A thoughtful piece by William Evans posted on the Aquila Report got me thinking today. The post is entitled, “Why I am (sort of) a Sabbatarian.”
It is worth reading. Evans is a Presbyterian, and his frame of
reference is the Westminster Confession. Mine is quite different, and
reading Evans’s piece helped me to appreciate what I regard as one of
the great strengths of the Reformed tradition in which I was reared.
I grew up in a “Dutch” Reformed community. What that meant was that
virtually all of the people in my church and school were of Dutch
background, just about everyone in the church over 55 had come from the
Netherlands, and all the people that I knew who were Dutch were
Christians. My interaction with neighbors who were not Dutch taught me
that people who are not Dutch were probably not Christians, and at best
they might be nominally Catholic.
My father, the pastor of our local Christian Reformed (later United
Reformed) Church, raised us with an excellent balance of warm piety,
Kuyperian vision, and Reformed theology, always reminding us to examine
whatever we do, no matter how traditional, from the perspective of
Scripture. He worked hard – I think – to communicate to us the freedom
and beauty of the Christian life, framing all rules and practices in
those terms.
Like most of my Reformed friends, my family refrained from
unnecessary work on the Lord’s Day. That was the day on which as kids we
could do whatever we wanted – outside of the times we had to be in
church – but we did not have to do our homework. We would regularly get
to have friends over, or go out to play soccer with a group of friends
and neighbors at the local park. Continue at Matthew Tuininga
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