Covenant Protestant Reformed Church
83 Clarence Street, Ballymena BT43 5DR
Rev. Angus Stewart
Lord’s Day, 13 June, 2021
“O worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness:
fear before him, all the earth” (Ps. 96:9)
Morning Service – 11:00 AM
Lead Us Not Into Temptation [youtube]
Scripture Reading: Deuteronomy 8
Text: Heidelberg Catechism, Lord’s Day 52
I. The Sources of Temptation
II. The Certainty of Temptation
III. The Prayer Against Temptation
Psalms: 146:1-8; 133:1-3; 95:6-11; 143:6-12
Evening Service – 6:00 PM
John’s Witness of Christ’s Resurrection (3)
Christ’s First Appearance to the Disciples [youtube]
Scripture Reading: Luke 24:25-53
Text: John 20:19-23
I. The Word of Peace
II. The Breath of the Spirit
III. The Preaching of Forgiveness
Psalms: 107:1-9; 134:1-3; 72:1-7; 25:8-14
For CDs of the sermons and DVDs of the worship services, contact Stephen Murray
If you desire a pastoral visit, please contact Rev. Stewart or the elders
CPRC Website: www.cprc.co.uk • Live Webcast: www.cprc.co.uk/live-streaming
CPRC YouTube: www.youtube.com/cprcni
CPRC Facebook: www.facebook.com/CovenantPRC
Quotes to Consider
Herman Hoeksema on Lord’s Day 52: “… why should the Lord lead his people that they stumble and fall? There may be several reasons, but a common one is that God desires to teach us lessons to cure us of pride, conceit, and self-confidence. Perhaps someone has a deeply rooted personal weakness or character sin, and God lets him go all the way of that sin to teach him to abhor it. Perhaps someone is proud, and God causes him to stumble over his pride to humble him … There is in this prayer [‘Lead us not into temptation’] the expression of a deep abhorrence of all sin and a sincere desire to fight against it. One who utters this prayer and then willfully seeks temptation is a hypocrite. There is also a profound sense of our weakness and helplessness, the confession that without the constant help of the grace of God we must perish. And there is the confidence in the all-sufficient grace of God that is able to uphold us in the fight, even to the end, when we will have the perfect victory. Watch, then, and pray. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak. But when we are weak, we are strong, for God perfects his strength in our weakness” (The Perfect Prayer, pp. 190, 191).
Don Doezema: “Successive stages in the progress of the kingdom of God … brought also advances in the work of the Spirit. Or perhaps that is better put the other way around: Greater gifts of the Spirit brought about the progress of the kingdom of God. The point, at any rate, is that the degree of knowledge possessed during any one stage is attributable directly to the revelation of the Spirit. Abraham could not have had the insights of Isaiah, nor Isaiah of John the Baptist, nor John the Baptist of Paul. The Spirit, you see, gave that which was appropriate to each stage. At the moment that Christ breathed on his apostles on Easter evening, there was a definite advance in the Spirit’s work. It was through the Spirit that they understood at last the cross and the resurrection. But, as Lenski also points out, ‘this was still a preliminary stage, not yet the final one of Pentecost, the climax of all the stages that preceded.’ Their knowledge of the work of Christ was not yet complete. Nor could it be. The Spirit would not apply the truth of the ascension to the right hand of power until Christ ascended and received all power in earth and in heaven. Perhaps this lack explains the disciples’ display of ignorance yet at the time of the ascension: ‘Lord, wilt thou at this time restore the kingdom to Israel’ (Acts 1:6). And, of course, they had to wait till Pentecost to receive power to go out at last as ministers of the gospel. (Acts 1:8)” (Upon This Rock, vol. 2, pp. 388-389).
Announcements (subject to God’s will)
We return to singing four Psalms in our worship services today.
A new issue of the Covenant Reformed News, with articles on “Geographical, Anthropological and Historical Catholicity” and “Polygamy,” is on the back table.
Thank-you to Jacob, Julian and Tommy for their help painting the walls in the car park.
Catechism classes:
Monday, 5:00 PM: Jason & Sebastian (Juniors OT)
Monday, 5:45 PM: Eleanora, Hannah, Jorja, Penelope & Somaya (Beginners OT)
Monday, 6:30 PM: Angelica, Bradley, Josh, Samuel & Taylor (Seniors OT)
Monday, 7:15 PM: Alex, Jacob & Nathan (Essentials)
Tuesday Bible study at 11 AM will meet upstairs to discuss the relationship between faith and works.
The Reformed Witness Hour broadcast next Lord’s day (Gospel 846 MW at 8:30 AM) by Rev. R. Kleyn is entitled, “Nurturing Fathers” (Eph. 6:4).
Next Sunday evening will be a preparatory service with a view to partaking of the Lord’s Supper on 27 June.
Limerick Reformed Fellowship preaching schedule:
13, 20 & 27 June — Rev. McGeown
4 July — Rev. Stewart (Rev. McGeown in the CPRC)
Offerings: General Fund: £1,748.60.
Translation Additions: 2 Polish and 1 Russian.
PRC News: Rev. Barnhill declined Wingham PRC.
A Covenant Home: What Is It Like? (2)
Herman Hanko (an excerpt from the Standard Bearer, vol. 60, issue 11)
There are, of course, certain things about a covenant home which would be readily noticeable. You would not have to be in such a home very long before you would observe that there is a great deal of music in the home but that the music which lies open on the piano or organ, the music which comes over the radio, the music which is sung, is all good music. It need not be Psalter music always. There may be classical music, church music, religious music; but you won’t hear in such a home the music of the world—not even when the children are practicing their piano lessons. You would notice too that there probably would not be a television set, although if there was one, it was used so little that you might wonder why the people had one at all. Instead, you would see books and magazines lying around the house and on the book shelves, and both parents and children often reading and discussing what they read. But the books and magazines, while surely not all religious, are nevertheless not such reading material as has to be hidden away somewhere when the minister and elder come on family visitation.
But there are other things which one would notice, especially if one stayed for a while. One would notice, in a covenant home, that those who belong to the family enjoy being in the home. They cannot always be home—the father must go to work; the mother must attend to shopping and other obligations; the children are off to school and to work. But it would not take you long to tell that the members of the family want to be home as much as they can; they enjoy it there at home best of all; they hurry home from wherever they have been. Father looks forward to coming home after a day’s work. Mother does not try to find work outside the home to increase the family income, nor does she gallivant about, eating breakfast and lunch at restaurants, sitting in idle chatter at other people’s houses, traipsing around in an almost desperate effort to escape the home. The children are not always rushing off here and there for all kinds of reasons in order to escape being home and making family life together a near impossibility. The family finds in its home its greatest happiness and looks forward to those moments when all are together.
It is for this reason that mealtimes are always the highlight of the day for a covenant family. Gathered about the table, there is the opportunity to have devotions together—to read and discuss Scripture, and to pray together bringing the thanks and the needs of the family to God’s throne; there is much laughter and joking; there is opportunity for the children to tell what has happened in school, for mother to tell about her day and father to speak of his work. There is time for talk about the problems and burdens of the day, and to share with the family the accomplishments, the disappointments and the troubles, and to find encouragement, help and comfort from one another. Each member, after all, has his own place at the table. When one member of the family dies or is absent for a long time, we even speak of the fact that his chair is empty—and no one can fill it. Just as in the church of Christ, each has his own place which no one else can fill and in which place each member contributes to the fullness of the whole.
And so it is a family in which there is a great deal of happiness. A covenant family is a happy family. This does not mean that there are not great sorrows which drive the members closer together; this does not mean that there are not serious problems which have to be solved; nor does it mean that always and only happiness is present in the home: there are times of bickering and fighting, of unhappiness and just plain orneriness. But each knows that this is sin, and that such attitudes disrupt and detract from good home life. Nor does it mean that children always do their chores around the house willingly and eagerly. Most of the time, this is perhaps not the case. But nevertheless, each knows that his part in the family is an important part and that whatever he contributes to the life of the family is a contribution to a covenant home.
Love, therefore, is the great thing. A reflection of the love of God in the family is what makes a family a covenant family—God’s great love for us in Christ Jesus. It is a love between husband and wife in which each knows his own place, in which each willingly and readily assumes that place, in which each is thankful for the other as a gift of God, in which each knows God’s love for him. It is a love between parents and children in which both recognize that God has given parents to children and children to parents as a great gift of grace. It is a love in which each knows and is thankful for his own place within the circle of love—which, as the apostle reminds us—is a bond of perfectness. It is a love that shows itself in each sacrificing his or her own personal well-being for the welfare of the whole. Finally, it is love which makes a home, a covenant home. Yet love is so imperfect, and self-love and selfishness constantly intrude. So it is a home in which there are constant reminders that love must prevail. And so it is in unexpected gestures of thoughtfulness and surprising efforts to help one another.
Sin is always there, in many forms. Sometimes great sins. Sometimes the nagging sins of small thoughtless acts, of unkind words, of surliness and selfishness, of disobedience and disagreement. And so a covenant home is always a home where there is instruction and reproof, confession and repentance, encouragement and praise for the one who does well, a bearing of one another’s burdens, a longing to help others do the right but a punishment when needed. Such is also a covenant home in this sinful world.
In short, a covenant home is a reflection, in all its rich variety, of God’s dealings with us. Where we are conscious of how God works in our lives and where we attempt, by grace, to reflect these great works of grace and love, there you have a covenant home.
