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Lucas Holtvluwer
Many men say they will die for their wives and children, but the real question is, will you actually live for them? In a time where leadership in the home is often misunderstood, avoided, or pushed into extremes, we want to bring clarity back to what scripture calls men to, in the strength of Christ. Not passivity, not control, but faithful everyday leadership. We’ll explore what it means to lead as a prophet, priest, and king in the home, and what that looks like in real life, not just in theory. And joining us for this conversation is author and theologian Dr. Joel Beeke. For men who feel the weight of responsibility or the sting of failure, this episode is about clarity, conviction, and hope. Let’s get into it.

Intro
A big thanks to our official sponsor, Trivan, for making this conversation possible. Be sure to check them out at trivan.com. The world’s changing fast, but what questions should we really be asking? You’re listening to Real Talk, a podcast presented by Reformed Perspective, where we take God’s word and apply it to the nitty gritty of life. Buckle up for real questions, real answers, and real direction. This is Real Talk.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Well, Dr. Beeke, thank you for joining us here at Real Talk. It’s a real pleasure to have you.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Great to be with you, Lucas.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Excited to talk about leadership in the home and how to lead your family well. Of course, you’ve written a book, many books, I’m sure, on this topic broadly, and specifically this small one we have here today in the studio, which is a great little bite-sized taste of information and scriptural wisdom that, yeah, I enjoyed reading it myself, and I enjoyed reading it for preparation for this podcast, and I would encourage our listeners to go check it out, but we’ll talk through it today. There’s many kind of angles we could take with an episode like this. It’s a big topic, how to lead your family well, and one you’ve been speaking about and writing about and talking about for many years, but I think we’ll just start off at the top here.

The biggest issue that I, at least, see like in my own life and amongst my peers and younger men in the church, and perhaps older men who are listening to this can relate as well, is kind of a confusion about what does it mean to be a good man, and what does it mean to lead your family well, and to do this in a way that honors and glorifies God, in a way that balances out yet, not being too heavy-handed on the one hand, of course, but not being too laid back, and abdicating your duties on the other side, and there’s a real temptation, I would say, in both directions, in today’s culture, but broadly speaking, the biggest push from my standpoint seems to be that we’re not clear on what it means to do this well and do this in a way that is in line with the biblical standard that’s laid out in scripture. So, off the top, big question, what does it mean to do this well, to lead your family well?

Dr. Joel Beeke
Yeah, big question indeed. And sometimes, our, you know, there’s an old Dutch saying that’s on plaques sometimes that says your talk talks and your walk talks, but your walk talks more than your talk talks.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Can you say it in Dutch?

Dr. Joel Beeke
No, not quite. I only read theological Dutch, and not every day. But I think the point that sign makes is a very important point. One of the best things we can do is to shadow a father who’s really doing it right and well, and observing, and if that’s our own dad, praise be to us. I mean, praise be to God. But, we’re the beneficiaries, and so my own father did a lot of things right, and I learned a lot from him, but basically over the years I came to be convicted that to get our arms around this issue and to give men a framework to work within this issue that we need to use the prophet, priest, king paradigm because we’re really ultimately as fathers to be image bearers of Christ in our homes and in our leadership, and the way to do that is to image Christ, of course, and to image Christ, He leads us, and He meets all our needs, if we’re true believers, by His prophetical priestly and kingly office, which are all one in Him. So as fathers we are to be small p, small k imitators of Christ in our families as prophets, priests, and kings. So, what that means is you go to things for your prophetical office, like Deuteronomy 6:4-9, where we’re told to teach our children diligently all the truths of the word of God, the whole counsel of God. So we’re to be real teachers. Prophets are not just predictors of the future, that was actually a side issue, but they were the mouthpiece of God.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Instruction.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Yes, yeah, and so, but they were to do it passionately. They weren’t to get more excited about a score of a ball, putting this contemporary, score of a ball game, than they were about Jesus Christ, so in the home the father must be full of passion, diligently teaching his children, maybe that means sometimes weeping, but it with the sobriety of what he has to teach, and the awesomeness of what he has to teach, and the magnitude of what he has to teach. This is huge. We’re to teach, Moses says in Deuteronomy 6, when we lie down, when we rise up, when we go to bed, etc. All those expressions are just a Hebrew idiom to say we need to teach every day.

Lucas Holtvluwer
All the time.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Yes, yeah. And, of course, our very walk is a teaching. I always say this to dads: your very life is the second most important book your children will ever read.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yeah, that’s true.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Next to the Bible. So that’s one, but then we’re also to be priests to our, our children by showing our, our sacrificial personality. We have to model not meritorious sacrifice like Christ did, but a gratuitous sacrifice that we lay down our lives for our wife and our children out of thankfulness, and as an image bearer of Christ laying down his life for us, but also, and this is huge, and I hope we talk about it later, we’re to be prayer leaders in our family, prayer warriors in our family, and our children are to see us pray often, to hear us pray often, and we’re to pray for them often also in their absence, as well as with them, this is a big part of our calling to be interceders, and for that I like to take people to Job 1:1-5, where his children are in the house having a good time together. We don’t read that they’re sinning, but he said it may be, it may be that in their heart they’re sinning against God. So I’m going to be offering sacrifices every day and praying. Now we don’t have to offer any bulls or turtle doves or anything today, because we go straight to the blood of Christ. So we go straight to God in prayer, and as Spurgeon said – so beautiful, I love the statement of Spurgeon – Job did it early in the morning, so Spurgeon said he hurried to the cross first thing every morning with his kids. Yeah, you know what a beautiful picture of a God-fearing father. And the text ends verse 5: “Thus did Job continually.” So it wasn’t a hit or miss, it was a consistent day by day storming the mercy seat for his kids, and of course the mother needs to do that too, but as a leader of the home, the man needs to really marinate all his leadership in this, this prayerful ethos and pathos and demeanor, and so kids should be able to say of their dads, “well, my dad’s not perfect, he’s got his faults and flaws like everyone else, but he prays for my soul, he cares about my soul.” Because, as J.C. Ryle said, “soul love is the soul of all love”, and that’s what my dad did so well. I don’t think he could care less about my body out, quite honestly. My mother took care of those needs, but boy, did he love my soul.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yeah.

Dr. Joel Beeke
And it came across in his prayers, came across in his prophetical teaching. And then there’s the third thing, which is kingship, and that’s a very broad concept, but kingship, I think, means in a nutshell to defend your children from enemies, soul enemies, defend them from excessive use of social media, defend them from unwise romantic relationships, defend them from bullies, defend them from bad teaching – don’t let them go to a school where they get inculcated with anti-biblical material. And then protection and guidance. The wise, kingly father gives a lot of guidance to each child, and that’s one of our greatest weaknesses as fathers, I think, today, including my own. And, oh, thank God for family worship, which helps a lot in this area, but just also sitting down with your kids at times where there’s non-family worship times, and just talking with them, and getting inside their mind, and giving them guidance in a fatherly way, like the wise men in the book of Proverbs, you know.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Okay.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Or, like, you know, come unto me, my son, and I’ll give you understanding, yeah. And giving you understanding, I’ll give you wisdom,

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yeah. Hear my instruction.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Yeah. And you can feel the affection of that, you know, from the time the child is three years old on your lap, and you’re, you’re encircling your arms, maybe you got two kids that are young, you’re encircling your arms around them both, and they’re both looking at you, and you’re just talking to them calmly, teaching them already at three years old about who God is, and how to hate sin, and you’re giving them guidance how to share each other’s toys, and you know, and the fruits of the spirit in Galatians 5:22-23, you’re modeling that for them, but you’re, you’re also talking to them about it from a very young age. Like Luther said, “Give me a child until he’s seven, you can have him for the rest of his life. I’ve already formed him.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yeah.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Or the guy who Napoleon Bonaparte said, I think it was Napoleon Bonaparte, said, “If you start training a child at five, you’re too late.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yeah, it’s amazing what they can pick up.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Yes it is! And I was just two weeks ago, I was just with my whole family in the swimming pool in Florida vacation, and I’m talking. It, by the way, that’s a great time to talk to kids, because you’re, you’re just treading water in the pool, and, and, and you know, you just talk. So, I try to corner each one, or corner him is the wrong word, it wasn’t anything forceful or heavy, but I just start chatting with them, and I’m talking to my, this four year old grandchild, one of the 13 grandchildren, and I said, “So what do you, what do you think? Do you think you hate sin, and you love God?” And she said, “I think I have some love for God, but not as much love as I should have.” “Okay, you hate sin.” “Well, I do sometimes, but I love my toys too much, and I just.. I enjoy life so much,” she says, “I’m afraid I’m.. I’m not ready to meet God.” “Oh, do you.. do you think you will be ready to meet God when one day in the future?” And she said, “Yep, I think so. I think on the day of judgment I’ll be ready to meet God.” I said, “Oh, on the day of judgment, but when do you need to start seeking God?” And she snapped her head around, she looks at me, and she goes, “Right now, Grandpa!” And I said “Yes, amen, you got it.” I think that’s the model, prophet, priest, king,

Lucas Holtvluwer
Got it. Okay, that’s that’s very clear, so I appreciate you laying that out. It’s definitely daunting as well, in terms of like what you need to be as a man, to be able to live up to those callings, right? I mean, we know we’re not gonna live up to it perfectly, but it’s there’s a lot there to build on and work on, like if I think of the typical, like if we think of the cultural vestiges that are left around from a more Christian time, like the whole protect and provide side of things, like that’s still like in our, in my psyche as a young man, for sure, right, and like growing up in the church as well, but then that whole provision element also being not just you go to work and make sure your family’s got enough money to put food on the table, kind of thing, like you got to be providing for them the soul care side of things too.

Dr. Joel Beeke
That’s correct, and I should have said that under the under the King-ly office also provide is another important thing. I just kind of take that for granted. I think all fathers know that they need to provide for their family, but the thing we really have to fight against today, and I think I think we’re making inroads, but is that that’s just the beginning.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Totally, that’s the basis.

Dr. Joel Beeke
That’s just the beginning. At the same time, we don’t want to fall in the trap, Lucas, of the father has to do everything and burden him overly much, so that he comes home from work is very tired. Well, you’re not allowed to take a 10 minute map, because you got to be, you got to be watching the kids now. This is nonsense, you know, he’s going to be much better father if he takes a 10 minute nap, at least most men are, and then has the energy to go, but his wife, even though she’s been working all day as well, but she should not think, well, now he’s going to be working hard from 6pm to 11pm being with the kids for five straight hours, and doing dishes and all kinds of things. I mean, he can do dishes, that’s fine. And I always, our family, I wash the dishes until the kids got married. My wife said, ‘Now you don’t need to anymore.” But you know, you find your own way in some of these things.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yes, you do.

Dr. Joel Beeke
We’re in a day now where some fathers are just henpecked by their wives, and man, they’re working all day hard, and they come home, they work all day till 11 o’clock, and their wife says, “Well I worked all day so you need to work all day, but men needed little time as a break on their own, as well as do wives. So, there needs to be kind of a sharing of the workload, but let’s not go to the other extreme and say men have got to just be working all the time with their kids.

Lucas Holtvluwer
No, yeah, and that’s more of a result of a lot of people, like with women working much more nowadays, right. There’s that natural pressure there, of like, well, they’re literally at work all day. If your kids are in daycare or something like that, right and that’s, you can, you can see how people go down that road, but if they don’t have clarity about what the vision is of Prophet Priest and King, what it means to do that. Well, that’s, I think, that’s where people can get confused, right. So, I appreciate you kind of laying that out, my one question, hearing you say that, was like, how did this build for you over time? If you think back to your time as a younger father, throughout different, you know, teen years and whatnot, like, I have a two year old and a three year old daughter, so I’m at the beginning stages of this, but now you’re in the grandparent stage, like you say, with you said 13 grandkids there, that’s a wonderful blessing. So, how did that kind of develop over time for yourself, making some of these habits, maybe to get practical? Like being a prayer warrior, like that’s not something that comes naturally for me, at least as a young guy.

Dr. Joel Beeke
So, I would evaluate myself with different grades on different as I look back on different aspects of fatherhood. The overwhelming daunting problem I had is that the denomination I was in when I became a minister had five ministers for 10,000 members, so when I was 25 years old, I was ordained in Sioux Center, Iowa, and I had 2000 members in my charge. Well, I had 15 weddings a year, about 20 funerals a year, all these sacraments, I had to see every person in the hospital. I had to prepare two new sermons every week for Sunday. It was overwhelming, but right from the get-go until to now, until now, at 73, I’ve got the mode of working long hours, but my wife is – this is something I want to say too, very important – every woman is different, and so some wives can handle a man who works longer hours much better than others, and my wife happens to be one of those. So, I say to my theological students, don’t follow my example, don’t work as many hours as I worked, but know your wife, know the needs of your kids, and do the very best you can, and so some of those years when our kids were very small, I was also the only minister in a new denomination, and in nine churches, so that was very, very hard, very hard, but I was caught between a rock and a hard place, but then when we got more ministers as a seminary picked up, Puritan Reformed Seminary, and we could fill the pulpits, I was able to spend a bit more time with my kids, but when I look back in my life, I wish I’d spent more time with them, but what did happen was I tried to, after supper every night, we, without fail, we would have family worship. If I didn’t do family worship, my kids would say, “What’s wrong with you, Dad? Are you sick?” And then many nights, not every night, some nights we had to go away, right then, but many nights, I would, I would play with them for about an hour or something, do things with them, and then I would go back to the study. So, I’m not a very good example in some ways with the time factor, but you know, I did do probably more with my son than my daughters, and I did go golfing with my son, and hunting, and things like fishing a little bit, but I could have done more there too. So, in some ways, I think you always feel guilty that you’d never spend enough time with your kids. With my wife, it was different, because we’re both really late night people, so after all the kids are in bed, we’d jump in the hot tub and chat for an hour. We go for still till today we go for a long walk around 11:30 at night.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Really?

Dr. Joel Beeke
Yeah!

Lucas Holtvluwer
I’m sleeping then. Yeah, that’s crazy.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Then we go to bed about usually it’s between 12:30 and 1:00. So I, you know, have that time with her, but and I do think I do think that where I did do better at was being aware of my kids’ needs, asking my wife every day, what’s up, you know anything about? Okay, Esther has a test tomorrow, Calvin is getting sick, going right away to Calvin, praying with him, talking with him, praying for Esther and Calvin in the family prayer after supper, talking with the kids. I did better, I did better at that, but I think my greatest downfall was not enough time.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yeah, that is tricky. Okay, so if we think about that, I’m just trying to think about, yeah, practical ways that, like, guys can improve and kind of get up to that standard of leadership, right?

Dr. Joel Beeke
Yes, and one thing that we did do, we tried to develop different things, what, like, the Puritans called holy habits, where we would have certain customs that we would follow, tried, tried to do quite, quite a few of those, one of them, of course, being in family worship. For example, on Sunday morning I would teach the children that today regularly is a very, very special day. God is coming to speak to us today. I would wake them up every Sunday morning. I don’t know if they appreciated it at the time, but I hope they do now. I would knock on the door and say, “Time to get up. We get to worship God today, and God is going to speak to us today. Let’s get up out of bed. This is an exciting day.” And you know, my prayer would be longer at breakfast, and with excitement that we’re going up to the house of God, and that type of thing, and so you develop, yeah, with the Puritans called holy habits. Maybe we’ll talk more about some of them later.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yep, yep, yep. No, that’s important. It’s important to have some tangible things that we can all work on that way. I guess you kind of mentioned this earlier about this, the reaction to cultural egalitarianism, but I guess, and we kind of sketched it out with a prophet, priest, and king thing, in terms of what that looks like to do that well, and to not be on one side of the ditch or the other side too far. Do you want to say anything more to that, or you want to keep moving on? We can keep going.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Well yeah, you can go to either extreme can’t you? You can go to a point where you’re the head of the household, and you exercise it by authoritarianism. You do what I say, or else, and lay down the law, and you come across hard and crass and crude and rude, and you alienate your kids. You may, you may beat them, you may beat brow them into obedience, but as soon as they grow up and they’re out of your sight, they’re going to sow their wild oats, because they’re not close to you. And then there’s the other extreme where you know you’re wimpy and the kids set the agenda and you follow them, you’re constantly giving in to them, and they rule the household. Same result, when they get older, they’re going to sow their wild oats, because they haven’t had good leadership. But if you maintain that right balance, and I think the right balance, and this is where I think all my kids knew all the all the upbringing. Dad and Mom both loved them like crazy, and, and that’s why we care. That’s why we teach you. That’s why we pray for you. That’s why we defend you. That was big in our whole household. Lots of verbal affirmations. I love you. Lots of hugs of mom and the kids, yeah. And you know that gives children a sense of security, so it’s love, love, love that’s got to pervade every single one of those offices. And that’s what Jesus said in Ephesians 5, didn’t he? You’ve got to love your wife, like I love my people. Well, he died for them. He shed blood for them. So it’s a sacrificial love, but it’s also a sweet love. It’s a genuine love, and love covers a multitude of evils, and so that’s key, if you don’t show your kids that you love them, you don’t tell them, and your wife as well regularly, you will fail as a father.

Lucas Holtvluwer
That kind of, it’s interesting you say that about the regular affirmations, and then the verbal, like, “Hey, I love you, I care about you, I’m here for you, you need to talk” all that kind of stuff, which is all good, and I agree with that, but I think there’s a kind of a gentle parenting movement as well, of course, nowadays too, and that tends to go kind of in that direction as well. So, maybe, do you want to just speak on a little bit, like when you say love, and you kind of just do this a little bit, but I just want to touch on it more. It’s not the easy love, right? It’s like it’s usually the thing that takes more work to do.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Yeah, but the gentle parenting movement, as far as I see it, is more like you’re affirming your kids for everything, you’re telling them when they did something very poorly that they did it well. You know, that’s not being honest with them.

Lucas Holtvluwer
That’s lying to them.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Yeah, so gentle parenting is, is, is really a lack of leadership. It’s putting the kids in the driver’s seat, I think. Whereas genuine love is, is ruling all three of these offices, means that the three offices still function – you’re still teaching, you’re still praying, you’re still sacrificing, you’re still defending, protecting, guiding – so you’re still, you’re still in the driver’s seat, you’re still the head of the home, you’re still leading the family, but you’re doing it in love. So, even when you discipline your kids, you know, I, you know, Ted Tripps’ book, A Shepherd in a Child’s Heart. I read that when our oldest was two years old, and I went to Mary, and said, “Oh, wow, I’m not disappointing my kids, right? And neither are you. We need to follow this model.” So I did. So from then on, and I would take a child, say it’s my son, I would take him into a separate room, I would administer the discipline, not with it to save him from shame, not to not to do in front of the other kids. First of all, I talked to him about his sin and show him why it’s wrong. He has to repent, and after he repented, I would say, “Well, I still need.. I need.. if it was a fairly serious sentence, I need to spank you twice, and lay him across my lap, and if I need, of course, spank him only on the rear end, which I think is the only place on the human anatomy that God is designed to sustain spankings, and if it wasn’t quite as serious, I’d say I’m going to just spank you once, and I would do it, and I would do it firmly for him, because he didn’t feel much like compared to the girls, and then I would scoop him up in my arms, and then I would pray, pray with him, and then I would tell him I love him, and I would tell him, this sin is now buried, you’ve repented, and yeah, and one time, one time, he was like maybe four, and we’ve been doing this for a couple years, and we walked out of the room, and we always walked out the room holding hands. I figured that was a really good affirmation for him, also, that the matter is buried, never brought up again, never to be brought up again. Just like God, when He forgives us, He doesn’t resurface it. Yep, Spurgeon said, “when you bury a dead dog, you don’t leave its tail sticking up out of the ground and revisit it.” Done.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yeah.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Okay. So I told kids that, you know, you’re forgiven completely. We’re never talking about this again, but don’t do the sin again. Hold hands as we walk out, and we’re walking out, and my son looks up at me and goes, “Dad, how come you never sin?” Whoa, okay. Back into the, we called it the sun room, because the sun shined in a lot of the windows. Back into the sun room, I sat him down. I said, “Son, I’m just as big a sinner as you. I need Jesus Christ just as much as you do to be my Savior and my Lord. So, don’t ever think your dad doesn’t sin, but we’re in this together. We want to walk in God’s ways. I want to, you want to, we want to live by the Bible, okay, son. Pray for me that I don’t sin. I’ll pray for you that you don’t sin.”

Lucas Holtvluwer
Well, that’s awesome. That’s so cool. That’s okay. Just to go back to this, the I’m interested in the order of operations. Or do you give your kids like a couple minutes to slow down and like kind of cool off before you come and talk to them? Like, would you put them in the sunroom, and then, because it usually they’re like crying or something, because they did, it’s kind of a mess.

Dr. Joel Beeke
I think Ted Tripps’ book is a good paradigm, but one of the tricky things about parenting is, I have this theory, it’s, it’s not written in the Bible inspired, but I still think it’s true. It’s this: I think God made every one of our children so astonishingly different from each other that He wants us to be dependent on His grace for wisdom to rear each one, and so often what works with one doesn’t work with another. I had a daughter that if I spanked her this hard, she would weep and wail uncontrollably, and I mean, and not stop. Very, very, very tender. But if you left that daughter in a bedroom all by herself for five minutes, she would feel the pain of what she had done, and she wouldn’t feel the rebellion from that she felt when she was even lightly spanked. So I only spanked her once or twice in her life, when she did something wrong with a sibling that I had to give them somewhat equal treatment here, and but for the rest, oh, it was much more effective to put her in a separate room. So I don’t think whether there were.. there were two families. I’ll tell you this quick story: two families had 10 kids each, and I’m.. I don’t want to give any details in case people guess who they are, but the one father whose family was a total mess came to the other father, whose family was amazing, and said, “What do you do? I treat all my kids alike.” And the other father said, “That’s probably your problem.”

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yeah.

Dr. Joel Beeke
You know, I mean, there’s a certain equality you need to maintain, like you can’t give one kid a $3 allowance per week and give the other one a $1 you know, in the same age range, you’ve got certain areas of equality, and you can’t play favoritism, but boy, oh boy, you better not raise all your kids alike, because then you’re not accounting for their, the originality of their personalities.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yep, that makes sense. In order to lead your family well, what is required of the man in terms of personal holiness?

Dr. Joel Beeke
Yeah, this is a huge question. Thank you for it. First of all, you’ve got to be saved. You’ve got to have a big heart for the Lord. You’ve got to want to rear your children according to the Bible, and you want to ransack the Bible, for tips for fatherhood. In fact, I would put it this way, that the Bible is still the best parental textbook on the market. Look at all the wisdom, explicit, implicit, given in the book of Proverbs alone. So, gotta have a heart right with God. You have to be born again, want to love Christ. Second, you got to guide your children by the Bible. Thirdly, you’ve got to understand that there’s a sense in which these children are your children, and there’s a sense in which they’re God’s children by the external covenant. They’re included in that covenant, and what God is really doing is He’s opening the womb of your wife and giving you children as a father to loan those children to you, and you’re to bring them up, Ephesians 6:4, in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, and as it were, return them to the Lord in your prayers and in your upbringing, and dedicate them back to the Lord, in a sense like Hannah did, although not have them leave your home, so the net result of that is that you on the day of judgment want to be able to say to God, “Lord, I had many shortcomings and I need, I need them forgiven, and please forgive me for all my shortcomings, but by the grace of God, I did try to govern my family and lead my children according to your will”, so that when I’m in situations, and I would tell my own kids this too, I say “I must discipline you because God is commanding me to discipline you as head of the home, and I need to obey God. This is no fun for me to discipline you.” But I’m to raise children for the Lord. That means we need to follow the Bible, and we need to follow biblical principles. So I think we’ve got to get away from this business of I’m going to do what I feel like doing because I’m the head of the home. No, no, no, you got to do what God wants you to do because you’re the head of the home so you need to, you need to sit still and say what does God want me to do, and if you’re angry because your children have been disobedient and you’re ready to discipline them, I learned the hard way that it’s not the right time to discipline them because you’re angry.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yes.

Dr. Joel Beeke
So what I say to them at that point is, I say, “Well, you’ve, you’ve committed a sin.” I try to keep my voice calm, sometimes a bit earnest, but never yelling, never yelling, and never angry, but I would say, “You’ve committed a sin, and your daddy is going to think about how to discipline you, and I’ll come back to you soon.” But then what I don’t tell them is I’m feeling angry inside, and I’m not ready to discipline you right now, and I walk away. Sometimes you only have to count to 10, and you regain yourself, so to speak. Other times you say, “I need a few more minutes. I really got to settle on a position here, exactly what I’m going to do.” Sometimes I even need to drop down to my knees and just say, “Lord, give me light and wisdom to know what to do,” and then when I feel more ready and more in self control, I go back and do the discipline.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Okay

Dr. Joel Beeke
When you discipline in anger, it will always come back to bite you. Just like when you get angry at anybody. I’ve had two times in 48 years of ministry where people were so angry with me, it was unbelievable, but I made the mistake of getting angry back, and I’ve lived to regret those times for decades, and but it’s the same with children, you know, every time you lose control and get angry, you will deeply regret it afterward. Yeah, and your conscience won’t be satisfied if you say, “Oh, well, they deserved it.”

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yeah, you should have seen what they said. Yeah, no, no, doesn’t matter. No, no.

Dr. Joel Beeke
No, no. So that helped me a lot, and I thank God I did learn that when the kids were very early. So, I. I don’t think my kids ever heard me yell at them, ever.

Lucas Holtvluwer
No, no. So, that makes sense on the anger front. What about when, if we talk about personal holiness and you have these – you mentioned these habits of holiness earlier, and you talked about one of them. Did those habits of holiness help sustain you through some of those seasons of life? And maybe you don’t have this, because if you’re a pastor, you’re in the Word every day, it’s not as, as like this, but I find you go through seasons where it’s more dry. Yes, you’re still a Christian, but your faith is not as alive, but you still are called to leave, lead your family, right? Like, how did you kind of get through some of those seasons?

Dr. Joel Beeke
Oh, okay, yeah, that’s an outstanding question. Yeah, well, of course, every believer has times where, if he’s not careful, if he doesn’t develop holy habits. In fact, the lack of developing holy habits is what usually generates lukewarmness and eventually backsliding, and it usually begins in the secret closet of prayer, where your prayers become colder, more distant, more formal, more brief, more without a heart, and that just slips away bit by bit, and Satan doesn’t usually grab us and take us 10 feet away in one shot, but he inch by inch by inch he just works away at our vibrant godliness until it seems to dissipate and float away. So, yeah, so what are those, some of those holy habits? Well, one thing is praying with children on their knees, in addition to family worship, and I hope we talk about family worship later, because that’s the biggest holy habit.

Lucas Holtvluwer
We’ll get into.

Dr. Joel Beeke
But when kids go to bed, is a wonderful time to pray with them, and just to lay by them, and talk, have real talk. Dinner conversation, my wife is really big on this one, have real talk at dinner time. She actually has a talk called conversations at dinner time and if I came home from work, and I’d be sitting there, and I wasn’t focusing on real talk. My wife is very gentle. I would feel this little gentle tap, tap of her foot on my leg underneath the table, oh yeah, and I know what you’re saying. She’s saying, “Join us, you’re still thinking about your sermon”, you know, and that type of thing, so that. That’s a really good thing, so that happy time around the dinner table is a really good time to talk about things about the Lord, just real things at school, and then a big thing for me, and I know a lot of men don’t do this, but a big thing for me, which we establish from the get go in our marriage is that at night when we go to bed we get down on our knees, hold hands, and one night she prays and one night I pray, and it’s not just a short little good night prayer, we pour out our heart for what happened that day, and pray that God will bless our feeble efforts of family worship that day, and I love to hear my wife pray. I love the feminine side of prayer, hearing that and the tenderness of it all, and I think she appreciates my leadership in prayer, and so that’s a very sweet time, and that’s like recharges your batteries, so that the next morning you’re ready to go again. We don’t do, we don’t do it as well in the first right when we get up, because, like I said, we’re late night people. Hi, I read about all these Puritans getting up at 4 o’clock in the morning and going to work and having two hours of prayer. I just, that’s just not me, but I get a second wind in the evening, so I’m much better in my devotions in the evening, so, so that, that’s a holy habit for us that I think is very important. But we also developed other holy habits and faith in our family that are just, you know, just automatic, like before you go on a trip, a vacation, all go down underneath in the living room, pray for safety and guidance, and so on. And then we van is all packed, and then we get in the van and drive away. As soon as we come home, we all go back into the living room want to acknowledge the Lord, we’re safe, all get down on our knees again and pray, and then we unpack the car and stuff. So just that type of, I want to build in the consciousness of our children and my own, that every moment God is protecting us like an eyelash is protecting an eye 1000 times a day. And that’s what Psalm 121 is all about. He shall preserve thee, and thy going out, thy coming in. He shall preserve thy soul. He shall preserve thee from all evil. The Hebrew word there, preserve, has a root meaning of the eyelet, protecting the eye,

Lucas Holtvluwer
Really?

Dr. Joel Beeke
Yeah, over and over and over and over again. And that’s what God does for us so you want to acknowledge that.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Beautiful, yeah, it’s small, small but powerful habits like that.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Yeah.

Lucas Holtvluwer
And you would literally all get like physically on your knees together as a family. Wow, okay, that’s quite something. That’s beautiful. All right, okay. Why don’t we delve a little deeper into Prophet, Priest, and King, and then I think we’re going to come through some of this family worship stuff from there too, so on the prophet end of things, is biblical leadership primarily about the teaching rather than the authority? Like, where does the authority play into, like, does, like, the husband have to teach, or can, like, the wife teach, and, like, how did that kind of work out in your home, and where have you seen that modeled well?

Dr. Joel Beeke
I think the biblical model is not that the man has to do all the teaching and all the praying, but the biblical model is that the man is the leader. So, in family worship, for example, I would lead the family worship, I would do the opening prayer. My habit was to then divide the reading of the chapter into so four parts, first the prayer, and then the reading of scripture. Let’s say we’re going to read 20 verses. We used to read about 20 verses in the Old Testament. It was the New Testament, we used to read about 15, maybe 10, because it’s more packed full of essence of doctrine, and that would just divide it, but as soon as they could all read, I’d say, you know, every one of us just reads four verses, and they know we’re going to talk about it, they know I’m going to ask them questions, so having them participate makes them makes them feel very involved, and then I lead the conversation. Of course now we have the Family Worship Bible Guide, which we worked on for five years, so we use that. Now we’re empty nesters. My wife and I still use that. And we still do it just like we did, as if the kids are there but we just do it with the two of. And then when it comes to the question at the end of that little section of one of the major takeaways of the chapter in Family Worship Bible Guide, maybe my wife would jump in if nobody answers right away, or one of the kids would jump in, but she’s there to assist me, and she has a whole talk, actually, for women on how to assist your husband and family worship. And so it becomes a co-labor thing, but she allows the leadership be to me, so, and that’s the wisdom of God in the scriptures that He’s given not in terms of hierarchy, but in terms of function, two different roles for man and woman to play in marriage. You can’t have two heads in the family, you need a leader, but, but particularly when the woman is theologically astute, and can maybe she’s more astute than the husband.

Lucas Holtvluwer
I was gonna ask you that.

Dr. Joel Beeke
But she must still give him the leadership reins, and she must be wise in not dominating him, but she can jump in and offer answers or offer important questions to ask the children, and as long as he doesn’t feel threatened, that can only strengthen his ability to do family worship. So, and then what happened with us was we wouldn’t do long family worships, maybe the maybe the instruction part, instructing on that chapter would last from 5 to 12 minutes. There were the times when you know we got really talking on something, and we kept going, but as a rule, and then we would have a closing prayer, and I would do the same thing. I would, I would take turns with my wife and each of my three kids to do what they called the daddy’s closing prayer, and it happened by accident, actually, or maybe I should say by providence, there’s no such thing as accident. So, my three year old sitting in my, my lap, my son, my daughter was one year old, sitting on the other knee, and I’m going to ask my wife to close in prayer, which was normal at that time. My son looks up at me and goes, “Daddy, can I do the daddy’s prayer?” I’m thinking three years old. Yes. So I said, “Daddy will whisper some words in your ear, and then you say them, and I’ll whisper some more, and you say them.” So we did that for a whole year, when it was his turn to pray, and he felt very important when he was doing the daddy’s prayer. When it was four, his fourth birthday, I said, “Okay, now you start to pray. And remember what Daddy taught you: A C T S, Acts formula, is the way we pray. You adore God, you confess your sins, you thank Him, and you supplicate, you spread out your needs.” Now he mixed up the order, that’s okay, but pretty much got those four things, at least a little bit, and of course it’s not always theologically as sound as you want, and as sound as you want. He’s four, so you let him go. But I said then when you run stuck, you just kind of poke your elbow in my stomach, just give me a little poke and I’ll help you again. So we did that from four to seven, three years, and then at seven I said, “Son, it’s all yours now, you pray the whole prayer”, and what was beautiful, Lucas was, and I didn’t even anticipate that, but by that preparation, I mean the Holy Spirit alone can teach them to truly pray, but by preparing them this way, even outwardly, when their peers would come over, when guests would come over, when unbelievers would come over. By the way, that’s a great time to evangelize people in your family. Is have them come over for something, and then just bring them into the living room, where you have all your books set up, and have them participate in family worship. So, anyway, then what would happen is he would pray in front of the whole group of people at seven years old, no problem, he’s been used to it.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yep.

Dr. Joel Beeke
So then I did my, I did our daughters the same way, because I realized this was working, so I did the daughters the same way, and one daughter responded a little better to it than the other, when one was a little more shy than the other, so it took a tad bit longer, but I think that’s very important to involve them, and then we would sing, which is the fourth part of family worship. Psalm 118:15, “I hear the songs of rejoicing in the tents of the righteous”, and our one daughter got to play the organ, and our son got to play the cello and they would get out their instruments, and we would have just a wonderful time singing. I loved it. We get, we get, we’d sit right around our daughter, that was more shy, she really poured out her heart in playing the, in the organ, and, and, oh, could she play that thing, or no, it was a piano, piano, she could play it so well, and put all her expression into it, and we would just sit around her and sing it is well, with my soul, there’s things like that, it was, I missed her so much when she got married, just for that alone. So, family worship is meant to be an enjoyable time. It’s a serious time. You don’t let.. you don’t let the phone.. you don’t answer the phone, you just let it ring. You’re in the audience of God. This is the most sacred time of your day. This is your primary responsibility, Father. To bring your children into the Word of God every day.

Lucas Holtvluwer
So you would go into a separate room to do that, not at the dinner table.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Absolutely.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Okay. And you feel like that was an important distinction.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Yes, because at the dinner table, where are your books? Where’s your salt book? Where’s your Bible? You know, so you have it all set up on a regular basis. It’s a holy habit, everyone goes to the same seat every time, everyone’s got their particular books, it’s all ready to go, and then you come back in and you clean off the table and do the dishes.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yep, yep, love it. Okay, so I just want to zero in on that, that point of potential point of tension with a wife who’s more educated or potentially more gifted in explaining theological matters that would typically be associated with the head of the household, the male, right, the husband, so that balance there that you mentioned your wife as a talk about as well. I think you used an interesting phrase of like, if the husband isn’t threatened by it, right? So, is it, is it just predicated on that, or like, where does that responsibility lie with the husband? Because there should be probably some real conversation there. If you know your wife is gifted in that area, you are not as eloquent, perhaps, or as well studied even. How do.. how have you advised people over the years to kind of handle that?

Dr. Joel Beeke
As a pastor, I’ve been around the block a few times, actually, just in a couple months from now, I started preaching 50 years ago. I can’t believe it.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Wow.

Dr. Joel Beeke
But what I’ve learned from working with people over the years is that one size doesn’t fit all in many of these things and people have different personalities, and a wise woman will be able to understand her husband well and know her boundaries, so that she doesn’t take over the family worship completely, or also take over, or take over to such a degree that he would feel uncomfortable, like “I’m out of it”, whereas another man will say, hey, honey, I’m glad for any help you give me, and she can be freer. Doesn’t mean that one is good or one is bad, it just means you need to develop a chemistry between the two of you.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Would you talk about that before, like you and your wife, about how you want to kind of proceed with this, or that just kind of developed over the years, or what did that look like for you guys?

Dr. Joel Beeke
I don’t even remember if we talked about it before, but we started. We started this extended family worship, instead of the typical traditional Dutch way of just praying before the meal and reading the Bible, and shutting the Bible, and then praying, and no singing, and no talking about the chapter. We started the more extensive form when my oldest was three years old, and I was asked to give a talk on family worship in South Africa.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Oh, wow.

Dr. Joel Beeke
And it changed my life. I read the Scottish Divines, I read the English Puritans, I read the Dutch, and I realized, wow, I thought all my life my dad was doing family worship, but.. and he did in many ways, on Sunday nights, he certainly did. It was a long family worship, about an hour, but on weekdays he did a partial family worship, but that was what the Dutch thought was family worship, at least in the 20th century. But I realized, no, no, no. After reading all these books on family worship that the Puritans wrote, this is only a little part of it. You’ve got to talk to your kids every day on the chapter, and so that’s when we, we change. But my wife is just a natural, so she, she would just jump in the conversation. I’m not sure we ever talked about it, and I’ve never felt threatened by her at all by contributing. I just felt grateful, but of course I’m a minister, so maybe that’s a difference. But I think 90% of Christian marriages, this is a non-issue, but I’m just saying that when a woman is very gifted theologically, she, she needs to understand her husband and continually defer to him on certain issues, even as she imparts her wisdom to the children. And he should learn to appreciate that very much.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yes, she can give that much more help.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Absolutely

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yeah, that makes sense. Okay. Interesting. What just again, when we’re on the topic, what is one way that your wife, like, assists you or really helps you that you appreciate?

Dr. Joel Beeke
Yeah, so let’s say I’m trying to ask my middle child at 10 years old a certain question, and she’s not quite getting it, and I framed it maybe a little bit above her level, or you know how you give kids a little bit of a clue to help them. My wife would jump in and say, “Well, what about this”, and say it in a little different way than I would say. Sometimes it would connect with her, and she’d come up with the answer. I’d be crazy to be.. I’d be crazy to be offended by that. She’s only helping the conversation along.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yep, yep. Okay. No, that’s interesting. Just figured I’d ask that, because it’s not just guys who are listening to this too, but it’s easy to get stuck on that as well. Okay. Yes, we talked about some healthy rhythms of family life and family worship there, so that obviously that involves active teaching of scripture in the time of family worship and that’s different, that’s an extension of the typical Dutch tradition, like you say. Yeah, that many of us are familiar with.

Dr. Joel Beeke
I need to say this. The Family Worship Bible Guy is written at a level of like 10 years old and up and so since then, since these four guys, mainly four guys, spent five years writing this, forefathers, and it’s been our best-selling book, and it’s transformed 10’s of 1000’s of families in the family worship – I encourage everyone to use it, and I’ve never heard one complaint. Well, I did hear one complaint on it, that the questions were too long, but no one else has said that, but it, that that book has been so blessed of God, but I had a lot of fathers come to me and say, can you do something similar for very young children. So now we’re doing a nine volume family worship series from Genesis to Revelation. Four of them are in print, two more at the printer. We’ve got three to go, and we’re working on the seventh volume right now.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Awesome.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Each volume has 90 family worships. So, there’s first volume is called Beginning, which is 90 family worships from Genesis, and we do four things in each family worship on two pages, takes six to seven minutes to do, review two questions of reviewing yesterday’s family worship, and you, and the answers are right there for the dad, and you just ask your kids, then read – here’s the new portion of scripture to read, and two questions on the reading, and then reflect, and the reflection is something that relates to young children, ages four 3 or 4 to 11 or 12, and that they can identify with, and then there’s three questions on that reflection, and the whole reflection relates to the text read. And then the last thing is request, so there’s a prayer need that corresponds with what the Bible reading is, and the reflection, so you have review, read, reflect, request, and it’s just each one is on two pages, takes 6 or 7 minutes, and this also is such a tremendous help the parents with smaller children. I find it very, very helpful.

Lucas Holtvluwer
I’m getting excited about you talking about, yeah.

Dr. Joel Beeke
There’s all kinds of people right now. I mean, I’m talking 1000’s of people who’ve gone through these, and, and they, and they say they, when I go to conferences, they come to me. When’s the next one coming out? We went back and we started with Genesis, because we’re caught up with you and upset. We’re trying,

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, that’s awesome. Okay, let’s get into priest, then, for a minute, just because I know we got to be respectful of your time here as well. So, you say in the book here, many men would willingly die for their wives. If you truly would die for her, you would also live for her. Can you explain what it means to love your wife like Christ loved the church, and how, in your doing that, how are you living for her in that so powerfully?

Dr. Joel Beeke
Yeah, well, I have this formula that I get from Ephesians 5, and let me, let me just walk this through, through in like three minutes. I think I think this is a very, very important question. It comes at the whole heart of being, being a husband and so I have four words that describe the man’s role as a husband in Ephesians 5. So, first of all, husband’s love your wives, verse 25 even as Christ also loved the church and gave himself for it. Not 50% 100% So, first of all, you love your wife absolutely as Christ loved the church. I’m to love her best welfare, for 100%. I’m to protect her, I’m to teach her, I’m to pray for her, I’m to, I’m to be a prophet, priest, king for her, which I explain also in that little book.

Number two, that he might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of water by the word, that he might present her to himself, to that is to Christ, a glorious church. Wow, I’m to love her purposefully. This is my purpose. This is the reason I should have married her in the first place, that I want to wash her with the water of the word and present her to Christ on the judgment day. And this, this means a lot to me personally. I want my wife on the judgment day to be able to say, “Lord Jesus, because I was married to this man, he washed me with the water of the word, and made me much holier than I ever would have been, by the Spirit’s grace, if I hadn’t been married to him.” So this is the purpose: you love your wife so that you might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of water by the word, and then present her to Christ as a glorious church.

Lucas Holtvluwer
So can I interrupt there? That’s, but ultimately still for the glory of God, not just for your satisfaction.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Oh, no, no, no, no, totally, totally for the glory of God. So you love her absolutely, you love her purposefully, and then, thirdly, you love her realistically. It goes on to say, not having spot or wrinkle. So, every wife, every person is a sinner. So, every wedding I do, by the way, I slip this in somewhere in the way, I look at the couple and I say, “you know who you’re marrying today, you’re marrying a sinner, you know that, and you’re marrying a sinner.” And it’s interesting, because conservative religious Dutch weddings, everybody takes that in stride, everybody realizes that, yeah. And note, there’s no comment at all, but in some ways people burst out laughing, they don’t even think of that, that you’re marrying a sinner, but I purposely want to say it there too because if you expect perfection from someone, you put a burden too heavy on their shoulders. Yes, and the marriage will collapse inward, because the spouse will feel like I can never measure up, so you love your wife. This is the third word, realistically. She’s the center, I’m the center. Yep, so what that means is your wife has some little awkward habits or things you don’t like that aren’t all that major. Hey, man, just look the other way. Doesn’t mean anything. If there’s sin involved, you need to learn that the method of constructive criticism, sandwiching your, your, your loving criticism between two slices of bread, two areas of compliments, just like Paul did in First Corinthians, where he complimented the Corinthians, then gave them seven levels of meat, dealing with seven criticisms, and the answer to all seven, by the way, was Christ. And then he gave them a top slice of bread by saying, you know, I want to come and meet you, give each other a holy kiss, and so on. And so that’s the way to criticize, but that’s only if there’s sin involved. But you need to understand every single spouse is going to have weaknesses, and don’t even bother to correct the small things. Fundamentally, what you see is what you get. Fundamentally, you don’t change people’s personalities. And you can nitpick and you can nag this can go both ways, be realistic.

Okay, and then fourthly, you’ve got to love your wife also sacrificially, as you love your own body. So, if you get something in your eye, what do you do? You don’t say, “Hey, eye, I’ll deal with the pain tomorrow.” No, it’s your body, you want it fixed now. Your wife is hurting, you drop everything, you give her attention now, you listen to her now. So that’s how a man needs to love his wife. Those four words.

Lucas Holtvluwer
So this whole model of the man, obviously being Christ and caring for his wife like Christ cares for the church. I’ve seen a lighter critique, perhaps, of the book where it said the writer of the piece was saying perhaps this is a bit too high of a view of what a man can do, but what would your response to that would be like, is it, are you’re not. Not saying that this is the only way that Christ could be shown to, to a wife, or to the family, right? But do you think it’s of such importance that it’s one of the primary ways?

Dr. Joel Beeke
Oh yeah, oh yeah, it is the primary way.

Lucas Holtvluwer
It’s the, okay.

Dr. Joel Beeke
But of course, but we also have our spots and wrinkles as men, so we’re never gonna, we’re never gonna reach in this side of the grave, we’re never going to reach the total ideal but the Bible always sets the duties before us in the ideal form. So, as Paul says, I count my not myself to have attained, but I strive after. So, please don’t misunderstand me, in every relationship in life we always come short, but this is the goal, this is the model, this is what we, what we aim for.

Lucas Holtvluwer
And you would say it’s the primary, because it’s so active every single day.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Oh, yes, and because it’s, it’s, it’s Ephesians 5 is the theological chapter on marriage, and it plumbs the depths of marriage like no other place in the whole Bible and so this is the primary goal. So I look at it this way: post fall, what was the greatest weakness of man naturally? The greatest weakness of a husband, naturally, is not to really love his wife, to be selfish. So that becomes the primary, just because it is the greatest weakness, and because it models what marriage is to be. So, husbands love your wife. What is the greatest weakness of a woman post fall? Submission, lack of I want my way,

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yeah, it’s just two sides of selfishness.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Right.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Okay, so you, you think that’s the primary way, because the contrast is so strong against the backdrop of our sinful nature.

Dr. Joel Beeke
That’s a good part of it. The other part is, this is realistic. This is the primary duties of marriage, just all by itself, not even regarding the post-fall emphasis, but the post-fall emphasis of our sinfulness just makes this all the more obvious, that my primary duty is to love, and as Ephesians five says of the woman, it’s not just submission, it’s reverence, respect, that’s what that’s what a man needs from a wife, right.

Lucas Holtvluwer
So, okay, so, but this would be primary, like above, like preaching at the word, or like, how do you kind of rank that in terms of like how people know Christ? I’m just trying to, I’m probably misunderstanding what you’re saying.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Oh, I misunderstood. I thought you talked within the marriage relationship. Okay. Oh no, preaching of the word is always, always primary. Yeah, of course, that’s God speaking to us directly, from the pulpit through His word.

Lucas Holtvluwer
But in a marital context, yes, it’s primary means. Yeah, okay, that makes sense to me.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Yeah, that’s yeah, the word is always primary.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yeah, yeah. Okay. No, I just wanted to.. I saw that as a critique. I thought, oh, hey, I’ll ask that question. All right, so talking about kingship, then how does Christ model authority that is strong but not domineering and servant-hearted but not passive?

Dr. Joel Beeke
Yeah, every step of the way. And when he talks about himself, this is exactly the balance, right? Come unto me, I’m meek and lowly and come unto me, all ye are weary and heavy laden. So he’s very inviting, he’s very coming, he’s very tender. He comes low, he eats with sinners. At the same time insists on obedience, and he says, if you love me, keep my commandments.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yeah.

Dr. Joel Beeke
You know, walk in my ways, fear God. And so there’s a balance in Christ that comes through every office, but also through the kingship office, where he, and this is a model for father as well.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yeah

Dr. Joel Beeke
Yeah, that kind of balance.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Okay, maybe just to end it on a nice positive note here, because we always like to do that too. If, if there’s been a father listening to this, and they feel that they’ve come up short, which we all do, and they’re, they’re, they’ve learned a lot from this episode, from the wisdom that you shared, from scripture, of course. Do you have anything to offer them if they look back, especially if it’s someone who’s a bit older in their journey, and you know that maybe their kids have grown up now, and maybe they have the opportunity to be to be a good grandfather for the grandkids, or whatnot? What would you say to encourage them, and then what can they kind of do in their lives at that stage?

Dr. Joel Beeke
I would say the Lord restores the years that locusts have eaten, and whatever mistakes you’ve made, you can correct. I confess, I didn’t spend enough time with my kids, I was young, all the pressures of such a widespread ministry, but I am trying to make up for that with my grandchildren, It’s one reason why I’m cutting back at my conferences, just to spend more time, probably the main reason, spend more time with the grandchildren, but also when we go to God and confess our shortcomings, it’s amazing how God himself can take over with his grace and cover our shortcomings with the fullness of Christ and the grace of Christ so that when we see God working in our children as well as our grandchildren, we just say this is incredible grace. We’re loaded with blessings. My wife and I often say that to each other. We’re loaded with blessings. Our kids turned out better than we raised them. It’s just, I mean, that’s amazing grace. So I would say to fathers or grandfathers, don’t give up, start right away, and go to godly men in the church who are more godly than you are, and ask them for help. All you need is one or two accountability partners, ask them to hold you accountable, if they’re willing to be your accountability partner, help get, help get you going in family worship and that you can bring certain individual cases, maybe cases of discipline, and replay them in front of that wise, godly father, and say, “What did that, what do you think I should have done better, or what did I do wrong”, and get serious about your fatherhood, and, and remember, you don’t learn to swim better by just looking at the water.

Lucas Holtvluwer
No.

Dr. Joel Beeke
You have to jump in, you have to start making motions with your arms and legs. They may, you may feel uncoordinated doing family worship the first time, but now you’ve got the resources you just have to get the books from rhb.org and or no, I’m sorry, in Canada it’s Reformed Book Services. You get the resources and you, you start, and you ask God to help you, and before you know it, you’ll be doing a pretty effective edifying family worship, and your sincerity will impact your kids, even if you don’t have really great content, but you’ll learn to have better content by using these resources, and God will help you.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Yeah, they’ll see that you love God and that you love them

Dr. Joel Beeke
Absolutely. Absolutely. Persevere, don’t give up, and don’t skip a day. Okay, family worship. Soon as you skip a day, guess what? You’ll skip another day, and the next week you’ll skip two days, and then three. Don’t do that. I don’t care how tired you are. I don’t care who you are. Every day, set time, holy habit. Just do the family worship, and you will be greatly blessed, and you will see impact on your children. I believe that will humble you.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Amen to that. Dr. Beeke, thank you for your time. This has been Real Talk, I would say, and yeah, you’re welcome back anytime.

Dr. Joel Beeke
Thank you, my pleasure, and God’s blessing on Real Talk.

Lucas Holtvluwer
Thank you, appreciate it.

Outro
Thanks for tuning in to Real Talk. If this episode inspired you, please share it with a friend, so you can continue this conversation in your own life. We encourage you to send us your feedback, or let us know who you would like to hear on the podcast. You can email us at [email protected].

This episode is produced by Tyler Vanderwoude, Lucas Holtvluwer, and Mariah Tamminga in partnership with Performed Perspective. Until next time, keep having Real Talk.

This is an overview of “World Gone Woke,” Episode #75 from Lucas Holtvlüwer and Tyler Vanderwoude’s Real Talk podcast. Real Talk is a bi-weekly podcast of Reformed Perspective featuring great conversations on everything from propaganda to pornography. If you haven’t checked it out, you really should. And you really can, at RealTalkPodcast.ca.

*****

What does it mean to be “woke”? What challenges does the “woke” world present to the Church, and especially for the younger members of the body? Real Talk’s Lucas Holtvlüwer recently sat down with Pastor Greg Bylsma to talk about the “world gone woke,” and other challenges for Christians today.

Rev. Bylsma developed a passion for evangelism as a teenager already, studying missions at Redeemer College, before becoming a theological student at Mid-America Reformed Seminary. He has served Living Water URC in Brantford, Ontario for the past thirteen years.

Being woke sounds good

In broad terms, Rev. Bylsma defined woke culture as the idea of becoming awakened to all the prejudices and discriminations that exist in the world, and newly alerted to the effects of these prejudices on the downtrodden. “When you become ‘woke,’ you begin to see all the aggressions and ‘micro aggressions’ (against minority groups, non-traditional sexual identities, or different viewpoints).”

And when you are woke, you will dedicate yourself to fighting this oppression, which exists whether or not others around you are woke enough to see it. The woke movement talks about “systemic racism” – prejudice against other beliefs and races that permeates all of our societal and governmental structures. The more woke one is, the more devoted one becomes to tearing down these structures and rebuilding a new world without prejudice or oppression.

Holtvlüwer noted that on the surface, this can sound good, and Rev. Bylsma agreed: of course we as Christians want to fight oppression and prejudice, and we must be opposed to all racism.

But the devil is in the details: when Satan and the world use what seems to be a righteous cause, to tear down the Judeo-Christian foundations of a society, the result is chaos where “everyone does what is right in his own eyes.”

How should we deal with the woke movement in the Church?

Rev. Bylsma recommended that Christians be very careful to examine what the underlying meanings are of slogans used by the woke movement: “’Love is love’ is not a statement we can stand behind because of what it has come to mean.” It means that all types of sexual love are acceptable and must be allowed, which of course is in contrast with Biblical teaching.

“We can’t fly the gay pride flag, because it symbolizes acceptance of homosexuality as not sinful,” he noted. One of the tools Rev. Bylsma recommended was the “New Reformation Catechism on Human Sexuality” written by Rev. Chris Gordon, which cuts through a lot of the confusion around sexuality and gender, using clear Biblical instruction.

At the same time, we want to recognize that all sinners are called to repentance, and people who are living a homosexual lifestyle are sinners that we should want to see saved to renewal in Christ. “We should be welcoming to LGBTQ people, we should want to preach the Gospel to them… But we can’t pretend that sin is OK,” the pastor explained.

Bylsma continued, “The Bible differentiates between one who is a sinner who is not a believer, and one who is a believer but continues in sin.” He referenced especially 1 Corinthians 5 where Paul differentiates between the sexually immoral, the greedy, and the swindlers who are of the world, from those continuing in sin who claim to be Christians – those who bear the name of brother.

“We are not to associate with those who claim to be Christians who also persist in sin and say that this is OK. We can and should walk away from those who persist in sin and claim to be Christ’s.”

Rev. Bylsma also noted that Paul puts sexual immorality on the same plane as greed and swindling – so it’s not the great sin; it’s just like greed, just like swindling. It is a sin like other sins.

But Christians who insist that being a practicing homosexual is OK, or that changing genders is acceptable, can’t be treated the same as one who is ignorant of the Bible.

“[If you’re] dealing with someone in your friend group, and they’re claiming to be gay, or a girl claiming to be a boy, and they say they’re a Christian, and there’s nothing wrong with what they’re doing… the Bible tells us in 1 Corinthians 5 that we should have nothing to do with that person.  First, we follow the rule of Matthew 18, but if they refuse to accept admonition, refuse to accept that this is sin, then we no longer have a relationship with that person.”

This is different from someone who is questioning their sexuality or questioning their gender.

“If they’re wrestling with these things, and they’re a friend, then we continue to talk with them. [We should steer] them towards good advice (a pastor, a parent, a Christian counselor)… Don’t shun them; keep them in your connections. Be a friend! You don’t have to be a Christian counselor. Especially young people should not think they need to be the counselor themselves…”

Let’s recognize that we all have areas in which we struggle with sin, especially sexual temptation. We should not excuse our own sinful tendencies. We all need Christ; we all need the same Savior.

What’s coming, and how to be prepared

Holtvlüwer wondered what might be coming next in terms of the woke movement, and how we can prepare for it.

“I don’t know what’s coming,” replied Rev. Bylsma.

“But Canada is moving ahead very fast with woke ideology. Faster than Europe for example. Friends from Holland recently said ‘We can’t believe how woke Canada is!’ In the U.S., there is strong pushback against the woke agenda (but that push) is not here in Canada.

“We may go into a greater time of persecution, where we can see the Church sanctified and purified. The Church will be tempted to compromise on what is called ‘non-essentials.’ The Church cannot do so, we must hold to God’s Word. If it means being shut down, going to meet underground, worshipping out in the fields, we must do so. We may see the Church split based on her stand for scriptural truth. Businesses may lose work, jobs, income, because they won’t support LGBQT agendas, won’t put the gay flags out. On the other hand, we could see a counter swing as people see what is coming and how far it’s gone (for example drag queens reading to children).”

God may give persecution, or a temporary stay – but either way, the Church’s response must be uncompromised allegiance to the gospel, and diligence and vigilance in making Christ known, and calling the nations to follow Him.

Real-life relationships

Rev. Bylsma is worried that so many people, in particular the young, are heavily influenced by social media and “electronic friends” as opposed to real, in-the-flesh friendships.

“The gospel deals with real people, real neighbors; gospel ministry is real people, getting to know your neighbors, speaking to people, hearing where they’re at. This whole Internet world destroys those connections. We need to teach our kids to have real relationships with real people. Away from artificial intelligence, away from virtual relationships, or following remote YouTube teachers.”

Holtvlüwer pointed out that many young people who are struggling with sexual identity are also spending time alone, researching things online, spending a lot of time under the influence of non-Christians. Positive, real-life friendships with fellow believers can go a long way in keeping one grounded in the foundations we have been taught at church, school and home.

Some conclusions

Holtvlüwer and Bylsma touched on other topics as well, including whether or not the Church should withdraw from the world in response to the anti-Christian culture around us. And they also addressed finding joy in suffering for the Name.

Ultimately, Rev. Bylsma finds the answers to the woke movement, and to an increasingly hostile world, to be the same as they always have been for Christians:

“The answers may be more basic, and more difficult, than we might assume. How do we prepare for what’s coming? Love the Lord, love His Word, love His Church, love the lost. No matter what guise the devil takes, the answers are always Christ.

“….How do we get through this? Reflect on 2 Timothy 3: ‘All of scripture is inspired by God, and is profitable, is edifying, to thoroughly equip the man of God for every good work’ – including today! Love the Word of God, study it honestly, take time to be with the Lord, take time to be in prayer, bring your kids to God in prayer, bring your lost neighbors to God in prayer, strive to be faithful in allowing the Spirit to talk to your heart and convict you of where you’re falling into sin. Pray the prayer of David (from Psalm 139): ‘Search me, oh God, and know my heart, try me and know my anxious thoughts, see if there is any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.’”

Byslsma concluded:

“Christ is always the Victor, He is always the King, He will never lose a sheep from His hand. Draw near to Him, love Him, love His Word. You don’t have to listen to a thousand podcasts, you don’t have to read a thousand books. Dig into the Scriptures, tackle this honestly, ask questions… Iron will sharpen iron, and the Lord will bless.

“[Satan] is a scary monster, but Christ has got His foot over (the devil’s) neck, and He’s about to stamp. Remember Romans 16: the Lord will soon crush the devil under your feet. Be humble, prayerful, and courageous, and bold as a lion, because the devil flees when we resist him… Stick to the basics and press on!”

This is an overview of a recent episode of Lucas Holtvlüwer and Tyler Vanderwoude’s Real Talk podcast. Real Talk is a bi-weekly podcast of Reformed Perspective featuring great conversations on everything from propaganda to pornography. If you haven’t checked it out, you really should. And you really can, at www.RealTalkPodcast.ca.

*****

Lucas Holtvlüwer recently interviewed Dr. Eric Watkins to learn more about evangelism and church planting from one with a lot of experience and wisdom. Dr. Watkins is the pastor at the Harvest Orthodox Presbyterian Church (OPC) in San Marcos, California and is also the director of the Center of Missions and Evangelism at Mid-America Reformed Seminary.

Dr. Watkins wasn’t raised in the church. Growing up in North Carolina, he was a troubled youth, particularly after his father left his mom when Eric was just twelve years old.

After college, Watkins was drifting around the country, following the band “The Grateful Dead,” when his sister lent him her Bible: “you’re going to be stuck for a few days on a bus, so take this…” Eric recalls that through His Word,

“God confronted me by His spirit, and convicted me that I was a sinner… and that Jesus was the Savior and had done for me what I could not do myself… I got on the bus a long-haired stinking deadhead, and I got off the bus a week later, longer-haired and stinkier, but converted!”

Dr. Watkins then began a long journey of learning more about the Lord, going to seminary, becoming Reformed, and teaching Bible classes at the same church where he now ministers in California. Becoming a pastor, Watkins helped plant a “daughter” OPC congregation in Orlando; seven years later he and his family moved to St. Augustine, Florida to start a “parachute church” – meaning that there was not yet an established core group, and one needed to “start from scratch.” By God’s grace, these two churches are still thriving today.

Capital “E” Evangelism and lowercase “e” evangelism

Watkins defines evangelism as:

“bringing the truth claims of the Gospel to bear upon the hearts of those that are outside the kingdom… where the objective content of the Gospel is made clear and people are called to faith and repentance in Christ.”

He further differentiates the general call of Christians to evangelize, from the specific calling by a church body for one to do the work of an (uppercase) Evangelist. “Like Paul says to Timothy, ‘Fulfill your ministry – do the work of an Evangelist,’ or when Paul says in Corinthians ‘Woe is me if I don’t preach the Gospel.’” In Watkins’ opinion, church planters in particular bear that warning to fulfill their duty to evangelize.

“Among the list of gifts that Christ gives to His Church in Ephesians 4 there’s a role for the gifting of the Spirit in the area of evangelism for people that are called to do particularly evangelistic ministry, and they literally live and sleep with that ‘woe is me if I don’t preach the Gospel.’ So that’s in a category of capital E Evangelism.

“Lower case ‘e’ evangelism is what the whole Church does. So, like in Acts 8, when the church is scattered, it says not simply those who were ordained like the apostles but men and women who were dispersed went about proclaiming the Gospel. To me that’s lowercase ‘e’ evangelism…. Even lay people in the Church in some fashion or another are called to walk wisely before the watching world, and even to engage them at times and opportunities that God will provide with the claims of the Gospel….

“There’s something important to be recognized in ministering not simply the Gospel to people, but also ministering the Gospel through people, and to help our members understand that they too have a role to play in the great commission, and the promotion of the life and the work of the Church. It may not be street corner preaching, or handing out tracts… but it is befriending the people that we have the opportunity to get to know that are outside the Church, wherever we’re able to meet them.”

Enough time for members old and new?

Holtvlüwer asked Dr. Watkins if there can be tension in the church when there is so much focus on reaching those outside the body, since there are also many needs among the current members. Watkins agreed that this can be difficult, and he advised that there should be clarity on what is required of the pastor and elders, best captured in written descriptions of their roles.

“For instance, it takes a certain number of hours a week to prepare a sermon; it takes a certain number of hours a week to visit the congregation, to do the bulletin, to meet with leaders, to disciple, and to do evangelism. So we have to decide what we think is important; we need to prioritize, and there needs to be not only transparency and accountability for the church planters, there also needs to be protectiveness for him and his family… It’s really important that you protect the time and space for the pastor to do evangelism… even after the church is up and running.”

Watkins continued:

“Visitation is very important in Reformed churches; I think regrettably evangelism isn’t, and we’ve created an unintentional… paradigm in which we have so busied our pastors that there’s no room for evangelism… There’s a lot of guilt on the shoulders of our pastors that [know] that this work really is important, and should be done, but I’ve got a 60 plus hour work week, with two sermons, and a congregation, and Consistory and Council meetings.”

Holtvlüwer suggested, “This might mean that you need to get a second pastor if your church is of a certain size.”

Do we expect the Holy Spirit to show up?

Talking about Reformed churches and evangelism, Watkins reminded listeners that John Calvin wrote his most famous books like The Institutes of the Christian Religion, as,

“…discipleship tools for new converts to the Reformation, and as a pastor he modeled and did evangelism. He housed orphans in his home, and what we could call seminary students whom he trained and taught the work of the ministry including evangelism…. Calvin is nicknamed the Theologian of the Spirit, and if you read his writings as they relate to evangelism, he wholeheartedly believed in it….

“Our problem at times is that we have too small a view of the Holy Spirit… We don’t expect (Him) to show up much, and to do great things in and through our church. Do we really expect God to convert people through the preaching of His word? Do we expect God to convert people off the streets, out of depravity and drug abuse and all the different things that are out there, into the arms of the church? Do we expect to see baptisms not just of kids but adults in our church? I think our Trinitarian theology could be enhanced and brought into greater conformity with Calvin’s view… that invigorated his ministry.”

Holtvlüwer wondered how or if Reformed churches had strayed from Calvin’s mission of being evangelistic in orientation. Watkins summarized that

“Part of the Church’s temptation in history has always been to isolate itself from the world rather than to engage. And yet with the best of intentions: because we don’t want our covenant kids to get swallowed up by the world. So what do we do? [We either] build high walls around them and insulate them from the world. The other [option] is to train and equip them to engage the world with the Gospel…. Do we simply teach kids to think about what’s wrong with the way the world thinks, or do we also teach them how to engage the world, not simply apologetically, but evangelistically.… Do we disciple with a view towards raising up people that will be able to contend for their faith in a 1 Peter 3 way or Colossians 4 way?”

Watkins also identified the opportunity for the younger generation of Reformed Christians.

“The world has come to the back door of the Church, and the front door, and is on either side of our house – it’s all around – the nations are all around us! What will we do with the… opportunities that God has placed before us in an increasingly diverse world. It’s an exciting time (for spreading the Gospel!)”

Christian schools and our covenant youth

Holtvlüwer mentioned that he is thankful for, and understanding of why our parents and grandparents spent so much energy and effort on establishing Christian schools, and that these institutions can still serve as a bulwark against the teachings of the world that are so prevalent all around us in social media and in the culture overall. But do we need to do more to prepare our kids to go out to the world with a strong apologetic viewpoint?

Watkins expressed thankfulness for Christian schools (his own children attend a Christian school in Escondido): “I’m not trying to change that paradigm at all!” At the same time:

“…social media has more access to our kids now than parents, pastors, and Sunday school teachers combined… the amount of time that kids are spending online in different media platforms (is huge)…”

What is the answer to all these potentially harmful influences? Watkins reminds listeners of the well-known Biblical verse,

“‘Train up a child in the way that he should go!’ That is, not simply protect and shelter him from all the things you never want him to hear or learn about… Parents and pastors must be the teachers, not the world… There’s a challenge to not simply reach the lost, there’s a challenge to keep our kids! There are a lot of kids that are drifting away from the church, for different reasons… and while there’s no silver bullet… I do believe in discipleship…”

Wakins continued: “An uncomfortable question we could ask would be,

‘Could a covenant kid graduate high school without ever seeing a parent or church leader share the Gospel with a non-Christian?’ …if the answer is yes, then think about what life looks like for them when they… go off somewhere else perhaps for college or a job. So we have to train our kids with not simply what’s wrong with the way the world thinks, but (train them) to engage the world evangelistically, in the hope that in doing so (we might) actually insulate our covenant kids the right way.”

Watkins wanted to emphasize that he appreciates the Reformed faith, and in no way wants to tear down the institutions that Reformed Christians have built.

“The Reformed faith is grand, as J. Gresham Machen said, and we have some of the most wonderful tools at our disposal… we do a great job in many ways raising our covenant kids. By God’s grace we have a wonderful doctrine of the Church, and what the world needs most… is for the church to be the church! To continue to be committed to the ordinary means of grace… to be committed to family worship, and at the same time… to use the tools for evangelism that are part of the Reformed faith.”

In the last part of their conversation, Holtvlüwer and Watkins discussed mentorship as a way for mature Christian men and women to provide leadership and guidance to younger people, both those new to the faith and those who have grown up in the church. Watkins ended his contributions with a call for “young men to consider a pastoral call in the ministry. We need pastors, we need church planters!”

The complete discussion between Holtvlüwer and Pastor Watkins can be found on all major podcast platforms – just search for “Real Talk Reformed Perspective,” episode 63. And you can watch it on YouTube below.

This is an overview of an episode of Lucas Holtvlüwer and Tyler Vanderwoude’s Real Talk, a biweekly podcast under the Reformed Perspective umbrella. It features great guests talking about a host of issues affecting our Reformed community, ranging from social and economic, to theological and educational. If you haven’t checked it out already, you should. And you can, at www.RealTalkPodcast.ca.  

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The Oct. 10 episode of Real Talk was all about church unity. Hosts Lucas and Tyler were talking with a couple of pastors representing two denominations working towards being just one. Their guests were Rev. Steve Swets, pastor of the Rehoboth United Reformed Church (URC) in Hamilton, and Rev. Dick Wynia of Lincoln Canadian Reformed Church (CanRC). The conversation covered the history of both the CanRC and URC, as well as the current and potential future status of the two federations’ relationship.

Two pastors, three denominations

Both pastors were uniquely suited to the conversation. Rev. Wynia grew up as a member of a Christian Reformed Church (CRC) in St. Catharines, but studied at the Canadian Reformed Theological College in Hamilton, prior to being ordained in Aylmer CRC in 1987. He then helped to lead a Calgary congregation out of the CRC federation and (eventually) into the newly formed URC federation. And for the past fourteen years, Rev. Wynia has served at Vineyard CanRC in Lincoln. With his experience serving churches in three different federations, he brought a unique perspective to the conversation.

Rev. Swets calls himself “an American serving in Canada”: he was a minister at Abbotsford (BC) URC for over seven years, prior to taking the call to Rehoboth URC. Rev. Swets grew up in the south Chicago area, and as a teenager, was part of a church split out of the CRC that resulted in the formation of a new URC. Rev. Swets is the secretary of the United Reformed Churches’ Committee for Ecumenical Relations and Church Unity, and has preached in many Canadian Reformed churches over the years too.

A little history to start

To begin, Rev. Wynia gave a general outline of the history of how and why the Canadian Reformed Churches were founded, with a helpful explanation of the main reasons that many immigrants from the Netherlands who were members of the “liberated” churches, could not find themselves at home long term in the CRC congregations, nor in the Protestant Reformed Churches they found in Canada.

(The CRC had not taken much interest in the church split that had happened in the Netherlands in 1944, with “liberated” churches on the one side, and the GKN church federation they’d been driven out of on the other. But by not taking a side, the CRC effectively supported the GKN. In addition, church leaders in the CRC did not want to bring any of the controversy from the Netherlands into churches in North America, and did not want immigrants to speak about these issues. But such a restriction couldn’t be acceptable to “liberated” believers – they couldn’t be somewhere where they weren’t allowed to talk about the stand they’d thought so important they’d taken it at the cost of friendships and family relationships too..)

Prof. K. Schilder, one of the leaders of the “liberation” had warm regard for the Protestant Reformed Churches (PR), so some of the “liberated” immigrants formed PR churches in Hamilton and Chatham, Ontario shortly after arriving in Canada. However, the PR Synod of 1950 required that their churches subscribe to a specific view of the covenant. This restriction on covenantal views was the very reason the “liberated” members had left the GKN, and so they could not live with a condition like this after their significant struggles in the Netherlands.

After this CanRC history lesson, Rev. Swets summarized how the United Reformed Churches came to be founded. They were begun largely by former members of the CRC who disagreed with that denomination’s views and decisions on the authority of the Bible:

“It really came to a head around 1995, when the CRC opened all the church offices to women… and there were issues of theistic evolution, and practicing homosexuals in good standing in the church. There were a lot of peripheral issues but really what it came down to is the Scripture.”

As Rev. Swets explained, by making the Scriptures and Biblical teaching limited to the culture or time of Paul or Moses (as the CRC was doing),

“you start to undermine the authority of the Scriptures: The Bible does not actually say what it means… all of a sudden you’ve kind of knocked the foundation out of the authority of Scripture. I’d say that is the real reason why these churches left the CRC.”

Rev. Wynia also recalled the controversies regarding the teaching of Calvin College professors like Harold Dekker, who denied limited atonement, and Howard VanTil, who held to theistic evolution. They held views that were not Biblical but which were being tolerated.

Why didn’t CRC exiles join the CanRC in the 90s?

Holtvlüwer asked if those who left CRCs in Canada during this period considered joining with the Canadian Reformed Churches.

Rev. Swets answered that although he wasn’t involved personally at that time, his understanding was that

“the URC needed to be established, and we needed to figure out who we were…. Dr. DeJong, and Dr. VanDam’s advice (to us) was to get ourselves established first, and then we’ll meet… and we can figure out a way forward of how we can become one that makes sense… So the advice was to become your own federation first.”

Rev. Wynia recalled asking Dr. Jelle Faber, his former professor from the CanRC seminary, for advice:

“I remember as a pastor in Calgary saying, ‘What do I advise my congregation to do; you know, there’s a true church in Calgary: should we start a new church, or should I say to (our members) that we are obliged to go there?’ And (Faber) said, ‘You have to be the shepherd of your sheep; if you advise them (to join the CanRC in Calgary), they will scatter, and this way [starting an independent congregation] you hold them together.’”

Some of the history of personal relationships and acquaintances was also a factor in the new federation forming. Rev. Wynia remembered that “at that time, you would have had members who remembered the Liberation (in the Netherlands), and… that was a bitter thing… I mean, they had their conflicts in the Netherlands, and to some degree in Canada, and they remembered.”

The group also discussed the impression that especially twenty-five years ago, some CanRC members would have considered their federation the only true church. While this was never an official position of the federation, enough CanRC members may have defended that idea to make former CRC members hesitant about getting together. Rev. Wynia brought up the counterpoint that whenever this issue was raised at the level of consistories talking to one another, the issue was quickly dealt with. As one CanRC consistory put it to Rev. Wynia, “If we didn’t think you were true churches, we wouldn’t be talking to one another.”

“There’s a lot of personal issues (in the past), and the pastors and leadership knew this,” said Rev. Swets. Some of these issues, dating back to the 1950s were still, in 1995, remembered by older church-goers. But not any more, 25 years later. As all four gentlemen could agree, there is excellent cooperation today between churches from the two federations.

Three obstacles to unifying

In 2001, the two federations accepted one another as “sister churches,” and there were some fairly aggressive timelines proposed for an official joining together. These discussions stalled for a variety of reasons (including a lack of enthusiasm from many of the URCs in the United States). The three main obstacles seemed to be:

1. a Proposed Joint Church Order which neither federation could entirely accept,
2. the issue of federational or independent theological seminaries for the training of ministers,
3. and a non-theological issue that still is close to members’ hearts – what songbook could be used in the worship services.

This last issue highlights a difference in the decision-making process within each federation. The URCs overall prefer that a matter like which songs may be sung in worship services would remain within the purview of the local elders.

While agreeing that Christ’s authority rests with local elders in local churches, the CanRCs have traditionally decided many things together at their General Synods. Rev. Swets stated, “There is a perception from the URC that the Canadian Reformed (church order) is too hierarchical, and that Synod has too much authority; Synod says too much.” With the URC’s history, coming out of the CRC denomination where the problems started at the top, this is a particularly understandable concern.

We have grown closer

The first half of the podcast might have had listeners believing that there is no foreseeable path towards unity for these two church federations. However, much of the second half of the podcast highlighted the progress that has been made over time. In Canada especially, there’s all sorts of cooperation between churches: in education, in mission work like Streetlight Ministries in Hamilton, and in recognition of one another.

In 2016, the URC took a six-year hiatus from further unity talks with the CanRC. But this year, in the URC Synod Niagara 2022, unity efforts will resume. The Synod will hear reports from the URC Committee for Ecumenical Relations and Church Unity, including the results of a survey that the committee put out to each URC. (This podcast was recorded about a month before Synod Niagara took place.) The results of this survey suggest that a small majority of the 58 URCs that responded are in favor of federational unity with the CanRC.

As might have been expected, a higher percentage of the Canadian URCs are in favor, while less than half of the American URCs responded positively. Only eight of the churches surveyed indicated they had any “theological concerns” regarding a potential union. One of the theological concerns brought up is the fact that the CanRCs have not made a federational statement on the Federal Vision movement, although professors from the Canadian Reformed Theological Seminary have participated in meetings and forums to explain the CanRC view of the covenant, and of the Federal Vision.

Looking further at the survey, Rev. Swets pointed out that “Twenty-eight of the 58 churches said they perceive the Canadian Reformed to have a hierarchy.” He personally disagreed with this perception, and stated that the URCs could also be perceived as having structures that are hierarchical. “We actually have a Stated Clerk of the URC; we elect him every Synod… he’s an employee of the URC.”

Rev. Wynia reminded the group that both federations “have some diversity of views when it comes right down to it… Professor Schilder, before the Liberation in Holland, would say that he could live in the same church federation as Kuyper, (despite their) different views of the covenant. We can tolerate theological divergencies. There’s an acceptable range that we would judge as within the bounds of the confessions and live with those differences.”

Rev. Swets shared one possible route to unity, by the CanRCs accepting the URC church order:

“Since the URC church order is broader than the Canadian Reformed, the Canadian Reformed church order can fit within the URC church order… The way that would work is that you would have to introduce regional synods into the URCs, or have the seminary under the oversight of, for example, Regional Synod Canada, and therefore it still has church jurisdiction, still has professors appointed by and overseen by a church ecclesiastical body. That would be the fastest way forward that… If you did that, nothing would have to change in the life of a Canadian Reformed Church: you aren’t forced to have the Trinity Psalter Hymnal if you don’t want, it’s up to each church. You can keep the Book of Praise… Whereas if the URCs become Canadian Reformed, we’d have to throw away our Trinity Psalter Hymnal for corporate worship, and we’d have to sing out of the Book of Praise… There would have to be more changes for the URCs to become Canadian Reformed, whereas in practice there wouldn’t be changes for the Canadian Reformed to become URC. The things you’d have to change are behind the scenes, like the oversight of the seminary, and how does superannuation work for ministers, but in the life (of the average member) nothing would have to particularly change.”

In his concluding remarks, Rev. Swets said, “When you talk about church unity, there’s a lot of issues to deal with. But at the very foundation of all unity is that it has to be given by the Holy Spirit. It can be frustrating because it takes time; you have to be patient in it, and pray, pray the Holy Spirit will work in this way…” Rev. Wynia expressed thankfulness for the unity that the two federations do have already, and for the progress made so far, in these discussions together.

Readers who would like to listen to more are encouraged to download the 90-minute podcast at www.RealTalkPodcast.ca, or watch the video version below.

“Into the Light” will equip God’s people to fight the pull of pornography

This is an overview of an episode of Lucas Holvlüwer and Tyler Vanderwoudes’ Real Talk podcast. Real Talk is a podcast of Reformed Perspective featuring great conversations on everything from propaganda to mental health, and if you haven’t checked it out already, you really should. And you really can, at www.RealTalkPodcast.ca.

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On this, their 50^th episode, Real Talk’s Lucas and Tyler invited filmmakers Jake Valk and John-Michael Bout to talk about pornography, its devastating effects on Christians, and how the Lord’s people can fight against this terrible pervasive sin.

Bout began by describing in a very real and personal way his own decade-long struggle with pornography – the feelings of guilt at what he knew was sinful, difficulties with anger brought on by his own hypocrisy, and his gradual drift away from the Lord with a conscience made dull over time. Bout described how grateful he is that God led other Christians on his path who had turned away from porn by the Lord’s grace, and dedicated themselves to helping others with this pervasive, insidious sin.

A providential conversation

So what made the two of them think about creating a documentary? Jake Valk shared a story of having coffee with Christian author Tim Challies, whose book Sexual Detox was of great help. Not (yet) knowing that Valk was a filmmaker, Challies wondered if books were the best means to address the problem of pornography: wouldn’t video be a better medium to reach those caught up in that cycle?

This suggestion fanned a spark into a flame: why not make a documentary that would inspire people to take the steps to get out of the grip of pornography? And that is just what Valk and Bout did. Their new film, to be called Into the Light introduces six speakers with expertise in Christian responses to porn, not just in understanding that porn is sinful and wrong, but with real and practical suggestions for how to stop sinful habits, from the perspective of both those struggling with the sin, and those trying to help “the struggler.”

Valk explained:

“(One of our speakers) is Deepak Reju; he wrote the book Rescue Plan. He and Jonathan Holmes wrote a pair of books that are really good. One of the things he talks about is the philosophy of locking down a phone: how to cut off all access, and he walks you through that process from the vantage point of someone who is struggling with porn, but also if you’re helping someone who is struggling, and understand how they would be tempted to get out of the full lockdown of a phone, and so you can be extra alert to make sure that you really are shutting down a device for all it’s worth.  So you can kind of take everything that our speakers talk about in the film from two different angles – the struggler, and the (one helping the struggler).”

Valk and Bout want the film to be made available for no cost to churches, organizations, and individuals, to be a resource to as many people as possible. To make this work, they’ve been fundraising through a Christian crowdfunding site with a target of $85,000. You can find out how to donate at their page GiveSendGo.com/IntoTheLight, and you can watch the trailer below.

It’s not about stopping the bad, but embracing the One Who is Good

Bout emphasized that freeing people from porn is not the end goal: the real goal is to help people find Jesus Christ, and to have Him be the foundation of their new life.

“There are other methods to get free from pornography that don’t involve God – there are many secular programs… but if you get free of porn and still lose your soul, what’s the point?”

Valk stated emphatically that a documentary can never take the place of a program like Life Renewal, with accountability, personal connections, and a thorough teaching program.

“Life Renewal is way better than what we can make. 100 percent! Life Renewal is so thorough; they really walk through the process and do it over a year. That’s way better than this!”

But there’s also a place for a film like Into the Light to help get conversations started, and to push a struggling sinner to seek help through a program like Life Renewal and other Christian resources.

“If you find this film, and you’re uncovering sin, and you’re bringing it into the light, and you’re really building your relationship with God, and you want to go to something like Life Renewal which will take you way, way deeper, please do! They do a phenomenal job.”

First, stop the bleeding

So what else is in the film? Bout summarized a section that deals with “triage”

“Deepak Reju gets into the radical practical measures of cutting off access (to porn)… if you walked into a hospital with an open wound, you’re not going to be getting asked ‘oh, so what are your symptoms, what are some things you need?’ The first thing they do is they take you in and stitch up the gaping bleeding wound so that they can have the healing take place, and to use that analogy, when you’re dealing with pornography it’s not legalism to say we have to start by cutting off access… cutting off total access.”

Valk remembered asking one of the speakers, Heath Lambert, when it was OK to introduce the internet or social media back into someone’s life.

“Heath gave a really thoughtful response to that, a large part of it being that you’re not necessarily the best person to make that choice, so having good community in your life saying, hey brother, you know it’s been two months since you last fell into pornography, you’re displaying good devotional habits, you’re really walking with the Lord, I can see that in your life. If you enjoy Instagram, I think it’s reasonable you can have it back, let’s see how that goes… So other people in your life can give you an opportunity to have a better perspective.”

Bout followed up on his own story:

“There are a lot of things that I cut out, and there’s (just) a couple of things I’ve reintroduced back. I never had to go as radical as going to a flip phone – actually, that may have been a good thing to do; I really respect people who do that. So for myself, I’ve actually kept most of the (guards) that I put in place, and just because I know I would so much rather live with the inconvenience than deal with the temptation or the potential relapse.”

What about relapse?

Speaker Ellen Mary Dykas is highlighted in one of the chapters in the film called “Endurance,” dealing with the reality of sinners struggling with a relapse, or a step backwards. Bout stated that it is very rare that one is able to “change instantly, although that is not beyond the Lord’s power. Your inadequacies, your failures do not mean that God is not able or willing to change you.” Valk summarized some of what Dykas taught:

“Your identity is not your track record. You are not your success last week, your success yesterday, the pattern of sin… even if you do really well, that’s still not your identity. Your identity has to be as a Christian, as a loved, cherished child of God, because that’s where you find your root in fighting in the first place.”

The last section of the film is presented by Garrett Kell, and reminds viewers of the hope that we have in Jesus’ saving work. Valk summarized: No matter what our sinful tendencies are today,

“one day all of this sin, that darkness, like what you did last night, all that’s going to be gone if you’re a Christian… God’s going to do away with this sin nature that we have, and that’s going to be incredible, and then there’s going to be (forever) of being porn free… I won’t have to shed another tear, an angry, frustrated tear (at my sins)… There is hope beyond this (life) where there are no tears anymore!”

You can download this and other episodes of “Real Talk” at www.RealTalkPodcast.ca, on your favorite podcast app, or through the ReformedPerspective.ca home page. You can also watch the YouTube version of the 50th episode below. For more information on “Into the Light,” go to IntoTheLightDocumentary.com.