Cornerstone Presbyterian Church
Presbyterian Church in America (PCA)
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Joel Beeke (Ph.D., Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia) is pastor of Heritage Netherlands Reformed Congregation in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
He is also professor at Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary
Reformed Confessions Harmonized, Edited by Joel Beeke and Sinclair Ferguson, Baker, 1999.
For
most Presbyterians, the Westminster Confession of Faith, together
with the Westminster Larger and Shorter Catechisms, all of
1647-48, are doctrinal standards, subject to and subordinate to the
Scriptures. These documents are footnoted with Scripture references
supporting their statements which were selected by the authoring groups.
Ministers, Ruling Elders, and Deacons, when they are ordained, vow that they “sincerely receive and adopt” these documents “as containing the system of doctrine taught in the Holy Scriptures”. They also vow that, if at any time they find themselves “out of accord with any of the fundamentals of this system of doctrine”, they will make that known. These officers may take exceptions to relatively minor points of the standards and still be accepted. Members of the church do not take these vows.
Other reformed churches have different standards which they use in a similar way. These older standards are not in contradiction with Westminster, but can supplement it in their way of summarizing the truths of Scripture. They, like other human writings, may be used profitably for edification. The older standards considered here are mostly from the Reformation era itself. They are: The Belgic Confession, 1561, the Heidelberg Catechism, 1563, the Second Helvetic Confession, 1566, and the later Canons of Dort, 1618-19.
In this book these 7 documents are harmonized. That means they are printed in parallel columns, 7 columns across each facing pair of pages, arranged in an order so that treatments of a given topic occur together.
As an example of such a topic, “The Fall of Man, Original Sin, and Punishment” is treated across three page-pairs. This is the first topic under the theological title Anthropology: The doctrine of Man. Later comes the theological title Soteriology: The Doctrine of Salvation. One of its topics is “Saving Faith”, which is treated on two page-pairs.
One benefit of this arrangement, which I have found rather useful, is the ability to easily find what any of these documents say about a given topic, such as Saving Faith. At that topic I find these pithy paragraphs (and many others):
Faith, thus receiving and resting on Christ and His righteousness, is alone the instrument of justification: yet it is not alone in the person justified, but is ever accompanied with all other saving graces, and is no dead faith, but worketh by love. – Westminster Confession
Q. Are all men then, as they perished in Adam, saved by Christ?
A. No; only those who are ingrafted into Him, and receive all His benefits, by a true faith.
— Heidelberg Catechism
We believe that, to attain the true knowledge of this great mystery, the Holy Ghost kindleth in our hearts an upright faith, which embraces Jesus Christ with all His merits, appropriates Him, and seeks nothing more besides Him. –Belgic Confession
The two editors of this book represent two reformed traditions, one Presbyterian and the other Dutch. See the sidebars. The book includes an introduction to the confessions, and a few pages about their history.
We have here a useful tool for finding things in our confession and catechisms, and comparing them with the others. In addition, it is just plain good reading.
— Dean Brown, November 2006
Sinclair Ferguson (Ph. D. University of Aberdeen, Scotland), has been pastor in Scotland, professor at Westminster Seminary, and is currently listed as teaching at their Texas campus.
He is an assistant editor of the Banner of Truth magazine, and was a featured preacher at the PCA General Assembly in 2005.
471 Mathews Rd, Boardman, OH 44512 Phone/Fax 330-758-5628
email: info@cornerstonepch.org