Loveland Protestant Reformed Church
709 East
57th Street; Loveland, CO 80538
Services: 9:30 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. (7:00 p.m. June
through August)
Vol. 6, No. 12 Pastor: Rev. Garry Eriks Phone: (970)
667-9481
Homepage on Internet: http://www.prca.org
Contents:
The Office of
Deacon
God's
Attempt to Kill Moses
Is Amillennialism Romanist (Again)?
The office of deacon is one of the most neglected offices in the church of Jesus Christ. Many churches do not have deacons, or if they do, the deacons do not perform their Biblical function in the church.
In most churches that have deacons the deacons do the work of elders, ruling the church. In other cases they merely take care of the financial affairs of the church, something for which ordination is not necessary.
To understand the office of deacon it is necessary to turn to Acts 6 where the story of the first deacons is told. Now, it true that word translated "deacon" in Scripture is simply the Greek word for servant and Scripture uses it to describe anyone who serves in any capacity in the church or among believers (Jn. 12:26, Rom. 16:1). Nevertheless, Acts 6 makes it clear that some are "servants" in a special sense.
Acts 6 teaches us, first, that the office of deacon is an office to which one must be ordained (vs. 6 - cf. also Phil. 1:1 and I Tim. 3:10, 13). This implies already that the office is more than a matter of keeping the church's books. It also implies that certain spiritual qualifications are necessary (vs. 3, cf. also I Tim. 3:8-13).
Acts 6 also suggests (and I Tim. 3:8-13 confirms it) that deacons, like elders and ministers, should be men. This follows from the fact that it is an ordained office involving the exercise of authority in the church, though not the same ruling authority that the elders have. Churches that have women as deacons are as much in disobedience to God's Word as those that have women elders and preachers.
We also learn from Acts 6 what the office and function of the deacons is. Their business involves especially the care of those who are in need, in Acts 6 the Grecian widows. That this involves more than the care of widows and waiting on tables, however, is clear from Acts 4:35. There we see that the "business" which the Apostles turned over to the deacons involved collecting for and distributing to all who were in need.
We would emphasize, too, that in doing this as ordained officers of the church called by Christ Himself, their work is more than mere charity work. It must follow that having been ordained in Christ's service to this work, they are responsible for helping in Christ's Name and for His sake: "It is very beneficial, that they do not only administer relief to the poor and indigent with external gifts, but also with comfortable words from Scripture" (Form of Ordination of Elders and Deacons of the Reformed Churches).
In doing this, they are fulfilling a certain priestly function in the church. Like the OT priests, theirs is an office of mercy, in that they receive the gifts that are brought and "offer" them in the service of Christ and His people.
We believe that they must follow the rule of Galatians 6:10 in their work, but that their office first and especially is for the church. When their office is restored then it will be true in the church: "Yet have I not see the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread" (Ps. 37:25). Rev. Ronald Hanko
And it came to pass by the way in the inn, that the Lord met him, and sought to kill him. Then Zipporah took a sharp stone, and cut off the foreskin of her son, and cast it at his feet, and said, Surely a bloody husband art thou to me. So he let him go: then she said, A bloody husband thou art, because of the circumcision. Exodus 4:24-26.
One of our readers has asked a question concerning this very interesting and unusual passage in God's Word: "Why did the Lord seek to kill Moses?"
Moses was returning to Egypt at the command of God after 40 years in the wilderness of Sinai where he tended Jethro's sheep. While with Jethro he had married Jethro's daughter, Zipporah, and had had two sons with her. But Moses had failed to circumcise his sons.
The text strongly suggests that Zipporah was opposed to the circumcision of her sons; and that may very well have been the reason Moses had neglected to do this. Nevertheless, this was sinful on Moses' part, and this sin was the reason why God sought to kill him. The ferocity of God's anger indicates what a serious sin this was.
It was a serious sin because it was simply disobedience to God. God had given the rite of circumcision to Abraham, and had commanded Abraham and all his generations to circumcise their male children. Failure to do this was disobedience.
Disobedience to God's express commands is always a serious sin. One is reminded of Samuel's words to Saul: "Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams. For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry" (I Sam. 15:22, 23). There is never an excuse for disobedience.
But the sin of failing to circumcise his sons was made more serious by the fact that God specifically gave circumcision to Abraham as his generations as a sign and seal of His covenant. It signified and sealed for Abraham and his generations that God had established His covenant with them (in distinction from all the nations of the earth), had chosen to make them His covenant people, had promised to save them and their children; and had indicated, through circumcision, that He had graciously imputed to them the righteousness which is by faith.
By failing to circumcise his children, Moses was being inexcusably careless with God's covenant, and indicating by his disobedience that God's covenant meant very little to him. It is true that Zipporah was not born in the line of the covenant and that she did not appreciate fully the significance of the rite. She apparently could not understand the importance of such a bloody sign and seal. But that does not mean that Moses is to be excused. He was the head of the family; he was covenant head within the family; he was responsible for seeing to it that his children received the sign and seal of the covenant.
His failure to do so actually disqualified him from being Israel's leader, for Israel was God's covenant people. Thus God sought to kill him. The sin of Moses was worthy of death.
How exactly God sought to kill him is not indicated in the text; but it was evident to Moses that he was about to die, and that the reason was that he had failed to circumcise his boys. God used this chastisement to bring Moses to repentance for his sin. The fact that Zipporah threw the foreskin of her son at Moses feet might indicate that Moses was very ill, for he may not have been able to do himself what had to be done.
God surely would not have killed Moses. God had chosen Moses and prepared him for the special task of leading Israel from Egypt, and God loved His servant Moses greatly. But God used this severe chastisement to show Moses how great his sin was and how important it was that he obey the Lord. It is the Lord's way of teaching His children.
The Lord has replaced the sign and seal of circumcision with baptism which is the sign and seal of the covenant in this dispensation (Col. 2:11, 12). When believers fail to baptize their children, they demonstrate a careless disregard for God's covenant and a spiritual disinterest in their children's salvation. They fail to lay hold on God's promise that He will be the God of both believers and their seed. This is a great sin.
God's people are a covenant-conscious people. And their faith in God's promise manifests itself in their obedience to God's command to baptize their children. Prof. H. Hanko
Several issues back we wrote a brief article in response to a booklet that had been sent us, The Supreme Irony: An Exposure of the Roman Catholic Roots of A-Millennial Calvinism, by Paul A. Bailey. In that article we also warned against the publisher that is printing and distributing this booklet, Penfold Book and Bible House.
Since writing that article we learned with great joy and thanks to God, that the author of the booklet, Mr. Bailey, has long since (three years ago) completely renounced the booklet and its teaching. He writes as follows "to all brethren in Christ who are versed in Bible prophecy:"
"The author of a booklet strongly attacking the reformed historical view of Bible Prophecy, and affirming the dispensationalist futurist doctrine of the pre-tribulation rapture, has renounced his own work and repented of that which he now sees as a false and evil doctrine....
"Since the publication of 'The Supreme Irony' I have had correspondence with godly brothers of the Reformed position, and by His grace the Lord has gently guided me into seeing the error of Dispensational teaching. It is a peculiar feeling to refute one's own work, but rest assured, 'The Supreme Irony' and in fact ANY book defending the 'pre-trib' rapture position crumbles under the severe testing of Scripture. I have read many books written from the Dispensationalist viewpoint and have found serious flaws in them all. It is not my purpose to go into detailed criticism in this letter, but I am firmly convinced that most Christians who have accepted the 'pre-trib' position have only been made aware of its 'surface' teachings....
"The writings of such men as Le Tan, Larkin, Gaebelein, even John Nelson Darby teach that the great commission of Matthew 28 was not for the church but for the future Jewish remnant. As former dispensationalist A.W. Pink, whose study of the Puritans revealed the errors of dispensationalism 'on almost every doctrine', wrote in 1933: 'Knowing that he is unable to shake the faith of the regenerate in the Divine inspiration and veracity of the promises recorded in Holy Writ, Satan has employed the subtler attack of seeking to persuade us that the great majority of God's promises do not belong to Christians at all, for seeing they are recorded in the Old Testament, they are the property of the Jews only.' The wickedness of such teaching is frightening.
"I ask any convert to 'pre-trib' teaching to prayerfully read that which the 'giants' of dispensationalism taught on the Lord's Prayer, the Great Commission and the Sermon on the Mount. Read Darby, Kelly, Larkin, Scofield and Gaebelein for yourselves, and you will be obliged to admit that the system is utterly false, I am compelled to say, with Pink and many others who have renounced it, diabolical."
Concerning the publisher of this booklet, he writes:
"I was employed with Penfold Book and Bible House, which is a brethren organisation. On denouncing the 'pre-trib' doctrine I obtained fresh employment as it would have been impossible to continue in 'brethren' fellowship believing their fundamental
position to be false. I relate this to demonstrate that what I have done has been costly."
We would add, "Shame on the Penfolds for continuing to publish and distribute a booklet that the author himself has repudiated." That is wickedly dishonest. "Ye shall know them by their fruits." R. Hanko