Covenant Protestant Reformed Church
83 Clarence Street, Ballymena BT43 5DR
Rev. Angus Stewart
Lord’s Day, 28 May, 2023
“And if ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed,
and heirs according to the promise” (Gal. 3:29)
Morning Service – 11:00 AM
Nehemiah, a Man Who Sought the Welfare of Israel (7)
Defending the Walls of Jerusalem [youtube]
Scripture Reading: Nehemiah 4:7-23
Text: Nehemiah 4:7-23
I. By Watching and Praying
II. By Information and Dedication
III. By Sword and Trowel
Psalms: 122:1-9; 69:6b-13; 83:1-6; 127:1-5
Evening Service – 6:00 PM
Divine Judgment in the Valley of Jehoshaphat [youtube]
Scripture Reading: Joel 3
Text: Heidelberg Catechism, Lord’s Day 19
I. The Setting
II. The Charges
III. The Sentence
Psalms: 97:1-8; 69:14-20; 1:1-6; 98:2-9
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
Quote to Consider
Herman Hoeksema on Lord’s Day 19: “… we may well accept that in that [i.e., the judgment] day we will see our sins as we never saw them before. Christ and our belonging to him will be our only as well as our perfect comfort … The sins of the people of God will be exposed, but only in the light of the everlasting love of God wherewith he loved them in Christ. They will see their sins as never before, but only to adore all the more the perfect righteousness of God in Christ, whereby they are justified forever. They will see their sins, but only as blotted out in the blood of the Lamb. Because of Christ, and because of their living part with him, they will have no fear in the day of judgment. Even with respect to their own sins, they will be of God’s party in that day and take his side in the condemnation of all iniquity, even their own, only to cling in the perfect consciousness of faith to Christ and to adore forever the wondrous grace whereby they have been redeemed from so great a darkness of death and become worthy of eternal life and glory” (The Lord of Glory, pp. 141-142).
Announcements (subject to God’s will)
We extend our condolences to the Kuhs family in the death of Manuel and Sven’s father last Sunday. The funeral is to be held on Tuesday. May the Lord comfort and uphold them during this difficult time.
Pray for one another: Remember all those who mourn the loss of loved ones. Pray for those who because of illness are unable to regularly attend worship services, like Eunice, Sinead, Billy Gould and Kerryann with her children. Remember those who care for spouses or children with long-term illnesses and disabilities: Alan, Stephen, Ann and Kerryann. Pray for those who struggle with the infirmities of old age. Pray for those who are married to unbelieving spouses and those whose children have gone astray. Pray for our parents as they raise their children in the fear of the Lord and our young people that they be not tempted by the world.
Tuesday Bible study at 11 AM will meet to discuss the Pentecostal/Charismatic doctrine of the baptism with the Holy Spirit in connection with faith.
Family visitation on Wednesday (31 May):
6:30PM – D. Crossetts (Reid/Rev. Stewart)
7:30PM – Carmichaels (Reid/Rev. Stewart)
8:30PM – B. Crossetts (Reid/Rev. Stewart)
The Reformed Witness Hour broadcast next Lord’s day (Gospel 846 MW at 8:30 AM) by Rev. Haak is entitled, “The Dress Code for Marriage” (Col. 3:12-13).
Rev. James & Margaret Laning will be here 13-26 June. Rev. Laning will be preaching on 18 and 25 June. Rev. & Mary Stewart will be in Singapore and Malaysia where Rev. Stewart is to preach and speak at a CERC church camp.
Offerings: £1,029.90. Donations: £105 (Shropshire, England), £250 (New Jersey).
Translation Additions: 2 Polish and 2 Spanish.
PRC News: Zion PRC called Rev. Spronk. Randolph PRC called Rev. Noorman. Rev. Kortus received calls from Hosanna PRC and Loveland PRC. Hudsonville PRC will call from a new trio of Revs. D. Kleyn, W. Langerak and Mahtani.
I Have Loved You
Rev. George M. Ophoff in the Standard Bearer, vol. 26, issue 21
“The burden of the word of the Lord to Israel by Malachi. I have loved you, saith the Lord” (Mal. 1:2a).
It is the Lord who is speaking to His people. And the word that He speaks to them is the message they always have need of hearing. It is the message that He loves them. And He has been telling them so from the beginning of time, through the ages of the past. And He will be telling them so through the ages of the future and everlastingly. For this word of God to His people “I love you” is gospel; it is the essence of the gospel. And His gospel He had been proclaiming to His people from the beginning. Right after the “Fall of Man,” He said, “I will set enmity between thee and the woman, between thy seed and her seed, he shall bruise thy head and thou shalt bruise his heel.” That was gospel. It was the Lord proclaiming to the church—there represented by our first parents—saying to His ill-deserving and condemnable yet chosen people, who had just disobeyed the commandment of God and made common cause with Satan, that He loved them unconditionally and unfailingly, so loved them that He gave His only begotten Son, that believing they might have life abundantly. And everlastingly His word to them will be: “My people I love thee.”
No mere man could tell them that God loves them, that is, tell them so that they know in their hearts that it is true—no mere man, I say, whoever that man might be; no mere human preacher of the word, whoever that preacher might be, could tell God’s people that He loved them. It is God who does so by speaking in their hearts His gospel of love and reconciliation—the gospel as preached by His servants called unto the ministry thereof.
So there is but one correct answer to the question: how does a man know that God loves him. And that answer is: God tells him. And that is the only reason that any man knows, can know. God tells him. And to this may be added that the only people who do know are the believers, the elect of God.
Here, I believe, we also have an answer to the question whether God loves the wicked. To avoid confusion I must speak here of reprobated wicked. Does He love them? Allow me to counter with this question: Lived there ever a reprobated wicked one with the testimony of God in his soul that God loves him? I can also state the question thus: is there one case on record of God telling a reprobated wicked through the preaching of the gospel as sanctified to his heart or by direct revelation that He loved him? There is not such a case on record, is there? It has never happened, has it? And it will never happen. Well then, let me ask, If God loves also the reprobated wicked, why doesn’t He tell them? But He doesn’t. All that He tells them is that He is angry with them every day, and that He is against them. And therefore they are afraid and have no peace. For they are wicked.
The only men who have in their heart the testimony of God that they are loved of God are the men who are not wicked. And these men are the believers, the elect of God in Christ. To these people, as speaking by His Spirit in their hearts, God says, “I love you,” and to these people only.
In the beatitudes in Matthew 5, Christ said, “Blessed are ye … for yours is the kingdom.” Did He say that to the wicked and to the pure of heart? Nay, but to the latter only. And whom does He comfort? Only they who mourn. Not also the wicked. And who inherit the earth? Only the meek. Not also the violent. And who shall be filled with righteousness ? Only they who hunger and thirst. Not also the satiated. And who shall obtain mercy? Only the merciful and not also the cruel. And who shall see God? Only the pure of heart, not also the impure. And who shall be called the children of God? Only the peacemakers. Not also the warmongers.
It seems to me that, everything considered—and by everything I mean the Scriptures as corroborated by experience—God does not love the wicked (reprobated). God loves His people and He tells His people that He loves them. If He loves the wicked, why does He not also tell them, too, that He loves them. But He never does. Does it not shut us up to the conclusion that He does not love them? That the love, the grace of God, is not common but particular?
Geoffrey B. Wilson: “Even as it is written, Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated [Rom. 9:13]. It cannot be denied that in this quotation from Malachi 1:2-3 the prophet has in view the nations of Israel and Edom, but is must not be assumed that their respective destinies can be considered in isolation from that difference which God first made between their respective heads. As the election of Jacob is the proof of God’s love, so the rejection of Esau is the evidence of God’s hatred. The two aorists look back to the acts which caused these twins to differ. Both were hateful on account of Adam’s sin, so that it is in fact easier to explain God’s hatred of Esau than his love for Jacob. For as Warfield well says, “When all deserve death it is a marvel of pure grace that any receive life; and who shall gainsay the right of him who shows this miraculous mercy, to have mercy on whom he will, and whom he will to harden?’ Certainly Jacob deserved this mercy no more than Esau. But God sovereignly chose Jacob in Christ, whereas he just as sovereignly passed by Esau. Hence God hated Esau for no other reason but his sin – for God hates nothing but sin – and this holy hatred of sin may not be defined in terms of a loving less, as some commentators try to do. ‘Nothing, then, is said of Esau but that might not be said of every man who shall finally perish’ (Haldane)” (Romans: A Digest of Reformed Comment, pp. 162-163).
