“Sow Spiritually to Life Everlasting”: A Thanksgiving Prayer
Since I’ve been posting selections from the Mercersburg liturgies, and since it’s Thanksgiving week here in the U.S., I thought I’d post a prayer of thanksgiving from the 1866 Order of Worship for the...
View Article“Put Upon Us the Armor of Light”: The Collect for the First Sunday in Advent
Last week I posted the Collect for the Sunday before Advent from the Order of Worship for the Reformed Church in the United States. Now the cycle starts over, and included below is the Collect for the...
View Article“Sing Unto the Lord a New Song”: The Canticle and Festival Prayer for Advent
The predecessor of the Order of Worship for the Reformed Church in the United States, the Liturgy, or, Order of Christian Worship (1858), which I have discussed previously (e.g. here), includes a...
View Article“Cleanse Our Conscience”: The Collect for the Second Sunday in Advent
Below is the Collect for the Second Sunday in Advent from the Order of Worship for the Reformed Church in the United States. I mentioned last week that the Collects in this volume are not simply...
View Article“That Clearer and More Blessed Vision”: Machen and Vos on Festival Seasons
At various points, we’ve discussed the celebration of Christmas and other holidays in various sectors of the Reformed tradition, including among some conservative Presbyterians in the nineteenth...
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Warfield’s Christmas
While we’re on the subject of Christmas: I noted in my most recent post that Geerhardus Vos fancied himself something of a poet; at the link you can see his poem on Christ’s Nativity. Vos was not...
View Article“Visit the Darkness of Our Mind”: The Collect for the Third Sunday in Advent
Here is the Collect for the Third Sunday in Advent from the Order of Worship for the Reformed Church in the United States. Once again, the prayer is different from the one for the same week in The Book...
View Article“The Lord of Glory”
Herewith another Christmas poem by another American Presbyterian: this time a man named Louis F. Benson (1855-1930), whose memory has mostly faded away. Benson was a Philadelphian who went to Penn,...
View Article“A World Is Born”: Vos on the Nativity (Again)
Last week I posted a Christmas poem by Geerhardus Vos. That, however, was not the only such poem he wrote. The second poem in an earlier volume of verse, called Charis (1931), 1 bears the same title as...
View ArticleBeginning to Explain The Theology of Federal Vision
I must apologize for the month-long delay in completing this series on the Federal Vision. Seasonal travels and other obligations interfered. Nevertheless, I will begin to lay out a summary description...
View Article“Oil in My Lamp”: A Reformed Guide to Private Devotion (6)
At long last, the last section of the “Guide to Private Devotion” in A Liturgy, or, Order of Christian Worship. The texts and prayers focus on (a) praising God in the watches of the night and (b)...
View Article“Arise, O Lord”: The Collect for the Fourth Sunday in Advent
Below is the Collect for the Fourth Sunday in Advent from the Order of Worship for the Reformed Church in the United States. Once again it differs from that found in The Book of Common Prayer: O Lord,...
View Article“Whereby Thou Hast Become the True Seed of Abraham”: The Collect and Festival...
Here are the prayers for Christmas Day from the Order of Worship for the Reformed Church in the United States. The Collect is the same as that found in The Book of Common Prayer, which connects...
View Article“Look Steadfastly Up into Heaven”: The Collect for the Protomartyr
It is not, of course, problematic from a Protestant point of view to remember with gratitude the example of holy men and martyrs. Indeed, it is meet and right so to do. After all, Hebrews 11 does the...
View Article“Shine Graciously upon Thy Church”: The Collect for John the Apostle
The second day after Christmas has traditionally provided an occasion for Western Christians for reflecting on the Apostle John. Below is the Collect included for that purpose in the Order of Worship...
View Article“Out of the Mouth of Babes”: The Collect for the Holy Innocents
December 28 marks the commemoration of Herod’s slaughter of the Holy Innocents. Particularly in light of circumstances here and around the world, it would perhaps be prudent for all Christian churches...
View Article“Rooted in the Mystery of the Word Made Flesh”: The Collect for the First...
The Collect for the First Sunday after Christmas from the Order of Worship for the Reformed Church in the United States is below. Whereas The Book of Common Prayer repeats the Collect from Christmas...
View Article“Circumcised in His Spotless Flesh”: The Collect for the Circumcision of Christ
New Year’s Day traditionally coincides with the commemoration of the circumcision of the infant Christ, in whom “dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily,” on his eighth day, as recorded by Luke....
View ArticleDouglas Wilson and Justification
Douglas Wilson is the embodiment of “RIP my mentions.” His controversies range from politics to theology to literature. People laud him as a visionary leader, and people deride him as a cult leader. To...
View Article“Bathed in the Light of the Incarnate Word”: The Collect for the Second...
I’m a couple of days late with this, but here is the Collect for the Second Sunday after Christmas from the Order of Worship for the Reformed Church in the United States. It turns on the same general...
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