Articles

A recent writer complains that ‘contemporary gospel preaching . . . rarely explains the cross of Christ;’ that is, it fails to tell us that ‘He died bearing the transgressions of His people . . . suffering the divine penalty for their sins . . . forsaken of God and crushed’ beneath God’s wrath. It […]

What should a church be looking for when it seeks a pastor? This is a question that should deeply exercise not only elders but every church member. What qualities should a search committee have uppermost in their minds as they look to God to provide them with a man after his own heart? Perhaps before […]

Those who sow in tears shall reap with joyful shouting (Psa. 126:5). Read carefully. If your church does not evangelize, then it will surely perish. I say this even if you have several hundreds or thousands of members and are presently a vibrant, fast growing church. We all know of churches that fifty or one […]

Eugene Peterson published The Message: The New Testament in Contemporary English in 1993. A whole Bible version was finally completed in 2002. The casual shopper in the average Christian book shop today could be forgiven for thinking that it is yet another of the veritable flood of English translations of the Bible that have been […]

What do we make of Alexander Whyte? His books, unlike those of many of his liberal contemporaries, are still in print and are popular with Christians all over the world. Christian Focus publish his famous Bible Characters. Other books of his in print include: Lord Teach Us to Pray, Samuel Rutherford and some of his […]

Although Robert Murray M’Cheyne did not take his place among the founders of the Free Church of Scotland (he was taken to glory just before the Disruption) he fully sympathised with their rejection of state control of the Church of Christ in Scotland, and would have been among them when their Deed of Separation terminated […]

David Cameron will almost certainly get his Syrian war. Who will fight it, let alone who will win it, remains unclear. But who will lose it is already known – the Christians. The relentless persecution of Christ’s followers is foretold in the Gospels. Suffering is portrayed as the pathway to triumph. The global position today […]

Some Christians are doubtful of the help they can find in a Puritan book written some 400 years ago. Tom Richwine, a trustee of the Banner of Truth Trust, addresses this concern with a recent example.

Thomas Oden, long time professor of Theology and Ethics at Drew University, for years wrote volume after volume elaborating and espousing the latest theories and practices — successful, up-to-date, modern, in the best liberal tradition — yet somehow he remained dissatisfied. So, quite a while ago now, he shifted gears sharply and produced a volume […]

Born in June of the year of the French Revolution, in the then village of Basildon, Essex, Allen Gardiner longed to go to sea, to fight the French, and to follow Mungo Park in exploring the interior of Africa. By 1810 he was at sea and engaged in fighting in the Pacific in the Phoebe […]

Having been vacant since June 2010 with the emeritization of Dr. L. W. Bilkes, the Free Reformed Church of Grand Rapids was privileged and blessed to install Dr. David Murray as a Free Reformed minister labouring in our congregation. Synod 2013 of the Free Reformed churches unanimously approved Dr. Murray to be called as Free […]

Lately many new church buildings have or are still being built by congregations of our denomination. Some of these are the congregations’ second buildings since their founding. What a contrast this is to the situation in Israel. During the entire history of Israel as a modern state, not a single building was erected and dedicated […]

On 30th August 2013 the news broke that Seamus Heaney had died in a Dublin hospital, following a short illness. A measure of the legacy left by the poet’s life and work was given by the widespread sense of sadness across cultures and continents that a man of greatness and forceful intellect had passed away. […]

In how many ways may we glorify God? 1] It is glorifying God when we aim purely at his glory. God must be the untimate end of all actions. Thus Christ, ‘I seek not mine own glory, but the glory of him that sent me’ (John 8:50) . . . Oh let us take heed […]

We are all familiar with the feeling of accomplishing a big task. Often we can feel the pressure almost physically in our muscles and bodies. But then one day we can say it is done, we tick it off and feel the relief. That is how we felt at HaGefen when the fifth and final […]

Who is sufficient for the task of spiritual leadership? The man who leads Christ’s flock needs at least two rare qualities: a compassionate heart, and also nerves of steel. No one is well equipped to guide the saints of God on earth unless he has two seemingly contradictory sides to his character. He needs to […]

At the Banner’s 2013 U.S. Ministers’ Conference, Paul Wolfe shared with us one of the most important lessons he has learned in his 12 years of pastoral ministry.

It is the easiest thing in the world to say, ‘The Lord gives, and the Lord takes away, blessed be the name of the Lord’, when all is well with you and yours. When life is sweet, when your children are trusting in Christ, when your church is united and loving, when your spouse loves […]

Do not be deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolators, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals will inherit the kingdom of God (1 Corinthians 6:9). That there be no immoral or godless person like Esau, who sold his birthright for a single meal . . . he found no place for repentance, though he sought it with tears (Hebrews […]

I first attended a meeting at the Aberystwyth Conference almost fifty years ago in 1964. It was Eric Alexander who was giving the morning conference addresses and I still remember an illustration he used in his message on man’s sinfulness. A circus performer had a boa constrictor. He would give the snake an order and […]

One of the great mistakes Christians make with regards to the Christian Sabbath is viewing it as a prison or hindrance. In fact, God has given it to us to bless us. In Isaiah 58:14, God promises three things in connection with the faithful observance of his day: increased delight in him, spiritual victory, and […]

New Testament Worship That which is special, that which is our best, that which is sacrificial: We may be tempted to think such standards made sense in the context of Israel’s ancient worship but have little to do with us. After all, none of us shows up at church on Sunday morning bearing sacrifices. Or […]

One of the many temptations confronting the minister of the gospel in this generation is to become involved in unnecessary administrative church work. Once involved, the demands tend to increase, often resulting in a degree of deterioration in the quality of his pulpit ministry. Books which encourage such involvement are pouring from the press, lauding […]

Marriage was God’s gift to a perfect world. He had said, ‘It is not good that the man should be alone’, even when that man was without sin and living in holy communion with God. God in kindness saw fit to make a companion for Adam – another human being, not identical to him, but […]

‘Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out!’ (Rom. 11:33). These words are the ending of the theological section of the letter to the Romans as Paul has set it out in the first 11 chapters of the epistle, and […]