With the appearance of this issue of Beacon Lights we will be in the year of our Lord 1957 and in the eleventh month of that year. And the last Thursday of this month has been designated Thanksgiving Day. With this in mind the editorial staff has asked me to pen a few thoughts about […]
Confession of sin doesn’t make sense — at first. Doesn’t God know our sins better than we do ourselves? Why should we tell him something He already knows and condemns? Reasoning in this manner has led many of us to shrug off the privilege of confession onto some simple and all-inclusive phrase as “and forgive […]
Last issue of the Beacon Lights we noticed that sometimes the preaching in our churches is said to be too doctrinal, with the result that practical emphases are lost. We noticed that this happens in many churches today outside the sphere of our own, where the extreme is that the Word of God is no […]
November is the month of the year in which the Day of Thanksgiving is traditionally observed in our country. The President issues an annual proclamation. Churches proclaim special services. Civic and social organizations bestow upon the needy and afflicted in the community bounties of food and clothing in an attempt to leave no one to […]
The First Missionary Journey I. Sent by the Antioch Church, 12:25-13:3. A. The Return of Saul and Barnabas to Antioch: 1. When did they return from Jerusalem? a. To what “ministry” does the text refer? b. Does this imply that they were in Jerusalem during the persecution by Herod? 1) Is this very likely? 2) […]
If I could speak with you today and should be able to ask each of you to name the animal that most amused you during your last visit to the zoo, you would undoubtedly answer most unequivocally, the monkey. If I should ask what animal impressed you the most, I would certainly get a variety […]
A few lines from the Psalter number which our pupils are learning in school this week go like this: “Teach me Thy way to know I have no God but Thee. By Thy good Spirit led From trouble and distress My erring feet shall tread The path of uprightness.” Modern educators often stress the fact […]
We as Protestant Reformed people believe in having school societies for distinctively Protestant Reformed education. One of the benefits from this is our confidence that our children will not be taught in History about some mythical prehistoric man or in Geography how someone believes the earth was formed some billions of years ago. We see […]
In Genesis 19:26 we read, “But his wife looked back from behind him, and she became a pillar of salt.” This is probably one of the shortest biographies in the Bible. It is nearly all we know of Lot’s wife; yet that single sentence has made her one of the outstanding examples of the Bible. […]
Dear Editor: Will you please give me a little space in regard to an article written in the July-August edition under the title, “Godliness or Narrowmindedness” by James Veldman. Now if the meaning of narrowmindedness is understood to be “Intolerance or prejudice,” it is never justified but it is sometimes confused with strictness or steadfastness […]