Five: THE AFRIKANER'S BACKBONE: HIS CALVINISTIC CHURCH
It has often been said that the Church is the backbone of the Afrikaner people. I believe that this is an accurate assessment, right down to this very day. The strength of the people -- that which has sustained them through many, many crises -- has unquestionably been this rigorous Calvinism as expressed in a monolithic Church.
There is a very strong denominational feeling. Schisms and separations have been practically unknown for 300 years. Remarkably -- despite the huge size of the denomination to which most of the Afrikaners belong -- it is practically the most conservative Calvinistic Church in the world today. Indeed, it is the only one I know, anywhere in the world, that has remained conservative for so long in spite of its huge size.
The Reformed Church was brought to South Africa in 1652 by governor Johan van Riebeeck M.D., the first Governor of the Cape. You will remember that he prayed on the seashore near Cape Town that the Reformed religion would be disseminated throughout the land.
This was the Church of strict Dordt subscription to the five points of Calvinism, to the Belgic Confession from Holland, and to the Heidelberg Catechism from Germany. German Lutherans who emigrated to South Africa during the next fifty years, were tolerated as fellow Protestants -- and welcomed at the Lord's Table in the Reformed churches. But they were discouraged, at least for the first fifty years or so, from building their own Lutheran Church.
The reason for this is that the Calvinists regarded the Lutherans as really being of the same religion as themselves -- though the compliment was not always returned by the Lutherans. So you have the Lutherans being welcomed, after approval, by the Reformed Session at the Lord's Table -- but not the other way round. Of course, this was the whole intention of the Heidelberg Catechism. It was drawn up by Calvinists for the very purpose of uniting them with the Lutherans.
It is safe to say though that, apart from a handful of Lutherans (many of whom became Calvinists through amalgamation into the Reformed congregations in South Africa), there was really only one denomination and one kind of Christianity in South Africa from about 1652 through the first British occupation in 1795 and indeed even 1806.
However, especially from 1806 onward, the British began to arrive in strength. Holland sold her Cape colony at the Southern tip of South Africa to the British, you will recall, to prevent it from falling into the hands of the French who were overrunning Europe and the various non French European countries' overseas possessions at that time. From 1806 onward, the British brought to the Cape: Anglicanism; Methodism; and a small amount of Roman Catholics and Baptists. However, they also brought a considerable amount of Presbyterians -- nearly all of them Scots, or Scots-Irish.
Especially from 1820 onward, the British consolidated their hold over southwestern South Africa. They tried desperately to anglicise the Afrikaner the people not only in language but also in religion. For the latter purpose, they imported a large number of Scottish Presbyterian Preachers. At one time, as I pointed out before, more than one-half of all of the Preachers on the Reformed pulpits in South Africa were Scotsmen -- and not either Dutchmen or Germans (not even South Africans trained in Holland). Yet, fortunately for the Afrikaners, the Scots Preachers afrikanerised -- rather than the South African congregations anglicising and losing their Afrikaans language (as the British had intended would happen).
So the Scots came. I am going to spend a little time on the Scottish influx into the basically Dutch-German-French Reformed Church of South Africa. As the internationally famous modern South African theologian Dr. Willie Jonker once said, South African Calvinism cannot be described merely as an extension of Dutch Calvinism or German Calvinism or French Calvinism. It has also been strongly influenced by Scottish Presbyterian Calvinism. All of these factors have gone into the South African melting pot. They have all been blended with the South African scene itself, so that a new kind of Calvinism has emerged. The local colour and ingredients added, have produced a Calvinism of a somewhat different hue even from its various European ancestors.
The Scots arrived -- the MacGregors and the Moffats and the Livingstones -- postmillennialists to a man! They were augmented by the Robertsons, the MacDonalds, the Browns -- and, of course, especially the Murrays.
Here we think of Robert Moffat, who went and laboured in the northern part of South Africa -- and got much involved in Bible translation and re-evaluation. He said: "I long to be engaged in the blessed work of saying to the heathen, 'Behold your God!' Do not think that the future seems to cast me down. No! behold, I go full of hope!" See J.S. Moffat's 1896 book The Lives of Robert and Mary Moffat.
Then, of course, there is the great David Livingstone. You will recall, toward the middle of the nineteenth century, that he left his native Scotland and went to Southern Africa to extend God's glorious Kingdom.
Livingstone is a very famous figure in South Africa. There is a Livingstone College in the Eastern Cape, named after David Livingstone. Livingstone wrote to his wife before he departed from Scotland: "I will go as a missionary to Africa, no matter who opposes. I know that you wish as ardently as I can, that all the world may be filled with the glory of God." Then again, from Africa, he wrote: "I am trying now to establish the Lord's Kingdom in a region wider by far than Scotland. Fever seems to forbid. But I shall work for the glory of Christ's Kingdom -- fever or no fever!."
Livingstone gives some interesting accounts of the way in which his preaching was received in Africa. "One day," he wrote, "I had a good and an attentive audience. But immediately after the service, I found the chief had retired into a hut to drink beer. A Minister who had not seen so much pioneer service as I have done, would have been shocked to see so little effect produced by an earnest discourse concerning the future judgment. But time must be given to allow the truth to sink into the dark mind and produce its effect. The earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord. That is enough. We can afford to work in faith. For Omnipotence is pledged to fulfil the promise!"
Note also his evaluation of yet another day's work: "A quiet audience today. The seed being sown -- the least of all seeds now -- will grow into a mighty tree. It is, as it were, a small stone cut out of a mountain. But it will fill the whole earth. He that believeth, shall not make haste. The dregs of heathenism still cleave fast in the minds of the majority. They have settled deep down into their souls, and one century will not be sufficient to elevate them to the ranks of the Christians in Britain. Missionaries in the midst of masses of heathenism, seem like voices crying in the wilderness -- reformers before the Reformation!
"Future missionaries will see conversions follow every sermon. We are preparing the way for them. May they not forget the pioneers who worked in the thick gloom, with few rays to cheer -- except such as flow from faith in God's promises! We work, however, for a glorious future which we (ourselves) are not destined to see. We are only the morning stars shining in the dark. But the glorious morn will break!
Missionaries do not live before their time. Their great idea of converting the world to Christ, is no illusion. It is divine! Christianity will triumph! It is equal to all that it has to perform!"
This was the mettle of those mighty missionaries, as they went out deeper and deeper from South Africa into the areas to the north. And in the wake of all this, the stirring Reformed Church of South Africa too marched through into Rhodesia (alias the modern Zimbabwe). There, after not too long, the Reformed Church had a larger number of members among the converted Blacks than all the other kinds of Christian denominations combined -- even though not one half of the Black population there has yet been christianised.
Well now, the Scots arrived -- the Scottish Presbyterians. Many, if not most of them, were soon afrikanerised -- within the South African Reformed Church. Many Scottish place names in Southern Africa in the nineteenth century attest to this new strain now coming into Afrikaner Calvinism. For there are South African place names such as Carnarvon, Cradock, MacGregor, Dundee, and Edinburgh -- and also a desert town in the Eastern Cape called Aberdeen.
But, of course, the greatest and most famous of all the Scottish Preachers that arrived, was the father of the world famous Dr. Andrew Murray. Dr. Murray was not a Scot by birth. His father was, but not he. His father came out from Scotland -- but soon afrikanerised and became the Minister of the Reformed Church in Graaff-Reinet --just thirty miles from the Aberdeen to which I have just referred. Graaff-Reinet was the pulpit where Dr. Daniel Francois Malan, round about 1912 or 1913, later gave his farewell sermon -- "Whether we eat or drink or whatever we do, we are to do all to the glory of God" -- and promptly entered politics and finally became the South African Prime Minister.
Dr. Andrew Murray grew up in that Reformed manse, where his father was the Reformed Preacher. There is a grapevine growing in the yard of that manse to this day. It was there when Andrew Murray was a little boy and it is still bearing grapes today. Andrew grew up in strict Calvinism. Then he went to Scotland and to Holland, in order to study theology at a time when the liberalism that Groen van Prinsterer and Kuyper would later arise to oppose had swept through the land and even the theological seminaries.
On arrival in Holland, Andrew Murray was very instrumental in supporting the conservative Calvinist Student Association there at the Seminary -- called "Zekar Dabar." That, you may detect, is Hebrew for: "Remember the Word! Murray was very instrumental as a South African student, in fighting against Dutch theological liberalism. He also studied German theology massively. Then he returned to South Africa in 1848.
Back in South Africa, he soon became known as a godly man and a man of great prayer and humility. In 1853, he represented the Orange Free State at the political independence talks in England. In 1860, he pioneered the annual ten-day Pentecost Prayer Meetings. And in 1862, he became Moderator of the General Assembly of the Reformed Church of South Africa (for the first of six times).
Murray was instrumental in liberating the South African Church from the control of the (British-dominated) South African State. Back in 1806, the British had taken over the Cape -- with their own idea of the Queen being the earthly head of the Anglican Church under God. Indeed, they had sought to inflict this pattern even on the Reformed Church!
Having the political clout, the British were able to try to do this -- for a few decades. At that time, the Reformed Church in South Africa was not allowed to convene in Presbyteries or in General Assemblies -- without the permission of the British Governor and State Officials at the Cape. Well, Andrew Murray was used in the hand of Almighty God -- to liberate the Church from this degree of Erastian oversight by the State.
It is told that Andrew Murray was still a humble man even while moderating the General Assembly. Dr. Andrew Murray normally when his own father (himself a Preacher) rose up to give an address, Dr. Murray (though Moderator) stood up -- out of respect for his own father in terms of the Fifth commandment.
According to Andrew Murray, the three greatest characteristics that should mark the life of any Christian, should be: humility, humility and humility. He was a godly man. He usually preached with closed eyes -- prayingly. Indeed, he prayed throughout his sermon -- so that every word he uttered might be expressed with compassion, with exactness and with efficacy.
He successively ministered in Bloemfontein, Worcester and Cape Town. Then he became Minister in the great church at Wellington in the Western Cape -- a church to which my wife's sister later belonged, and a church which to this very day is permeated with a spirit of godliness and prayerfulness. It is as if Andrew Murray many decades ago left his permanent stamp on it. Indeed, his influence still moves powerfully throughout the denomination.
It was a time of great revivals throughout the world -- in Switzerland, in the United States, in Scotland and in South Africa. There Andrew Murray, perhaps the foremost South African instrument in the hand of God, promoted this real movement of God's Spirit. Dr. Murray would get up on the pulpit and preach prayerfully, with his eyes closed, to quiet congregations where you could hear a pin drop. There would be no emotion shown from the pew throughout the service. Then people would get up without a word, and leave the church and go to their homes.
But the Spirit was working! About Tuesday or Wednesday during the week after the sermon, as people were working in their fields or tending their horses or cutting down wheat, they were still in the grip of the words they had heard in the pulpit from the praying man with the closed eyes. Then the Spirit of God would sweep through their souls and convict them of sin -- some three or four days after hearing the preached word! They would sink to their knees all alone in the fields and in the barns, and call out to God for mercy.
Well, that is real revival, in my opinion. And it left a permanent imprint on the whole character of the format of conversion in the South African experience.
So great revivals swept the land. Andrew Murray became the pioneer of one of the most blessed church institutions of which I know. In South Africa, that institution is known as the Pentecost Prayer Meetings.
This has got nothing to do with claiming to speak in tongues. Tongues-speaking phenomena were totally absent here. Yet it seemed to Dr. Murray, as he read his Bible in Acts chapter one, that the Lord Jesus ascended into heaven in order to sit upon the throne of the universe. Thence He would exercise His dominion and extend His control over all men here on earth, until the earth became full of the glory of Jehovah as the waters covered the sea.
It seemed significant to Dr. Andrew Murray that between Ascension Day and Whitsunday (alias the Day of Pentecost ten days later), the Early Church met each day for sustained Bible study and prayer. So he instituted this practice in his church each year. Following the church calendar after Ascension Day and before the day of Pentecost, during those ten days he asked his congregation to come to church every night -- to listen to an exposition of the infallible Word of God. Then he asked all in the pews to lift up their hearts to God, and to pray as the Spirit moved.
This practice speedily spread to most of the other pulpits in the land. It has become the characteristic and peculiar feature of the Calvinism of the South African Churches. I could wish with all of my heart that this feature would be exported to every church in the whole world. For its blessings are untold. No one then ever spoke in tongues in these South African Reformed Churches. But after the day of Pentecost was commemorated each year, there has been a deepening work of the Spirit of God in the hearts of almost all believers who had attended the services. Indeed, there has also been much spin-off, even into the lives of the non-churchgoers of the land -- through their contact with those who had attended these services.
Andrew Murray also became a great power in education in South Africa. He got very much involved in the christianisation of the school system (that was then being de-christianised under British control). Indeed, he promoted new life in it -- to the extent to which he was able.
He also became very concerned about the social welfare services. He felt they were not being done christianly enough in South Africa. So, in his preaching and in his practice, he got young people to become more involved in social welfare. Indeed, he established Huguenot College in his town of Wellington. It is still operative today, and offers courses to train not only Missionaries but especially Social Workers -- to help the poor and the needy, and to rehabilitate people.
This is one of the greatest factors why the Reformed Churches of South Africa today are involved to such an extraordinary degree in medical work, in care of unwed mothers and orphans, and in operating homes for retarded children and suchlike. This is regarded as a vital diaconal work of the Church of Jesus Christ. For if this work is not being done -- and if all we are doing is telling people how to be saved in a vacuum (but no concrete expression is being given to the ministry of mercy by the Church as an institution in the world) -- then we are very little more than sounding brasses and tinkling cymbals. All of this, I trace back especially to the work of this godly man, Andrew Murray.
He was also concerned about the inadequate extent to which the Reformed people were reading their Bibles. So he pioneered a system of daily readings to the Bible called "Uit die Beek" (alias "From the Brook"). This was printed up, and copies blanketed the land. People were encouraged to read their Bible and meditate every day. This also led to the creation and establishment of the South African Bible and Prayer Association, which became a powerful instrument in the hand of the Lord to sustain this true Holy Ghost revival.
Andrew Murray had many sons and descendants, nearly all of them being good Christians -- something like the descendants of Jonathan Edwards in the United States. Many became Preachers or Ministers and Missionaries. Even my own Professor of Philosophy at the University of Cape Town (under whom I wrote my M.A.) -- Professor Andrew H. Murray -- is a descendant of Rev. Dr. Andrew Murray.
Dr. Andrew Murray, in the English-speaking world, is best known for those of his writings that have been translated into English -- nearly all of them of a devotional nature. Such include works such as Abide in Christ; Absolute Surrender; The Full Blessing of Pentecost; The Holiest of All; Holy in Christ; How to Raise Your Children for Christ; Humility; With Jesus in the School of Prayer; The Inner Chamber; The Master's Indwelling; The Spirit of Christ; The Spiritual Life; and Waiting Upon God.
Yet we need to know that he was also a great expositor of the Word of God. He wrote a tremendous book on Hebrews. But his greatest written achievement was perhaps his massive work on the Heidelberg Catechism (of the German Reformed Church). To my knowledge, this massive work has never been translated out of Afrikaans. Today it is unobtainable, even in Afrikaans. It sells out rapidly whenever it is reprinted. Oh, that we could get that work translated, particularly into English!
I would like to close out on Andrew Murray with three powerful quotations from his book With Christ in the School of Prayer. Just listen to these words: "It is in very deed God's purpose that the fulfilment of His eternal purpose and the coming of His Kingdom should depend on those of His people who, abiding in Christ, are ready to take up their positions in Him their Head -- the Great Priest-King -- and in their prayers are bold enough to say what they will that their God should do.
"As image bearer and representative of God on earth, redeemed man has by his prayers to determine the history of this earth. Man was created and has now again been redeemed to pray, and by his prayer to have dominion over the earth and the sea and the sky and over all things in them to the glory of God.
"Lord Jesus, it is in Thee that the Father hath again crowned man with glory and honour and opened the way for us to be what He would have us be. O Lord, have mercy on Thy people - and visit Thine heritage! Work mightily in Thy Church, and teach Thy believing disciples to go forth in their royal priesthood and in the power of prayer to which Thou hast given such wonderful promises -- to serve Thy kingdom; to have rule over the nations; and to make the Name of God glorious in the earth!"
As far as I know, it was Murray who pioneered the idea of subjugating the universe specifically through the agency of prayer. Here there is tremendous emphasis on the priesthood of all believers -- as one of the chief tools in bringing about the triumph of the Gospel throughout the world.
From 1850 to 1860 quite a struggle took place in the Reformed churches of South Africa against liberalism. I guess you can say it started in 1852 -- when Reformed people in South Africa of Coloured skin-colour sent a petition to the General Assembly -- to be allowed to separate from the White churches and to congregate by themselves in their own churches. A lot of the preaching, they felt -- then delivered by White Ministers -- was unsuitable for their needs. After a lot of discussion at the General Assembly, the predominantly White General Assembly acceded to the request of these Coloured people. So a new denomination was launched -- the Coloured Reformed Churches (N.G.S.K.). Confederately, however, it remained loosely linked to the White Reformed Churches.
The ferment continued. In 1857, some of the Reformed Churches seceded and formed a new and a much smaller denomination. It is the one that later pioneered the establishment of Potchefstroom University for Christian Higher Education. As far as I can determine, the chief concerns in that church-split -- and this was the first time that the Church had ever split in South Africa -- was that these brethren believed that only one cup should be used at the Lord's Table. Largely for reasons of hygiene, the General Assembly had decided that little glasses would be instituted. But the secessionists felt that this was a departure from the essence of the sacrament. Also, a larger number of godly and majestic hymns were then beginning to be used. However, the group that left were then exclusive psalm-singers - although not anti-instrumentalists.
Shortly after this, some other congregations left the Reformed Church General Assembly -- on account of the liberalism of about five preachers in the Church, and the slowness of the General Assembly (committed to due process of law) in dealing effectively with this matter.
So autonomous Reformed congregations arose at places like Tulbagh, Hanover, Aliwal North and Victoria West. It is very interesting to see the way the General Assembly of the Reformed Church handled these maverick congregations. They urged the seceding congregations to come back to their Church, and to participate in the processes of Presbytery and General Assembly. But they used no force against the seceding congregations to try and attach their property, nor to prevent them from seceding.
The General Assembly finally got around to disciplining the five liberal Preachers to whom I referred. They were men who felt it nonsensical to pray that God would send rain (because they felt God has predestinated before the foundation of the world whether it will rain or not). That was the essence of the liberalism of these men. When these Ministers had finally been disciplined, all of these secessionist congregations returned to the General Assembly. But those who had established the tiny new denomination in 1857, did not.
The only other movement into liberalism I am aware of in the Reformed Church, took place in the 1930's. The world famous Missiologist and great New Testamentician Professor J.J. du Plessis was then quite the most "evangelical" man in the Reformed Church of South Africa -- a real soul-winner and missionary-minded individual. He wrote the standard work at that time on the evangelisation of Africa in the English language. He also started his own newspaper called "The Searchlight" -- in which he drew attention to the fact that not so much the written word in the Bible, but rather the living Christ was where the emphasis should rest. Indeed, he correctly protested against a certain amount of dead orthodoxism in the Church.
But unfortunately, he also drew attention -- as a Professor at the Stellenbosch Theological Seminary! -- to four or five Bible texts which he felt were not fully infallible. A couple of them were in the books of Samuel and Chronicles, involving dates.
More seriously, however, he also took the position that Christ had become so much bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh at His incarnation, that -- though God before His incarnation and though again God after His ascension into heaven -- our Saviour had not only decided not to exercise His divine attributes during His earthly incarnation, but had in fact then laid aside His divine nature. Christ did, however -- asserted Du Plessis -- assume it again, after the completion of His fully human work in keeping the covenant of works as the second Adam to the end of His earthly life.
Well, this marks a very interesting chapter in the history of the Reformed Church. The brother of the previous Prime Minister of South Africa whom I knew very well, Rev. Dr. Koot Vorster -- a personal friend of mine -- himself told me of the amazing things that happened in the Stellenbosch Seminary and at the University while this particular furore was taking place in the l930's.
Dr. Vorster said a group of very conservative students were very grieved about this heresy in their Seminary. So they went out one night, and put their hands round an enormous oak growing in the seminary garden. It was a massive tree that looked like it could live for another couple of hundred years. They linked hands around this oak tree, touched it, and prayed an imprecatory prayer. They prayed that if heresy, in the eyes of Jehovah, was indeed ever being taught in the Theological Seminary -- that Almighty God would shrivel up that oak tree till nothing was left of it! From the next day or so onward, that sturdy oak tree began to shrivel up from the root!
Yet the wrangling continued. I think you would agree with me that although heresy was indeed involved, it was not the worst kind of heresy in which one could possibly have been embroiled. Indeed, it was evangelically motivated by a man whose dedication to the Kingdom of Christ was beyond reproach. Nevertheless the matter went up for adjudication by the highest court of the Church. Du Plessis was found guilty on five points of heresy by the General Assembly. Consequently, he was removed from his teaching office at the Seminary.
At that point, Du Plessis enquired about his salary. The General Assembly Moderator, Rev. Hugo, said that if necessary they would pay it to him for the rest of his life. Du Plessis insisted that he would then go on teaching at the Seminary. But the General Assembly would not permit that.
Thereupon Du Plessis took the Reformed Church General Assembly to the secular courts. He demanded the right to teach, in exchange for receiving his guaranteed salary. This went right up to the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of South Africa. But the final opinion of the highest court in the land was that if the Church wanted to give him money for doing nothing, there is no way he could demand to render her work in return for that money.
So that was that. It is the closest that the Reformed Church has ever come, in its 320-year existence in South Africa, to being split by liberalism.
The Reformed Church of South Africa today is, I would say, in a healthy condition. It is a very evangelical and very missionary-minded Church. Indeed, it is a Church that is becoming increasingly Reformed. In it's preaching, it is becoming ever more relevant -- in addressing itself even to the conquest of the non-ecclesiastical areas of life.
I would now like to say a few words about a godly leader known as Rev. Dr. John Daniel Kestell. Kestell was Chief Chaplain in the South African Republican Army in the Anglo-Boer War against the British. His own father was born in England, but he was born in South Africa. He thoroughly associated himself with the Afrikaner cause. He was particularly concerned, after South Africa lost the war, about the "Poor White" problem and the economic uprooting of his people. And so he established an organisation known as the "Reddingsdaadbond" -- the "Association for Accomplishing the Deed of Salvation."
This was an economic organisation which would try to re-educate the defeated Afrikaner people, especially in the field of economics, to teach them pride again. It strove to show them how to rise up from their economic defeat, and to become economically self-sufficient.
It involved establishing many towns on the edge of the desert, to which penniless "Poor Whites" who had lost everything during the war were geographically transported. There they were shown how to work in the development of these towns, while getting on their feet again economically.
Kestell also wrote the Forewords to, and had a mighty role in launching some very valuable books that appeared in the depression years -- called Koers in die Krisis (alias the "Course in the Crisis"). Three volumes in particular were of exceptional value. They are books that are hardly obtainable today. Written in Afrikaans, there are also a few contributions from Calvinists in other countries: one or two from America, Scotland, Hungary, France, Germany and so forth. But for the most part they were written by South African Calvinists -- setting out the program to move forward toward the conquest of the earth. They offer blueprints for this, not just in church affairs -- but also in politics, anthropology, biology, zoology and all of the recognised major fields of learning.
But I think the true greatness of this man Kestell is seen in his work as the translator of the Revised Version of the Afrikaans Bible. It too appeared in the depression years. He worked on it for several years, from nine in the morning until three in the afternoon, every day. It is said that, as an old man, he would often take his granddaughter with him for a walk in the garden. There he would read her the translation work that he had done in the New Testament during the last six hours. If his little granddaughter could not understand every word, he went back and revised it until she could. He felt it to be very important that the true seed of the Church -- the covenant children -- must be able to understand the Bible translation, loud and clear.
I would make this observation, if I may -- as a great lover of the King James Bible which I have used practically exclusively, ever since preaching in English in the United States. I would point out that our family never spoke English at home, until I returned to the United States some seven years ago (1973). At that point, I began to preach from the English Bible (and no longer from the Afrikaans Bible).
The King James is a wonderful version of the Bible. But it is much more difficult for young Americans of the twentieth century to understand the King James Version (even though they can if they try hard enough) -- than it is for young Afrikaners to understand their version of the Bible (which they can do with great ease). I have nothing against the King James, although I do prefer the Geneva Bible. But I would make this point.
Rev. Dr. Kestell more than anyone else was responsible for the translation of the New Testament into Afrikaans. He did it in such a way that Christ's little ones would be able to understand it very easily -- in the modern colloquialisms of the day.
I would like to say something now about the organisation of the Reformed Church in South Africa. The Congregation is the fundamental building-block. A very interesting difference between South African Calvinism and American Presbyterianism -- is that in American Presbyterianism the Preacher has his membership in the Presbytery and not in the Congregation. In the South African Reformed Church, however, the Preacher becomes a member of the Congregation -- together with his family. He can only be disciplined by the Presbytery. But that is also true of all the Elders -- and not just of those Elders who represent the Congregation in the Presbytery.
The Session and the all-male Deacons meet collectively in a body known as the Consistory. This shows the influence of the French Huguenots. For in Dutch Calvinism and in Scottish Calvinism, the Deacons rarely if ever meet with the Session. In French Huguenot Calvinism, the Calvinism of Calvin -- and in South African Calvinism -- they always do. So you have three Offices represented at the congregational-level meeting of the Special Officers.
Another interesting difference with American Presbyterianism, is that no congregational meetings are held in the Reformed Church of South Africa. The Consistory -- the Elders, the Deacons and the Preachers administer the Congregation. The Consistory is the body that elects new Special Officers. This is the body that calls Preachers to the Congregation, even though -- after their selection has been made -- the Congregation is asked to approve or to disapprove of the action of the Consistory. Disapproval is very rare.
The South African Reformed Church's government is geared to a triune view of Office. The Preacher has a different Office to the Elder. He is not just a different variety of the Elder. It is regarded as wrong and irregular for Elders to preach, or to administer the sacraments. That is the job of the Preacher alone. The Elder may, though -- in the absence the Preacher - deliver a priorly approved sermon (generally written out by or printed from that given by a Preacher).
The Offices are clearly delineated from one another. But never will you find it emphasised that the Preacher's work is more important than the different work of the Elder nor the yet different work of the Deacon. These three different kinds of church work are all regarded as being equally important -- "the one and the many!" When these Officers assemble for church worship on the Lord's Day, you will find them all similarly attired -- each wearing a black suit and a white tie. So, if you see someone walking to or from a church building on a Sunday, with a black suit and a white tie -- you won't know whether its a Preacher or a Deacon or an Elder. But you will know that its one of the three.
Yet quite apart from this high view of Special Office, an even higher view is held concerning the General Office of all Believers -- the Prophethood of all Believers; the Priesthood of all Believers; and the Kingship of all Believers. For the Preacher is regarded as nothing more than a specialised form of the Prophethood of all Believers; the Elder is regarded as nothing more than a specialised form of the Kingship of all Believers; and the Deacon is regarded as nothing more than a specialised form of the Priesthood of all Believers. Because all Believers have been engrafted by holy baptism -- into the Office of all Believers so as to partake of the benefits of Christ's functions lifelong!
All Preachers are exactly the same as to their influence. There are no Senior Colleagues. There is no such thing, in the South African Reformed Church, as: "the" Minister; or an Associate Minister; or an Assistant Minister. This very idea would be repudiated out of hand - as a hangover either of the collegiate system of the academy, or otherwise as a remnant of Romanism and its hierarchy. The youngest Minister in the Church is exactly the equal of the very oldest Minister in the Church. For they are Co-Ministers! They would say that the very idea of Associate and Assistant Ministers is hierarchical -- foreign to the teaching of the Word of God!
Presbytery, in the South African Reformed Church, meets but once a year. Each Congregation must submit a statistical report to Presbytery of its growth; its missionary and evangelistic work; the cases of discipline it has had; the number of baptisms performed; its educational work; and its actual state of affairs. Presbytery delegates people to go to the Provincial Synod alias the State Assembly, and the latter again to the National Synod or General Assembly. These courts are never referred to as "Higher Courts" and the "Highest Court" -- but only as "Fuller Courts" and the "Fullest Court."
In South African Calvinism, the General Assembly is not regarded as the "Highest Court" nor as more important than the Consistory at the congregational level. It is merely a fuller Court, dealing with matters of national importance rather than just matters of local importance. All these various Courts are regarded as co-important.
These South African denominations belong to the Reformed Ecumenical Synod. Indeed, they predominate there. Yet they are extremely perturbed by the continuing deterioration of the Dutch Churches in Holland. I think that if the Dutch Churches do not deal with the heresies of Wiersinga and of Baarda and Kuitert very soon --you are going to see that body split right down the middle.
The diaconal work of the Reformed Churches is vast. Previously, they ran Christian schools and hospitals. Today, they still run homes for unwedded mothers; rehabilitation centres for "Poor Whites"; homes for orphans; old age homes; youth hostels; rehabilitation centres for alcoholics and drug addicts; street-preaching stations; schools for the deaf and the blind; and cripple-care centres for people who are physically disabled and children who are spastic. All of this is done in the Name of Jesus, and for Christ's sake -- Matthew twenty-five. These are not State enterprises. These are Church enterprises -- funded by the Church; done in the Name of Christ, as a legitimate work of the Church as an institute (in addition to her preaching).
The Church is also much involved in organising Conventions about social evils, Protestant Action, fighting communism, and promoting National Education. Indeed, the Church often makes pronouncements even against the State Government's policies.
Not too long ago, the South African State, wanting to raise more money for defence against threatening enemies, got itself involved in a Defence Bond Obligation Scheme. In terms of this, people were asked to invest in buying arms -- and were guaranteed a minimum of 7% interest in return. Nothing wrong with that. But then the State decided to sweeten the pot. It decreed that each week, a number would be drawn from a hat -- and the "lucky" person whose number was drawn, would be given a prize of one or two thousand dollars.
The Church was furious! This led to a major Church-State confrontation in South Africa. Though it lost that battle, the Church warned the State that its action was going to bring the curse of Almighty God onto the nation -- by introducing this gambling element into the matter.
The State told the church it respected her view-point and right to say this. Yet the State felt it needed to do this in order to raise the money needed so as to be able effectively to fight communism.
So you do get these Church-State clashes on these matters from time to time. Can you imagine something like that, a Church-State clash on such an issue, taking place in any other country of the world today? But it is that way in South Africa.
Of course, there have been occasions when the State is right and the Church is wrong! We have already referred to the State's decision to have the Romish cross removed from Devil's Peak. I can also recall an occasion when the State rightly prohibited a Church from immersing totally naked women in public -- and another occasion when the State prosecuted a blasphemy case in the teeth of opposition from some of the denominations.
There is also a massive missionary outreach of the South African Reformed Churches -- into Rhodesia, into Nigeria, and into various other parts of Africa. There are also denominational missions to Jews and Moslems. There are even missions to the Portuguese and the Czechs, to Japan, to European embassies throughout Europe, and soon also in North America. There is even a denominational mission to the Communists. It evangelises Russian and Polish seamen that call in and around Cape Town, and "bombards" them with Bibles.
There is a tremendous emphasis on Reformation Sunday in the South African Reformed Church. The pulpit is always in the middle of the church -- with a massive Bible on it, and a communion table in front of it (at a much lower level). The liturgy is simple, and strictly Genevan. The Elders empower the Preacher to proclaim God's Word. The announcements are made at the beginning of the service, so that they will not interrupt the service once it gets underway.
The first thing that is sung is generally a Psalm -- not a Hymn. The Hymns may be sung later. The Ten Commandments are read every Sunday from the pulpit. Thereafter, the people sing a Hymn to this effect: "O Lord, we have broken Thy Law! Grace is all that we appeal to. But work in our heart through Jesus Christ -- a new desire to keep Thy Law!"
The Apostles' Creed is then professed by the people. They then give their affirmation to that Creed. Then the Preacher, in the Name of Jesus Christ, pardons and absolves all those who have made this Confession of their faith -- according to the true condition of their hearts before God.
Only organs are used in public worship. Pianos, violins, guitars and such like are regarded as instruments not generally worthy enough to accompany the singing of the praises of the Almighty. The music in the church consists of all 150 Psalms, together with a few extra melodies of some of them -- and also 180 really excellent Hymns (all of them indexed chronologically in the order of the Apostles' Creed). Very recently, they strode back over the 17th century Dutch and German melodies, and went all the way back to the original Genevan melodies of the French Reformed Churches at the time of the Protestant Reformation).
One last point. There is a tremendous amount of reflection going on theologically -- particularly in the area of heart and organ transplants from dead people into living people -- eye corneas, and so forth. If I had the time, I could read you some of the theological reflection on these difficult areas -- and also the tremendous emphasis on catechizing in the churches, and the teaching of the Law of God to the young people. Indeed, before they are first admitted to the Lord's Table -- they must, over three years, have mastered the Catechism and the significance of Church History and the Lord's Prayer!
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