                                         he

                                  tan$ard-

                                                   earer

             .



A R E F O R M E D   S E M I - M O N T H L Y   M A G A Z I N E



IN  THIS  ISSUE:


         Meditation  - "Exalted Above Sun And Moon"


         Editorial - Redemptive-Redeeming Hocus Pocus


         Mission Preaching and  Total Depravity                   _

                                                                        -
         Ichabod                                                       :,





                                              Volume  XLI/ Number  20/ September 1, 1965


458                                                                                                                          THESTANDARDBEARER

                                                                                                                                                               T H E   S T A N D A R D   B E A R E R
                                                   CONT.ENTS
Meditation  -                                                                                                                                   Semi-monthly, except monthly during June,  Juiy and August
       Exalted Above Sun and Moon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 458                                                Published by the Reformed Free Publishing Association
              Prof. H. C. Hoeksema
Editorials --                                                                                                                                                     Editor- Prof. H. C. Hoeksema 3
       Right, But Dead Wrong (4)                                                                                                                Communications relative to contents should be addressed tt
       Redemptive-Redeeming Hocus Pocus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 461                                                           Prof; H. C. Hoeksema, 1842 Plymouth Terrace, S.E., Grand
              Prof. H. C. Hoeksema
       New Readers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 462                Rapids, Mich.       49506. Contributions will be limited to 30C
              Prof. H. C. Hoeksema                                                                                                              words and must be neatly written or typewritten. Copy dead-
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       Reformation Rally! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 463                         All church news items should be addressed toMr. J. M. Faber,
              Rev. M. Schipper                                                                                                                           1123 Cooper, S.E., Grand Rapids, Michigan 49507
A Clous of Witnesses -
       Ichabod . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 464    Announcements and Obituaries with the $2.00 fee includedmust
              Rev. B. Woudenberg                                            .'                                                                  be mailed ,8 days prior to issue date, to the address below;
From Holy Writ -                                                                                                                                All matters relative to subscriptions should be addressed tc
       The  Gospel of Chris; Preached on Mars Hill . . . . . . . . . . . 466
              Rev. G. Lubbers                                                                                                                              Mr. James Dykstra;1326  W. Butler Ave., S.E.
Trying The Spirits -                                                                                                                                               Grand Rapids, Michigan 49507
       Theosophy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 468                 Renewal: Unless a definite request for discontinuance  is
              Rev. R. C. Harbach                                                                                                                received it is assumed that the subscriber wishes the sub-
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              Rev. H. Veldman
The Church At Worship -                                                                                                                                Second Class Postage paid at Grand Rapids, Michigan
       The Lord's Supper Form
       Preparatory Self-Examination (Continued) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 473
              REV. G. Vanden  Berg                                                                                                                                     ANNOUNCEMENT
The Lord Gave The Word -
       Mission Preaching and Total Depravity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 475                                                            The  1965-66  term of the Theological School of the
              Rev.  C. Hanko                                                                                                                    Protestant Reformed Churches will begin, D.V., on
Examining Ecumenicalism  -                                                                                                                      Tuesday, September 14, at 9 a.m. The churches are
       R.C.A. - P.C.U.S.: Proposed Merger (3) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 477                                                             asked to remember our seminary in prayer.  Consis-
              Rev. G. Van Baren
News From Our Churches --                                                                                                                       tqries  ,are reminded that all requests for student pulpit
              Mr. John Faber . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 480                      or catechism supply must be addressed to the Rector.
                                                                                                                                                                              Prof. H. C. Hoeksema, Rector





                                                                                                   EXALTED  ABOVE SUN AND MOON

                                                                                                                          Pyof.  H. C. Hoeksema

                                                                       Then spake  Joshua to the  Lovd in  i;he day when the Lord  delivered
                                                       up the  -Amovites  before the children of Israel, and he  said in the sight
                                                       ofIsrael,  Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon; and thou, Moon, in the valley
                                                        of Ajalon. And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed, until the people
                                                        had avenged themselves upon their enemies. Is not this written in the
                                                        book of Jasher? So the sun stood  still in the midst of heaven,  a&
                                                        hasted not to go down about a whole day. And theve was no day like that
                                                        before it  OY  after  it; that  the  Lovd hearkened unto the voice of a  man:
                                                       fob-  the Lord fought fov Israel.                                                                              Joshua  10:12-14.
                                                                                              \
       Wonderful day!                                                                                                                                  Indeed, there was no day like that before it or after
       The  Lord hearkened to the voice of a man, Joshua!                                                                                       it!
       Joshua was exalted above-the sun and the moon!                                                                                                                         ****
       The sun and the moon stood  still at his command,                                                                                               The natural man, who cannot receive the  .things of
and hasted not `co go down for about a whole day!                                                                                               the Spirit of God because they are spirituallydisc&rned,
       And all -this took place in order that Israel, the                                                                                       is foolish. Contemplating the Word of God, he rejects
people of Jehovah, might avenge themselves upon their                                                                                           it. Confronted  by the wonder, he denies it. It is  fool-
enemies, and  ins order that it might be revealed that                                                                                          ishness  to. him; and he would far rather believe the lie
the Lord fought for Israel;                                                                                                                     concocted by his own foolish mind than embrace by


                                                    THE STANDARD BEARER                                                 459

faith the wonder of grace.                                       as His servant, as the one who was called to execute
   Thus, men have invented all kinds of. would-be                the Lord's work. Standing before theLord,  in the name
"`interpretations" in order to escape God, the God of            of Jehovah this servant whose very name means
the wonder. And there are Christians who are misled,             ` `Jehovah- Salvation" addressed the sun and the moon.
deceived by the cunning craftiness of men, who attempt           He gave commandment that the heavenly luminaries
to compromise somewhat with unbelief's denial, on                were to stop in their courses. And the result of that
pseudo-scientific grounds, of the wonder of grace.               commandment was -that Joshua was indeed exalted above
How dangerous and how comfortless is such compro-                the sun and the moon: they obeyed him, and they let
mise !                                                           their light rest upon  Gibeon and Ajalon until Joshua
   Some have excused these attempts to avoid the                 and Israel had finished their' work. At the command
literal meaning of the record of these verses by an              of Joshua about the length of a whole day was added to
appeal to poetic license. The book of Jasher was a               that day because the sun hasted not to go down about a
poetical book in which some of the most illustrious              whole day.
works of God for His people are celebrated.- And using              Wonderful day!
the alibi of poetic license, men have allowed them-                 There was no day like it, before or after!
selves all kinds of license in "explaining" these words.            Could the Word of God be more plain? Could it be
There are those, for example, who claim that that                said more simply? What other meaning could the words
famous day only  seemed  twice as long as an ordinary            of Scripture have here than the literal meaning that
day because so much was accomplished in it. Joshua               that day was almost doubled in length? How otherwise
supposedly told Israel, "Let not the sun and the moon            can the very emphatic language of these verses be
go down until the work is finished." And Israel so               understood?
busily filled the day with the activities of war that it            No, I cannot  explain-  this event. Indeed, I need not
was as though the sun and the moon stood still; Others           assume that the Word of God actually teaches here that
"explain" that Joshua said, "Sun, be silent," that-is,           the sun ordinarily moves and that the earth stands
shine no more, and that there was an eclipse of the              still, as some have foolishly objected against-scripture,
sun on that day. Others find the "explanation" in the            asserting that this is an "inaccuracy." It is evident
fact that the day darkened because of the -terrible              that Scripture does not speak the technical language of
storm at the time of the battle, the hailstorm mentioned         the astronomer, but is God's revelation to us' in "our
in verse 11, and that after the storm the sun came               language." No more than we ordinarily speak of our
through again, so that it was as though the day were             days and nights in terms of the earth's rotations in
prolonged after darkness began to fall.                          relation to the sun, but rather speak of the sun's rising
   But let it be noted that these "explanations" are not         and setting, no more does Scripture speak technical
really interpretations at all.        They are not serious       language, but.  rathe  r speaks ordinary "every day"
attempts to understand the language of the text. On              language. But. though I can conceive of the fact that the
the contrary, they are excuses. They are distortions             sun stood still on that day, I cannot comprehend this
of the text. Moreover, when you compare these "ex-               wonder and explain it.. If I could do so, I could compre-
planations" with the language of the text itself, it is          hend and explain God Himself!
immediately evident, too; that they are indeed distor-              Nor is it necessary to fathom what took place in
tions . They are distortions on the very face of them,           Ajalon!
all rather silly and superficial.                                   Faith  has no difficulty whatsoever to believe this
   How foolish is the natural mind!                              wonderful fact. Why cannot the same God who holds
   It would rather believe anything instead of the Word          the universe in His hand, Who keeps it in existence,
of God!                                                          Who preserves and directs it by the omnipresent power
   It wants to escape the idea of the miracle because,           of His providence, moment by moment, year by year,
of course, the essence of the miracle is the wo der of           century after century, yea, Who called that universe into
grace.                                               I?
            That wonder of grace the natural man do s not        being by the Word of His power,  - why cannot that
want.      Yes, he has his reasons,  - scientific reasons.       God lengthen a.mere  day? Is  Henot  much more able to
Indeed, the whole universe would be destroyed .if any-           stop the' entire universe in its course, if need be, by
thing so utterly contrary to the "laws of nature" should         His almighty Word than I am able to stop the move-
happen!      But the reason is this: the things of the Spirit    ment of my watch? Is it any-more difficult to believe
of God are foolishness to him!                                   that He caused the sun to stand still than to believe
                           * * * *                               that He called the worlds into being? Is it more diffi-
   But the truth of the Word of God is simple, so                cult to believe  .that the moon stood still in the valley
simple that a little child can understand it.                    of Ajalon than to believe that God keeps all the heavenly
   And the wonder is faith's dearest child!                      luminaries in -their courses second by second? Is it
   The battle against the kings of the south, who pur-           more difficult to -believe this wonderful event than to
posed to take vengeance upon the Gibeonites and to               believe the final wonder whereby He shall glorify all
recapture the strategic heights of  Gibeon, had been             things by the power of His grace at the parousia of our
joined.      And Joshua, captain of the host  of-Israel,         Lord Jesus Christ? Is it more difficult to embrace
stood somewhere between Gibeon and Ajalon. He spoke              this wonder than all the wonders: the incarnation, the
"to the Lord," which here evidently means that he                resurrection, the ascension, the outpouring of the Spirit,
spoke before the Lord, that is, as standing before Him,          the work of regenerating grace?


460'                                              THESTANDARDBEARER


   No, I cannot understand any of them. Least of all          army of Israel, they must not be allowed to escape
can I understand how God can make of a sinner such            under cover of darkness. The battle of Jehovah against
as I, a child of the devil bynature, a living and obedient    Jehovah's enemies must be finished.               Israel must
child of God?                                                 avenge themselves upon their enemies.
   But this I know: our God is wonderful above all my            When this takes place, however, it must also be
comprehension!                                                clearly evident that it is all the Lord's work. It must
   And: "Das Wunder ist des Glaubens liebstes Kind."          be evident that "They gained not the land by the edge
But then: Faith, which has the wonder as its dearest          of the sword, Their own arm to them could no safety
child, is itself a wonder, a gift of grace!                   afford." It must be Israel's confession, "But Thy right
                           ****                               hand saved, and the light of Thy face, Because of Thy
   Faith, however, believes  .the miracle precisely be-       favor and wonderful grace." It must beclearly evident
cause the essence of the miracle is thewondev of grace.       that not we establish the kingdom, but He establishes
   God's miracles are not freaks. They are not the            His own kingdom, while we are privileged through
tricks of a magician. They are not even merely mani-          grace to be of the party of the living God.
festations of extraordinary power. In fact, the essence          This explains the repeated promise, "I have given
of the miracle does not lie in its element of extraordi-      the enemy into Thy hand." This accounts for the hail-
nariness.    The significance of the miracle is that it is    storm that killed more Amorites than the sword did.
the breaking through of the power of God's grace,             This also accounts for the standing still of the sun and
whereby He saves His people, into the darkness of our         the moon. The wonder of grace broke through in be-
night. Hence, the miracles of Scripture always have a         half of God's people, in order to give them the victory!
purpose.                                                                                 * * * *
   Thus it was here. And all was of the Lord. God                There was no day like it either before or after!
purposed to show the power of His grace through His              And while that is literally true, yet from a deeper
servant Joshua. Not Joshua was the originator of the          point of view a better day has come! The day of
idea, but God. And God revealed His purpose to Joshua,        reality, the day of the fulfillment of all the types and
assured him of that purpose, created within Joshua            shadows, has come!
the faith that God would perform it. So it came to pass          We see not the Old Testament Joshua, but we see
that Joshua was exalted very highly and spoke in the          Jesus crowned with glory and honor. We see not a
name of Jehovah.                                              servant of Jehovah, but  the  Servant of Jehovah. And
   That the work might be finished and that the people        He is the Captain of the host of Jehovah, the Captain
might avenge themselves upon their enemies was the            of our salvation.
purpose of this miracle. However, this was no ordinary           Exalted He is, not merely for a moment, and not
work and no ordinary battle. We must remember that            only over sun and moon, but forever and over all
the land of Canaan was to be the old dispensational           things.       All power is given unto Him in heaven and on
realm of God's kingdom, and that Israel represented           earth, -to finish the work!
the army of that kingdom of God, the Lord's army.                Hence, all things must work together for evil to the
The enemies, the Amorites, against whom they fought           enemy, and for good to God's people, until the work is
were the Lord's enemies, enemies of Jehovah and His           finished, the enemy is finally destroyed, and the king-
kingdom.     They were ripe for judgment. The measure         dom of God is established in perfection.
of their iniquity was full. It was time for the curse            Be of good cheer, therefore!
upon Canaan, Ham's son, to be executed upon them with            All things are ours, as we are Christ's, and as
finality. But the judgment of the world is the salvation      Christ is God's!
of the church.      Zion is redeemed through judgment!           We are more than conquerors through Him that
Hence, after the enemy has been put to flight before the      loved us !

                  CHANGE OF ADDRESS                                                      NOTICE
Effective September 7, my address will be: 1842               ANNUAL MEETING of the Reformed  .Free Publishing
Plymouth Terrace, S.E., Grand Rapids,  Mich. 49506.           Association will be held Thursday, September 30 in the
`Contributing editors' and correspondents will please         Hope Protestant Reformed Church at 8:00 P.M. -Rev.
note this change.                                             G. Lanting will be the speaker.
                                   Prof. H. C. Hoeksema                                           G. Bouwkamp, Sec'y.


                  SEMINARY STUDENTS                                                     LECTURE
Pre-seminary and seminary students in need of  finan-               Time:            8:00 p.m.
cial assistance in attending our  .Protestant  Reformed             Place:           Hope Protestant Reformed Church
Seminary should contact                                             Date:            Thursday, Sept. 23, 1965
                  Synod-Secretary                                   Speaker:         Rev. H. Hanko
                     Mr. Gerrit Pipe                                Topic:           Protestant Reformed Education
                     1463 Ardmore Street SE                                          - A Unique Enterprise
                     Grand Rapids, Michigan 49507                   Sponsors :       P.R. High School Circle


                                                      THESTANDARDBEARER                                                                 461





                                               RIGHT, BUT DEAD WRONG

                                                                 (4)

                                       REDEMPTIVE-REDEEMING HOCUS POCUS

                                                     Pvof.  H. C. Hoeksema

Two Loves  OY One?                                                          surely not to posit two kinds of grace, two kinds of
   Dr. James Daane, treating the theological position                      love, each qualitatively different, in the nature of God;
of Prof. Harold Dekker, has found three reasons why                        nor to posit two Crosses, two Holy Spirits, and two
Dekker's position has raised questions and uncertain-                       Gods, to explain the difference between the final end
ties in the Christian Reformed community. The first,                        of the elect and that of the non-elect.
namely, that Dekker asserts that there is but one love                            Such an explanation would be rationalistic, for to
of God, we considered in the August 1 issue. Daane                          explain something is to show why it is necessary.
treats the second reason also in the November, 1964                         But one may not from the biblical perspective thus
issue of the  Reformed  Journal; and to this very specu-                    explain either the salvation of the elect or the non-
lative treatment by Daane we give our attention in the                      salvation of the non-elect. The former are saved by
present editorial. However, we should keep in mind                          grace, and it is never necessary. What Christian would
                                                                            appeal to the nature of grace to demonstrate that his
that this second reason stands closely connected with                       salvation was necessary? Nor is it permissible within
the third. The second is:  `I...this love is said to be a                   the biblical perspective to make the nature of God the
redemptive love for all men, though it redeems only                         referrant that explains the lostness of the lost, for
the elect." The third is: "...the distinction between                       within the biblical perspective it is impermissible to
`redemptive' and `redeeming' does not, it is thought,                       look beyond their sin and unbelief.
protect his position from the charge that it violates                      It is not my purpose to enter at this point into all
the doctrine of limited atonement."
   First of all, let us listen to Daane's own presenta-                 the details of this highly speculative bit of philosophy.
                                                                        For one who is very concerned about method I must
tion of this second reason for Christian Reformed                       confess that I find Daane's method here a profoundly
questions and uncertainties:                                            unbiblical, anti-confessional, rationalistic, and con-
      The second reason Dekker has raised questions and                 fusing one. More about this later.
   uncertainties in the mind of the churches by his                        But let us, for the moment, take Daane at face
   doctrinal assertions, lies in his introduction of the                value. Where do we end then?
   terms "redemptive" and "redeeming." He has as-
   serted that God has a redemptive love for all men but                   Again, let us note that there are certain elements
   that this love redeems only the elect. Some feel that                in Daane's position that are, when taken bythemselves,
   these terms are inadequate andmisleading, particularly               one hundred per cent right. The doctor seems to have
   as they touch on the doctrine of limited atonement.                  20/20 vision on the. following:
   They ask how God's love for allmencan be redemptive,                    1) There is only one love of God. On this Daane
   if in fact it does not redeem all? For many it seems                 has insisted all along. In the light of Scripture and the
   that the mere raising of this question settles the matter.           confessions this is a correct proposition. The same
   Yet one could ask the very same question of the late                 may be said of God's grace. And Daane's criticism of
   Professor Berkhof when he asserts that the one grace                 1924, as far as it goes, is to the point.
   of God effects the salvation of some men and bestows
   only "natural blessings" on others. Hoeksema raised                     2) It is incorrect to posit two kinds of grace, two
   this question too. But the matter can be put even more               kinds of love, in the nature of God, even as it would be
   sharply. We are here discussing the nature  of God's                 incorrect to posit two Crosses, two Holy Spirits, and
   love  - as 1924 was discussing the  natuve  of God's                 two Gods, to explain the difference between the final end
   grace. In 1924 it was asked how the one grace of God                 of the elect and that of the non-elect. This negative
   could be two grades, having two different results.                   statement is also true in the light of Scripture and the
   Dekker is now being asked how the one love of God,                   confessions. I could not imagine a Reformed theolo-
   redemptive in nature, can be extended to all men and                 gian who would dare to challenge this. Two loves or
   have two different results and not the single result of              two graces in the nature of God?               This would be a
   saving all men.      But notice that if we think of the
   nature of God (not of His freedom or sovereignty) and                denial of the essential attribute of God's simplicity!
   grant - as we all do - that God is in a real sense the               The very suggestion would be sheer heresy!
   God of all men, the same question yetumzs:How canGod                    But do not overlook the fact that Dr. Daane is
   be true to His nature, how can He be what He is, the                 nevertheless  dead wrong  here again.
   Gcd of all men, if in fact Hedoes  not save all men?                    Mind you, I am taking Daane here on his own
      The correct theological response to this question is              basis.


462                                                 THE STANDARD BEARER


       And then I insist that what he sees so well apparently    redeem, but it does not achieve its goal: for it does not
in Berkhof and in 1924 he fails completely to see in             redeem.
Professor Dekker and in himself. He becomes guilty                  In the second place, - and this is far more serious,
of the error of the pot calling the kettle black. He             -- what does this theological position do to the honesty
comes indeed very close to seeing the light when he              of the preaching?
writes: "They ask how God's love for all men can be                 This, after all, is the original issue: the preaching
redemptive, if in fact it does not redeem all? For               of the gospel, not merely some theoretical and abstract
many it seems that the mere raising of this question             theology. Dekker proposed that the preacher must say
settles the matter. Yet one could ask the very same              to all men and every man, "God loves you," and "Christ
question of the late Professor Berkhof...." Perhaps if           died for you."
Daane, who seems to delight in philosophical specula-               But in the light of the above, this is only a half
tion, had confronted the above question in the light of          truth; and therefore to preach this would be dishonest,
his criticism of Berkhof a little more carefully, he             -- unless, of course, one would take the out-and-out
might have come to better conclusions. Apparently                Arminian position that makes all of salvationdependent
"the mere raising of this question" did not even cause           in last analysis on man. (When I say "half truth," you
Daane to pause, much less "settle the matter" for him.           understand I am arguing from Daane's own position.)
       Notice, now, that Daane and Dekker propose a              According to this position of Daane and Dekker, it
doctrine of two loves in God.            This is the plainly     certainly would be short of honest merely to proclaim
logical implication of the proposition that God has a            that God loves all men and that Christ died for all men.
redemptive love for all men that is redeeming only for           One would be bound before God to qualify that in one
the elect. These two loves are:                                  fashion or another.
                                                                    I leave it to Daane to tell us how this must be
       1) God's redemptive-redeeming love (for the elect).       qualified:
       2) God's redemptive-but-not-redeeming love (for              1) By saying, "God loves His elect redemptively and
the reprobate).                                                  redeemingly, but the reprobate redemptively and  non-
       Daane, therefore, with all his speculation, stands        redeemingly?"        I am afraid this would defeat the
theologically condemned out of his own mouth.                    generalistic purpose of Daane and Dekker.
       All this is very serious.                                    2) By saying, "God loves you redemptively, and
       I am not interested in merely proving Daane's             Christ died for you redemptively; but I do not know
position to be logically absurd. My interest is in the           whether God loves you and Christ died for you redeem-
Reformed faith, -- also as far as the Christian Re-              ingly or non-redeemingly?" .But this is no gospel, but
formed Church is concerned.                                      the mere expression of doubt.
       Notice the seriousness of the error involved here.           3) By saying, "God loves you redemptively and
       In the first place, what a terrible contradiction one     Christ died for you redemptively; but only if you fulfill
arrives at with this theory. For "redemptive" means:             the condition of faith and repentance does that  `re-
serving to redeem.        Apply this definition once to the      demptively' become `redeemingly?' " But this is sheer
second kind of love mentioned above, and you get this:           Arminianism, and a denial both of the efficacy of God's
God's serving-  to-Yedeem  - but-not-Yedeeming love fov          love and the efficacy of Christ's atonement.
the  vepobate.       And if, then, we keep in mind that the         And how does Dr. Daane arrive at this two-loves
subject under discussion is the love  of  God, one can           theory?
only conclude that here is a flagrant denial of the power           By theological  hocus pocus.
and efficacy of that love of God. God's love serves to              But about this next time, D.V.


                                                      NEW READERS

                                                   Pyof. H. C. Hoeksema

       Needless to say, the  Stativd   Beaver  is always         that all the adults  in our Protestant Reformed homes
interested in new readers.                                       make it a practice to read our  Standizvd   Beaver, and
       No, I am not speaking now of subscribers, which we        that too, from cover to cover. This surely ought to
also like to obtain: for new subscriptions always help           be, a habit with us adults. Our magazine does us no
to ease the financial problems of the R.F.P.A. But I             good merely by adorning the magazine rack and even-
am interested specifically in  readers,   and still more         tually ending up. in ,a paper drive.       It purposes to
specifically:  new  readers.                                     instruct us in the truth; and this purpose it cannot
       At the risk of being called an idealist,1 will assume     reach unless we read it. But, as I said,  I.will assume
that our magazine finds its way into `all our Protestant         that the Standard  Beaver  is read regularly and thorough-
Reformed homes.          This ought to be the case, at any       ly by the adults in our homes,  - well, by almost all of
rate; and pastors and elders do well to look into this           t h e m .
at the time of family visitation.                                  But who are the new' veadevs ?
       At the risk of being called a dreamer, I will assume         Our  childyen,  potentially!


                                                   THE STANDARD BEARER                                                 463

    No, I do not refer to our little children: for they       they prepare to take their places as adults in the
 are not of an age to digest meat as yet. They must be        churches. Especially in this day of rampant error and
 fed with milk.                                               doctrinal indifference and spiritual laxity it is im-
    But I have in mind our bigger children, our teen-         portant that our young people imbibe all the sound
 agers, especially from, say, fourteen and fifteen years      instruction available, both for its present and its future
 old and up.                                                  benefits.
    As a general rule, I dare say, our magazine is read           Hence, I offer these suggestions:
 very little by them.                                             1. Young people, pick up this magazine and make a
    Yet what sound reason is there for sucha situation?       beginning at reading it regularly. It will surprise you
    Our young people have  Beacon  Lights.  To be sure,       what dividends, both of instruction and of increased
 they should read their own magazine, perhaps more            interest, this will pay.
 faithfully than they sometimes do. Yet this is no reason         2. Parents, make it a point to urge and encourage
 to exclude the  Stundavd  Beaver  from their lives. For      your young people to become readers of our magazine.
 our magazine offers a different kind of reading material.    They need not begin by reading everything. But let at
 Besides, it is meant for our  families.  In addition, no     least a beginning be made,  - say, one or two articles
 more than the reading of  Life  is a reason not to read      from an issue. And make it a point to-discuss some-
 The  Readev's Digest,  no more is the reading of  Beacon     thing that was written in your family circle.
 Lights  a reason not to read the Stand.avd  Beaver.              3. Pastors and elders, make it a point to inquire
     Secondly, beginning to read our magazine is neces-       into the reading habits of your young people and to
 sary for the formulation of good reading habits on the       suggest the reading of the  Standard   Beaver  as one
 part of our youth. It is not reasonable to expect our        phase of forming good reading habits.
 young men and young women suddenly to pick up and                4. Teachers, society leaders, catechism teachers,
I read the Standard  Beaver when they reach adulthood or      encourage and stimulate the reading of the  Standard
 perhaps establish their own homes if they have never         Beaver  by bringing some article or some subject under
 read it before. On the contrary, it will take an abrupt      discussion in our magazine into the class work or the
 change of reading habits to make adult readers of those      after-recess program; or make the digesting of an
 who never were teen-age readers.                             article that is pertinent to your class work part of an
     Thirdly, our teen-agers not only become capable of       assignment.
 reading and digesting our magazine as they grow up;              And above all, parents, do not fail to teach by ex-
 but the Stundavd  Beaver also has much to offer them by      ample.       If you do not read the  Standuvd   Beaver,  you
 way of instruction that will stand them in good stead as     may expect that your children will follow your example.





                                               REFORMATION RALLY!

                                                   Rev, M.  Schippev


     That's right! You heard correctly! The Mission           doctrinal indifference and confusion that fills the reli-
 Board of the Protestant Reformed Churches in America         gious atmosphere of our day.
 is sponsoring a rally in the Civic Auditorium of                 Professor H. C. Hoeksema, instructor in our
 Grand Rapids, Michigan on Wednesday, October 27,              Protestant Reformed Seminary and Editor-in-Chief of
 1965, at 8 P.M., the Lord willing!                           the  Standard  Beaver, who is well qualified to bring this
     Approximately 5000 people will be coming from all        message, has been chosen to be the speaker. Mr.
 over Western Michigan and Illinois to witness a pro-         Roland Petersen, who for many years has ablydirected
 gram such as has never before been prepared and              the Reformed Witness Hour Radio Choir, will assemble
 offered. to the Reformed community by our Protestant         and train a mixed choir of from 70 to 100 voices which
 Reformed Churches.       Christians of all faiths whose      will render several choral selections in harmony with
 historical roots rise out of the principles of the           the theme of our program.
 Reformation are invited to share with us in our rich             Every man,' woman, and child of our Protestant
 Reformed heritage.                                           Reformed Churches in this area will want to be present
     Bill boards-, newspapers, radio stations,. bulletins,    to witness this historical event. They will also make
 hand-bills, and other advertising media will be used         it their business to extend to their relatives, friends,
 to extend this invitation. The sponsors of this program      and neighbors a gracious invitation.  t,o attend with them.
 are of the firm conviction that we have a message                We sincerely believe that as God raised up Martin
 which will stir the hearts of many who are looking for       Luther, John Calvin, and other Reformers to guide
 a way out of the spiritual lethargy and apostasy,            His people in the way of His truth in those never to be


464                                                   THE STANDARD BEARER


forgotten days of the Reformation, so He has given unto            program, we feel that the very best medium of com-
us today the calling to show the way out of the perplex-           munication is a well-informed and enthusiastic people.
ing situation of our time. Today many sincere children             Therefore we are asking all our Protestant Reformed
of God are crying: Who will show us any good? They                 people in this area not only to make plans to attend, but
sense the departures in doctrine and life, and are                 also to extend an invitation to as many outside of our
looking for such leadership that will return them to the           churches who can be reached to attend with them. Here
old paths, to the long forgotten and neglected principles          is a wonderful opportunity for our young people also to
established and pronounced by our Reformed fore-                   get busy contacting their friends of other denominations
bears.      We dare not, nor shall we, neglect to realize          and inviting them to share in the blessings they
our calling; and therefore we will use  this splendid              possess.
opportunity to share with them our blessed heritage.                      The sponsors of this program prayerfully expect
We will do this very humbly, because we acknowledge                that under the blessing of our covenant God it will be a
that we have nothing that we did not receive, and that,            huge success. But, whether the audience will be little
of pure and sovereign grace!                                       or great, we know that in our message His Name and
       Though considerable publicity will be given to this         His Truth will be highly exalted !





                                                          ICHABOD

                                                     Rev. B.  Woudenbevg

                          And she named the child Ichabod, saying, The  glory is  departed  from
                        Israel: because the  ark  of  God  was  taken.                    I Sam.  4:21


       The period of the judges was coming to its end; and         dedication and joy in the service of Jehovah which had
it appeared that the life of Israel was reviving.                  not been there before. And when still a youth, he began
       It had begun, perhaps, with Samson. At the time of          to receive visions of revelation from God. For Eli it
his birth, the children of Israel had been thoroughly              had been difficult, for the revelation was against him
demoralized, cowed by the power of the Philistines.                and his family; nevertheless, the wonder of this revela-
The Philistines had subjugated them, and they had not              tion could not be ignored. It had been given in open
had the will to fight back. In fact, when Samson him-              vision such as had not been received since the days  of
self had begun to seek occasion for. battle against the            Moses.      Nor was that the end. Open visions continued
Philistines, they had sought to make him stop because              to appear unto Samuel, and soon all Israel came to
he was arousing the anger of the Philistines against               know of it. It was like a breath of fresh air - as though
them.      But  .gradually  this had changed. The children         the -face of the Lord was turned to them again after
of Israel began to recognize in Samson the power of                being for a long time hidden. All of Israel was moved
God preparing the way to deliver them. For nearly                  by it.
twenty years they came to recognize Samson as a judge                     The first great indication of the change that was
in their midst.                                                    taking place in Israel was a sudden willingness to move
       The next step along the way took place under Samuel.        against the Philistines in battle.         This was the one
Eli too had served as judge, and his judgeship had over-           thing that Samson had wanted so badly but had never
lapped that of Samson. He also had experienced the                 seen. For many years they had been too completely
demoralization of Israel. Eli, being High Priest as                overawed by the power of the Philistines. In fact, for
well as judge, lived his life and  .fulfilled his office           a long time they had felt that the only thing they-could
within the courts' of the tabernacle at Shiloh. Here,              do was try to be friends with the Philistines by doing
more than anywhere else, it had been apparent how                  whatever the Philistines commanded.            Samson had
far Israel had departed from-dependence upon Jehovah.              brought the people so far that they had given this up.
The tabernacle was often a quiet, almost solitaryplace,            They had come to recognize Samson as their judge
so few were the worshippers that frequented it any                 and the Philistines as their enemy; but they refused to
more. And then  .of those that did come, many used it              be rallied to'battle. Now this was changed. There was
as a place for excess and debauchery rather than                   something in the revelations given to Samuel that re-
true worship.      His own sons, priests under him, were           minded the children of Israel of the works performed
the leaders of that crowd.                                         under Moses. They became convinced that the Lord
                                                                   had returned unto them in favor and that now no one
       But then Samuel had come. He was only a child;              could withstand their power.           Almost spontaneously
but he had brought to the tabernacle a new sense of                they came together and arrayed themselves in battle.


                                                       THE STANDARD BEARER                                               465


    Nevertheless, all was not well in this movement.                  By the God of Israel, this attitude could not be
Outwardly it was quite proper that Israel should rec-             condoned, and He would not support it. Light-heartedly
ognize and fight against the Philistines as their enemy;          and with confidence, the children of Israel arrayed
but inwardly it was not done in most cases with the               themselves in battle against the Philistines; but it was
proper motive. The fact was that many of the children             not long before they were turned back in defeat before
of Israel had for years been following the heathen                the hardened forces of the Philistines.     Behind them
nations in their idol worship. Some of them had never             four thousand men lay dead in the field.
known any other form of religion because their parents               The indications were there. The children of Israel
had been idol worshippers before them. Idolatry was               had every reason to stop and reconsider the foolish
really the only form of worship they knew. To them                way in which they were going. Had they really taken
this new allegiance to Jehovah was little different from          the appearance of Samuel the prophet seriously, they
changing from one idol to another. It was just that the           should have searched him out and'inquired  what it was
appearance of a prophet like Samuel seemed to them                that the Lord would have them do so that they might be
to be a good omen. It was sufficient basis for them to            delivered from their oppressors. But no, these were
be willing to identify themselves as worshippers of               people steeped in the practices of idolatry. They de-
Jehovah for the time being, so that they might be in on           pended upon magical omens, and when one didn't work,
what ever advantage the appearance of Samuel might                they looked for another. Thus the elders of Israel,
bring about.                                                      having returned to their camp, said' to each other,
    The superficiality of their attitude became evident           "wherefore hath the LORD smitten us to day before
as the children of Israel prepared themselves for                 the Philistines? Let us fetch the ark of the covenant
battle.     There was no sense of repentance to be found          of the LORD out of Shiloh unto us, that, when it cometh
among the people for the sins they had committed in               among us, it may save us out of the hand of our ene-
the past.          There was no returning to the writings of      mies."
Moses to study and learn how they ought to conduct                   Here we have one of the low points in the history of
themselves in their worship and in preparing them-                the nation of Israel. Through the spiritual decline of
selves for battle. There was no sense of dedication               the period of the judges, even the elders of Israel could
to defending the name of their God against the wicked             not tell the difference between the worship of Jehovah
powers of the heathen. In the past whenever Israel                and an idol. They thought that they could satisfy the
had prepared itself seriously for battle, the people had          demands of their God by merely' taking His ark from
first come together before the Lord to sacrifice to Him           out of the tabernacle and using it as a magical charm.
and to ask for His guidance and blessing; but not now. It         Israel had much to learn.
was more as if the people were preparing themselves                  On the fore in this all were Hophni and Phinehas,
for some frivolous game which they could not `really              the sons of Eli who figured so prominently in the first
lose.      The feeling was that they had a sort of magical        prophecy of Samuel. Being priests, they perhaps were
power on their side which made defeat quite impos-                numbered among the elders in Israel. If getting the
sible.     They would go to battle; but they didn't have to       ark from the tabernacle was not their idea, it certainly
worry, they didn't have to go out of their way to pre-            met with their approval. It meant that they would be
pare themselves, they wouldn't even have to fight so              the center of activity and attention in the army, and
hard; the omens were in their favor and victory was               that was where they liked best to be. As quickly as
assured in the end.                                               possible, they hurried back to Shiloh and took the ark

                     WEDDINGANNI'VERSARY                                                 INMEM~RLAM
Our beloved parents                                               On August 8, 1965, the Lord suddenly took into His
           REV. AND MRS. GEORGE C. LUBBERS                        Eternal Glory, our beloved Husband, Father, Grand-
                                                                  father and Brother
celebrated their thirty-fifth wedding anniversary on
August 17, 1965. We, the children, take this occasion                                  HENRY B. HOLTROP
to express our gratitude to God who has graciously                at the age of 64.
spared them these many years, fulfilling the promise                 We believe and are comforted that our loss is his
of Psalm  128:5  and 6, "The Lord shall bless thee out            gain, which is to be with the Lord in the home of many
of Zion: and thou shalt see the good of Jerusalem all             mansions, not redeemed with silver or gold; but with
the days of thy life. Yea, thou shalt see thy children's          the precious blood of our Lord. Jesus Christ. I Peter
children, and peace upon Israel.`!                                1:18, 19. Sadly missed by:
    Congratulations, parents ! May it please Jehovah to                         Mrs. Susan Holtrop
grant you many more devoted years together in His                               Mr. and Mrs. Richard J. Wierenga, Sr.
s e r v i c e .                                                                 Jane Ellen Wierenga
                    Miss Agatha Lubbers                                         Joan Lynn Wierenga
                    Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Newhof, Jr.                             Richard J. Wierenga, Jr.
                    Mr. and Mrs. Cornelius Lubbers                              Miss Minnie Holtrop
                    Mr. and Mrs. Lammert Lubbers                                Mrs. Rena Entingh
                         six grandchildren                                      Miss Bertha Holtrop
                                                                                Mr. and Mrs. Fred Holtrop


                                                 THE STANDARD BEARER


from the inmost sanctuary. There was no difficulty               How sad this. day was for Israel wesee as we follow
from their father. Ninety-seven years old, he was now        the messenger of the battle.
nearly blind, and they were far gone before he even              Fikst he came to Eli. By this time the old man had
realized what it was that they had done.                     learned what his sons had done with the ark of the
    Into the camp of Israel Hophni and Phinehas came,        covenant.        It was the ultimate abuse of the priestly
proudly bearing the ark; and a great shout went up all       office, the final fruit of his failure to discipline his
about them.     The children of Israel now were more         sons in their younger years. Now an old man of too
confident than ever.                                         many years, he could only sit by the gate of the taber-
    Through the hills this shout rang until it came even     nacle to hope  .and wait and pray. His eyes are now
to the camp of the Philistines. The scouts were sent         dim, but his ears are yet sharp. When he heard a cry
out, and soon the report came back that Israel had           go up from the city, he knew a messenger had arrived
received the ark of their God into their camp. For a         and he knew the outcome of the battle, but the  all-
moment there were flutterings of doubt as they said to       important details still remained. Impatiently'he cried
each other, "Woe unto us ! Who shall deliver us out of       out for explanation until the messenger came also to
the hand of these mighty Gods? for there has not been        him and said, "Israel is fled before the Philistines,
such a thing heretofore. Woe unto us ! who shall deliver      and there hath been also a great slaughter among the
us out of the hand of these mighty Gods? these are the       people, and thy two sons also, Hophni and Phinehas,
Gods that smote the Egyptians with all the plagues in         are dead, and the ark of God is taken." It was that
the wilderness. Be strong, and quit yourselves like          last that hurt. Israel had been defeated in battle be-
men, 0 ye Philistines, that ye be not servants unto the      fore, and he had long known that his sons would come
Hebrews as they have been to you: quit yourselves like       to no good in the end; but when he heard that the ark
men, and fight." These Philistines were not cowards.         was taken, that was too much. From the shock of it,
    The next day the battle was joined; but not for long.    the old man fell from his seat so that his neck broke
The overconfident and ill-prepared Israelites were no         and he died.
match for the fierce determination of the Philistines.
But more important was the fact that God was on the              It remained for his daughter-in-law, Phinehas' wife,
Philistines' side.      .He would not allow His ark to be     to express the dismay of it all in words. She was
manhandled as though He were a mere idol who had              about to bring forth a child when she heard of the out-
nothing to say about it. It was more important that           come of the battle and gave way to despair. It was
Israel should learn to reverence and respect His law         not the death of her husband that hurt the most; it was
even than that His ark should be kept from the hands         nothing the birth even of a son could cure. She was,
of the heathen.       In short order 30,000 soldiers of      unlike her husband, a God-fearing woman. In shock,
Israel lay dead, including Hophni and Phinehas; and           she gave up the ghost, but only after she had named
the ark of the covenant was taken.          The defeat of    her son Ichabod, saying, "The glory is departed from
Israel was complete.                                         Israel: for the ark of God is taken."





                                 THE GOSPEL OF CHRIST PREACHED ON MARS HILL

                                                   Reti. G. Lubbers

                                                    Acts  17:16-34

God's  Providential  Rule  Ovev Men And The  History  Of     unbelieving mind, because it does not believe in the
The  Wovld.   Acts  17~26-28,                                one, true God, cannot possibly explain the unity of the
    But our God is in the heavens. He rules all things       human race. In their superstitious pride they elevate
by His counsel. and providence. All things are by his        the various nations in which they belong to a higher
will.    He is above all "gods"! He, and He alone, is        origin than other nations.        This among the Greeks
Lord of heaven and earth.                                    was called with the technical term  autochthones.
    He made a human  race; He did not simply make            Writes Prof.  Lechler in the Lange Commentaries on
each nation rise out of the earth as a distinct nation       Acts : "Paul here combats, not so much the opinion of
by itself. Such is the ignorance and folly of heathenism     the Athenians specially, who deemed themselves to be
which does not believe in God, the Creator. They try          autochthones,  as, rather, the delusion in general, which
to explain the existing of things from their national        was fostered by the religion of nature in  .its forms,
god-idol.    Thus they destroy the human race in its          according to which the respective origins of the different
unity and purpose. But Paul preaches sound Theology          nations of the earth were all essentially distinct from
and Anthropology here on Mars Hill. The latter is not        one another." And the Rev. Charles Gerok writes in
possible without the former. Wherefore the pagan,            the same Lange series on Acts: "The  : unity- of the


                                                    THE STANDARD  BEdRER                                               467


human race was unknown to all polytheistic religions.           church is gathered in such a way that the church is
All these, conforming to the theory that there are              saved, the one new man in Christ, and all things are
many gods, proceeded on the principle that the  pri-            united under one Head: Christ, the Heir of all things!
mordials of the various nations were also many in               Heb. l:l-4; Eph.  1:lO; Col.  1:16. Indeed all things
number; and that these nations and their respective             were created through the Son and unto the Son, Incarnate.
founders were originally of different degrees of rank.             And that God has thus created and rules all things
This essential difference as to origin was assumed as           in His providence makes Him very near to each one of
perpetuated in the subsequent history of the nations.           us. We are to seek Him in all this. That is the very
The conception of the unity in the  history  of mankind,        design and purpose of history and geography. He who
was also entirely foreign to heathenism. Even those             does not seek out God is profitless. He who does not
nations which had risen to the highest degree of culture        seek out God and find Him has not read history nor
and intelligence, the Greeks and Romans, regarded               traced the map of geography as it is traced out  ,by
themselves, respectively as constituting the central            God through the ages. There is no solid and profitable
point of the history of the world; they could form no           learning in all the text-books of the unbelieving world.
conception of a Universal History of mankind, viewed            It is the jargon of unbelief; it is merely profane
as one  Qace.  (See Baumgarten, II. 1. 269 ff.)"                babbling. It is profane because it would trample under
        What a heathenish, paganistic life-and-world-view!      foot all that is holy, keeping the truth down in unright-
        This view too is cut asunder with one mighty stroke     eousness; it is babbling because it is empty speech,
of Paul here in the Areopagus in Athens. Paul does not          without the content which answers to the reality of
merely state that God made all men out of one man, but          God in history.    Behold, here posited the need of our
rather emphasizes that God made all men to dwell on             own day schools, the need of solid instruction in our
all the face of the earth out of one man. There is no           catechism classes and Sunday Schools ! The attempt of
nation or people which can claim to be an exception to          "common grace" to interpret history is as vain as
this rule !                                                     were all the attempts of paganism! They remain vain
        More still. The Lord also  mL,?es all things. He has    attempts ! We do well to listen to Paul in Athens.
the destiny of nations in His hand. He has determined              What is more, he who fails to seek out God if ever
the set time and the bounds of their habitations. Here          he might touch and find him is guilty before God. This
is God's history and geography! And the design of all           guilt, in a way was overlooked, "winked at" in the
nations out of one man, one human race, is in them              times on the Old Testament in heathendom, but now
all.       And it was. meant to be so by the Lord; This         that time is past. In the coming of Christ, in his death
pattern is stamped indelibly in all of history. The             and resurrection, the meaning of history is objectively
unity of the human race, as controlled by the Lord in           unfolded, and only stark unbelief fails to see and ac-
His providence, points up the unity of the Creator,             knowledge it !
Sustainer of all things. It is written upon every page             This is not a counter-philosophical dissertation.
of history as God writes it. He is Lord of heaven and           This is preaching of Christ,. as all God's works in
earth!                                                          Creation, history, and geography are taken up in the
        This is borne'out by'what we read in Gen. ll:l-9:       Wonder of grace ! Nowhere is there room for Pantheism
"The whole earth was of one speech and of one                   which would make everything God and God everything.
language." There were no separate nations prior to              Creator and creature each remain distinct, or both
the confusion of tongues at Babel ! Then God made the           are destroyed in thought and religion.
nations! It is stupid pride and horrible unbelief that             Thus Paul draws the lines in this sermon!.
would make each nation come from a national god or                 They are indicative of the straight paths of the most
primordial. It is a denial of the judgment of God and           High, and proclaim the unity of work of God in creation
of God's Christological purpose in all things, namely,          and in re-creation.
that Japheth shall dwell in the tents of Shem. But here             All must end in the one man, Jesus Christ, the
the record is set straight. Of this Moses sings in Deut.        judge of heaven and earth!
32:7-9,  where we read: "Remember the days of old,                 There is a "glimmering".  *of this still evident in
consider the years of `many generations: (generation            the utterance of the  Greeks'-po.ets. The exalted origin
and generation) ask thy father, and he will shew thee;          of man in all creation is  stil!l observable in the poets.
thy elders. and they will tell thee. When the Most High         Yes, here too the truth-is  keptdownin unrighteousness,
divided to the nations their-inheritance, when he separ-        so that these poets are without-excuse before.God. A
ated the sons of Adam, he set the bounds of the people          Cleanthes may write in his  .H@nn`to Zeus, "for out of
according-to the number of the children of Israel. For          thee we are a kind," (generation),>& he refers this to
the Lord's portion is his people; Jacob is the lot of his       Zeus, the greatest of immortals. He  has,.eaen here,
inheritance."                                                   changed the glory of the incorruptible God into the
        Here we have the true interpretation of history!        likeness of corruptible man.  `Rem.  1:23. They had
        Here we have the real meaning of geography!             not eye for the nature of  the  `-`Godhead". Cleanthes,
        Creation, Providence, and Christology are one.          the Stoic poet-philosopher,  &ii hot "find" God. Had
The history of the world is the history of the human            Paul here preached "whom" y&served  and not "what"
race, only as it is the history of the church. World            ye serve, we  might.conclude that Paul quotes the poets
history and world geography is  church  history and             without reservation. But now we know that he is finding
church  geography! Out of the whole human race the              the psychological point of contact in these heathen,


 468                                                 THE STANDARD BEARER


 appealing to the "glimmerings of natural light," so             strange reasoning in the sinner  which'is fatal. -Says
 that they may be led pedagogically to holy ground.              Rev. Gerok, "They reasoned thus, `If we belong to the
 There was a Dyonysius the Areopagite who saw the                divine race, then the gods must belong to the human
 light. It was not the light of nature, but the illuminating     race, and it is both in our power and becomes a duty
 power of the Holy Spirit which accompanied the Word.            to make human images of them.' " It is the process of
 It was the Holy Spirit cum Vevbo!  Paul lays the founda-        Romans  1:22, 23 which reads: "Professing themselves
 tions, he waters, and the Lord gave the increase!               to be wise they became fools, and changed the glory of
                                                                 the incorruptible God into an image made like unto
 The Great Conclusion Acts  17:29-34                             corruptible man, and to birds and to four-footed beasts,
        Erroneous as was the Greeks' conception of the           and creeping things." Thus their practice sank even
 godhead, they nonetheless held to a conception of the           beneath their "theory" which is the expression of the
 ` `godhead" which placed "him" among the "immor-                glimmerings of their natural light!!
 tals", far above mere brick, stone, be they raw mate-               Paul points out a different reasoning. It is: "Those
 rial or carved and formed by the technical skills of            who belong to the divine race dishonor themselves, if
 artificers.      So much is evident from the writings of        they do not restrict their worship to their Founder and
 the poets.       And these poets were read and exegeted         Head, but bow down before any being inferior to Him
 by these Stoics  and.Epicureans.                                Who is Lord over all". Gerok.
        And yet that is exactly what Athens was doing. In            But Christ is the Lord. He is God in the flesh, and
 their practice they sank beneath their "theory".                yet the man Jesus Christ. He is powerfully revealed
 There is a lack of consistency in their theory and              to be the Son of God by the resurrection from the
 practice.      In their  ` `theoria" they attempted the deep    dead.       He is Lord over all. Now these heathen are
 contemplation of the truth; they wrote poems and dis-           called to repent from these dumb idols to the service
 cussed the nature of the "godhead"; they discussed in           of the living God.
 their ethics and metaphysics the nature of the world,               Paul taught them "what" they worshipped!
 being and becoming, what is permissible and what is                 He preached to them "Whom" they should worship.
 required, who are evil and who are good. But in this                According to this gospel will also these Athenians
 contemplation "man" is never in the category of temples         and all men be judged in that appointed day. Then
 made with hands.                                                shall all the "glimmerings of natural light" fade out
        Why this inconsistency?                                  into endless night! But the righteous shall then serve
        Why could not their practice rise as high as their       the Lord in His spiritual temple.
 theory?                                                             For the gospel. was preached on Mars Hill, and not
        Paul points this out to these Athenians. There is a      in vain!





                                                        THEOSOPHY

                                                     Rev. R. C.  Havbach

 Its Connection.                                                 a tripartite being, having physical, astral and' mental
        There is a close connection between Spiritism and        parts, all occupying the same space as a goldfish
 Theosophy. The latter devotes a great deal of space to          bowl filled with a sponge and water. By means of his
 the former subject.         It is of interest to note that      "astral body" he can enter the spirit world. He is his
 Swedenborg was in principle a Theosophist. He was               own spirit medium. Theosophical publications adver-
 also a spiritist. As a matter of fact, Theosophy is a           tise books by Sir Arthur  Conan  Doyle, the British
 form of Spiritism. Madame Blavatsky for' years before           spiritist.     Spiritism is said to be evolving in the
 she became one of the -founders  .of modern Theosophy           direction of Theosophy.
 had been one of the earliest of spiritistic mediums.
 She herself admitted that Theosophy was Spiritism,              Its Divec tion.
 "but under another name." Theosophists secure in-                  Theosophy proceeds on the basis of evolution in
 formation by means of "clairvoyant investigation"               every sense of the word. It pretends to be as graded as
 which furnishes them with geographical knowledge, so            the stream of evolution. For all religions have their
 that they are able to produce accurate maps of the              origin in "God", and all of them flow from him and
 world as it was -800,000 years ago! But if the spirits          appear in the world in an ascending scale from
 cannot get the chronology of the world straight, how            Animism, Fetishism, Spiritism and nature worship to
 can they be so sure of its pre-deluvian surface  con;           Theosophy and, eventually, the realm of angels. Thus
tours'? Man, according to this alleged philosophy, is            pantheistic evolution reveals that humanity has always


                                                  THE STANDARD BEARER                                                469


1 been panting after "God." (Esoteric Christianity, 4)        Pythagorean number, the perfect Square, and a  six-
 Its Cbnglo~m evation.                                        faced Cube on earth. The Macroprosopus (the Great
                                                              Face) is now Microprosopus (the Lesser Face); or, as
    Theosophy like Freemasonry is a syncretistic              the  Kabalists  have it, the Ancient of Days, descending
system which claims to be not a religion, but to              on Adam  Kadmon whom he uses as his vehicle to
embrace the essential truth and unity of all religions,       manifest through, gets transformed into  Tetragram-
science, and philosophy. It claims to cull the good of        maton" (S.D. 129). Is the reader enlightened? Enough,
 Gnosticism, with  yhich  it begins, of Spiritism, panthe-    certainly to give such blasphemy the burial of  .an ass
ism, evolutionism, monism-dualism, occultism (a syn-          (Jer.  22:19).
onym for theosophy), Astrology, Buddhism, Chris-
tianity, Freethought, Hinduism, Islamism, Judaism,            Its Sym bology.
Kabbalism  and Zoroastrianism. It seeks to reconcile              The Theosophist emblem, in part, is that of a
these and all religions, except for the Christian reli-       serpent circled around a star of David. In the center
gion, which- it thoroughly despises as a "blasphemous         of this star is an  ansated  cross, the Tau cross with a
and sorry caricature of the Ever-Unknowable" (The             loop or a handle at the top. At the peak of the cross is
Secret Doctrine, I, 43f).     "Members of the.  Theoso-       a circled swastika. The serpent in primitive symbology
phical Society are free to profess whatever religion          was a guardian god, a symbol of majesty and dominion.
or philosophy they like, or none if they so prefer,           In Egypt, only the rulers wore the serpent on the head
provided they  are. in sympathy with,. and ready to           to signify absolute sovereignty. Almost universally the
carry out one or more of the three objects of the as-         serpent represented the sun-god incarnate. The serpent
sociation. The society is a philanthropic and scientif-       was regarded as the great life-restorer. After all, it
ic body for the propagation of the idea of brotherhood        was the serpent who "assured" mankind, "Ye shall
on practical instead of  theoretical  lines." Members         not surely die  !"       The serpent was also the great
 "may be Christians, Mussulmen, Jews,  Parsees, Bud-          enlightener.      After all, the serpent gave -mankind the
dhists, Brahmins, Spiritualists or Materialists, it does      knowledge of good and evil! "Ye shall be as Elohim,
not matter;.."  (l<ey to T., 19). The object is to erect      knowing good and evil." Undoubtedly there is much
a great "Century Twenty-One" Temple of  Mis-Under-            more secret "wisdom" available in connection with
standing.                                                     the meaning of the serpent. Indeed, "professing to be
                                                              wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the
 Its Objects.                                                 incorruptible God for the likeness of an image of
    The Theosophical Society has three main objects:          corruptible...cveeping  things"  (Rom.  1:22f). According
(1) to form the nucleus of the universal brotherhood of       to our secret wisdom ( I Cor.  2:7), that serpent is a
man, embracing all races, creeds, sexes, castes and           dead serpent. Even  pr'imitive  mythology represents it
colors; (2) to encourage the study of comparative             as such. For a living serpent is not stretched out in
religion, philosophy and science; (3) to investigate the      the form of a complete circle. That can be done only
unexplained. laws of nature, and the powers hidden in         with a dead serpent -- dead because struck by lightning
man.     These are exactly the aims of liberalism and         (secret wisdom: the wrath of God). The  lightning-
ecclesiastical modernism.                                     struck serpent encircles the Tau cross, the Egyptian
                                                              emblem of generation. Thus the serpent's brood. The
Its Wvi tings .                                               Tau or T represents Tammuz, and the circle-handle
    Theosophy invites the outsider, if he likes, to           the fact that Tammuz was the sun-god. He was the
regard its writings as fairy tales, or as the phantasies      father of all. Here the cross represents a condemned
of dreamers, nevertheless claiming to be as scientific        race, the seed of the serpent.          The swastika was
as some of the latest scientific hypotheses and far           thought to represent a flame of sacred fire, the sun
more philosophical and probable  (.S.D., I, 88). The          in its daily rotation  - another sun-god emblem. It is
present writer interprets this to mean that if you read       a Buddhist inscription in India, a Celtic inscription in
any theosophy, that is your misfortune; if you continue       Britain, a Tibetan symbol. and an American Indian
to read it, that is your fault; and if you read more,         symbol.        The word "swastika" is  Sanscrit meaning
that is your. folly.      As a sample of what we find in      "well-being," i.e., good luck.        The swastika cross
Theosophy's "The Secret Doctrine" by Madame H. P.             inscribed within a circle represents a pantheistic
Blavatsky, the following, selected at random, may we          phallicism.       Recall that Freemasonry has its heathen
impose upon the patience of the reader!         "Thus is      trinity, Jah, Bul and  on. Jah, a deity removed from
repeated on earth the mystery enacted, according to           its polytheistic environment, was made a special
the Seers, on the divine plane. The `Son' of the Im-          national God in an attempt to invent a monotheism.
maculate `Celestial Virgin (or the undifferentiated           That name in the first chapters of Genesis is said to
Cosmic Protyle, Matter in its infinitude) is born again       be androgynous, and denominates  a. priapic god (S.D.,
on earth  -as the Son of the terrestrial Eve, our mother      72f).    We are also informed that 3.1416 = Pi = circle
Earth, and becomes Humanity as `a total -- past,              with horizontal diameter = the encircled swastika  q
present and future  - for Jehovah, or Jod-He-Vau-He,          the androgynous Logos (the Jesus-Mary). This is a
is androgyne, or both male and female.- Above, the            monster tale out of Plato's Symposium. It is also a
Son is the whole kosmos; below, he is MANKIND. The            revolting denial of the truth revealed in Gen.  1:27;
Triad or Triangle becomes Tetraktys, the sacred               Mat.  1:20, 23; Heb.  2:14.


470                                                 THE STANDARD BEARER


                                                                 that which comes from Christian Science's self-hypno-
Its Denials.                                                     tism, the power of suggestion, the advice of psychology
       The Chvistian  trinity   "had its origin from the tri-    or the effusions of a spiritist medium (ibid., 73). The
angle, in the archaic occultism and symbology of the             theosophist does not pray. He exhorts himself. He
heathen" (S.D., 173). A refutation of this allegation            commands the god within .        THE HUMAN SOUL is
may be found in the article on Jehovah's Witnesses.              "certainly not bestowed by a personal God" (ibid., 75).
"The Christian `who says `God is a living (sic) fire,'           The soul has no such origin, but comes from its
and speaks of the Pentecostal `Tongues of Fire' and of           environment, the universe, just as the mushy substance
the `Burning Bush' of Moses, is as much a fire-wor-              of the jelly-fishcomes from the ocean which surrounds
shiper as any other `heathen."' (ibid., 180). THE                it!     True, Theosophy is not a religion, nor does it,
CREATOR, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob: "in                strictly, have to do with any god whatsoever, except
such a God Theosophy does not believe. ..We reject the           that -which a man might care to think himself to be. It
idea of a personal, or an extra-cosmic God...The God             is rather pantheistic evolution, another form of atheism.
of theology...is a bundle of contradictions and a logical        THE RESURRECTION of the body in the flesh is de-
impossibility.      Therefore, we will have nothing to do        cidedly rejected.      Body and soul blend back into the
with Him" (K. to T., 61). Although Theosophy rejects             natural essence of the universe, as a raindrop falls
with all the revulsion it canmuster the "contradictions"         into the ocean. HEAVEN as described in the Bible,
and "impossibilities" of the orthodox Christian church,          being the conception of uneducated Christians, with its
it does hold most tenaciously to the teaching that `.`God"       truncated angels, silver trumpets, golden harps, and
is at the same time  "Be-ness" and "Nothingness."                palm-bearing resurrected saints in white robes, pre-
CHRIST was not a unique personality, but the  first-             sents a picture like a fairy scene at a Christmas
fruits of humanity, and every man can become a                   pageant (ibid., 171). THE ULTIMATE DESTINY OF
Christ.      The Son of God. is not a distinct person, but       MAN is not a Heaven presided over by God, but the
the New Testament revelation of the one-person God,              gradual dispersal of matter into the primordial ele-
who took the body of the man Jesus, and dwelt therein            ment, Spirit.
for three years (Esot. Chr., 98f). Christ has no ob-
jective being or personality, nor is He the Saviour of           Its Modernism  .
the world.        Man is not destined "to be saved  ijy an              Theosophy makes these evaluations of history. The
extevnal  Christ, but to be glorified  into  an  inns            Protestant Reformation was a part of the Theosophical
Christ"       (ibid., 187).    THE DOCTRINE OF THE               movement. Masonry was also, standing for tolerance
ATONEMENT is a dangerous, cruel dogma. "We believe               (except tolerance for orthodox Christianity  - RCH),
neither in vicarious atonement, nor in the possibility           religious and intellectual liberty. The American Rev-
of the remission of the smallest sin by any god, not             olution and the Declaration of Independence were a
even by a personal Absolute or Infinite, if such a thing         great step forward in the Theosophical movement.
could have existence" (Key, 135). Atonement is con-              Slavery was the real issue in the American Civil War
ceived in the Christian Science manner, an at-one-ment,          as well as in the Russian Revolution. Abraham Lincoln
a unifying force by which individual lives know their            made for the Rights of Man, as opposed to the forces
merger with the divine (E.C., 150). THE ASCENSION                of reaction. The atheist Robert G. Ingersoll, and the
OF CHRIST is nothing more than humanity "consciously             Unitarian W. E. Channing to a large extent did much to
recognizing itself as the Son of God" (ibid., 186).              break the hold of bigotry and intolerance. (Here the
PRAYER is rejected. Theosophists never pray. They                opprobrium intends th e historic Protestant church).
boast of acting, "instead of  talking."          God is the      The writings of Spencer , Dickens, Tolstoy, et al.,
totality of the visible world.        No time is wasted in       fought more for theunrestricted domain of the individ-
addressing the universe.        Prayer was a superstition        ual conscience than any "thus saith the Lord" dogma.
invented by the Jews and popularized by the Pharisees            Agnosticism and infidelity were but laudable attempts
(Key: 67).        Christian prayer is like an apple picker       to snap the shackling fetters of orthodox Christianity.
sitting under a tree wishing that his employer would do          "The world needs no sectarian church, whether of
all the work, which he all the while does do (ibid., 72).        Buddha, Jesus, Mohamet, Swedenborg, Calvin or any
The comfort of prayer is said to be no different: from           other...Man requires but one church  - the temple of

                RESOL UTION OF SYMPATHY                                           RESOL UTION OF SYMPATHY
The Consistory of the Hope Protestant Reformed                   The Men's Society of the First Protestant Reformed
Church, Grand Rapids, Michigan, herewith expresses               Church of Holland, Michigan herewith expresses its
its sympathy with their fellow consistory member, Jay            sincere sympathy to Mr. and Mrs. B-. Windemuller and
Bomers, in the loss of his Mother,                               family in the recent passing of her mother,
                    MRS. JERRY BOMERS                                                MRS. JENNIE KNOLL
May our God, who is gracious, comfort those who                  "Happy is he that hath the God of Jacob for his help,
mourn, even according to His sure promise.                       whose hope is in the Lord his God." Psalm  146:5
                                   Rev. H. Veldman, Pres.                                         Rev. G. Lanting, Pres.
                                   John Kalsbeek, Clerk                                           E. Cammenga, Sec'y.


                                                   THE STANDARD BEARER                                               471


God within" .him. (Theosophical Movement, Dutton  &             Blavatsky vs. Olcott, Annie Besant vs. W. Q. Judge,
Co., N.Y.C., 1925, 37).       "The drift of modern thought      Old vs. Judge, etc. It is full of their fears, doubts,
is palpably in the direction of liberalism in religion          dissents,    jealousies, quarrels, frictions, estrange-
as well as in science. Each day brings the reactionists         ments, and mutual depositions.      It is a history per-
nearer to the point where they must surrender the               meated with suspicion of falsehood, fraud, and trea-
despotic authority over the public conscience which             chery. Page after page records their secret meetings,
they have so long exercised and enjoyed" (ibid., 48).           their plots for revenge, and conspiracies to ruin one
                                                                another.     Then there are the suits for libel. Also
Its His tovy.                                                   charges of carousing were made against one of the
   As we know, the main object of the Theosophical              most prominent of Theosophists, Col. H. S. Olcott. In
Society is to promote brotherhood among all races and           his middle life he had been a "man of clubs,  drinking-
religions of man. To accomplish this utopian dream,             parties and mistresses," as he had himself publicly
man's natural selfishness, his ferocious and irresisti-         stated (T.M., 332).       Charges of grave immorality,
ble self -centeredness  must be uprooted and eradicated.        homosexuality (p.  685),  forgery, and spurious writings
"Theosophy  alone  can eradicate" these malicious  him-         also flew back and forth. The history further records
drances.     Just how successful has Theosophy been to          Olcott's and Besant's gross violations of their own
this end?        Its own history reveals the very opposite      solemn pledges...Like teeming maggots fighting and
of brotherliness. It is one relentless  furore  of con-         chewing one another over a festering and rotting  car-
niving and back-stabbing among its leaders: Madame              case which long baited the trap of the devil!





                                          THE DOCTRINE OF CREATION

                                                       (Continued)

                                                    Rev. H. Veldman

   Calling attention to the history of the doctrine of          but he evidently had a profound acquaintance with the
creation, we are quoting from the Fathers of the early          inspired writings, and he powerfully exhibits their im-
history of the Church of God as in the New Dispensa-            mense superiority in every respect over the heathen
tion, during -the  ,First Period, 80 to 250 A.D. In our         poetry and philosophy.
preceding article we quoted from Irenaeus. We now                  In his chapter on "The World Created By God
call attention to the writings of Theophilus.                   Through The Word," he writes the following (in his
                                                                w,riting  to Autolycus): "And first, they taught us with
THEOPHIL  US                                                    one consent that God made  ali things out of nothing;
   Theophilus occupies an interesting position, after           for nothing was coeval with God: ,but He being His own
Ignatius, in the succession of faithful men who repre-          place, and wanting nothing, and existing before the
sented Barnabas and other prophets and teachers of              ages, willed to make man by whom He might be known;
Antioch, in that ancient seat, from which comes our             for him, therefore, He prepared the world. For he
name. as Christians.        In his writings, he opposes a       that is created is also needy; but he that is  untreated
certain Autolycus who is known as an idolater and               stands in need of nothing. God, then, having His own
scorner  .of Christians. Little is known-of the personal        Word internal within His own bowels (Theophilus here
history of Theophilus of Antioch. It appears that he            refers to the Word, the Logos, the eternal Son -H.V.),
was born a pagan, and that he owed his conversion to            begat Him, emitting Him along with His own wisdom
Christianity to`the careful study of the Holy Scriptures.       before all things. . . . .He, then, being Spirit of God,
Eusebius declares  Ithat he was the sixth bishop of             and governing principle, and wisdom, and power of the
Antioch in Syria from the apostles, the` names of his           highest, came down upon the prophets, and through
supposed predecessors being Eros, Cornelius, Hero,              them spake of the creation of the world and of all other
Ignatius, and Euodius. We also learn that Theophilus            things.      For the prophets were not when the world
succeeded to the bishopric of Antioch in the eighth             came into existence, but the wisdom of God which was
year of the reign of Marcus' Aurelius, that is, in A.D.         in Him, and His holy Word which was always present
168.    He is related to have died either in  A;D. 181, or      with Him. Wherefore He speaks thus by the prophet
in A.D. 188, some assigning him an episcopate of thir-          Solomon: `When He prepared the heavens I was there,
teen, -and others of twenty-one, years.          He, too, is    and when He appointed the foundations of the earth I
somewhat fond of fanciful interpretations of Scripture;         was by Him as one brought up with Him.' (Theophilus


 472                                               THESTANDARDBEARER


here quotes Prov.  8:27; the Logos here is the Wisdom          truth might be obvious, the plants and seeds were
as with the Father. -H.V.).         And Moses, who lived       produced prior to the heavenly bodies, for what is
many years before Solomon, or, rather, the Word of             posterior cannot produce that which is prior. And
God by him as by an instrument (notice his emphasis            these contain the pattern and type of a great mystery.
here upon Divine Inspiration -H.V.), says, `In the             For the sun is a type of God, and the moon of man.
beginning God created the heavens and the earth.'              And as the sun far surpasses the moon in power and
First he named the `beginning,' and `creation,' .then he       glory, so far does God surpass man. And as the sun
thus introduced God; for not lightly and on slight oc-         remains ever full, never becoming less, so does God
casion i it right to name God. For the divine wisdom           always abide perfect, being full of all power, and
forekneJ that some would trifle and name a multitude           understanding, and wisdom, and immortality, and all
of gods hat do not exist. In order, therefore, that the        good. But the moon wanes monthly, and in a manner
living G d might be known by His works, and that it            dies, being a type of man; then it is born again, and is
might b          known that by His Word God created the        crescent, for a pattern of the future resurrection. In
            P
heavens and the earth, and all that is therein, he said,       like manner also the three days which were before the
`In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.'      luminaries, are types of the Trinity, of God, and His
Then having spoken of their creation, he explains to           Word, and His wisdom. And the fourth is the type of
us: `And the earth was without form, and void, and             man, who needs light, that so there may be God, the
darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the Spirit         Word, wisdom, man.       Wherefore also on the fourth
of God moved upon the water.' This, sacred Scripture           day the lights were made.        The disposition of the
teaches at the outset, to show that matter, from: which        stars, too, contains a type' of the arrangement and
God made and fashioned the world, was in some manner           order of the righteous and pious, and of those who
created, being produced by God." In this quotation             keep the law and commandments of God.            For the
Theophilus clearly stated that the Lord is the Creator         brilliant and bright stars are an imitation of the
of the heavens and the earth, and that all matter owes         prophets, and therefore they remain fixed, not declin-
its existence alone to the living God.                         ing, nor passing from place to place. And those which
        Then, after describing, very briefly, the work of      hold the second place in brightness, are types of the
creation'during the six days of creation, Theophilus           people of the righteous.      And those, again, which
has a chapter entitled: "The Glory Of The Six Days'            change their position, and flee from place to place,
Work," and we quote: "Of this six days' work no man            which also are called planets, they too are a type of
can give a worthy explanation and description of all its       the men who have wandered from God, abandoning His
parts, not though he has ten thousand tongues  and. ten        law and commandments."
thousand mouths; nay, though he were to live ten                  In this quotation we have a rather vivid example of
thousand years, sojourning in this life, not even so could     the type of Scripture interpretation by the Church
he utter anything worthy of these things, on account of        Fathers during the early days of the New Dispensation.
the exceeding greatness and riches of the wisdom of            They were fond of allegorizing. Theophilus declares
God which there is in the six days' work above nar-            in this quotation, for example, that the sun is a type of
rated. Many writers indeed have imitated the narra-            God and the moon is a type of man. We believe that the
tion, and essayed to give an explanation of these things;      sun is a type of Christ, the moon, which has no light
yet, though they thence derived some suggestions, both         in itself, is a type of the Church of God, and the stars
concerning the creation of the world and the nature of         represent the Church from the aspect of its many and
man, they  haye emitted no slightest spark of `truth.          countless individual members. But, be this as it may,
And the utterances of the philosophers, and writers,           it is striking to read what he writes concerning the
and poets have an appearance of trustworthiness, on            creation of the plant world prior to the creation of the
account of the beauty of their diction; but their dis-         heavenly luminaries: the sun, moon, and stars.       Be-
course is proved to be foolish and idle,  .because the         cause  .the Lord knew (we would say: sovereignly knew)
multitude of their nonsensical frivolities is very great;      of the follies of the vain philosophers, who teach that
and not a stray morsel of truth is found in them. For          the things that grow on the earth are produced from
even if any truth seems to have been uttered by them,          the heavenly bodies so as to exclude God, He created
it has a mixture of error. And as a deleterious drug,          first the world of plants and then the sun and moon
when mixed with honey or wine, or some other thing,            and stars, in order that vain man might never be able
makes the whole mixture hurtful and profitless; so also        to say that the heavenly bodies brought the world and
eloquence is in their case found to be  labour in vain;        the things that are therein into being.      Theophilus
yea, rather an injurious thing to those who credit it."        certainly maintains that God is the sole Creator of the
In this passage Theophilus rather forcefully exposes           heavens and the earth, and all the things contained in
the lie of heathen philosophers and writers.                   them.
        Speaking of the fourth day, Theophilus writes as          Concluding our quotations from the early Church
follows, and we quote: "On the fourth day the luminar-         Fathers, we wish to quote from the New Schaff-Herzog
ies were made; because God, who possesses fore-                Religious Encyclopedia, Vol. III, 301-302, and we
knowledge, knew the follies of the vain philosophers,          quote: "In contrast with the systems already discussed,
that they were going to say, that the things which grow        which emphasize the cosmogonic (of the world) element
on the earth are produced from the heavenly bodies,            at the expense of the monotheistic (one God), these
so as to exclude God.         In order, therefore, that the    latter dwell exclusively on God's action in creation, to


                                                     THE  STANDaRD  BEARER                                                        473


the neglect of what may be accomplished by the powers                 Here again occurs the assertion that God needed no
and laws set in motion by him. 1.  In Judaism  Pvopev:                more than an instant for the creation of the world. The
Here not only is the creation of heaven and earth out of              Alexandrian school especially followed  Philo's view on
nothing strongly emphasized, but special stress is                    this point; Clement even denies that the world was
laid on the relative nothingness or weakness of the                   created in time, since time came into existence with
creature in comparison with God (Wisd. XI. 23; Ps.                    created things.              Origen, asserting the same thing,
23. 6; Isa. 48. 13; Judith 16. 18; Ps. 97. 5; Mic. I. 4;              places over against it an eternally creative activity of
Rev; VI. 13).      In harmony with the unconditional                  God, which, indeed, he confines to the production of
supernaturalism, nay, acosmism of such a view, it is                  the spiritual world. Athanasius, Basil, and Gregory of
not surprising to find the six creative`days of Genesis               Nyssa assert the same practically instantaneous and
taken in the strict literal sense, or even minimized                  extratemporal creation; and so also Ambrose and
into mere points of time in a definite prearranged                    Augustine in the West. The underlying thought of a
sequence. The last is the case especially with  Philo,                creation not gradual but at once concluded, and the
who, in spite of his Platonic acceptance of the eternity              accompanying proposition that the world was made `not
of matter, regards its formation into anorderlycosmos                 in time, but with time,' descended from Augustine and
as a work which God could, if necessary, have ac-                     the schoolmen, and so to the common orthodox teaching."
complished in a moment, and which he divided into six
days merely for the sake of orderly procedure. 2.  In                      The Lord willing, we will call attention in subse-
the Pat&tic  Period:   Here the absolute nothingness out              quent articles to the views as set forth in the period of
of which God created the world is sharply emphasized,                 the Christian Church, after 250 A.D. But it is clear
as by Tertullian in opposition to the dualism of the                  that in the period, 80 to 250 A.D., the view of creation
Gnostic Hermogenes, and by later representatives of                   was set forth that the creation of the heavens and the
the ecclesiastical creationism, such as Ambrose,                      earth was the work of the living God, and that the days
Jerome, and the scholastics from Peter Lombard.                       of creation are not to be understood as periods.


                                    7b &km4 AZ we*
                                    ("0 worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness." Ps. 96:9a)


                               \              THE LORD'S SUPPER FORM
                               \
                               )      PREPARATORY SELF-EXAMINATION
                                                       (Continued)

                                                     Rev. G.  Vanden  Bevg

   We wrote the last time that everyone is duty bound                `deservedly under that awful curse. This must be so,
to consider by himself the matter of his sin in con-                  for it follows from the very nature of God Himself. We
nection with the preparatory self-examination that is to              must never forget that He is the Holy, the Just (Right-
precede the celebration of the Lord's Supper. We                      eous) and eternally Unchangeable One. He can never
stressed  the. personal or  ~individualistic  character of            assume a tolerant attitude (either in time or eternity)
this self -examination. In the experiential sense of the              toward that which is contrary to Himself or His own
word each one of us must be brought to self-knowledge                 infinitely perfect Being. Always His disposition is that
of sin in order that we may consciously realize the                  of wrath  toward all that is of sin, even as His love
real need of the Saviour and Mediator Whose death we                  extends to that which is in harmony with Himself. And
celebrate in the sacrament.                                           always that which is of sin is deserving of His wrath
   .There is, however, more to be said. The Communion                 even as that which is ethically agreeable with God is
Form speaks not only of considering and knowing "our                  worthy of His love and virtue. This is because God, in
sins," but it adds, "and the curse due to him for them."              His disposition toward the creature, is always  just.
This statement here serves the purpose of bringing                    There is no unrighteousness in Him.
before our consciousness the indisputable fact that                        On this point the Scriptures are very explicit. To
whenever we sin we justly deserve nothing less than                   the first man they declare: "The day thoueatest there-
the curse of God upon us. Every thought in our minds                  of thou shalt surely die".              Throughout irrevocable
and every deed in our  -walk  that does not conform                   testimony is given, such as the following: "The soul
perfectly to His standard of right and is not motivated               that sinneth shall surely die." "Cursed is everyone
completely by love to Him and our neighbor brings us                  that continueth not in all things that are written in the


474                                               THE STANDARD BEARER


book of the law to do them." "The wages of sin is             and that because of this the only possible reaction in
death." More need not be added: for the matter is             Him toward our sin is that of a great...a very great
indisputable.     No one can and no one may deny that for     wrath.       Then, in the second place, the emphasis must
every sin we commit we are worthy of and deserve the          be placed upon the fact that this wrath of God against
curse.                                                        our sin is so great that we could never bear it. It is
       Now the matter of God's curse is not something         impossible that we by `our works, our piety, our prayers
with which we may trifle. Men often do that. Do you           or faith, our employing the aid of any other creatures,
not hear every day in the world where loose and vile          in any way can possible alleviate or obliterate that
language is spoken, the using of God's Holy Name and          wrath of God.          This we must also realize  ficlly: for
the calling upon God to bring down His curse upon             in the measure, or  rather, to the extent that any
things and  pe.ople as though it were a matter of no          thought remains in us that we can pacify that wrath
consequence?       The gibberish and vulgar tongue of man     of God in some way, the sin of pride has not left us,
is very free with its, "Gosh, darn it" and "dammits";         and we cannot humble ourselves before God. And if we
and if we would add that those who speak this way do          are not humiliated, we can meet God only in the sphere
not realize what they are saying, it would not be to          of His wrath, where there is no communion of life and
excuse or justify such vulgarity, but only to emphasize       fellowship but where we are consumed by death. Then,
the fact that they speak as fools who have no under-          in the third place, let it be observed that this wrath of
standing.                                                     God against sin is so immensely great that it required
       We repeat that the matter of God's curse is not        the bitter and shameful death of the SON OF GOD on the
something to trifle with. The mere mention of it is           cross to placate it.         Though in a sense this means
enough to make one shudder.  An+ attempt to form an           everything to me, in the present connection there is
idea of this reality results in great trembling of body       one fact that impresses me deeply and makes me fully
and soul. Words are entirely inadequate to describe           conscious of my own nothingness and makes me stand
the awfulness, the intensity, the excruciating  horrible-     in silent and humble adoration of God. That fact is:
ness, of the divine curse. It is God Himself, with all        MY SALVATION IS DEPENDENT SOLELY UPON GOD.
the power of His infinite being, coming  against the          Without Him, in the Person of His Son, I could never
creature in holy wrath.        It is immeasurably more        be saved. On the corner stone of this truth my con-
destructive than all the combined forces that have            fession and hope rests.
wrought devastation throughout the history of mankind.            Summarizing, then, this first part of true  self-
It is unbearable and evinces wailing and gnashing of          examination, we may say that it unveils to us four
teeth and unutterable cries of torment. God's curse           things, the knowledge of which incites in us a spirit
is HELL. It is death. . ..eternal death inall its implica-    of true humility. These are:
tions. In Thy wrath we pine....and DIE!                           (1) The self-confessed knowledge that our sins are
       The true examination of ourselves consists of this     exceedingly great.
first, "that everyone consider by himself, his sins               (2) The acknowledgment that, because of these
and the curse due to him for them." Do we come to             sins, we justly deserve only God's wrath and eternal
that realization each time we celebrate the Lord's            p e r d i t i o n .
Supper? Do we feel that deservedness of that terrible             (3) The realization of the utter impossibility of
death?       Do we reach that necessary consciousness in      removing or pacifying the wrath of God by ourselves
which we know ourselves to be miserable and wretched          or through the creature.
sinners?                                                          (4) The awareness that GOD HIMSELF punishedour
       Without this we cannot reach the purpose of this       sins when He poured out His wrath upon His own be-
part of the self-examination which is expressed in the        loved Son, Christ Jesus, our Lord.
words of the Form:        "to the end that he may humble
himself before God." Directly connected with this is          The Second  Pavt of the Self-Examination
the statement that follows and which indicates how this           According to the Communion Form we are enjoined
humiliation of self before God is brought about. That         in the second part of the self-examination as follows:
statement reads: "Considering that the wrath of God                     That everyone examine his own heart, whether he
against sin is so great, that (rather than it should go           doth believe this faithful promise of God, that all his
unpunished) He hath punished the same in his beloved              sins are forgiven him only for the sake of the passion
`Son Jesus Christ, with the bitter and shameful death             and death of Jesus Christ, and that the perfect right-
of the cross."                                                    eousness of Christ is imputed and freely given him as
       Several thoughts come to our mind in this connec-          his own, yea, so perfectly, as if he had-satisfied in his
tion that literally strip us of all pride and bring us            own person for all his sins, and fulfilled all righteous-
before the face of God in the right spirit and attitude           ness.
of humiliation. First of all, we note the words that are          As we proceed, then, with this part of our  self-
found in parentheses above. The implication of those          examination, we observe. that this is to be done in the
words is not that God might have conceivably simply           same subjective vein as in the first part. The question
winked at sin or turned his face the other way and let        here is not whether we know about or have been in-
it go unpunished.       This we know is an impossibility      structed in the Scriptural truth of the atonement of
with God. Rather, this is mentioned here to bring out         Christ; but the matter of concern has to do with the
this fact that God could not allow sin to go unpunished,      personal, conscious appropriation of the benefits  ofHis


                                                  THE STANDARD BEARER                                                  475


-redemptive work. The fact that Christ died for sin and        according to the promise.           Now our purpose in this
that through His death He has fulfilled all righteousness      connection is not to enter into all of these matters, for
is here assumed. The reality of this and of all that,          that belongs to another rubric in our paper.           Our
on the basis of Scripture, might be said about this is         present concern deals with  self-examination  with  re-
not being disputed but the matter of our deepest concern       spect to these matters; a self-examination that is
here is wrapped up in the personal question: Has               concentrated now on the personal question: "Do I
Christ died  for me?' Are  my sins forgiven on the basis       believe the promise?         Do I believe in Christ? Do I
of His redemptive work?          Am  I a  pavtakev   of His    possess the righteousness and salvation of His Cross?"
benefits so that I can appear before God in the state             It is a question of  faith  in the second part of our
of perfect righteousness?                                      self-examination.
   The main object of investigation in the second part            To be noted, first of all, and to be emphasized here
of our self-examination, therefore, is the matter of our       is the fact that our communion form speaks in this
faith in the promise of God. Concerning this also there        connection of "everyone examining his own heart".
is considerable superficiality in our day; and, lest we        Faith is a matter of the  heart.  The fact that one is
be carried away by this spirit, we must take our time          outwardly a member of the church and numbered with
here and devote ourselves seriously to these matters.          those who are called the children of God and even given
   What is the promise of God? This question may               certain legal rights in the congregation, does not
indeed be asked and carefully analyzed. Many there             guarantee the blessings of communion with God at His
are who construe the promise of God to include just            table. There must be faith in the heart. The center of
about everything.      The idea is that God will give us       our being, out of which all the issues of our life pro-
whatever we want if only we are willing to go to Him           ceed, must be joined with Christ so that the power of
and ask for it. This, of course, is altogether foreign         His life pulsates that heart. Theremust a real spiritual
to and has no basis in the Scriptures.                         knowledge in us of the Christ in the sense that we
   Others have only an Old Testament concept of the            experience the power of the work He has accomplished
promise of God and limit it to the temporal and earthly        through His passion and death. In our hearts there must
things that were promised to the patriarchs and to             be an unwavering confidence in Him as our Lord and
Israel.     They fail to see that these promises of God        Saviour which gives us that wonderful assurance that
were typical of the promise of better things and had           His perfect work is imputed unto us and on this basis
their ultimate fulfillment, not in the procurement of          alone we are made acceptable before God in the
the land of Canaan, but in Christ and the realization          Beloved.
of the eternal Kingdom of Heaven through His Cross
and resurrection from the' dead.                                  We need not add that this "believing" is God's gift
   That the promise of God is centrally andessentially         to us.      Concerning this we shall write more, D.V.,
Christ is clearly taught throughout the Word of God.           next time; but because of this, the finding of this gift
All the promises of God are yea and amen in Him. To            in us through self-examination gives us confidence to
Him are the promises of God given, and only they that          come unto the table of the Lord in the certainty-that He
are in Christ are of the seed of Abraham and heirs             will not cast us out.


                             7hdthtqbd  7h~%wt.,   ,
                                                                                  (Psalm 68:ll)


                                 MISSION PREACHING AND TOTAL DEPRAVITY


                                                      Rev. C. Hanko

    We are discussing the five points of Calvinism in          us to preach "the Gospel to all nations." That Gospel
connection with missions. The question comes down              includes the whole of Scripture, the whole counsel of
to this:- Can mission work be carried out on the basis         God.      It is that Word of God which is the power unto
of the five points of Calvinism'? In that connection we        salvation. The truth, and the truth alone, can make us
are compelled to ask: Can a missionary preach sover-           free, so that freed from the bondage of sin and death
eign predestination,. total depravity, limited atonement,      by the power of the truth we are free indeed! That
efficacious grace, and the preservation of saints? This        truth of Scripture we profess to be formulated in our Con-
really amounts to placing ourselves before the question:       fessions. Ministers and missionaries -sign the Formula
Can a Calvinist preach his convictions on the mission          of Subscription to declare their agreement with those
field?     And that is the same., as asking: Is Calvinism      Confessions as the truth of Scripture, promising to
the truth of Scripture, or isn't it?                           teach and defend those doctrines, rejecting all errors
    All these questions imply the answer. Christ calls         that militate against it.


476                                                     THE STANDARD BEARER


       Yet the five points of Calvinism are being chal-            Adam's original guilt brought death to all his posterity.
lenged.          And this is done particularly in connection       For that he appeals to Scripture, and with that we
with the preaching of the Word on the mission field.               agree.       But then he adds that Christ died for the
The slogan, "God loves you, Christ died for you," is               original sin of Adam, and since the original sin of
set up as the only criterion for any gospel message.               Adam is the sin of every individual, Christ died in that
And since this slogan, when applied to every individual            sense for all men, none excluded. There we certainly
who hears the gospel message, conflicts with the five              have a universal atonement, according to Daane. And
points of Calvinism, the Five Points must be cast                  from this he seems to conclude, even though he does
aside.                                                             not say so in so many words, that there is also a
                                                                   restraint of sin in the heart of the unregenerate,
       That this is indeed the sad case in Reformed                which enables him to accept the gospel offer and make
circles today is evident from what Dr. Daane writes in             a decision for Christ. If we are laying words in Daane's
the Reformed Journal of December, 1964, about the                  mouth, we shall appreciate his telling us so.
death of Christ and the love of God that must be                       This reasoning does not surprise us in the light of
preached  `to all. He asserts that the preacher must be            history.     Daane refers repeatedly to 1924 to point out
able to say to every individual he meets that God loves            that his church actually took that position already in
him and that Christ died for him.            In this connection    1924 by adopting the Three Points of Common Grace.
he writes:                                                         Daane considers the term "commongrace" amisnomer,
           The  assertions about the death of Christ and the       because the synod of 1924 spoke of the general  well-
       love of God in the current discussion are simply            meant offer of salvation as an evidence of God's
       another aspect of the general well-meant offer of the       common grace to all men.              Daane wonders how a
       gospel. What is badly needed in the rarified theological    certain "common grace", or temporal blessings can
       atmosphere in which these matters are discussed is a        include a general well-meant offer of the gospel. And
       down-to-earth questioning and investigation of what         he is so right.       But then he concludes from this that
       one actually says, or inevitably appears to be saying,
       in the act of preaching.                                    the church even then had in mind, not a certain "com-
                                                                   mon grace", but a special or saving grace to all men.
       We can appreciate the fact  that%r.  Daane wants a          And if there is a saving grace in some sense for all
clear cut, down-to-earth discussion on the subject of              men, then it also must follow that Christ died for all
the real contents of the breaching of the Word, whether            men, be it possibly only in the sense that Christ bore
that be on the mission field or from the pulpit of an              the original sin of Adam which is the sin of all men,
established church. The Standard  Beaver gladly takes              since all men died in Adam.              No one is worthy of
part in this discussion. But obviously what Daane has              condemnation on account of original sin, and no one
in mind is this: how is it possible to preach a general            shall be condemned because of it, but all are free from
well-meant offer of the gospel without saying to every             the guilt of original sin.         And now God reveals His
individual "God loves you," and, "Christ died for you?"            love to all men in the preaching. The preacher must
He is simply reminding his readers that in 1924 the                not hesitate to approach anyone with the assurance
Christian Reformed Churches adopted the Three Points               that God loves him and that Christ died for him.
of Common Grace and declared in the first point that                   Dr. Daane must be aware of the fact that when he
this common grace to all mankind is evident from                   syates  that the original guilt of every individual was
the "general well meant offer of the gospel." When                 taken away by  -the cross, he is in direct conflict with
the Synod of 1924 adopted the first point of common                the Canons.        For the Canons in the Second  ,Head  of
grace it also officially declared that the preaching of            Doctrine, Article 5 of the Rejection of Errors, declare:
the gospel is a general well-meant offer to all who
hear it.                                                                     The true doctrine having been explained, the Synod
       It is in this connection that Daane comes in conflict           rejects the errors of those who teach: That all men
`with the doctrine of total depravity as taught in our                 have been accepted unto the state of reconciliation
                                                                       and unto the grace of the covenant, so that no one is
Confessions and in the five points of Calvinism. He                    worthy of condemnation on account of original sin,
writes:                                                                and that no one shall be condemned because of it, but
          Moreover, if we wholly reject every possible                 that all are free from the guilt of original sin. For
       meaning of the statement, Christ died for you, what             this opinion is repugnant to Scripture which teaches
       shall we do with original sin? Christ's death atoned for        that we are by nature children of wrath. Eph. 2:3.
       original sin, that, one sin which is the fountain of all        Here our Canons declare in no uncertain terms
       other sins, that one sin which entered the world, and       that it is the error of the Arminians to teach that
       as Paul teaches, brought death upon all men, that one       Christ bore away the original guilt for all men. They
       sin which is every man's sin. One can, conceivably,
       say that Christ did not die for all the sins of every       call this an error repugnant to the Scriptures. And
       man, but one cannot say - and remain within Biblical        they point out that by nature we are "children of
       teaching - that Christ did not die for that one sin         wrath", according to the Scriptures.
       which is every man's sin. Not every meaning of "for"            But we express that same conviction in our Con-
       can be rejected in the statement, "Christ died for your     fession of Faith, Article 15, which deals with the
       sins."                                                      subject of original sin.
       Here Daane argues that the original sin of Adam                       We believe, that, through the disobedience of Adam,
was imputed to every individual of the human race.                     original sin is extended to all mankind; which is a


                                                     THE STANDARD BEARER                                                          477


   corruption of the whole nature, and an hereditary                   as the result of our fall in Adam our nature has become
   disease, wherewith infants themselves are infected even             so corrupt that we are all conceived and born in sin.
   in their mother's womb, and which produceth in man                  Our Catechism knows nothing of a restraint of sin in
   all sorts of .sin, being in him as a root thereof; and              the heart of the wicked, which enables theunregenerate
   therefore is so vile and abominable in the sight of
   God, that it is sufficient to condemn all mankind. Nor              to bring forth fruits of good works which are pleasing
   is it by any means abolished or done away by baptism;               to God. Infact, our Catechism teaches,the  very-opposite
   since sin always. issues forth from this woeful source,             by maintaining that by nature man is only depraved;
   as water from a fountain;  .notwithstanding it is not               nothing but regeneration can change that.             This is
   imputed to the children of God unto condemnation, but               evident from the next question and answer:
   by his grace and mercy is forgiven them.                                     Question 8.      Are we then so corrupt that we are
   This article' plainly teaches that the original sin of                   wholly incapable of any good, and inclined to all
Adam is "extended to all mankind," and "is sufficient                       wickedness?
to condemn all mankind." It also states that only the                            Answer: Indeed we are; except we are regenerated
children of God are freed from this imputation, for                         by the Spirit of God.
this sin "is not imputed to the children of God unto                        And this is confirmed by such passages of Scripture
,condemnation, but by his (God's) grace and mercy is                   as Gen.  6:5, Job  14:4, Job 15:14, 16, John  3:5, Eph; 2:s.
forgiven them." According to this article Christ did                        It is absolutely true. that Scripture knows but one
not die for all men. He did not remove the original                    grace of God, and that is saving grace. But it is
guilt of Adam from all men. Nor does this article                      absolutely wrong to maintain that this grace applies to
teach a restraint of sin in the heart of the wicked. But               all men.
it tells us that the whole nature is corrupted, and that                    Again, it is true that Christ died for that one sin of
children are already infected with this hereditary                     Adam, so that the original guilt of Adam is borne
disease when they are born. The-first sin of Adam is                   away.      But it is error to teach that Christ bore away
the root of all sin, producing all sorts of sins. It is so             the guilt of all men. Christ is the representative-Head
vile and abominable in the sight of God, that it is                    of His people.          He laid down His life for His sheep.
sufficient to bring God's just condemnation upon all.                  Therefore, as in Adam, all those who are included in
   Our Heidelberg Catechism teaches us the same                        Adam die, so also in Christ, all those who are included
tmth.                                                                  in Christ are made alive again. I Cor.  15:22.
         Question 7. Whence then proceeds this depravity of                 Once more, on the basis of Christ's merit the elect
    human nature?                                                      are saved.           God sees no sin in Jacob and no trans-
         Answer. From the fall and disobedience of our first           gression in Israel. Those in Christ are made alive
   parents, Adam and Eve in paradise; hence our nature                 again. But there is no other merit of the cross. There
    is become so corrupt, that we are all conceived and                is no basis in the accomplished work of Christ for
    born in sin.                                                       some mere improvement in the dead sinner that takes
  Although our Catechism does not speak of original                    place before  .regeneration.       We are by nature dead in
guilt, this is certainly implied. The obvious implica-                 trespasses and sins.           We are in ourselves totally
tion is that the guilt of Adam is the guilt of all his                 d e p r a v e d .
posterity, because he is our representative head. And                       And no preacher may hesitate to say so.





                                        R.C.A. - P.C.Li.S.: PROPOSED MERGER

                                                                (3)

                                                      Rev.  Gi Van  Baven

   We have been viewing the progress of the study                      included three supplements concerned with a study of
committee, called the "Joint Committee of 24," as it                   the similarities and differences of the denominations
has been working in the past years towards a goal of                   involved.       This report was adopted without dissenting
eventual merger of the Reformed Church in America                      vote by the General Assembly of the Presbyterian
and the Presbyterian Church U.S.  (Souther'n).  Last                   Church this past April, and was also adopted by the
time I called attention to their reports to their re-                  General Synod of the Reformed Church by a vote of
spective highest assemblies  .in 1963 and in 1964. This                246 to 16 in its meeting at Buck Hill  Falls,.Pa. on
time I would present the report of this same committee                 June 3 to 9. The quotations which follow come from
to the General Synod and the General Assembly this                     this report as it was printed in the "Handbook of the
past spring.        The report itself is not very  long, but           General Assembly" of the Presbyterian Church, pages


I    478                                                      THESTANDARDBEARER

     131-150.        `The report was kindly sent to me by Dr.                      . ..Both  of our denominations believe in the proc-
     James Millard, Jr., stated clerk of the Presbyterian                    lamation of the whole counsei of God and the faithful
     Churtih.                                                                observ&ce  of the Sacraments. A service of sacred
                                                                             music is no substitute for the preaching of the Word;
     A Comparison of Government and  Organization                            nor do we observe the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper
                                                                             without the sermon. We share a common understanding
            The first supplement of the report is a comparison               .of covenant theology. Children born into a Christian
     of the government and organization `of the two denom-                   home a're baptized in the name of the Triune God, their
     inations.            It compares (a) doctrine, (b) practices in         parents taking  solemn vows to raise them in the nurture
     congregations, (c) offices in the church, (d) ecclesias-                and admbnition  of the Lord. Our two denominations
     tical assemblies.              The study shows considerable             spare no effort to provide the best: possible program  of
     similarity between the two denominations. The Pres-                     Christian Education in the Church School, but the
     byterian Church U.S.  has, as doctrinal standards, the                  primary responsibility rests in the home. Deut. 6:4-7
     Westminster Confession of Faith  (1646) with later                      would be binding upon us all.
     amendments, and the Larger and Shorter Catechisms.                      Concerning the second caregory, dealing with those
     The R.C.A., of course, has the three forms of Unity                  matters which are logical deductions from the teachings
     except for the negative sections of the Canons of Dort.              of Scripture, the statement declares:
     The joint committee is convinced that these various
     creeds express essentially the same doctrinal truths.                         .  ..Both denominations have refused to baptize chil-
            I will not bore the reader with a detailed analysis of           dren indiscriminately. One or both parents must be
     this study.            Members of the two churches involved,            professing Christians.... On this deduction. from the
                                                                             Word of God we are in full agreement. In another area
     however, had better study this report very carefully.                   there is disagreement. The PCUS .& the 1964 General
            There is a second study, or supplement, with the                 Assembly officially approved for the first time the
     report which compares the permanent agencies of the                     ordination of women as Ministers and other officers
     two denominations as far as their structure and func-                   of the Church. After several years of study throughout
     tions are concerned. This part of the report surely                     the Church, this was enacted as a deduction from the
     points out that even though two denominations believe                   teaching of the Bible.         It should be pointed out that
     themselves to be doctrinally one, it is not  a.gimple                   there is conscientious disagreement on this point
     niatter  now of declaring those who were two to be now                  within each denomination, though it has not proved to
     one.        During the period of many years, different                  be sufficiently crucial to disrupt fellowship. Imple-
                                                                             mentation remains in the hands of the local congrega-
     organizations or  c.ommittees  have arisen. The com-                    tion or presbytery, and there  ,is no possibility  iti either
     mittees of one denomination do not have exactly the                     denomination-that this would be changed.
     same duties and functions of an apparently similar
     committee in the other denomination.               If a merger          In the third category of similarities (or differences)
     takes place, an immense amount of effort must be                     are included "what may be called `pious customs,'
     expended in order to integrate  the. various efforts of              which may be very beneficial to spiritual growth but
     the two denominations.                                               which are not binding, no matter how good they may
                                                                          be." Of these, the statement declares:
     Examinationof CevtainPYactices  inthe  PCUSandRCA 1                           . ..There is the requirement in the RCA that the
            A third supplement examines how close  (or far                   major points of doctrine in the Heidelberg Catechism
     apart) the two denominations actually are. The com-                     be &pounded from the pulpit at least: once every four
     mittee maintains that onk must distinguish three                        years. There is no similar requirement in the PCUS.
     categories in considering the different customs and                           Catechetical  in6truction  of children and youth has
     usages within these two denominations.                  The first       gdne through great changes in both denominations under
     category "are those matters that are clearly enjoined                   the pressure of modern times. One of the most signif-
     in the Word of God. There can be no disagreement                        icant- features of the Covenant Life Curriculum in
                                                                             which we are jointly engaged, is the renewed emphasis
     between our two churches at this point, if we are to                    on the catechism. Many churches in the PCUS (though
     continue walking together in ever-deepening fellow-                     not  all by any means) have special classes in  the
     ship." Concerning that first category, the committee                    catechism.      The Board of Christian Education awards
     d e c l a r e s :                                                       a Bible to those who recite the Westminster Shorter

                           RESOL UTION OF SYMPATHY                                          WEDDING ANNNERSARY
     The Ladies' Society of the First Protestant Reformed                 On August 23, 1965 our  p&rents,  Mr. and Mrs. Henry
     Church of Holland, Michigan `herewith expresses its                  Zandstra, celebrated their 25th wedding anniversary.
     deepest sympathy to Mr. and Mrs. B.Windemuller and                   To the covenant Lord we offer prayers of thanksgiving
     family in the recent passing of her mother,
                                             ._                           for our Christian parents. May the Lord bless them
                                                                          in the future and be their guide.
                              MRS. JENNIE KNOLL                                               Mr; and Mrs. Al Buiter
     "Our help is in the- name of the Lord, who made heaven                                   Henry Zandstra
     and earth." Psalm  124:8                                                                 Barbara Zandstra
                                Mrs. Wayne Lanning, Pres.       :                             S h a r o n   Z a n d s t r a
                                Mrs. Joe Van Kampen, Vice-Sec'y.                              Cynthia Zandstra
                                                                                                     two grandchildren


                                                         T!-K$TANDARlJ  BEARER                                                        479


                                                                      "discipline."
     Catechism. Communicants' classes, preparing young                                  It is stated that "both denominations
   people to make their public profession of faith in                 are equally concerned for the purity of life in the con-
    -Christ, vary from six weeks to much longer periods.              gregation." But this does not say much yet. Is dis-
            The PCUS has a carefully defined "Rules of  Dis-          cipline regarded as a matter of pious custom in these
   cipline" which sfates- that "every court should show its           churches - and that is all? That would explain too how
     constant concern that the conduct of members, officers,          that liberal, even modernistic elements exist within
     churches and courts under its care be in accordance              both denominations.
     with the laws of Christ.' . ..Individual  pastors and               The Joint-Committee of 24 presented the following
     elders seek to prepare their people by pastoral counskl-         recommendations at the close of their report, for
     ling, and by public proclamation, for the proper  obser-         adoption by both the General Synod of the Reformed
   Vance  of the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper. It would
     be fair to say that both  denotiinations are equally             Church (adopted 246 to 16) and the General Assembly
     concerned for the purity of life in the congregation.            of the Presbyterian Church (adopted without dissenting
            In the RCA there is the Spring Classical Inquiry at       v o t e ) :
     which time each Minister gives an accounting of his                     Your Committee, after three years of study, explor-
     stewardship. In the PCUS there is the Commission on                  ation, consultation with Boards and Agencies of our
     the `Minister and His Work, which gives oversight in                 respective Churches, and earnest prayer seeking .the
     local situations as needed, and has the power of Pres-            guidance of the Holy Spirit, recommends that the
     bytery. to act within certain clearly specified limits....           General Assembly and General Synod:
            The question of clerical dress is regarded by both               1; instruct the Joint Committee to begin drafting a
     churches as a matter of local custom andfree  decision.              Plan of Union for possible presentation to General
     Concerning the above, a few remarks might be in                      Assembly and General Synod not later than 1968;
                                                                             2. authorize the Joint Committee to  call on persons
 ,order.      Regarding the second category, especially the              from various areas in both communions to assist in
 ordination of women as Ministers, it is stated that this                preparing the first drafts of sections of a Plan of
 is a point of difference between the RCA and the PCUS.                   Union;
 That is true. But it ought to be noted that at its last                     3. and authorize the Committee to circulate to our
 meeting this spring, the General Synod of the Reformed                   Presbyteries and Classes the preliminary draft of
 Church approved the ordination of women elders and                       sections of the plan, requesting that the Presbyteries
 deacons.       If this action receives the approval of two-              and Classes send their suggestions concerning the
thirds of the classes, as it likely will, it will have                   draft to the Joint Committee for their consideration
 become church, law, and the RCA will `have taken                         in'the completion of their assignment.
 definite action to remove this difference between                        One declared that the adoption of the above recom-
 denominations.          I understand that there is also a            mendations did not yet mean that the R.C.A. and the
, document prepared for study in the churches concern-                P.C.U.S. are engaged. True; but their courtship has
 ing the possibility and scriptural basis for the `ordi-              become very serious -leading, it would seem, to a
 nation of women ministers. It is rather interesting,                 firm engagement before or by 1968, with marriage
 or perhaps I should say: shocking, how  .this develops.              shortly thereafter. Members especially of the more
 This is termed one of those "logical deductions"                     conservative  -.element. in the  Refqrmed Church (found
 from Scripture with which it is "possible todisagree."               largely in the mid-west) must be having very serious,
 The Reformed, Calvinistic churches in the past have                  disquieting thoughts about this time concerning where
 strongly, consistently opposed not only women as                     all this will lead them.
 Ministers, but even forbade women to vote within the
 church.        First  .the. barrier against women voting is
 eroded away (only recently the Christian Reformed                                   RESOLUTIONOFSYMPATHY
 Church reversed its former stand and approved woman-                 The Men's Society of Hull Protestant Reformed Church
 suffrage -- though yet maintaining that it is contrary to            expresses its heartfelt sympathy to Mr. Ray Brunsting
  Scripture that women hold offices in  the.church). The              in the death of his father
 next step, inevitably, is that women are allowed to
  serve as deacons and even elders (that will also happen                              MR. RALPH BRUNSTING
 in the Christian Reformed  Church[within  the next few               and Mr. Peter Roy Westra in the  death.of  his father
 ~years   y even as it has happened in the Reformed Church
 this summer). The -final step, which has already been                                   ph.  P E T E R   WESTRA
 taken by most major denominations of our land, is that               "In God is my salvation and my glory; the rock of my
 women are  ordined  as Ministers of the Word.                        strength, and my refuge, is in God."
     In the third category there are also questions which                                         _.    Rev. J.  Kortering,  Pres.
 ought to be raised. This includes "pious customs"                                                      Egbert Gritter, Sec'y.
 which are not to be binding in  thechurch. Catechetical
  instruction is included in that list. Does the committee
 mean that this catechetical instruction is one of the                    "AS in war, as the  arts- of battery and methods of
  "pious customs" not to be binding-(that appears to me               destruction do increase, so  also,doth skill in fortifica-
 to be the idea of the committee), or that the  mc+wiaZ               tion; so-in the Church, God still bestoweth gifts for-the
  of instruction can and, does vary from church to church?            further explication of truth."
     In this same category is placed the matter. of                                                                        - -Selected


                                                    de..-                                -___~-      ----   _   ~~~.~_   .~--
                                                      ,..
480                                                          THESTANDARDBEARER


                                       ?@kUd?Wbbu~
                                       ("AU the saints salute thee . . ." Phil. 4:21)

       Candidate Robert Decker is considering two calls:                      faithful servant's "Coronation Day"  ,is rapidly ap-
one from Lynden, Wash., and the other from  Doon,                             proaching.
Iowa.                                                                                                          * *  *
       Rev. G. Van  Baren;  of Randolph, Wis., accepted                            Loveland's people held a Dedication Service Wed-
the call he had from First Church in Grand Rapids.                            nesday, July 21, dedicating their new church edifice
                            *  * *                                            to the service of God and to His glory. Rev. G. Lubbers,
       The Reformed Witness Hour features Rev. H.  Veld-                      their former missionary-pastor, was the principal
man for August 29 through Sept. 19. The topics are:                           speaker.      His topic was: "Sanctified by the Word and
Aug. 19  - "God's Particular Love;" Sept. 5  I- "God's                        Prayer." The programincluded a vocal duet by Marilyn
Particular Election;" Sept. 12  - "Christ's Particular                        and Phyliss Schwarz; instrumental numbers by Marilyn
Atonement; " Sept. 19 -- "God's Particular Salvation."                        Schwarz and by Mrs. Dennis Gleason; singing by the con-
Copies of these "particular" sermons may be had by                            gregation (including a German song, "Veil ich Jesu
writing to the Reformed Witness Hour, P.O. Box 1230,                          schaeflein bin"); and a film recording the progress of
Grand Rapids, 1, Mich.                                                        the construction of the building by Mr. Ray Ezinga,
                            * *  *                                            the contractor-builder. The offering taken was ear-
       Rev. H. Hank0  preached his farewell sermon in Doon                    marked for the organ fund.                   Rev. Engelsma led in
Aug. 1, and, with his family, enjoyed a farewell party                        opening devotions and gave a short address, and Mr.
Aug. 2; and moved into his father's last parsonage at                         G. Huber led in closing prayer. After the program the
1221 Bates St., Grand Rapids,  Mich. His family will                          entire company was served refreshments by the ladies.
reside there untii a suitable home may be located and                                                          * * *
purchased.      Professor-elect Hanko will be installed in
his new office, D.V., Sept. 9, in First Church of Grand                            From Redlands, Calif.,  we learn that Mrs. C. Hankc
Rapids, with- Prof. H.C. Hoeksema preaching the ser-                          is steadily improving. She attends church regularly,
mon and Rev. G. Lubbers reading the Form for Instal-                          walks with the aid of a cane, and is slowly regaining
lation, under the supervision of First Church's  Con-                         her faculty of speech. The Ladies' Aid Society gave
sistory.                                                                      a Supper and used that occasion to present Rev. and
                            *a'*                                              Mrs. Hanko with a very generous purse. Rev. Hankc
       Seminarian Dale Kuiper has begun his public career                     wrote in the bulletin, "We keenly feel the strong bond
by "speaking a word of edification" in several of our                         of love that has united us together in the Lord, es-
churches: Oaklawn  - July .25; Southeast in Grand Rapids                      pecially throughout the difficult experiences.of the past
-Aug. 8, and Aug. 15 in First Church's evening                                months.       May the Lord continue to strengthen us in
service.                                                                      love and fellowship together."
                            *  * *                                                                             * *  *
       Southeast and First Churches have both had tele-                            A notice printed in the May 1st issueof the Star&v&
phone-signal-lights installed so that emergency calls                         Bearer   brought some gratifying results from an un-
may  ,be received during services.
                            *  *  *                                           expected quarter. The notice dealt with the Index to
                                                                              the S.B. compiled by Mr. Tom Elzinga, of Holland. A
       The Mission Committee is announcing a "Reforma-                        minister from South Dakota wrote for the index and as
tion Day Rally" to be held in the Civic Auditorium in                         many back copies as Mr. Elzinga could find for him.
Grand Rapids, Oct. 27. The purpose of this Rally will                         Brother Elzinga sent him 171 back copies which were
be to call the children of the Reformation in this Re-                        greatly appreciated by the minister.                 He wrote in
formed community back to the principles of the Ref-
ormation. Under a Steering Committee composed of                              part, "I got the box of magazines you sent me, I could
                                                                              hardly believe my eyes ! God be praised! I'm going to
Rev. M.  Schipper,  Elders H. Ophoff and D. Kooienga,                         be busy catching up on some important reading. I find
a broader committee will formulate and carry out a                            the  Shtird  Beavers  _..very stimulating and edifying,
well planned program that may draw several thousand                           and I've learned a great-deal from them that was never
people from Michigan and northern Illinois who are                            touched upon in my Seminary. I use these magazines
still interested in the Reformed truth. That means our                        and the printed sermons of -the Ref. Witness Hour in
constituency, first of all, and those whom we might in-                       my study constantly. . . . . .  ."
vite with us, and interested ones who respond to the
radio and press advertisements. Further details will                                                           *  *  *
appear in area bulletins and newspapers.                                           Has your family a copy of the 1965 Acts of Synod?
                           * * *                                              Every one will want this valuable booklet which con-
       Rev. H. Hoeksema's condition is steadily worsening                     tains decisions of tremendous significance to all our
due to intermittent slight strokes. At this writing he                        churches.      Ask your pastor or clerk for your copy for
is but semi-conscious, showing little or no response                          which you only have to pay $1.00.
to efforts to arouse him. It begins to look like this                              . . . .see you in church.                            J.M.F.


