for the Young People's Convention to the
 young voices of praise-singing youngsters -reminding one
                                                                   Loveland Prot. Ref. Young People's Society, 750 Jefferson
 of the children who met Jesus at His triumphal entry into
                                                                   Ave., Loveland, Co,lorado.  Surely this plea will be met with
 Jerusalem. The last number of the choir, "Open the Gates                                        .
                                                                   warm response for all who want to help make this convention
 of the Temple," was accompanied by piano and organ, with
                                                                   a success - one which will `serve .to'bring awareness of their
 trumpeter Dan Swart playing the antiphonal responses. The
                                                                   covenant responsibilities and privileges'. me. our sons and
 entire program was an unfolding of the theme that Spring is
                                                                   daughters. The -Convention theme has `been .announced  as,
 a picture of the Resurrection as it has been revealed to us
                                                                   "The Beauty. of Holiness." ' .               _'
 in the glorious resurrection of our Lord. Truly, a wonderful

 evening of spiritual joy and worship !                                 Rev. R. C. Harbach and Rev. J. -A. Heys served as

                                                                   Church Visitors in Loveland, April 25. The same evening.
     The concert of the Hope Heralds, scheduled for April 16,
                                                                   Rev. Harbach gave a lecture on the topic, "An Evaluation
 but snow-cancelled, was held April 30 at' Southeast Church:
                                                                   of the Modern Educational Process" sponsored by the Love-
 Under the direction of Mr. Gerald &riper  and accompanied
                                                                   land Prot. Ref. Schqol  Society. `And in reciprocation, Rev.
"by Miss Lois Schipper, the men's group gave an excellent
                                                                   Heys and Rev. K&per  were, given opportunity to preach in
 program well pleasing to the. audience, and because it was
                                                                   Lynden,  April 36, on their Church Visitation to-m-.
 God-praising we may believe that it was also God-pleasing.

 The program,was  in three groupings with an organ solo, by        _    . . . . s e e   youin  c h u r c h .    " : J.M.F.


