MISSION TIDINGS

GIFTS RECEIVED FOR MISSIONS IN MAY 1979

CLASSIS MIDWEST SOURCE AMOUNT Friend in Michigan Gift $ 135.00

Friend in G. Rapids Gift 100.00

Friend in Ontario Gift 80.00

In Kalamazoo Col. Gift 30.00

In Unionville Col. Gift 500.00

G.R. Ladies Aid Gift 107.75

Friend in Chicago Hts. Gift 125.00

In will of Jo Gonlag Gift 2000.00

CLASSIS WEST

Waupun (Mary Martha) Gift 200.00

CLASSIS FARWEST

Lynden Calendars 60.00

OTHER

Friends in Australia 154.47

TOTAL $3,492.22

Dear friends,

Again we want to thank everyone for their kind gifts in support of the mission. May the Lord truly bless you and your gifts.

Rev. Kuijt asked us to place a request in the Banner in behalf of the mission team in Irian Jaya, that no more packages of any kind be sent to Irian Jaya. He's very sorry to make this request because of the love shown by our ladies aid, especially those who have sent so many packages in the past years, for which the mission board and the mission team of Irian Jaya want to thank you very much. We can understand that this is a disappointment for the ladies aids, but possibly our ladies aid could work more in a way to support our mission in a financial way, as many of you are doing already. The reason for the request for no more packages, is that the duty is so unreasonably high that it is not advisable to send packages anymore. We also ask that no more packages be sent to the Bethlehem Mission in Baldwin, because Bert & Ruth Warmenhoven will be leaving there sometime this summer. Mr. & Mrs. Louwerse are hoping, with the help of the Lord, to open a new mission station, named Sumtamon. We hope that the Lord will provide that the way may be opened, so that a new mission can be opened in the country of Haiti. May the Lord give prayer for it. We also include a letter from Rev. Kuijt. May the Lord remember all the mission workers and all of us together.

American General Mission Fund

Netherland Reformed Congregations

of United States and Canada

John Spaans, Treasurer

R.R. 3, Box 17

Plankinton, So. Dakota 57368

Phone: 732-4539

A LETTER FROM NIPSAN

Nipsan, April 3, 1979

Dear mission friends:

Thank you so much for all the mail you sent us. Excuse me please, when I answer you by way of this general letter. We are in the process of rebuilding the Nipsan station after it was opened up again. There is some delay in the building of our house. We are dependent on building materials from the coast. And just now these building materials are not available. In the meantime, three little worker's houses were built — one for Sabonwarek our faithful co-worker in the Lord. He just went for a little break to Abenaho after he was away from home for four months. We might consider it quite a miracle that he had a chance to take his wife with him, this morning. As you know, the tribes from Abenaho and Landikma are still very much hesitant to send their sons and daughters to this place. This is understandable, looking back to the past. Nevertheless, Hera arrived and we do hope that her stay with her husband may be to the furtherance of the blessed Gospel to which Sabonwarek has surrendered his life.

On the spiritual side, like we did in Bommela, we continue our daily morning devotions. Some times there are but a few hearers, sometimes there are many. Last Sunday we had some 30 listeners in the open-air church, the Sunday before some 60. We are thinking of erecting a little house of prayer on the same spot as where our first simple, but practical, church building was. We are not then depending anymore on the weather, and we can have regular hours of worship.

There is some change of mind regarding schools. My wife and I were thinking of starting an old men's school e.g. so that, if they see it's too difficult for them, they would allow the young men to follow the lessons. But we have to be very careful, and patience is necessary to live and work with these people.

We are really praying that our first helicopter might soon arrive in Nipsan. Our representative in Jakarta is working hard to do all the paper-work, and then there is enough left for us on this side of the country to complete it. Right from the start, it has been a matter of faith, and although many storms came up already, by faith all things are possible. Even the Vice-President of the Republic of Indonesia is on our side now, and we see that for those who love the Lord, all things work together for good. But oh, if faith is failing, with Peter we sink away in the sea-billows.

My wife had to go home because of the serious illness of her father. In the meantime, my father-in-law passed away. My wife is hoping to be back in Sentani tomorrow. The two litle ones are staying with me, although plans were to bring them to Bommela. However, when the oldest said, "Papa, can I stay with you?", it broke my heart and we travelled on to Nipsan. For me it was a lesson. I instantly gave ear to hear, how much more the Lord will listen, if we cry to Him! Receive hearty greetings from your missionary in Nipsan.

A WONDERFUL AFTERNOON

Part I

It was in the winter, and it was winter. The roads were slippery. It was no pleasure to go outdoors. My flesh had not much desire for it either, but it had to be done. For 18 years, I was favored to serve the congregation in the East and have always lodged in the same house. My hostess asked me if I had already been to see Mrs. Non, whom I now wish to write about, and who lived at the end of the street. She was old and could no longer go to church, even though her life was in church.

My brother-in-law, Niewenhuis, who also lived in the East, was so kind to take me there with the car. (It would have been impossible to walk.)

When I arrived upstairs where she lived, she sat with her hand under her head. She was in a difficult state. She was a person who had nothing if the Lord did not give her anything. She was very deaf. I went to sit close to her and asked her how it was with her. Her answer was very brief. She said, "Not well." When I asked her why, she just said, "Today I am 78 years of age, and the Lord never had anything but grief from me. I have sinned for 78 years, thus I must go to hell." When I went to that woman, it was colder within than in nature. But these first words of that aged widow dropped so deep into my heart, that in one moment the ice was broken. One of our beloved departed ministers once said, "During your life, you may hear something so that you say immediately, 'That is not it.' At times you hear something so that you say, 'It could be.' But it also happens that you hear something so that you say immediately, 'That is it.' " Thus it was also that afternoon. There was no room and no time to doubt or to suspect it. I have heard at one time that the late Rev. Pieneman said to a person who had been talking for three hours, "You don't even touch my cold clothes."

But here it was different. What an unforgettable afternoon that became!

I went to sit close to that aged friend as if she was my mother. God's work impresses and imprints. We ourselves have nothing to do with that. How much boldness did the Lord give me to talk to that woman. And there was every reason for it. She was still young when the Lord had called her out of darkness into His marvelous light.

Her husband had also been blessed by God and had been taken from her when he was 39 years old. One morning, he was run over by a train and never came home alive again. But the Lord had made known unto her what had taken place. In the early morning hours the Lord had shown unto her what took place. These words came to her: "I saw heaven opened", and it was revealed to her that the Lord had taken her dear husband to Him. The police came to her house. They said, "It is not well with your husband." She said, "He is dead." The police asked how she knew this and she replied, "The Lord had revealed it to me."

The widow was left with a large family of children. The Lord led her through deep ways, but it has been unto her salvation, as we also read in the book of Job. Her mind had suffered much, but the work of God within her was clear and evident. Hence, when she was in such a severe soul struggle, and it was as dark as midnight for her soul, she said, "I must go to hell." I received such a great boldness from heaven to say to her, "You need not go to hell, you have already been there." See Psalm 116:3. The first moments of our conversation it was indeed, "But a wounded spirit, who can bear?"

Whenever I tried to encourage her out of God's Word, then it was constantly, "That is for God's people, that is for God's people. I do not belong to them."

At the beginning of that afternoon, it was with that friend as it was with Asaph in Ps. 77:2, "My soul refused to be comforted."

Was it all despondency? Was it all unbelief? Ah no. There we heard the knowledge of God and also the knowledge of self. There something also shone of the majesty and the holiness of God, but also of her unworthiness. There it was also being practiced, "I am not worthy that Thou should come under my roof." There was no conceited Pharisee, but the frame of a humble publican, the greatest of sinners, the least of the saints.

Most of the religious people are very zealous and do their utmost to place themselves next to them, but this woman placed herself outside of it.

There are also many people who bear great testimonies, cast themselves far away, but at the same time run fast to push themselves up again, but that is really nothing but hypocrisy. At times their confessions are accompanied with some emotions to have it sound more effective, but with the true people, it repels because it is all hypocrisy, a show to appear to be something before man.

It was the same thing with the witch at Endor, who as an instrument of Satan, caused Samuel to come up, but it was not Samuel.

At times, the true people of God may also be bewitched, like at one time the Galatians, being carried away by all sorts of melancholy words. But to become jealous of that, that is something different. But you may become jealous of that language which that afternoon was spoken by that widow. It does not happen everyday of our life that it is really true.

Perhaps there are some among our readers who will say, while reading this, "Was that alright for a person who is possessed with grace to make such a remark, 'I must go to hell?' " Such a person should be more willing to believe than to oppose everything and to act as if nothing had ever taken place. We may not dishonor God by denying his work, may we?

It is true, indeed, that the Lord has formed His people to show forth His praise, Is. 43:21, and in Psalm 66:16, "Come and hear all ye that fear God, and I will declare what He hath done for my soul."

We even read in I Peter 3:15:"But sanctify the Lord God in your heart and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you, with meekness and fear."

God's children are called in Matt. 5:16 by Christ Himself, "Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.''

They are special times in the life of God's people when heart and mouth may be filled with the praise of the Lord, when their cup runneth over, Ps 23:5, when they receive humble boldness to speak to the honor of God and His deeds. Yea, when it may be experienced like the poet of Ps. 145:1 (Psalter No. 397:3):

"Upon Thy glorious majesty,
And wondrous work my mind shall dwell,
Thy deeds shall fill the world with awe,
And of Thy greatness, I will tell."

Those times, that woman about whom I write had experienced, but the days of darkness of God's children are many. It does not happen often that God's people may feed upon the mountains. It is more in the valley than upon the height, more in the abyss than on the moutain,

more in want of it than the possession,
more flesh than spirit,
more beast than human,
more hell than heaven,
more bands than liberty,
more closed than open,

and not to extend it any further, the Lord gives all His people and children experiential and practical lessons of these things which constantly return again during their life, and that is: first, that which Christ has declared to His disciples in John 15:5: "Without me, ye can do nothing." But also that which Paul wrote in Phil. 4:13, "I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me." In themselves, helpless and impotent, always perishing and suffering shipwreck, always to lose the battle against that three-headed enemy, the devil, the world and the flesh.

But on the other hand, in Christ as their Head and Lord, they are more than conquerors, and like Paul wrote in II Cor. 2:14: "Now thanks be unto God, which always causeth us to triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest the savour of His knowledge by us in every place."

And that this is scriptural is confirmed throughout the entire word of God; also that which we find in that single line in Ps. 107:17 (Psalter 295:2): "By the billows heavenward tossed, Down to dreadful depths again."

For God's people it remains a warfare till the end. And they must enter into the Kingdom of God through much tribulation. Yea, we read in Revelations 7 that they all came out of great tribulation, and the greatest tribulations of the people of God in this world is really for themselves, that they cannot come to, and not under God. And besides, they must always experience that the flesh does not subject itself to the law of God, and neither can it do so, Rom. 8:7. But also, that they always are disappointed with themselves. Ah yes, who may still understand and grasp it in our dark and superficial times when so little of that true life of God is heard, that God's people, in their own observations live closer to hell than to heaven because they become more unconverted than converted in themselves.

The more Ezekiel was led into the glory of God, the deeper he had to look into the wall, and then it was ever, "Dig now in the wall, son of man, and ye shall find greater abomination." God's people become more blind in themselves, so that He shall fulfill that covenant promise to them, "And I will bring the blind by a way that they knew not; I will lead them in paths that they have not known. I will make darkness light before them and not forsake them," Is. 42:6.

In the Lord's leading of His people is also included that the Lord teaches all His people that faith is a gift of God. God's dear Spirit works that faith in the hearts of the elect when they are ingrafted into Christ and become partakers of His benefits.

According to the word of Christ spoken to Peter, Luke 22:32, that faith shall never cease. Christ always lives to pray for His people, and in that intercession at the right hand of the Father, He continues until the end. Often that faith is weak, subject to many conflicts and doubts, but as a gift of God, faith remains in the heart of God's people. But now concerning the exercises of faith, the believing people always remain dependent upon the immediate operations and ministry of the Holy Spirit. A man can receive nothing except it be given him from heaven, John 3:27. In our days, faith and believing is urged and forced from all sides upon men. With all their strength, they preach that unbelief is such a great and God-dishonoring sin, and to that we agree with all our heart. Who, that love and fear God, would plead for unbelief? Ah no, that is impossible.

Unbelief suspects God in His faithfulness, in His love and in His power. Unbelief strengthens the devil in his temptations, but it also grieves God's Spirit in His work, and it tears and destroys the life of the soul.

Just think of Thomas, who, although he had been delivered out of the state of unbelief, yet was so tangled in the morass of unbelief in his condition, so that for days he wandered hopelessly over the earth until the risen Christ delivered him out of those bands, and He was favored to testify, "My Lord and my God", John 20:18.

God's people want to believe, but they cannot believe at the command and upon the authority of people. Anymore than we can pluck the stars from heaven with our hands, no more can those people believe. Faith is a gift of God, but also believing from the side of those people. They must continue waiting for the troubling of the water and for the operation and application of the Holy Spirit. An afflicted and a poor people who shall trust in the Name of the Lord, Zeph. 3:12, has been left by the Lord, and that shall remain so until the end of the world. They are no high fliers, but within their heart it is as with Lodesteyn:

"I need not be the first,
If I may but go along."

They cannot help thembselves, but are kept so poor that they must be helped again and again. We read in Ps. 89:19 of that One that is mighty, upon Whom God has laid help from eternity, and Who according to Ps. 72:12 helps only the needy and him that hath no helper.

Now there is something else in this connection that God's people must experience, namely that to the day of their death they must experience the fruit and the consequences of their deep fall in Adam. What? the fruit and the consequences of Adam's fall? Yea, but the superficial Christendom does not speak about that. I once read of a minister who wrote, "Speaking and preaching about Adam's fall only makes the people despondent. Come with the Gospel! That must be proclaimed, and just tell the people that Christ has died for sinners, and that a person is duty-bound to accept that. Perhaps in the beginning it is a little difficult, but it becomes easier and easier. By and by you become a believing and joyful person." Thus I could write still more about this, but let these few Unes suffice to give an impression how the people are deceived for eternity. Ah, people, in Paradise we have lost the true knowledge, and by nature our mind is so darkened that we know Adam no more than Christ, unless it is revealed from heaven.

We, ourselves, do not know what sin is. But now someone taps me on the shoulder and says, "Man, man, now you are saying too much! Is it really true? I cannot see it that way." I become aware constantly.and I accuse myself that concerning man's state of death, I say too little. Yea, there are moments that I feel that with the state of man it is as with that fourth beast that came up out of the sea and which was shown to Daniel in Daniel 7, and which was so dreadful and so terrible and very strong that no name could be found for it, and it could not be compared with any animal upon earth.

Thus it is also with the depth of our fall; incapable of any good and prone to all evil. Those poor people of God are willing to believe, but they cannot believe. They would be willing to believe that they have been known by God from eternity. They would be willing to believe that Christ has died for them and was raised again. They would also be willing to believe that they are no stranger and sojourner, but fellow citizens with the saints and of the household of God, that they have been sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise. I could mention still more what the portion and benefit is of God's established people. At times they can see all that be there, at times they may taste and see something of that, but to put their arms around it, that is something different. At times they are so close to it, but then again, they are so far away from it that they say, "It seems to be such a hopeless case for me."

Ah, it all awaits the immediate application from God the Holy Spirit, for their own heart and life. Ah Lord, I realize the necessity of those most important things, but shall that ever be for me? Can that ever really become my portion?

SONGS OF DEGREES

Psalm 122:1, "I was glad when they said unto me, Let us go into the House of the Lord. "

The 122nd Psalm is a song of David, the man after God's heart—David, who is also called, rightly so, the sweet psalmist.

God's child and servant wrote about the days when Israel's people were not yet divided into the kingdom of the two tribes and the kingdom of the ten tribes. Undivided, not split, the people of the Lord went up to Jerusalem, the city of the great King in order that they might abide there in His House.

What a privilege it would be if all who belong together, also in this day and age, might yet—one of heart and one of intention—walk together and go up unto the House of Zion's King!

Alas, God's church on earth hes divided and torn asunder among so many names. In our former fatherland, where Dutch Zion has flourished so richly, the church has broken into a great many divisions. Wherever we go in North America we observe the same. Moreover, the true joy of faith is known so little, which, by grace alone, for Christ's sake, is given unto those who in true need in their soul, worked by God, may learn to ask for it.

Three times in a year Israel's people went up to God's sanctuary, namely with the Passover, Pentecost, and the Feast of tabernacles. They went to the place which God had chosen, in order to appear there before His countenance.

"I was glad," says the poet, "when they said unto me, Let us go into the House of the LORD." It can also be read this way, "I was glad among those …" The poet was not only glad in those who went up, but he belonged to them and was glad with the multitude that kept holyday. He regarded it as a privilege to belong to them.

Is it also still a privilege for us at times to go up into the courts of the LORD? Or is it only routine, a boring habit? Or is it because we have to go anyway as required by father or mother?

Oh, that it would become the desire of our soul to go up!

How many there are who no longer are able but who would so gladly go up. How many see only later in their life what they have missed by walking past the door of God's House.

There can be seasons that the Church goes about in great soul-distress and that the Lord has their circumstances explained in His House, or that they are a little encouraged on the battle-field of this life. Yes, God can comfort them so sweetly that they may say, "It was good for us to be at that place."

It can also occur that everything which we hear in church condemns us and that we must acknowledge: Against Thee only have I sinned,

Done evil in Thy sight;
Lord, in Thy judgment Thou art just,
And in Thy sentence right.

(Psalm 51, Psalter 143)

However, it can also be that a pilgrim on the way of life already on Monday looks forward to the Day of Rest:

My soul is longing, fainting,
Thy sacred courts to see.

(Psalm 84, Psalter 237)

David was in holy rapture: the sight of Jerusalem, the city of peace—and then above all, presently to be privileged to enter the sanctuary where the Lord lived and whence He spoke of favour and peace to His children.

Reader, is this your sincere desire? Yes, then blessed joy can fill the heart of God's children if they may still hear about the way of free grace, about the wonder that God sent His Christ into a cursed world so that they might become partakers of that salvation which He alone obtained for guilty people, worthy of death and damnation.

That is a different joy than the world offers in her feasts and pleasures. The enjoyment found in those always leaves a bitter after-taste. It does not fulfill the heart. And one time we shall bemoan it if we have found our life here beneath. Do you hear it, too, young people? For in reality we eat ourself to death with sin.

But it is so great if the true need becomes to testify with the singer of the olden days, "Let us go into the House of the LORD."

There a truly hungry one is not disappointed, although such a one can indeed be disappointed in himself. Yes, happy are we if we meet with much disappointment in that way, so that we learn to look away from ourself and learn to expect all from heaven whence only can come every good and perfect gift. It seems contradictory and still it is so true: Whosoever cannot expect it from himself any longer, but who, by grace, may cast his eye upon Him, that man or that woman may at times go with joy into the House of the LORD. Chilliwack, B.C.

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