Regional Synod of Canada - Reformed Church in America

Pioneer Christian Monthly

Date - Jan/92

Contributor - Arie Blok

Title - Changes - and Our Attitudes Toward It

Topic - Reformed Church In Canada

I was born sixty-three years ago to Dutch emigrant parents in Grand Rapids, Michigan. When I was born, my father had been in America for five years; my mother for sixteen years. As a child, I witnessed my parents struggle with the poverty of the Great Depression, and also with the changes emigrants from Holland faced in the American environment.

The pre-World War 11 Dutch emigrants tended to have a reluctant attitude toward change and Americanization. My grandparents on my mother's side came to Wisconsin in 1912 and never returned to the Netherlands again. My grandmother never learned English, and when entering a store in the east end of Grand Rapids did fine with just two English words, "Dutch clerk." Since the seamier side of life is usually hidden from children, my mother, who left the Netherlands as a child, always spoke of the Netherlands as a holy nation, unlike America with all its worldly and immoral enticements. The earlier Dutch emigrants tended to be very conservative people. They tenaciously clung to their language and religious culture. When Zeeland, Michigan celebrated the fortieth anniversary of the founding of the town, the language of the celebration was entirely Dutch. A monument was erected with the names of those who came as emigrants and were still living. On one side of the monument is the inscription in h "Veertigjaren heeft de HEERE ons geleid" (The LORD has led us these forty years).

In 1949, 1 belonged to a choir that gave a concert in the Holland Home in Grand Rapids. A man who was a recent emigrant was invited along to give a religious talk to the residents. He had been invited along because of his knowledge of Dutch, but since he was in the USA, he assumed that he should make his speech in English. His English was adequate, but the Holland Home at that time was full of old Hollanders who understood no English. After his speech, someone had to give the old people a brief summary in Dutch so they could know what he had been talking about.

As I was growing up, the church we belonged to was forced into a reluctant language change. One of the arguments of the die-hards against the change to English was that the King James Version is a very inferior translation of the Bible. It is interesting to me that the sons of those very same die-hards are now maintaining that the King James Version is the only reliable translation of the Bible into English. Conservatism really does not change, only the things that people are conservative about change.

My father was convinced of the necessity for English language services but regretted the necessity of it. He once told me that I did not have to go to English services because I understood Dutch. To this I replied that if that was so, then I did not have to attend Dutch

services because I understood English. His predictable response was to say that I was a smart aleck. In that religious climate there was, as might be expected, no interest at all in reaching out with the gospel to the non-Dutch people of the community.

What very conservative people fail to realize is that the only alternative to change is stagnation. Stagnation itself is a change, but it is a change whose effects are entirely negative. When we look at places where the churches are almost empty, we usually attribute it to a liberalism that has departed from the Word of God. But sometimes a stagnated Orthodoxism should share the blame.

On the other hand, I have observed that very radical changes tend to create conditions similar to those that existed before the change. In other words, the radical change gets turned around again. The French Revolution overthrew King Louis XVI, but eventually saw the rule of Napoleon as Emperor of France. Russia overthrew the autocratic Czar Nicolas, but it led to the crueller tyranny of Joseph Stalin. Changes that are more rapid than people can adapt themselves to tend to become undone with time. The only changes that really last are of three kinds:

1. Changes made to conform to a predominant culture.

2. Gradual changes within a culture.

3. The radical change called conversion that is worked in our hearts by the Holy Spirit.

Here in our Ontario churches the pace of change has been rapid. In some ways this fast change has been good, but in other ways it has not. When people change languages it is inevitable that they leave much of their cultural treasures behind. The faster the change of language, the more cultural treasures are left behind. Often people learn how to talk about business in another language without learning how to talk about God in another language. One result is that people find it hard to talk to their children about the things of God and almost impossible to adequately communicate their faith to their grandchildren.

On the one hand, changes have been good. Some people were moved to seek after God for the first time in the homesickness that emigration brought with it. On the other hand we have been much better at changing languages than we have been at changing the ethnic focus of the church. The ethnic focus of churches tends to remain the same, even after a congregation contains a sizable ratio of non-Dutch people. We need to regain the evangelistic focus that our churches had in their earliest days, but re-focus it toward people who up to now have been largely outside of our area of evangelistic focus.

We are again in the process of a new and rapid change. "Spiritual Refugees" of a different ethnic background and somewhat different religious traditions are now part of the Classis of Ontario. Some people may find this threatening. I can understand this. We are going through another great change. Yet we should not feel threatened by this.

I have the privilege of being one of those entrusted with examining Spiritual Refugees that apply to come into the Reformed Church. I am impressed by their earnestness in the cause of Christ. The ministers who have come to us have left their previous affiliation because they wanted to take a stand for our Lord and for His gospel. This has usually been done at great cost to themselves and their families. The lay-people who have come to us have left comfortable, well-financed churches to undertake the expensive founding of new churches in this time of economic adversity. Believe me when I say that we are getting the "cream of the crop." It is a great change for them also, because, in coming into a largely Dutch affiliation, they have, in a certain sense, also become emigrants, to live among strangers who are much closer to each other than to them.

But then, aren't we all supposed to be life-long emigrants: those who seek another country - and that a heavenly country? We should be people who seek the changes that are necessary for holiness. Let us not forget that we are on this pilgrimage of holiness with all those who love our Lord Jesus Christ. Remember also that, as Christians, it matters a lot more where we are going than where we are from!

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