Editorial Notes
Extracted from Ordained Servant vol. 5, no. 3 (July 1996).
With the kind permission of Dr. Peter Y. de Jong, the Christian Education Committee reprinted his classic study entitled Taking Heed to the Flock in past issues of Ordained Servant. Because of the value of this study, and the need for all our elders to have ready access to it we asked, and received, permission from Dr. de Jong to republish this material—at cost—in book form. It is now available from the office of our general secretary, Rev. Thomas E. Tyson, for a mere $3 per copy, postage paid. We urge pastors to get this into the hands of all our ruling elders. And we hereby express, again, our deep appreciation to Dr. de Jong for his willingness to grant us this free gift.
In this issue we reprint another of the fine studies originally presented at a Regional Church Extension Conference held at Lake Sherwood Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Orlando, Florida. This conference was sponsored by our denomination’s Committee on Home Missions and Church Extension and we hereby express our appreciation for permission to make this material more widely available.
At the recent General Assembly, under the able direction of Mr. Clifford Collins of the computer section of the University of Ohio, we were shown how easy it is to access the Information Superhighway. This demonstration was provided because it is part of the vision of the Christian Education Committee to encourage the Orthodox Presbyterian Church to make the best possible use of this means of communication. An example of what is “out there” on the Internet is provided by the interesting and informative article by Dr. David Hall of the Center for the Advancement of Paleo-Orthodoxy, and the Abraham Kuyper Institute. It is our hope that articles such as this will further stimulate interest and use of this new means of communication within the OPC. The editor first read Dr. Hall’s article via the Internet and when Dr. Hall was contacted, by email, he graciously granted us permission to include this article—written for the July issue of Premise—in the current issue of Ordained Servant. We hereby express our thanks to him.
“It is our solemn conviction that where there can be no real spiritual communion there should be no pretense of fellowship. Fellowship with known and vital error is participation in sin. Those who know and love the truth of God cannot have fellowship with what is diametrically opposed thereto, and there can be no reason why they should pretend that they have such fellowship” (Charles Haddon Spurgeon).
“Scripture is not a dry tale or an old chronicle: it is the ever-living, ever youthful Word which God at the present time and always sends out to His people” (Herman Bavinck).
“No single error has yet been demonstrated to occur in the Scriptures as given by God to His Church” (Benjamin B. Warfield).
“In my preaching, teaching and pastoring, I often ask: Do you and I know what that means that Christ has said: It is finished! (John 20:30)? Do we know Who this Christ is? Do we know what it is to behold the Lamb in all His beauty? Do we know what it is to give ourselves up to the surpassing worth of knowing Jesus our Lord (cf. Philippians 3:8)? Do we know, from the heart of the Gospel, what the atonement is and what it means that God in Christ was reconciling the world to Himself (2 Corinthians 5:19)? Do we know the language and the power of the blood of atonement? Do we know that without shedding of blood there is no remission (Hebrews 9:22)? Are we able to live apart from faith in the remission of sin? All these questions mean to lead us to the beautiful focus spelled out in our Belgic Confession of Faith, article 21: ‘... In [the] ...wounds... [of Christ] we find all manner of consolation. Neither is it necessary to seek or invent any other means of being reconciled to God, than this only sacrifice, once offered, by which believers are made perfect forever’” (from an editorial in Diakonia 10:1, June 1996).