Herman Hoeksema (HH), the minister of the gospel whom Jesus Christ used to found the Protestant Reformed Churches in America (PRC), is little recognized by the Reformed and Presbyterian community of churches or, with the rare exception, by prominent Reformed or Presbyterian theologians. Indeed, there is a conspiracy of silence, to keep him hidden from […]
Introduction The question is not, “Who makes a church Reformed?” The answer to this question would be, “the Spirit of Jesus Christ.” By his Spirit, Jesus Christ himself, who is the head of the church (Eph. 5:23), creates a group of believers and their children as his body in a certain place at a […]
Great events in the history of the church are bolts of lightning from heaven. But they do not strike out of a clear, blue sky on a sunny day. They flash from storm clouds and are forecast by a darkening day. Such was the case with the writing, and adoption as a Reformed creed, […]
By dating, I understand a special relationship of fellowship between an unmarried young man and an unmarried young woman, the nature and purpose of which is the possibility of marriage. There is some biblical defense of dating. Jacob dated Rachel seven years with a view to marrying her (Gen. 29:20). In the New Testament, there […]
This article is the shortened version of the recently published booklet by me under the same title. This abridgment necessarily omits much of the booklet, including elements that I consider to be of great importance both to the subject and to the thinking of Reformed persons concerning church membership. I urge the young person to […]
The young reader of this article is encouraged to read first the 5th head of doctrine of the Canons of Dordt and to have it before him as he reads the article. Introduction Can one who has been saved go lost? It often seems as though those who are saved for a while lose their […]
*This article was originally published in the December 1961 issue. At no other time of the year does the behavior of the American people as closely approach insanity as at Christmas. One glance at a red-colored date, five sixths of the way through the December calendar, and an entire nation lurches into incredible activity. Like […]
Although I became editor of Beacon Lights only in 1959, I managed to stir up controversy over the magazine as early as 1958. I had the help of others, who with me were members at that time of the Federation Board of Protestant Reformed Young People’s Societies. The Federation Board had the oversight of the […]
“And Jabez was more honorable than his brethren: and his mother called his name Jabez, saying, Because I bare him with sorrow. “And Jabez called on the God of Israel, saying, Oh that thou wouldest bless me indeed, and enlarge my coast, and that thine hand might be with me, and that thou wouldest keep […]
With Jane’s approval, I add to her moving article on marriage, divorce, and remarriage what she herself could not comfortably write. When she was cruelly and wickedly abandoned and then divorced by her husband, she was assailed by especially two powerful temptations. One was despair. Using her distress, and for a woman, especially a young […]