Everybody Talkin’ ‘Bout Love Ain’t Lovin’

Olive Wilkinson. Trowel and Sword. November 1971

Preamble: What is love? There are times when I/we think we know exactly what love is and other times when I/we haven’t got the faintest idea. Case in point – a man who might say to his wife (or vice versa), “I love you but I don’t like you much right now”. How is that even possible? It probably isn’t possible if your only idea of love is warm fuzzy feelings for your partner. When those warm fuzzy feelings subside, so does your love. But is that all there is to love? Olive Wilkinson says no. There is so much more. In this article she sets out to explore the differences between ‘maternal’ and ‘paternal’ love. Read on.

Everybody Talkin’ ‘Bout Love Ain’t Lovin’

One almost fears to talk about that greatly-bandied-about word “love”, for most of us have become so familiar with it, switch off, or at best, nod intellectual assent when we hear it. In some of the churches, the whole message of “love” has become rather sickly and one suspects that many people who are earnestly urging “love and relationship” are perhaps not so good at lovin’as they sound (myself, included). Seriously, though, the more we are urged along the road of love, the more Studdert Kennedy’s words come to mind; “Weak tea, cold slops, cold leg of lamb without mint sauce!”

Why is it that the word which Jesus used in the second commandment has somehow lost its strength? R.L. Katz clarifies what has been happening in modern religion in these words; “There is in tradition an emphasis on the value of unconditional love, of support and of consolation. These values which might be called maternal are closely linked with the care of the sick, the protection of the weak and the indulgence of the dependent. But religion speaks of a parallel set of values which might be called paternal. These deal with the life of the individual in the community, with his responsibilities, his relationships and his commitments”. The maternal view of love appears to be emphasised in present religion at the expense of the paternal view. Parents know that both have to be present in the training of children. Without the basic needs for love and dependence having been met, the basis of personality is missing; but on the other hand, without the teaching of responsibility and all that that involves we get a personality which is characterised by ego-centricity and self-indulgence.

Taking up Katz’s comments on the need for paternal love to be restored to its rightful place in life and living, O. Hobart Mower, a psychologist who has gained renown through his emphasising the aspect of moral responsibility in personality growth and relationships, adds that he is convinced that “the typical ‘neurotic’ of today, (and let’s face it, we all have our own peculiar neurosis) is not so much in need of unconditional motherly love and acceptance, as of a clearer sense of duty and obligation, which is a way of manifesting love – and, ultimately, receiving it in the only mature way possible, which is to say, by deserving it.” These are strong words and perhaps better applied and appropriated to ourselves than to the other person if we are to avoid the pitfall of becoming judgemental or unloving. As soon as I say that, I want to qualify it, too, by adding that sometimes we insult our friends by not expecting enough of them, by being too accepting!

Within the Christian circle there are many of us who are having real troubles about being loving. Perhaps it is not overstating the case to say that as a fellowship we reflect in our interchange with one another the same kind of conflicts and difficulties we have about being “loving in every other aspect of life. Here, we cannot avoid looking at the quality of our home life, for the things that happen there will colour every other part of our life and living; in fact our family life has a direct bearing on the family life of the Church. .. (No wonder that fellowships are such mixed affairs!).

Granted that maternal love must pervade the family, let us have a fresh look at those values which Katz says belong to the realm of paternal love; responsibility, relationship and commitment, as they are seen in family life. A stock-taking inventory for the family, based on these values might read something like this: “How much trouble do I really take to know and reach out to my partner?” How much do I really care about his or her personality and spiritual growth?”; “Do I help or hinder?”; “Does our love spill over in mutual concern for the children?”; “Are the children safe in our love or have they an uneasy feeling that all is not well?” “Does our home welcome others, reach out in fellowship to other married couples, singles, children?” It’s so easy to be self-contained: “Us four, no more, close the door!”

Because I believe that Christian Fellowship is based on what happens in our more intimate family relationships and the maternal and paternal aspects of love expressed there, let us look at what happens between husband and wife and parents and children. It is not uncommon that even in Christian homes husband and wife have ceased to have any real enjoyment in each other. The spontaneous giving and sharing of early marriage has been replaced by separateness. Perhaps there have been times of disagreement where hurt feelings have been dealt with by withdrawal, or by increased criticism, both ways of erecting protective barriers and setting up walls of separation. The only way of breaking down the walls is to courageously lower the defences. Jesus said, “Give and it shall be given unto you”. This paradox is set firmly in the centre of every vital relationship.

Cecil Osborne in “The Art of Understanding Your Mate”, says that we all carry over immature longings from our childhood. He lists these longings as, 

(a) A conscious or unconscious desire to have all of our needs met; 

(b) We want to control or change those about us so that they will meet these needs; 

(c) We all yearn for unconditional love. 

He maintains that a marriage can only be successful in so far as we replace these immature desires with more adult attitudes. These are:

(a) Instead of demanding that all of my needs be met, I will seek to meet the valid needs of my marriage partner. (For instance, a woman needs to be reassured freely that she is loved and valued for herself, and time and trouble must be taken to translate these sentiments into making the routine and isolation of the daily housework a little lighter. What about a meal out, sometimes? It only makes you appreciate her cooking more! A man, just as much as a woman, needs to be built up as a person of worth, to be shown consideration, too. Neither party ever appreciates criticism!);

(b) Rather than trying to change others, I will recognise that I cannot change anyone else. I can change only myself, and when I change, others tend – in time – to change in relation to me!

(c) Instead of expecting unconditional love, I will face the fact that no one can give this kind of limitless love consistently. I will love rather than demand or expect it, believing that love begets love. Here, I would like to say that acting in a loving way often precedes feeling loving. Don’t wait until you feel loving or you may never get started!

It sounds simple, doesn’t it? All it needs is the will and commitment and a bit of help from your partner!

Some of us are just learning what real loving involves; others of us have come through many ups and downs but have won through to a deep contentment and enjoyment of each other. Could those who are more experienced share with the less experienced? It always helps a fellowship when its members can share with each other out of the depths of their experience.

Ultimately, as Christians, we have a great High Priest who has Himself been touched by the feelings of our infirmities and knows how frail we are; yet, He stands as the great example of disciplined, sacrificial loving and we are called to follow in His steps. There is nothing weak about His love; it is characterised by unwavering responsibility and commitment. It is from His example that we must learn to help each other.

OLIVE WILKINSON*

*Olive Wilkinson was the wife of Tom Wilkinson, professor at the Reformed Theological College for 17 years. Olive worked as a counsellor and regularly lectured students at RTC on psychology, mental health and welfare, relationships and pastoral counselling.

We look forward to receiving feedback about any of our posts. We also encourage you to share our posts with family, friends and acquaintances; in fact anyone you think may appreciate and/or benefit from the knowledge and wisdom handed down to us from the past.   To view previous posts visit our website at www.tsrevisited.com

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The Rev Aubrey P.F. Hoffman

13 July, 1955 – 21 December, 1988

Peter G. van Dam, Trowel & Sword. Jan/Feb 1989
With contributions by Willem Schultink & Jessamine Remminga (nee Schultink)

Preamble: What do you do when your best friend is killed in a traffic accident? When your daughter just survives the accident? When they are on the road to doing God’s work in this world. Aubrey Hoffman was good man who loved the Lord with his whole heart and gave all his energy to bringing God’s Word to people. Both those who already knew, and those who needed to hear. When this accident happened, he was on the way to Manjimup with some young people from our church for a letter box drop. My daughter, one of the young people in the car, has written some closing thoughts. They are at the end of this article. All of it is well worth your time to read. (Willem) 

The Rev Aubrey P.F. Hoffman

Silence fell upon our churches here in Western Australia and then also upon all our churches in Australia, when word reached them that the Rev Aubrey Hoffman and two young people of the Brunswick Junction Church had died in a traffic accident, on 21 December.

Mr. Hoffman and five young people of the Church had gone on their way to distribute pamphlets in Manjimup, 100 km south of Brunswick Junction, to invite people of the town to join in the Christmas service which he would conduct there with the members of the church and regular visitors in the area, for whom he had been conducting their twice-monthly Sunday worship service during the past two years. While travelling south, a truck moved out of a side road without giving any attention at all to possible traffic on the highway. A collision was unavoidable. Upon impact Mr. Hoffman and two of the young people, Hagar Carelse (22) and her brother Mark (14), must have died instantly before the mini-bus, in which they were travelling, burst into flames.

Hagar and Mark were the only two of the five children of Mr. and Mrs. Carelse who had come with them from South Africa when Mr. Carelse took up the position of principal of the small ‘Unity Christian School’ at Brunswick Junction which had been set up by the members of the church. A couple who had been driving behind the mini-bus helped the other three young people escape. Two of them are in hospital as they suffered from internal bleeding and cracked vertebrae: Jessie Schultink and Ida van Zonneveld. Marit Noordermeer was the only passenger who attended the funeral service.

Thus far the Lord has given Sister Hoffman extraordinary strength and courage. We were relieved to hear that her parents would come over the following day. For Mr. Hoffman Sr., Rev. Aubrey Hoffman’s father who had come over from Sri Lanka about two years ago to stay with his son and family, the event was tragic in deed; his son died on exactly the same day on which his wife had died five years ago. Our thoughts have gone to Mr. and Mrs. Carelse no less, in their distress; their other children being so far away.

Following the completion of his studies at the Reformed Theological College at the end of 1979 it took almost four years before the Lord called Brother Hoffman to the ministry of His Word. He was ordained in this His holy office in the Brunswick Junction Church, on 26 February, 1984. At that time the Brunswick Junction Church had been vacant for eight years as it had not been in a position to call a minister. When the Classis granted Brunswick Junction permission to call a minister it at the same time committed itself to assisting the Church in its support of a minister. However, as Mr. Hoffman continued his ministry with the church the moment arrived when it informed the Classis that it was no longer in need of its assistance.

Among the ways – besides those in his own church – in which the Lord had blessed Brother Hoffman’s ministry were those of the organisation of – and the ministry of the Word to – a group of former church members and other christians in Manjimup. He led them in their twice monthly worship services. Just very recently the decision was made that, beginning with the new year, worship services would be held every Sunday in Manjimup. During more recent years Mr Hoffman had taken on an active interest in the spiritual needs of students at the West-Australian College of Advanced Education, Bunbury Campus. Meantime, he had also endeavoured to come closer to the Aboriginal community in Brunswick Junction with which members of the church had already had contacts for many years. For the past two years the Rev. Hoffman had also served as the chairman of the State Youth Council of our WA Churches.

Perhaps there was no more convincing testimony to the way the Lord had used Brother Hoffman in the ministry of His Word than that of the very, very many who attended the funeral ‘Thanksgiving Service’, held on 30 December at the Brunswick Junction Church. More than two hundred people attended; far more than the church building could accommodate. Among them were many members of the Perth Churches and of Manjimup, people from other places such as Bridgetown, many residents of Brunswick Junction, students of the WACAE. And many aborigines.

In conducting the funeral service, Rev. S. Bajema preached on the well-known opening words of Psalm 91; words so full of truth and comfort:
‘He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High 
will rest in the shadow of the Almighty. 
I will say of the Lord, ‘He is my Refuge
and my Fortress; my God in Whom I trust.’

It is a text often read also at the close of another year or at the beginning of a new year!
A word was conveyed prepared by the Synodical Interim Committee on behalf of all the churches of our denomination. Sister Hoffman had prepared a very gracious response, inserted in the order of service, to the very many who had been supporting her. In her response she wrote:  ‘Aubrey would want the Brunswick congregation to remember these thoughts: ‘Don’t be fainthearted or afraid” (Deut.20:3);’ , those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength’ (Isa.40:31); ‘Finally, be strong in the Lord and in His mighty power’ (Eph.6:10).

She wanted the comfort of the Lord, once expressed by her husband when he wrote in the local paper on Psalm 23, to reach Mr and Mrs Carelse. And all of us. Brother Hoffman had also been very close to his colleagues in the small Classis of WA. More importantly at this time: the whole of the Brunswick Junction Church, all of its members, rallied round Sister Hoffman and the family, Brother Hoffman, Snr. and Brother and Sister Carelse. At the funeral service all present knew and experienced the blessing of the truth of Psalm 133: ‘How good and pleasant it is when brothers live together in unity …; for there the Lord be stows His blessing, even life for evermore’.

For, yes, at that service it was so evident beyond doubt that the Lord had taken from us those who had become dear to us who had known them. The memory we have of them will not fade easily.May the Lord then, by His own Word and Spirit, keep, guide and encourage Sister Hoffman in her care for the four children He had given our brother and sister, their ages ranging from six years to three months. They will move to Melbourne where Sister Hoffman’s relatives live. And where the body of Mr Hoffman will be committed to the earth.

May He keep Brother Hoffman, Sr. close to Himself.
May He continue to comfort Brother and Sister Carelse in the sudden stillness of their home.
May the Lord continue to show His love for the Brunswick Junction Church; prove and confirm unto her the blessings of the work which He had granted his loyal servant to do in her midst and with her support and whom He has now taken to higher service. May He Himself provide in the need for the Church of the continuation of the ministry of His Word.

On behalf of the Churches of Classis Western Australia.

Peter G.van Dam

My Grace Is Sufficient For You

Willem Schultink. Trowel & Sword. Jan/Feb 1989

Why?
That burning question. 
Why?

Aubrey.
My Brother.
I loved you dearly,
As my brother in the Lord.

We could uphold each other,
Build each other.
Share our joys.
And our sorrows.

Care for each other,
In the hard times.
Really Rejoice
In God’s blessings.

We had so many plans
So many things we
Were going to achieve together.
So much to do.

Now you are gone.
Why, dear Lord?
‘My grace is sufficient for you.’
Always.

27 December 1988.

Reflection by Jess Remminga (Schultink)

Any time is a bad time for a car accident, but I’d hazard a guess that just before Christmas is a particularly bad time for anyone. I was 13 when my pastor and two young people were killed as we were travelling for our church’s Christmas letter box drops. Chatting with the girls in the seat behind, all I remember was Aubrey’s shout, “Look out!”, a great swerve as I caught one glance of an ancient, faded blue-green Dodge truck before a horrendous crunch, and black, and fire. Then I was sitting on the side of the road, on a towel, in the gravel, with a trail of water running by, hearing explosions. A passer-by had gone into the burning wreck and pulled us out. 

The ripples ran wide. 
A church had lost its pastor. 
A wife, her husband. 
Four little children, one just a new baby, their dad. 
Parents, their children. 
A man, his best friend. 
And me? That single event has been the pivot point of my life. 
Before: A golden childhood, a simple faith, and a God who kept me safe. 
After: Long years of working out how a good God could allow such suffering. 
It felt like a slap in the face. 
Yet….he’s not a tame Lion.

The survivor guilt and the ‘what-ifs’ were bad. 
We had just stopped and swapped seats. I had been in the front. If we hadn’t Mark would have made it and I would have died. 
Hagar was right beside me. Death literally touched me as we were thrown about the car.
If we hadn’t stopped, or if we had stopped a little longer, would it have even happened? Would we have completely missed that truck pulling out when it did? 
Would those little children still have their daddy?
What was it like for my mum, fielding the first phone call (in the days before mobile phones) from a country hospital and hearing her daughter in tears on the end of the line; knowing it was bad and going straight to be with Debbie when the police came knocking. 

Nearly 38 years on, (yes, still counting, I think I always will) I still don’t understand why God allowed this great grief. It doesn’t seem to make sense this side of eternity.
I do know that I have been grown by this long, unfinished, wrestle with God. I understand Job better now, though it has taken a long time. 
I understand from the inside the grief that cries out AND the faith that holds on. 

There is a Love that will not let you go. 
There is a warm Presence who walks beside you through the dark night.
And in the blackest darkness there is a voice that whispers, “Courage, dear heart”.

For those who are suffering and it doesn’t make sense – it’s okay to question God. It’s okay to throw big emotions at him. 
He can handle it.
You can trust him to hold you even when you’re devastated and angry and in despair. 

Why?

Because ‘the eternal God is your refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms.”

So I say with Job:
“I know that my Redeemer lives, 
and in the end he will stand upon the earth, 
and after my skin has been destroyed,
yet in my flesh I will see God. 
I, and not another. 
How my heart yearns within me.”

And I hold onto the promise that one day he will 
‘wipe every tear from our eyes. 
There will be no more death, or mourning or crying or pain, 
for the old order of things [will have] passed away. 
Behold, he is making all things new… 
… these words are trustworthy and true.’

Jessamine Remminga
July 2026

PS. Life is good, and I am thankful. pastedGraphic.png

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A Tale Of Sheep And Drovers

John Zylstra. Trowel & Sword. March 1987

Preamble: This poetic masterpiece was published in T&S not that long after I started a new job where, on the first day, I was advised by the Foreman not to do any more than the next bloke. It’s funny the things you remember. Has anything really changed in the nearly forty years since? We now live in a time when a man holding a lollypop directing traffic can earn more than a primary school teacher responsible for educating our children. Go figure! Pay particular attention to the last two verses of the poem next time you enter a ballot box to cast a vote. For many years we’ve been sold the pup that church and state should be kept separate. It’s time we stood up and said: NO MORE!!

Back in the eighteen hundreds
When Australia was young.
We had our squatters and our sheep 
And all the work got done.

For a worker was a worker then
And he gladly lent a hand.
For the fortunes that the squatters made 
Were ploughed back into the land.

For they had an ounce of common sense
And were proud to earn their keep.
T’was impossible to lead them on 
Like today’s two legged sheep.

It used to be a privilege
For one to have a part
In building up this country: 
Not tearing it apart.

When mates were mates and men were men. 
It used to be a shame.
To bludge the whole darn day away.
But now it’s just a game.

‘Now listen mate. It isn’t fair
That he’s got more than you.
You sit and bludge’ shop stewards yelp.
‘Until you get it too’.

‘Yeah, sure it’s  hard on poor old Bill
That he can’t get to work:
But any bloke who works that hard 
Is just a bloom’n jerk’.

“You’ve got to think of Number One. 
Remember, blow the rest.
Those over-conscientious blokes 
Are just a bloom’n pest’.

Thus speaks our new philosophy. 
And workers, just like sheep.
While Union Bosses crack The Whip 
Are driven up the creek.

‘I don’t know what you’re thinking mate.
But as for me. I guess
That all this grabbing for one-self
Will cause one stinking mess’.

‘Do unto others as you’d have 
Them doing unto you’.
Is what The Master taught.
And yes, I’m pretty sure its true.

Instead of grabbing what we can
Put God and country first. 
For if we keep this caper up 
We’ll end up much the worst.

John Zylstra

We look forward to receiving feedback about any of our posts. We also encourage you to share our posts with family, friends and acquaintances; in fact anyone you think may appreciate and/or benefit from the knowledge and wisdom handed down to us from the past.   To view previous posts visit our website at www.tsrevisited.com

Comments from last week’s “Kyrie Eleison”

‘I really miss this in worship.
Also remember the psalms. There are some still in the 1990 book of worship, e.g. Psalm 6 “lord chasten not in anger, nor in your wrath rebuke me, give me your healing word..” and Psalm 77 “I cried out to God to help me … day and night I sought in vain, joy for sorrow, ease for pain…”

‘Yesterday I led congregational prayer using the last 6 Lords Day lessons (the Lord’s Prayer) of the Heidelberg Catechism. Many found it refreshing.’

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Kyrie Eleison (Lord, Have Mercy On Us) Contrition in Worship

Bill Deenick. Trowel & Sword. March 1987

Preamble: Background – When the Psalter Hymnal was no longer readily available from the U.S., the decision was made to produce a hymnal for The Australian Church. The first edition of the “Book of Worship”, produced in 1981, consisted of a brown, loose leaf folder containing three separate music sections, Psalms, Hymns and (Spiritual) Songs, as well as sections for Standards and Forms. It is to this book that Rev. Bill Deenick refers when he wrote about the song titled “Kyrie Eleison” in 1987. The final 1990 edition of the “Book of Worship” no longer divided the songs into separate sections and a number of songs from the first edition (including “Kyrie Eleison”) were dropped while others were added. With the advent of overhead projectors and electronic screens, the “Book of Worship” itself has passed into history and it would seem that the choice of music for Worship Services has now fallen to individual churches and their music teams.

Kyrie Eleison (Lord, Have Mercy On Us)

We do not sing it much. I do not remember having sung it even once in church. Yet, it is one of the songs in the Book of Worship (of the Australian Reformed Church);

Song 23. Kyrie Eleison; Lord have mercy on us.

In that particular section of the Book of Worship [‘Songs”] it is the only song in which the Church cries to God for mercy. There are plenty of hallelujahs, praise- the-Lord’s and hosannas in that section. There is also flag waving, clapping and raising of hands, laughing and shouting and dancing in it. But it has only this one cry for mercy; and it is hidden in Greek. Admittedly there is one set of bended knees in Song 10 and in Latin there is a prayer for peace but on the whole the Church singing the songs of this section is a triumphant and happy Church, full of joy, praising the Lord, living for Jesus, born again and with its sins forgiven, sanctified, one in the Spirit, walking hand in hand, sharing in Christ’s victory; and we will know that they are Christians by their love.

Well, is there any thing wrong with being a happy Church? Is it not pleasing to God when we sing cheerful songs of faith and rejoicing? Yes, sure it is; and I am ready to admit that I really love some of the songs in this section, such as the numbers 3 and 7; 20, 43 and 55:1&3.* And many of the others are quite alright too. Some of my grandchildren think that we have killed them by over-use. I have heard them say: “Oh no, not this one again” when a particular song was proposed. But then, they are still quite young. They may not yet appreciate the beauty of repetition!

My experience with Christian people [Reformed or otherwise] is that they are not really such a happy victorious band. The Church as I have come to know it is much more like a miserable, divided crowd of often small-minded and often discontented people;

My problem is a different one. I tend to be very suspicious about all that happy singing around me. To be honest, I am tempted to disbelieve it. I have never had much trouble in believing in the honesty of a man or a woman calling upon God for help, mercy and forgiveness. But when I hear all these triumphant hallelujahs I often feel very uncomfortable. They do not seem fair dinkum: They come too easily, even glibly. My experience with Christian people [Reformed or otherwise] is that they are not really such a happy victorious band. The Church as I have come to know it is much more like a miserable, divided crowd of often small-minded and often discontented people; and only very seldom was it possible to see that they were Christians by their holiness and love. I find that especially true with regard to evangelism. Everybody seems to be talking about church growth these days. Like the Pharisees of old, all Christians are supposed to make a few converts here and there [Matthew 23:15) but when all is said and done the Church as we know it in this country is unbelievably ineffective in its outreach, no matter how many training courses we organise or little books on church growth we read. In real evangelism – making Christ known to a lost nation – the Christian Church in this country is an abysmal failure. Yet, we sing our hallelujahs as if we really shared in the victories of Christ. And when a few souls are won we are so pleased with our little successes that we must report on them as soon and as widely as we can, counting the heads (how many we gained and lost) and making comparisons with others (how many they gained and lost). Forgetting about what we should really do: humble ourselves before God with cries and tears of contrition. Who knows, God may still have mercy on us.

In the Christian Church at worship a few more bended knees, a few more contrite hearts and a few more cries for mercy would seem more believable than the hallelujahs and the praise-the-Lord’s.

Now it could be argued that I have come to this negative view of the Church because I have always mixed with the wrong crowd and worked in the wrong church. But when I hear about their experiences from other Christians at times (when they are honest) and I listen to the testimony of church history I come to the opposite conclusion, viz. that God has rather blessed me in the Christians I met and the churches I worked in. But that does not alter my conclusion that the Lord’s unfavourable assessment of five of the seven churches in Asia Minor (Rev.2 and 3) is still very relevant to most of the Christian Church today, not excluding our own denomination. All these high spirited hosannas are out of character with the Christian reality of the day. In the Christian Church at worship a few more bended knees, a few more contrite hearts and a few more cries for mercy would seem more believable than the hallelujahs and the praise-the-Lord’s. Before too many hands are raised in jubilation, a few more tears of repentance and a few more prayers de profundis [Psalm 130] would not be out of place. After all, only the hallelujahs out of the depths of sorrow and of sins confessed, are truly believable.

I have a great problem on this score. As Christians these days we seem to be able to overlook without too much trouble the almost complete failure of our Christian life and witness in the world. To talk about God’s anger and revulsion at the sins of those who claim to be Christ’s is quite out of fashion. We are forgiven, are we not? We are in Christ, are we not? In our kind of welfare society we are faring very well, thank you, also spiritually. We seem tobe so satisfied with the kind of Christians we are. We do not seem to realise how ‘wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked’ we are (Rev.3:17) and we feel embarrassed and do not know what to say when we happen to meet a Christian who feels totally rotten about his life before the Lord. We will possibly try to assure him that it is not as bad as all that. Once again an incredible bourgeois satisfaction has taken hold of our middle class Christian world; as it often did in the past, e.g. in the days of Kierkegaard.

This is reflected in our Sunday worship. Do you remember the days when the Christian Church dared to pray prayers like this: ‘Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Judge of all men; we acknowledge and bewail our manifold sins and wickedness, which we, from time to time, most grievously have committed by thought, word and deed, against Thy divine Majesty, provoking most justly Thy wrath and indignation against us. We do earnestly repent and are heartily sorry for these our misdoings. The remembrance of them is grievous to us; the burden of them is intolerable. Have mercy upon us. Have mercy upon us, most merciful Father. For Thy Son our Lord Jesus Christ’s sake, forgive us all that is past and grant us that we for ever hereafter serve and please Thee in newness of life…’?  I quote from the Holy Communion liturgy of the Church of England. Such prayers kept the message of sin and forgiveness alive in the English Church even in its darkest days. But I could have quoted from the Prayers of the continental Reformed Church as well: “O eternal God and merciful Father, we humble ourselves before Thy great majesty, against which we have frequently and grievously sinned. We acknowledge that if

Thou shouldst enter into judgement with us, we would deserve nothing but eternal death. We are deeply conscious of the fact that on account of our original sin we are unclean before Thee and children of wrath. Since we are conceived and born in sin all manner of evil desire against Thee and our neighbour fill our soul. We continually transgress Thy commandments, failing to do what Thou has commanded and doing that which Thou hast expressly forbidden. We all like sheep have gone astray. We have turned everyone to his own way. We acknowledge our waywardness and are heartily sorry for all our sins. We confess to our humiliation and to the praise of Thy mercy that our transgressions are innumerable, and that our debt is so great that we cannot even begin to repay. We are not worthy to be called Thy children nor to lift up our eyes heavenward to Thee in prayer. Nevertheless, O Lord and gracious Father . . . etc.”

Thus the Christian Church confessed its sins in years past. You can still find such prayers in the back of the Psalter Hymnal. If we compare this language with that of the liturgical forms now proposed, and accepted by the Australian Reformed Church Synod (1985])for provisional use, we seem to enter a totally different world, not only language-wise but also content-wise. I could illustrate that from practically each of the now suggested forms.

Do you remember that in the past we asked parents at the baptism of their child: ‘Do you confess that our children, though conceived and born in sin and therefore subject to all manner of misery, yea to condemnation itself, are sanctified in Christ and therefore as members of His Church ought to be baptised?’ Later we had a ‘Grey Book’, provisionally adopted. In it we were told to ask parents: ‘Do you believe that our children are born with sinful hearts and yet are holy in Christ and therefore as members of His Church ought to be baptised?’ Then we had a ‘Blue Book’ provisionally adopted. The questions changed again and we asked, more in line with the old form: ‘Do you confess that our children, though sinful by nature right from the beginning of their lives, and consequently deserving of God’s judgement and even of eternal death, are by His mercy holy in Christ…?’ But now the questions have changed again (all within a period of 15 years; the earlier forms lasted four hundred years) and we are instructed to ask: ‘Do you believe that your child though sinful by nature, is received by God in Christ as a member of His covenant…?’ That is all: sinful by nature. How sinful by nature, just a little or a great deal, we leave that up in the air. In the original form we had a Reformational question. With our present question any semi-Pelagian could wholeheartedly agree. Sin has been played down and we do not talk about condemnation or judgement.

We could also have a look at the now proposed forms for the celebration of the Holy Supper. It is good that we do that. Synod 1985 encouraged us all to study the Liturgy Report and to discuss ti widely in the churches. That includes T&S, I am sure.

In past centuries the Holy Supper liturgy always included what the Presbyterians called a ‘fencing of the Table’, in which unrepentant sinners were warned to repent and to turn to the Lord before partaking in the Supper. In recent years this warning has still been retained in what we call the exhortation before the Supper, to be read on the Sunday before. The exhortation now proposed still has that one sentence of prohibition: the Table of the Lord is not open, however, to those who wilfully and unrepentantly live in sin. We urge them to seek – or rediscover – the abundant grace of God’

But what about the new forms for the celebration of the Supper? Do they still ‘fence the Table’; do they still reckon with unbelievers and unrepentant sinners who might possibly be present in the church and who could ‘eat and drink judgment’ on themselves? No, they do not. With not one word is anyone discouraged from taking part because of unbelief or unconfessed sin. Even the words of Paul in 1Cor.11, which throughout the ages have been part of the Christian Church’s Supper liturgy are not worthy of inclusion in the now proposed forms. The rationale behind it is, no doubt, that a positive invitation to repentant sinners should suffice. But why should we be wiser than the Lord himself and his apostles? His words are full of warning; and it is not only in 1Cor.11 that Paul tells us about all the sinners who have no part in the Kingdom of God’s grace. We read about it also in Galatians: I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the Kingdom of God! That was written to the Christian communities in the province of Galatia.

If the Reformed Church is not to be a sect but an ecclesia in the N.T. sense it needs to hear before its Holy Supper celebrations that no one can run off with someone else’s wife or live in the sins of tax evasion, gambling or quarrelling and still have part in the Kingdom of God.

From the apostle’s example we learn that we cannot presume everyone in the Church to be among the elect, a born-again believer living a sanctified life. Such a distorted view of the Church has sectarian but no biblical credentials. The Church of Jesus is not a friendly society of nice, like-minded and morally living Christian people with loveable children. In the Church, as the people of God, there are among us rebels and hypocrites; there are goats among the sheep and tares among the wheat. If the Reformed Church is not to be a sect but an ecclesia in the N.T. sense it needs to hear before its Holy Supper celebrations that no one can run off with someone else’s wife or live in the sins of tax evasion, gambling or quarrelling and still have part in the Kingdom of God.

Do you remember the old form that served us for four hundred years? It is still in the Psalter Hymnal. Read it once more. But you have to hurry; it is not likely to be incorporated in the new Book of Worship. When we still knew that the Reformed Church was not a sect but a Church, we read: *wherefore also, according to the command of Christ and of the apostle Paul, we admonish those who know themselves to be defiled with the following gross sins to abstain from the Table of the Lord; and declare to them that they have no part in the Kingdom of Christ; such as all idolators. all despisers of God and of His Word, and of the holy sacraments; all blasphemers…all who seek to raise discord, sects and mutiny in Church or State; all perjurers… quarrelsome persons… all adulterers… gamblers, covetous persons, and all who live offensive lives. All these, while they continue in such sins, shall abstain from this food which Christ has appointed only for his believers, lest their judgment and condemnation be made the heavier.” And then, of course, followed the delightful passage in which the invitation came to the “contrite hearts of the believers” who are “by the grace of the Holy Spirit heartily sorry” for their sins.

It pains me to think that there are young ministers in our church who have never read that form for their congregation; and possibly never even have heard it being read.

Now, I have quoted this from the continental liturgical forms of the Reformation period, but I could have quoted also the Book of Common Prayer of the English

Church. Please, check it for once, in the form for the Holy Communion.

One more point: the now proposed forms for profession of faith and adult baptism. Notice the questions asked and the statements expected from the candidates for baptism and confirmation. The form for adult baptism includes a straightforward confession of sins, as does one of the four (only one of the four) Holy Supper forms; however, such confession may have been included earlier in the service. But then the questions and the statements; especially the statements. The candidate assures us: “I profess… I want to follow and serve… I believe… / trust….. I continue to turn from my rebellion.. with repentance… I believe… I accept… I promise… I join..” in short a statement of good intentions, excellent intentions; and there is repentance of rebellion. All of that is nice enough. But again, where is the typical Reformation emphasis? Any semi-Pelagian could answer questions and make statements like these. In the questions we used in the past (which were introduced only at the start of this century) there was at least still: “do you abhor yourself and humble yourself before God because of your sins and do you seek your life not in yourself but only in Jesus Christ your Saviour?”

Throughout the history of Christianity the spiritual life of mature believers has been characterised by a deep and humble recognition not only of their creaturely insignificance but especially of their total original lostness in sin and of their abiding helplessness and unworthiness before God. The OT Psalms are full of it and so is the Book of Job. The Lord Jesus gave expression to it in his parables and miracles. He surrounded himself not with the nice people of his day but with the morally and spiritually down-and-out. In Jesus’ days the Pharisees were the praise-the-Lord party. Their hallelujahs resounded through the temple. They rejoiced no end about being Abraham’s children. Jerusalem, the golden! The temple, the temple is here! Hosanna in the highest! But it was the publican who went down to his house justified. Jesus said. Only “de profundis” is there hope”. Out of the depths I cry, o Lord, to Thee.”

Have we become a consumers’ church in which grace is readily available over the counter in neat little packages?

Have we become a consumers’ church in which grace is readily available over the counter in neat little packages? 

In short, and putting it in historical terms: surrounded by a Christian world of spirituality on-the-cheap, could we not have a little more Augustinianism, even Jansenism, in Reformed worship? 

In Eastern Orthodoxy the hallelujah of the “Christ has risen indeed” is properly counter-balanced by the humbling “Jesus Prayer”, “Lord Jesus, Son of God, have mercy on us, Sinners”. Kyrie Eleison.

Bill Deenick

*Songs referred to:
3 – Be Still And Know That I Am God
7 – Surely Goodness And Mercy
20 – Therefore The Redeemed
43 – Thy Loving Kindness
55 – Because He Lives (verses 1 and 3)
also 10 – They That Wait Upon The Lord

(Bill Deenick is a Retired Minister since 1983. He has served Reformed Churches in New Zealand, N,S.W., Vic. and S.A. For many years he has been Editor of Trowel and Sword and is still a regular contributor).

We look forward to receiving feedback about any of our posts. We also encourage you to share our posts with family, friends and acquaintances; in fact anyone you think may appreciate and/or benefit from the knowledge and wisdom handed down to us from the past.   To view previous posts visit our website at www.tsrevisited.com

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Australia – Mission Accomplished?

George Van Groningen. Trowel & Sword. Jan/Feb 1987

Preamble: The author, Dr. George Van Groningen served the R.C.A. (now C.R.C.A) and R.T.C. from 1958-1971, after which he and his family returned to the U.S. During 1986 he returned to Australia to lecture in Old Testament at the R.T.C. The following article was written by Dr. Van Groningen for an American readership, but was reprinted in T&S with the expectation that readers would be interested to read it, as an insight into how Americans viewed the progress of the Reformed Churches in Australia. He also gave an insight to the challenges still facing the Reformed Churches at that time; in particular the development of Christian tertiary education, a subject that was close to his heart. Another forty years down the track, how many of these challenges still remain, and what new challenges have arisen in the interim?

Australia – Mission Accomplished?

Forty years ago the first immigrants from The Netherlands arrived in Australia. For ten years there was a steady stream of new arrivals; since then it has become a trickle. Among these immigrants were a number of people who held to their Reformed convictions; they had difficulty worshipping and identifying with the various churches in Australia. They began to gather and worship separately. Thus the Reformed churches, a sister denomination of the Christian Reformed church, was begun.

The first congregations formed called pastors from the Netherlands. An appeal in 1957 to the Christian Reformed churches (in the USA) for ministerial help was fruitful. Three ministers and an evangelist arrived in Australia by 1960. We, the Van Groningens, were the first of these to arrive in 1958; we lived, worked and worshipped with the Reformed churches for thirteen years.

When we arrived there were fourteen congregations, some of these worshipped in two or three separate places; in time, most of these became separate congregations. Today there are forty congregations; some of these are sponsoring an outreach program with the hope of establishing more independent congregations.

During the year 1986, we assisted as a part-time volunteer lecturer in Old Testament studies in the Reformed Theological College – an institution we had helped to develop. Our lengthy visit gave us an opportunity to make some observations.

There have been changes. The Australian population increased from 13,000,000 to 16,500,000. But the general religious attitudes have not. A recent study by professors at Monash University reported the following results after surveying people from all walks of life. 87% of the people identify with some denomination and say they believe in God; but 57% consider themselves religious. While 67% said they pray or contemplate at times less than 30% attend worship services, some of these only once or twice a month. Mainline city churches were found to be almost empty on a given Sunday morning while middle-class suburban churches, often of an “ethnic” or “non mainline” type were filled. The greatest percentage of atheists, some of whom were outspokenly antagonistic to any religion, were members of the political Labor Party. The present prime minister, of the Labor Party, claims to be an agnostic atheist.

Changes in society and culture are evident. As in other countries the church has to face issues such as abortion, adulterous life styles, biological/genetic technological experimentation, divorce, euthanasia, homosexuality, use of nuclear power and weapons, radical feminism and radical socialistic and communistic ideologies.

The tremendous increase in affluence in the past fifteen years is obvious. New homes, late model cars and 4-wheel drive vehicles; new supermarkets and huge department stores; four lane highways and extended freeways; long vacation periods and numerous holiday houses.

Church life has changed. Efforts in ecumenicity resulted in the Congregational, Methodist and some Presbyterians forming the Uniting church. Presbyterian bodies increased in number; formerly there were three, now there are the Continuing Presbyterian, Evangelical Presbyterian, Free Presbyterian, Presbyterian Reformed, Reformed Presbyterian and Westminster Presbyterian. The Reformed Churches’ relationship to these is varied.

Worship services in the Reformed churches were quite uniform originally; now a great degree of variety and casualness has been introduced. Most of the ministers are young compared to the older migrant pastors of former decades. Of the fifty active pastors, professors, missionaries, forty have received their training at the Reformed Theological College.

It was a blessed experience to listen to former catechumens preach; to have former students as professorial colleagues and to see 12 year old cadets of years ago serve as office bearers in the church.

An increased awareness to reach out by means of evangelism, diaconal work/assisted by care groups and church planting is evident. Some folk of non-Dutch origins are active in the churches and some new ones affiliate each year.

One of the greatest changes has taken place in Christian youth work and education. Youth organisations, including Cadets and Calvinettes introduced from the CRC, have developed and their facilities improved. In the 1960s there were four or five Christian day schools, now the NUCS – CSI related number over forty. The acquiring of enough Christian teachers adhering to Reformed views is very difficult.

The Reformed churches are confronted by great challenges. Each area of change mentioned above presents ongoing challenges. The penetration of Australian society and culture at all levels of life with the gospel is very necessary. The uniting of forces by those adhering to Reformed confessions and principles of life should be a high priority.

The development of tertiary education is a prime requirement; ministers, missionaries and teachers for Christian schools must be trained but also people entering other vocations and professions should be prepared to serve as Christ’s representatives in their respective areas. There is a great need to foster a deep and abiding loyalty to the Reformed confessions and the working out of the meaning of these for all of life in terms of contemporary issues and by ways that meet the unique pressures of modern social life. Constant efforts must be made to remove the sources of tension within the Reformed Churches so that an effective and united witness will go out.

During the course of the school year we heard repeated expressions of gratitude for what the Christian Reformed Church has done in helping the Reformed Churches during their first forty years. Assistance was provided by supplying pastors, evangelists, teachers and funds for the Theological Student Aid Fund. With aid from the home office in Chicago, the Back to God Hour began to be broadcast. The Cadet and Calvinette organisations and materials were adopted and adapted. Christian schools and the World Home Bible league here received much encouragement.

The time for giving direct assistance has gone. An exception could be made in regard to an occasional guest lecturer at the Theological College. Other causes such as the Back to God Hour might need a boost. The Reformed churches are “coming of age”. Young vigorous leadership has been prepared and is taking shape. It is for the Christian Reformed Church now to demonstrate its readiness to be a model in Reformed believing, communication, life and service. It is for us to be a faithful supporting and encouraging sister church and to continue to share in mutual blessings.

Finally, to sum up our observations: the Christian Reformed Church’s mission to Australia is accomplished. Now is the time to stand shoulder to shoulder to carry out the mandate Christ has given His Church in the world of the 1980s and 1990s.

George Van Groningen

We look forward to receiving feedback about any of our posts. We also encourage you to share our posts with family, friends and acquaintances; in fact anyone you think may appreciate and/or benefit from the knowledge and wisdom handed down to us from the past.   To view previous posts visit our website at www.tsrevisited.com


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Ballad Of The Common Cup

Mike Vanden Bosch. Trowel & Sword. November 1988
From the Magazine “Reformed Worship”

Preamble: While many of the articles in Trowel & Sword tended to be weighty, theological treatises, (perhaps contributing to a common idea that T&S was mainly a magazine by ministers for ministers), we do sometimes come across an item such as the following “tongue in cheek” poetic composition describing how one particular congregation, led by its Minister and Elders, dealt with the vexing question of large, shared cups as opposed to individual cups when partaking of the communion wine. For our non-Dutch speaking subscribers we have included translations for the occasional Dutch words used in the poem which were not part of the original script.

Ballad Of The Common Cup

(In several of our congregations discussions are being held – and at times emotions are running high! – about some aspects of the Lord’s Supper celebration, viz. the common cup or individual cup, and wine or grape juice. We thought it good to introduce a lighter note as well, and received permission to reprint the ‘Ballad of the Common Cup’)

Grace CRC, some years ago,
served wine at its Lord’s Suppers. 
They passed a cup from hand to hand, 
for they were “common cuppers.”

The young resented cups from hands 
still stained from greasing tractors; 
some said their appetite for wine 
was spoiled by such factors.

If work-stained hands did not offend, 
long whiskers did much quicker; 
for wine like pearls of blood would stick 
to whiskers dipped in liquor.

Yet old folks loved the common cup 
the supper was their mecca. 
Jan Klinker, having sipped his wine, 
would whisper loud, “Smaakt lekker.” (tastes good)

But lo, a preacher came to town 
whose wife was somewhat spiffy. 
He said some habits would be changed 
in what he called a jiffy.

He lectured his consistory 
on germs and all diseases; 
He said a fly could put a germ 
on anyone it pleases.

He said a kiss imposed a threat, 
a real though hidden danger, 
especially from the lips of one 
who could be called a stranger.

Whenever pigs would die, he’d say, 
“The germs have been invadin’.”
Soon fear began to rise in hearts, 
and elders said, “Ach heden.” (Oh dear)

And so since lips had deadly germs, 
as preacher had been noting,
they asked the people to decide 
and waited for their voting.

Alas, the vote was tied that day, 
for older folks insisted 
tradition shouldn’t be changed for germs, 
and sternly they resisted.

They told the elders they believed 
that God ordained their sneezing. 
If germs in fact were on the cup, 
he gloried in their wheezing.

The elders sensed theology 
too deep for them to touch
so deep it couldn’t be explained 
unless one spoke in Dutch.

Alas, the preacher’s Dutch was weak 
in terms he sorely needed. 
He knew he wouldn’t convince a soul 
no matter how he pleaded.

“They’ll never change their minds,” he said. 
They see like old Cyclops.
No heads in all the world are like 
the ones we call Frieskops.” 
(Frieskoppen – person from Friesland, Northern Holland 
known for their stubborn nature)

So since he couldn’t wrench these folks 
by force from their tradition, 
he planned a skilful strategy 
to win by sure attrition.

He stopped his arguing at once; 
he vowed he wanted peace 
(but casually noted that his wife 
thought common cups were vies). (dirty)

The statement stabbed them to the quick, 
though some were quite offended.
But then he offered them a plan 
that everyone commended.

We’ll offer wine in common cups 
to you who love tradition.
You’ll choose the kind of cup you want 
by choosing your position.

“Those on the right, appropriately, 
get wine from cups prodigious;
but larger cups cannot be said 
to mean you’re more religious.

“Those on the left, you may have guessed, 
with fingers youthfully nimble, 
will get their wine in little cups 
no larger than a thimble.

“But they mayn’t think that dainty cups 
make holier Lord’s Suppers.
Nor should they brag because they are
the only bottoms-uppers.”

The elders sensed some wisdom which
the church so badly needed, 
but thought the preacher somewhat weak 
in having so conceded.

“Won’t strangers think we’re odd,” they asked, 
“with cups of different sizes?’
One thought perhaps Leviticus 
had banned such compromises. 

The preacher said such difference
could well be overlooked, 
but elders said, “Theology 
should save us from such drukte.” (fuss)

But soon they sensed the preacher’s plan 
though earlier confusing; 
he knew the flu could make them choose 
for cups no one was using.

So through the years the thought of germs 
and long untrimmed moustaches 
moved nearly all conservatives 
in silent, beaten batches.

From thimbles then one Sunday morn 
two hundred people sipped; 
around the rims of dinky cups 
their mouths were tightly lipped.

But from a cup ten times the size 
with others slightly jealous 
a lone man drank communion wine 
from one big silver chalice.

Jan Klinker was the man who drank
in swallows long and easy. 
The elders thought his attitude 
was just a bit too breezy.

Said one, “We shouldn’t have given in,
for now we pay the price.
We give the man ten times the wine
for being eigenwijs.” (pigheaded)

The preacher had been pleased because 
his plan to change some drinking 
had changed, without an argument, 
some quaint, outdated thinking.

But when he served Jan Klinker wine
his joy was somewhat muted;
his plan in Klinker’s stubbornness 
seemed oddly now refuted.

So soon the preacher hoped (in guilt) 
Jan Klinker would catch cold 
or flu or whooping cough and then 
get prematurely old.

Jan Klinker died a ripe old age, 
a chalice in his hand.
He said he’d drink from it in joy 
in heaven’s promised land.

But when Jan Klinker breathed his last, 
the preacher, with some malice, 
put in his hand a tiny cup 
and took the silver chalice.

“If heaven has the common cup, 
you won’t need this,” he sighed. 
“You’ll drink from golden goblets then 
and never be denied.”

The preacher spoke quite warmly, 
but his thoughts were more malicious.
A puny cup in Klinker’s hand 
brought feelings quite delicious.

“Big cups,” he said, “will always stand
for antiquated people 
who worshiped in a wooden church
with one old-fashioned steeple.”

But when he died, his heirs passed ’round 
a common cup for drinking; 
and they were praised for love and warmth 
and innovative thinking.

Mike Vanden Bosch

(Mike Vanden Bosch is a professor of English at Dordt College in SIOUX Centre, Iowa).

We look forward to receiving feedback about any of our posts. We also encourage you to share our posts with family, friends and acquaintances; in fact anyone you think may appreciate and/or benefit from the knowledge and wisdom handed down to us from the past.   To view previous posts visit our website at www.tsrevisited.com

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The Pain of Separation: “De Afscheiding”

Rev. Henk DeWaard. Trowel & Sword. Oct. 1984

Preamble: History! What is of greater concern? That history is often re-written to conform to the narrative of the day or that history is totally ignored? Have you ever heard of ‘The Great Emu War Of Australia?’ Perhaps the greatest concern of all is that history simply isn’t taught to new generations. How many members of the Reformed churches in Australia or New Zealand, particularly the younger generations, know of, or have even heard of a painful separation in the Dutch Reformed Church in the Netherlands called “De Afscheiding”? How many can even pronounce the words? Yet the effects of this division can still be seen today. Knowing the past often leads to a greater understanding of the present.

1834 The Pain of Separation: “De Afscheiding” 1984

‘We are not divided, 
All one body we..!

So we sing with great gusto, while the Body of Christ is in tatters! Never before in the church has there been such emphasis on unity, and never before has the church shown such division and diversity. It is 150 years ago this month that a painful separation took place in the Dutch Reformed Church of the Netherlands. The separation is called: De Afscheiding. Older readers will know something about this historical event. I hope the younger generation will want to know!

Why remember this event?

It is not popular in an ecumenical age to rake up stories of church division, yet the underlying issues at stake are of such importance that we would do well to take note of them through an examination of the Afscheiding.

Fifty years ago, when the centenary of the Afschiding was commemorated, prime-minister Colijn was chairman of the committee to organise activities to remember the event. Today it is inconceivable that a Dutch prime-minister would head such a committee. Rather, the importance of the Afscheiding will be downplayed and many would like to forget it altogether. They regard rememberance of this event as a misplaced triumphalism, for the Afscheiding not only split the church but in turn gave rise to many denominations all of which claim Hendrik De Cock as their spiritual father.

Why then should we remember this event? Obviously for some it is a churchly nostalgia. They want to idealise the ‘Golden Age’ of the Reformed church when men and women were prepared to fight for the faith! Publishers will encourage church historians to write books about the Afscheiding in order to keep printing presses busy. I believe that commemoration of this event only has meaning if we ask what motivated the men of the Afscheiding to separate from the church. What did they consider of more importance than unity? What was at stake at the time?

Decline and Revival

In the late 18th century, the impact of rationalism and the Enlightenment was keenly felt in the Dutch church. This was the movement which glorified human reason and the scientific method. According to the enlightenment view, only what can be observed, proved, analysed and understood can be accepted as truth. Since only ‘nature’ is objectively real, Nature (with a capital N) came to take the place of God. At best God became the Prime Mover who set everything in motion and then withdrew behind the natural processes. It was the time when there was widespread belief in the goodness and perfectability (sic) of mankind. Dogma became a bad word representing prejudice, superstition and non-scientific thinking. The only acceptable authority was the human mind, not God, Scripture or the church.

However, early in the 19th century, a revival took place in the Dutch church. Men such as Bilderdijk (1756-1831), da Costa (1798-1860) and Groen van Prinsterer (1801-1876) were the leaders of the movement. They met regularly for study and discussion on the condition of the church. In 1823 they published a treatise entitled: ‘Objections to the spirit of the age’, in which they concluded that the age of freedom and enlightenment, of which European culture was so proud, was in fact a dead end leading to unbelief, meaninglessness and ignorance.

These leaders sought to formulate ideas that would result in programmes to implement Reformational principles in society. Groen van Prinsterer is best known for his labours in the political arena and particularly for his activity around the question of the nation’s schools which were dominated by the liberal principle of neutrality. When optional religious instruction was refused by the government, Catholics and Protestants began establishing their own schools financed by parents.

Revival leaders also attempted to free the church from state domination and return it to its Calvinistic confessional basis. They did not leave the Dutch Reformed Church but hoped to renew it from within. However, secession could not be prevented in the conflict surrounding Hendrik De Cock.

The 1834 Secession (Afscheiding)

Some church history books tell us that this church split took place because De Cock provided pastoral care to neighbouring parishes and because he criticised the hymnal. To suggest this does not go to the heart of the matter. The cause of the Afscheiding is to be found in the devaluation of the Three Forms of Unity which formed the confessional basis of the Dutch church. The official teaching of the church was not adhered to by a number of ministers and professors. Without any action on the part of the church, doctrines such as the vicarious atonement of Christ, justification by faith, could be denied. This situation had been encouraged by a new Church Order of 1816 imposed by King William I. This church order made Synod accountable to the King and the church subject to the state. The King forbade the formulation of new doctrinal statements and denied the church’s right to make decisions in doctrinal controversies.

Hendrik De Cock, minister of the Dutch Re-formed Church in Ulrum, became the spokesman for the confessional group in the church. Protesting against the spiritual apathy and doctrinal laxity of the church, he was the focus of a controversy which led to his suspension in 1833. His reference to the ‘enlightened’ ministers as wolves who attack the sheep-fold of Jesus Christ did not endear him to the hierarchy of the church!

One of the charges against De Cock was that he baptised children of parents from neighbouring congregations. Parents who would refuse to have their children baptised by liberal ministers would ask De Cock to baptise them. The offence this gave led to his deposition from office in 1834. Yet De Cock had no plans to form a new denomination. The formation of a new church was encouraged by the members of his congregation who had endured injustices from church authorities and had been prevented from inviting Reformed ministers to their pulpit. On October 13, 1834, the greater part of the congregation seceded from the ‘synodical Reformed church in order to return to the foundation of our fathers’. They wished no fellowship with the Dutch Reformed Church until such time that the church would return to the true service of God. Wrangling about church property (usual after church splits!) caused much bitterness and even landed De Cock in prison for three months. Much persecution and ill-feeling were generated, causing considerable numbers to migrate to the USA where they founded the Christian Reformed Church in 1857. In spite of opposition, the secession movement grew so that by 1886, it had a membership of around 200,000.

The Question of Separation

What is the relevance of the Afscheiding for us today? Obviously, it raises the question of whether and when we may separate from a church. Separation is serious business and must always be a last resort. Christians should normally remain in the fellowship which gave him/her spiritual birth. I have no sympathy for those who continually transfer church membership, never satisfied, always looking for (and finding!) heresies, always angry at the church because the church is not perfect. 

Admittedly, at times ‘abnormal’ things happen in a church. The New Testament speaks of apostasy, that is, a falling away from the faith. The whole Christian era is marked by evil, violence, godlessness, paganised religion (Matthew 24:4, I Tim. 4:1- 4, Il Tim. 3:13, John 15:19, 20). The church and the world are at odds with each other. One way to ease this tension is for the church to compromise the message of the Gospel. It is against such a course of action that the N.T. warns, calling on the church to deepen its loyalty to Christ and not to fall away from the faith. The church is vulnerable to penetration by corruption and must fight for its integrity. I Peter 2:1-3. This is what occurred in the 19th century Dutch Reformed Church. The Church did not deal with teachers that spread heresy. Nor was De Cock free to protest against abuses. Rather, he was deposed and the formation of a new denomination was inevitable.

While the unity of the church is a very important matter and a Biblical command, the desire for unity has its limits. When ‘another Gospel’ is proclaimed, the limits of unity have been reached and truth must triumph over unity, Gal. 1:9. It is precisely this concern for truth that has caused such intolerable tensions within the Reformed Ecumenical Synod.

Some Questions

No reader of T&S will have problems with the above. We have been used to defending the faith, coming down hard on the side of separation from other denominations, World Council of Churches and such like. While I would uphold the need for separation, I also believe that we have been far more concerned to reject fellowship with those who fail the test of truth than to seek fellowship with all who confess Jesus Christ as Lord. In that respect I believe we are not fulfilling our ecumenical calling. Perhaps we would do well to ponder the following questions – Do I sincerely believe that there are Christians beyond my own group? Do I ever pray for them? Do I really believe that the expression of unity is a Scriptural command, Eph. 4:3? Is the Lordship of Christ expressed in my attitude to Scripture, sacraments, discipline and evangelism? Am I allowing an emphasis on doctrinal purity to detract from the search for the unity of the church?

We must be continually grieved by the fact that our commitment to Scriptural truth has cut us off from millions of people who say they believe in Jesus as Saviour and Lord. Can anyone be satisfied about that?

Reunion in 1986?

In 1834 Hendrik De Cock reluctantly separated from the established church, but… only as long as the church would continue in its disobedience. At present there are very serious efforts to undo the Afscheiding (and a later separation called the Doleantie, 1886). Leaders of the Dutch Reformed Church and the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands (GKN) hope that in 1986 they will be able to declare a state of union. Does this mean that the Dutch Reformed Church has returned to the foundation of the fathers? If that were so, we would rejoice.

The opposite, I fear, is the case. The churches that once separated, are themselves moving from the foundation of the fathers!

So we must pray.
Pray that a new ‘afscheiding’ may be prevented.
Through renewal and revival.

Henk DeWaard.

Footnote:
In 1986, the synods of the Netherlands Reformed Church (Nederlandse Hervormde Kerk or NHK) and the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands (Gereformeerde Kerken in Nederland or GKN) formally approved a document declaring they were in a “state of reunion” to facilitate an eventual full merger.
The Outcome: The journey was long and marred by intense debates among conservative factions. However, the process ultimately succeeded, and the denominations officially merged into the Protestant Church in the Netherlands (PKN) in 2004.
Churches Involved: The Netherlands Reformed Church (NHK), the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands (GKN), and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in the Kingdom of the Netherlands (ELK).
The 2023 Merger: The New Dutch Reformed Churches (NGK)
While the mainline churches merged into the PKN, the orthodox/neo-Calvinist churches underwent their own massive reconciliation. On 1 May 2023, a historic split that occurred during the Cold War era was completely healed.
Churches Involved: The Reformed Churches in the Netherlands (Liberated) (Gereformeerde Kerken Vrijgemaakt or GKv) and the Netherlands Reformed Churches (Nederlands Gereformeerde Kerken or NGK).
The History: The two groups had painfully fractured in 1967 over church exclusivity and strict dogmatic binding. Over decades, the GKv loosened its stance, opening the door for dialogue.
The Outcome: The unified denomination adopted the name Dutch Reformed Churches (Nederlandse Gereformeerde Kerken, also abbreviated as NGK). With roughly 130,000 members across 320 congregations, it is currently the second-largest Protestant body in the Netherlands.
(Source: AI Overview of reunions in the Dutch Reformed Churches in the Netherlands).

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Prophetic Gifts? (Lining Up)

Keith Warren. Trowel & Sword. November 1984

Preamble: Look again at the date of this article – 1984. For those familiar with George Orwell’s novel titled “1984” and first published in 1949, it should come as no surprise that Keith Warren chose to write an article on prophecy/prophetic gifts in that year. It’s a very brief exposé focussing on prophet as predictors of the future, and while this was certainly one of the characteristics of biblical prophecy it was not the only task assigned to prophets by God. What can be said with surety is that all true prophets were called by God to deliver messages to His people. Self-appointed “prophets” claiming to speak on behalf of God were condemned as false prophets.

Prophetic Gifts?

Some people today have prophetic gifts.

At least, that’s what they say they have. Looking into the future, making predictions, and with authority too!

I certainly don’t have that gift. I can’t even correctly forecast who’s going to win the footy next Saturday. Certainly not when you’re barracking for the kind of team I feel some slight loyalty towards. But anyway, football is gone for now. Hello, cricket!

But I was talking about prophecy. Predicting the future. As regards the church. And the world.

Many people have made predictions about the future of the church. And are busy making them. And are also busy making fools of themselves. Do you remember that in the mid 60’s Herbert W. Armstrong (of ‘The World Tomorrow’ broadcasts, and the glossy magazines) made some startling prophecies in a booklet that had the title ‘1975 in prophecy’ It’s possible that you do not remember, for that booklet has not been around for a long time. Mr. Armstrong would be ashamed to see it circulating today, in 1984. I’m sure of that.

Why would Mr. Armstrong be very unhappy to see this booklet about ‘1975 in Prophecy’ in the hands of the public in 1984? For the simple reason that the whole thing turned out to be quite ridiculous. His predictions did not come true. Not at all!

Here are some of the predictions he made:

The war of the future will be between (on the one hand England and America, and (on the other hand) the United States of Europe.

Before or in 1975 calamities will hit the world. These will be so terrible that one third of England’s and America’s population will die.

Then World War 3 will break loose, after which the ‘great tribulation’ will occur. Armstrong claims to find evidence in Scripture that one third of the population will be killed, and the remaining one third will be scattered over the earth (sic). After 3 1⁄2 years of tribulation Jesus will return.

Warned Armstrong, some twenty years ago now: “All this is now only a few years off….  Yes, millions of lukewarm, inactive professing Christians will suffer martyrdom, and that before the anticipated push-button leisure-year of 1975 dawns upon us!’

That year 1975 appears to have had a fascination for others too. I remember very well that evening in the late 60’s when I had a spirited (and frustrating!) debate with a Jehovah’s Witness (talking about a misnomer!).

Next to many other things, he also told me that our daughter would never become a teenager. For the simple reason that 1975 would mean the end of all things. Human life as we know it, he told me, would be snuffed out. The end of the world!

Well, our daughter has been married now for several years.

While I’m typing this I ask myself the question: How do these self-styled prophets continue to live with integrity and some measure of self-worth? Yes, after it has become clear that their authoritative predictions turned out to be so much nonsense.

What is even more amazing is that so many people follow these prophets. And the most amazing thing of all is that it apparently makes little difference to the standing and popularity of the ‘prophets’ when their predictions disappear down the gurgler of prophetic ‘bloopers’.

The followers remain loyal.

So what, we’ll try again another day.

I have said before in this column that we may expect an upsurge in prophets and prophecies the closer we come to that ‘magical’ year 2000.

We’ve seen already a little flurry of activity this year: 1984. The year of Big Brother. The title of George Orwell’s book (1984′) even captured the interest of the secular newspaper columnists earlier this year.

Others gave it a more religious slant. 1984 was to be the year of the cashless society! And just have a quick look at your Bankcard . See the stylised letter ‘B’, in three colours? There it is: 666! The mark of the beast!

Then a crazy story began circulating; several thousand people in Scandinavia were supposed to have taken part in an experiment and had their social security number tattooed on their forehead. Or was it on their hand?

To top it all off: someone in the States wrote a book in which he claimed to have ‘cracked’ the bar-codes, and found all kinds of sinister information about what the enemies of the church were about to do. The bar-codes, by the way, are those sets of black stripes on your peanut butter jar and margarine tub, helping you to get quicker through the check-out. That is, if they have an electronic scanner there.

Oh well, 1984 has nearly come to an end. No one talks about ‘The Late Great Planet Earth’ anymore. But that was 10 years ago. I guess that the author and publisher are laughing all the way to the bank.

Looking at it all I am prompted to say: One man’s eschatological fancy is another man’s Cadillac!

Why are so many people fascinated by these things?

The times in which we live certainly provide an ideal setting for it all. There is so much insecurity and fear in the hearts of many.

What is going to happen next? When will the communists be here? Will we die in a nuclear blast? When is the next economic down-turn coming? Surely, things can’t go on the way they are?

In such a climate anyone who gives precise and authoritative answers about the future will be listened to. You do not know what the future will bring? Listen to me! I will tell you. On the basis of God’s Word!

I think there is another reason too. It is: the attitude of the church. The attitude of Christians.

I’m not now thinking in the first place of liberal theology and churches, where they are so exclusively busy with the affairs of this world that many no longer believe in the return of Christ.

No, I’m thinking of churches where they still believe in God’s future and Christ’s return. But where those beliefs play little or no role in the way these churches and these Christians operate. Believing is one thing, practicing is another.

We tend to shrug our shoulders and snigger a little when someone comes to us with one or other fanciful theory about the end of the world and the coming of Christ Jesus.

But such excessive views are possibly the ‘unpaid bills’ of the church!

When an outsider looks at the average evangelical church, and the average Reformed congregation, does he/she get a picture of Christians in whose midst lives an expectancy, a joyful hoping, an eager waiting? Or do Christians give the impression that they’re here to stay! Digging the foundations deep into the stuff of this world?

Rather, says Jesus, ‘keep watch, because you do not know the day or the hour,’ (Matt. 25:13).

Keith V. Warren

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Discussion On The Sunday

(Editorial Paragraphs)

Prof. K. Runia. Trowel & Sword. June 1966

Preamble: If we were able to ask Prof. Runia about it today he would probably admit that he was surprised by the depth and passion of Rev. Deenick’s response to his articles on “Sunday Observance and Sunday Labour”. Likewise, if we were able to talk to Bill about it he would probably have to admit that he didn’t actually address one of the initial and main points raised by Klaas; that being how to integrate the “traditional” view of the Sabbath, ie. as a day of rest and no work, with the demands of a modern society which cannot exist without a considerable proportion of the population working on the Sunday. Theology versus practicality.
Rev. J.W. Westendorp commented after we re-published the first of these articles that he still vividly remembered the discussions and debates (arguments?) triggered by these articles in family and church; and that was sixty years ago. Runia recognised the potential for all out war and wisely ended the debate; but there will always be questions relating to the interpretation of scripture where the only solution may be that we agree to disagree.

Discussion On The Sunday

After the Rev. J.W. Deenick has completed his series of articles on the Sunday, it seems better to close the discussion, at least for the time being. I do not believe it to be profitable for our churches, if I started a new discussion of the exegesis of the N.T. passages, as given by Mr. Deenick. Although I still believe that these passages require a different exegesis, I am quite happy to let the matter rest. Perhaps there are other means and ways to continue the discussion among the theologians. It would undoubtedly be more profitable for the churches, if after the completion on such a discussion they could be informed of the results.

It may be helpful, however, if I add a few general remarks.

In the first place I would like to state that, when I started this series of articles, I was under the impression that the SECTION OF THE WESTMINSTER CONFESSION, dealing with the sabbath, WAS NOT YET BINDING on the New Zealand churches. This, of course, was a wrong impression. I am sorry that I did not check the matter in the Acts.The impression was due to the fact that before the last N.Z. Synod a lengthy report on Sunday observance was published in which the Westminster Confession view was defended. This led me to believe that it was still an open question. After the publication of my first articles the N.Z.Synod met and only then it became clear to me that I was mistaken. But at that time I had started already and I thought it better to finish the series than to break off half way. In addition, our Reformed position has always been that not the confession but Scripture is the FINAL authority. And in my articles I did nothing else than try to bring out what I regard to be doctrine of Scripture itself.

Of course, one could ask: Would it not have been better to bring the matter up by way of a gravamen? In general this is true. In this particular case, however, the matter is somewhat complicated, because as a minister of the Reformed Churches of Australia I am not in the same way bound to the Westminster Confession as the New Zealand office-bearers. The Australian Churches have accepted the Westminster Confession as an important and genuinely Reformed confession, but because of certain objections in details no office bearer is bound to it on those points, in which the Westminster Confession goes beyond the Belgic Confession. I may further point out that also in other cases sometimes a public discussion started before an official gravamen was lodged. Dr. Kuyper, e.g., openly criticised Art. 36 of the Belgic Confession, in its old formulation, long before it was changed at the 1905 Synod (cf. Chr. Encyclopedie, 2nd ed., Vol. I, p. 339).

Yet I personally do not think this is the best way and I wish wish to state publicly that, if I had known the exact situation on this point, I would not have started this discussion in Trowel and Sword.  Perhaps I may add, not as an excuse but as a clarification, that last year, when I attended a conference of the N.Z. ministers, we discussed the problem at length. At the end of the discussion I asked whether they could agree to my writing about it in Trowel and Sword. The unanimous reply was Yes. It is, after the reactions, quite obvious that there has been misunderstanding on either side. But it confirmed my impression that the matter was still open for discussion.

Prof. K. Runia.

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Confusion Around The Lord’s Day (3)

THE SABBATH Made For man

Rev. J.W. Deenick. Trowel & Sword. May 1966

Jesus and the Sabbath.
In Mark 2:27 we found this word of the Lord Jesus: “the sabbath was made for man” and I ventured to suggest that when the Lord Jesus said “for man” he meant “for man” and not “for the Israelites from the time of Moses to the day of the death of Christ”.

It has been argued that we should not divorce this statement of the Lord Jesus from the context in which He made it and that in that context He obviously had the people of Israel in mind. He addressed the Pharisees and rebuked them for making God’s people slaves of the Sabbath and He said: “why do you make it look as if the people of God were there for the sabbath; the sabbath is there for them” So runs the argument and it is true to a point.

The Lord Jesus certainly had the Jews of his time in mind primarily; but not exclusively. He had also the human race in mind, just as he always had the human race in mind whenever he spoke of “man” or referred to Himself as the “Son of man”. Moreover, we know that it is nothing unusual for the Lord Jesus to make a statement of a very general nature in circumstances, in a conversation, in a conflict of a very particular nature. I refer to the Lord’s conversation with Nicodemus, or with the woman at the well or with the Syrophoenician woman. I cannot therefore think of one reason why “man” in this context should not have precisely the same meaning as it has in e.g. the song of the angels (Luke 2:14) or in John 2:25. I do not think that anybody would suggest that when John wrote that Jesus knew what was in man, he merely meant to say that the Lord knew what was in the Israelites from Moses to his own days. Yet, that is exactly what we are invited to believe concerning Mark 2:27.

In the April issue I pointed out that we have to be careful not to imply that in fact the Lord Jesus was imprecise in what He said and that He did not say what He meant. As a matter of fact I have not seen one exegesis of Mark 2:27 in which the universal implications of the text were not acknowledged. But how then could we deny that in this text the Lord Jesus declared that His Father instituted the sabbath, i.e. the day of rest for worship, as a blessing meant for all men?

In this connection we may well remember that here too the conflict was not about the sabbath as such but about the sabbath as it was legalistically observed by Phariseism. In that conflict the Lord Jesus said nothing about the abrogation of the sabbath (as he would do about the mosaic divorce regulations – see Matthew 19:8) but rather He pointed to the universal design of the sabbath and He further pointed to Himself as the Lord of the sabbath. By saying this the Lord Jesus meant that He as the Son of man, i.e. as THE man, was placed in charge of that sabbath-for-man to see to it that it be protected and used for the glory of God and the well-being of man. There is no suggestion anywhere in the New Testament, as far as I can see, of the Lord Jesus being in charge of the sabbath for the purpose of abolishing it. During the three years of his public activity the Lord Jesus consistently defended the sabbath against all the innovations and misinterpretations of phariseism. He battled to unmask the falsehoods of legalism in connection with the sabbath. His desire was to give back to the nation the privilege of its sabbath. But then as the sabbath was made for man, His desire was also to extend that privilege to all mankind. I propose that it is a legitimate conclusion from this text to say that still to-day the Lord Jesus is the Lord of the sabbath and that it is His office still, and His desire, to defend the sabbath, and to extend it to all the nations of the world, the people of Ceylon not excluded.

At this point the reader may remind me of the distinction which I made in the April issue, i.e. the distinction between the sabbath as such, or the sabbath of the fourth commandment, and the mosaic sabbath and he may ask whether the Lord Jesus referred to the mosaic sabbath when He said that the sabbath was made for man. This would be a relevant question because the sabbath which applied to Jesus’ days was the mosaic sabbath. Now, this distinction between the mosaic or levitical sabbath and the sabbath of the fourth commandment is not by any means a discovery that I have made. One will find it with Prof. Dr. Willem Geesink and with many others. It is also a quite biblical distinction of which we make use in connection with each of the first nine commandments of the law. In the mosaic or levitic law we find a great many regulations meant to assist Israel in the interpretation and application of the ten commandments. This is true of e.g. the seventh and the fifth commandment. It is also true of the fourth commandment. Many of these regulations were meant to foreshadow the fulness of God’s grace in the Kingdom of heaven. They found their preliminary fulfilment in the work of Christ. The Lord Jesus Himself always observed the mosaic or levitical law in the days before his resurrection. Yet, we notice that He was careful not to render a universal application to it. After his resurrection He did not say to His disciples: “go and teach the nations what Moses commanded you.” He said: “all that I commanded you”. One of these commandments was that the sabbath was made for man.

Now, where are we? Looking back we notice a full agreement between the Lord Jesus and Paul in the matter of the sabbath. While the new approach has considerable difficulty in reconciling their exegesis of Paul’s texts with Mark 2:27, we found no such difficulty at all. Whereas the Lord Jesus declared the sabbath to have been designed as a blessing for all mankind, Paul contended that certain mosaic or levitical manners of observing the sabbath had been abrogated. And both the Lord Jesus and Paul militate against a legalistic observance of the fourth commandment, or for that matter of any other commandment.

The sabbath in the ten commandments.

From the New Testament we come to what the Old Testament teaches about the sabbath. I do not think we have to be very elaborate about this now. No matter whether we follow Dr. A. van Ruler (who somewhere in his momentous thesis on the fulfilment of the law somewhat strangely contends that the Old Testament is the actual Bible and that the New Testament is something like a list of explanatory notes in the back of the Old Testament) or Dr. Runia (who wrote in the October copy of Trowel and Sword that the correct point of issue for the interpretation of the Old Testament is the New Testament), we had to give precedence to the New Testament in any case. Yet, the Old Testament remains extremely important. In it we find the very heart of the gospel. There is, of course, nothing legalistic about the Old Testament. It gives the message of the grace of God for sinners from Genesis 1 to Malachi 5. As far as I can see nothing legalistic can ever be legitimately derived from the Old Testament. Legalistic attitude has nothing in common with either the Old or the New Testament; it is phariseistic or judaistic but certainly not Old Testamentic. (sic).

What we find then in the Old Testament is that God’s love for His people established a glorious sabbath ruling for their lives in the Kingdom of His grace. This is as true of the mosaic law as it is of the ten commandments themselves. However, we shall leave the mosaic or levitical law out of consideration for now. And even about the ten commandments I would like to be brief. The ten commandments, of course, should never be considered as merely a part of the levitical law. Both the Old and the New Testament forbid this. The ten commandments alone were written by God’s own hand on the tablets of stone. And in the New Testament we find each of the ten commandments repeated as still valid and applying to all the nations.

In the fourth commandment God commanded His people to remember the gift of the sabbath, as a day to be hallowed. From the Hebrew word used for “to hallow” it is obvious that God wanted them to set that day apart for religious feasting and worship, see O.Procksch in Kittel’s Worterbuch. It should also be noted that they are commanded to rest from work for that very purpose, that they may rejoice in the LORD. The resting is subordinate to the worshipping. They were commanded to rest, not for the sake of resting, but for the sake of enjoyment in the LORD. Real sanctification of the seventh day does not consist in abstinence from daily work but in making it a day of religious enjoyment and worship.

It has been proposed that under the New Testament God’s people are no longer commanded to keep this day of rest (for worship), seeing that the “rest aspect” as the “ceremonial aspect” or as the “legal code aspect” no longer applies. The commandment still would bind us to coming together for worship but no longer to observing a day of rest-for-worship. The day of rest-for-worship would still be advisable or agreeable but no longer commanded. In practice it comes down to this – that a few hours of rest ( for congregational worship) would still be commanded but no longer a day.

In this connection I would merely ask why the supposedly ceremonial or legal aspect of the fourth commandment is singled out as no longer applying, whereas similar aspects in e.g. the fifth, the seventh and the eighth commandment are still held to apply. I have a feeling that with these scholastic rather than biblical distinctions we raise more problems than we solve. Moreover if we are still supposed to observe, in obedience to the fourth commandment a certain rest (of a few hours for congregational worship), is then that rest “un-ceremonial”? And what right do we have to limit arbitrarily the privileges of the New Testament church by narrowing down the sanctification of the day to the sanctification of a few hours and by limiting that sanctification to acts of worship only, and then of congregational worship alone? Is really the New Testament church to be made poorer than the Old Testament church? Were they granted a full day of rejoicing in the LORD (of which worship was only one of the elements) and are we sent back to work with a few hours rest for congregational worship? And if one would contend: “yes, but we have seven days of the week to rejoice in the LORD, not merely one day” I would venture to reply: “and so had they!”

The sabbath and the creation 

In the fourth commandment (Exodus 20) the creation is mentioned. It is mentioned in none of the other commandments. Yet, whereas the other nine commandments are held to be “creation ordinances”, this is called into question with regard to the fourth commandment. Has the sabbath been ordained from the beginning as e.g. the marriage relationship for life is taught to have been ordained from the beginning? See Matthew 19:8. That is the point at issue.

Genesis 2 teaches that God Himself sanctified His “seventh day”, i.e. He made it a “day” of enjoyment in Himself and in the works of His hand. In Exodus 20 God’s people are called to follow the LORD’s example in this. In Mark 2 the Lord Jesus teaches that God ordained the sabbath for “man”, that is for “adam”, the hebrew word “adam” meaning nothing but “man”. The question then is raised whether (and how God made it known to the first “adam”, known to us as Adam, that this sabbath institution was meant to be observed by him. With the same right I could ask whether (and how) God made it known to Adam that marriage was meant to be a monogamous relationship for life or whether (and how) God made it known to Cain that he had to obey and honour his father and his mother. Yet, we all take it for granted that Adam knew about marriage and Cain about parental authority. I fail to see why we should make an exception here for precisely that commandment in which the creation is mentioned. The fact that we find little or no evidence of sabbath observance in the time of the patriarchs should not disturb us more than the other fact that we find very little evidence of a monogamous marriage in their time. The separation of Israel from the nations and the re-establishment of God’s law was necessary exactly because ALL God’s commandments had been so universally forgotten and contradicted.

The seventh day.

It is argued that if we desire to observe the fourth commandment we should rest on the seventh day of the week. This misunderstanding arises from the fact that the fourth commandment is read as if it said: “the first six days of the week you shall labour, but the seventh day of the week is the sabbath day”. It is obvious however that this “of the week” is nowhere in the text. The text says that they were to rest for enjoyment in the Lord on the seventh day after six days of work. We find this manner of dating everywhere in the Bible. In Numbers 19:11,12, e.g. it says that the man who touched a dead body would be clean again on the seventh day, not on the seventh day of the week but after so many days of uncleanness. In Exodus 16 it says that after six days of gathering in the manna the nation rested on the seventh day. The Lord Jesus rose on the third day, i.e. not of the week but after his death and burial. God’s desire was not that His people rested on one particular day then already known as “the” seventh day; He wanted them to rest after six days of work. It was not until the rule of sabbath observance was well established that people began to call the days with their number in relation to the sabbath as the seventh day. The week was ordered round the sabbath, not the sabbath in the week.

By observing “the day of the Lord(‘s resurrection)” (sic) as the day of rejoicing in His accomplished work the New Testament church observes the fourth commandment. After six days of labour we sanctify the seventh day and we do so after the apostolic example on the first day of the week, the Lord’s day.

Any practical difference?

People have asked what difference it makes in practice whether we follow the one approach to the sabbath or the other. I would say that this depends on the degree in which the new approach inclines to a certain”radicalism”. The new approach may, even quite conservatively so, insist on a rather strict observance of a day of rest for the sake of worship. But the point of difference is that in the “new approach” we observe this day of rest not because God commands us to do so in the fourth commandment, but merely because as (Reformed) christians we have “voluntarily” agreed that it is wise to do so; see the Helvetic Confession. The problem is what would happen if we no longer agree. There is already quite considerable disagreement among (Reformed) christians and some people come to me with the most remarkable opinions about what we should “voluntarily” agree upon. I have the unpleasant feeling that for christian ethics our “voluntary” christian agreement is rather a weak basis to stand on, if it is a basis at all. Thus the question of what difference it makes in the practice of our sabbath observance can only be answered from the case to case, when we know how radically “new” the “new approach” desires to be.

Conclusion

Those who find comfort in the knowledge that they are surrounded by a host of sympathetic christian witnesses in their battle for a christian sabbath I would remind of the many Reformed scholars of the past and the present who stood up for the defence of the Lord’s day, to be observed according to the fourth commandment. I refer to men like Gysbertus Votius, William Amesius, Charles Hodge, James Bannerman, J.C. Ryle, Herman Bavinck, Abraham Kuyper, Benjamin Warfield, Willem Geesink, Klaas Schilder, Kornelis Sietsma, Simon Gerrit de Graaf, Gerrit Brillenburg Wurth, and, to mention one living theologian, John Murray of Westminster seminary, Philadelphia. No one in Australia or New Zealand would have to feel ashamed about being in that company.

And those who are afraid of being looked upon as out of touch with the latest trends or as narrow-mindedly puritan I may refer to the defence of the Lord’s day by a man like the Barthian Dutchman, Dr. K.H. Miskotte, not a puritan by any description, whom Brillenburg Wurth in 1955 quoted as recently having written that the sanctification of the sabbath was in a certain way even a more fundamental principle than the sanctification of the human life or of marriage, and that therefore the desecration of the Sunday was in certain ways a more serious sin than e.g. murder and adultery.

And I would like to finish with a quotation from another scholar, philosopher and novelist, of no mean ability, Prof. Dr. K.J. Popma, who wrote: “With regard to the sabbath it is now very clear that it is an eternal institution; it stretches out over the full sum of the times. Whoever desires to understand the Sunday, must take careful note of what is revealed concerning the sabbath. The sabbath lives on in the Sunday. Whoever in disregard of the Old Testament desires to think away the sabbath entirely, loses also the meaning of the Sunday”

J.W. DEENICK

This concludes Bill Deenick’s contribution to the debate concerning the Sabbath. There is one more contribution to this discussion by Dr. Runia which is not so much a continuation of the the debate but more an explanation of his purpose in instigating this discourse in the first place. This will be published next week.
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