sacraments

Word and Sacrament

Preaching of the Word and the pure administration of the sacraments are among the marks of the true church. Why? This article answers this question.

Jesus Christ instituted two sacraments in his church: baptism and Lord's Supper. This article discusses their meaning and function.

The Lord's Supper: Addresses on Worship

Sacraments are means of grace, therefore they are essential to your spiritual growth. How? This article explains how the Lord’s supper is related to your spiritual growth.

Re-Thinking Baptism: Addresses on Worship

Sacraments are means of grace, therefore they are essential to your spiritual growth. How? This article explains how baptism is related to your spiritual growth.

What Luther Says: The Means of Grace

Martin Luther is known for leading the reformation. But what was Luther’s theology? This article explains his teaching on the church and sacraments – baptism and Lord’s Supper.

What is the relationship between Word and sacraments in the worship service? This article explains that the sacraments confirm the Word, and thus should follow it. The author also gives some thought to the way in which the sacraments are administered.

The Belgic Confession of Faith: Article 33

Sacraments are the means of grace. How do we know this? Based on Article 33 of the Belgic Confession, this article explains how sacraments are the means of grace, the number of sacraments, and the purpose of the sacraments.

Marks Of The Church: Church Discipline An Act of Love

The marks of the church are true preaching, administration of discipline, and sacraments. In this article the focus is on church discipline, laying the foundation of church discipline to be God's holiness and the call on His church to reflect this holiness.

Pulpit or Table: Pick Any Two: The Church Needs Both to Be Well Fed

This article wants to give encouragement to learn to cherish both preaching and the sacraments.

The Sacraments as Visible Words

What does it mean that the sacraments are signs and seals? This article looks at the relationship between covenant promises and covenant signs. It also looks at the relationship between sacraments and God's Word. The sacraments are dependent upon the Word of God.

The Confession of Faith Article 33 Of the Sacraments

What are sacraments? Sacraments are signs and seals. From the Belgic Confession, Article 33, this article explains how this is so by looking at the relationship between Word and sacraments, and how baptism and the Lord’s Supper are signs and seals.

Belgic Confession Articles 33-35: The Sacraments (1)

This article explains articles 33-35 of the Belgic Confession (on the significance, purpose, and number of sacraments). It also provides content questions.

Sacramental Efficacy

This article explains the ways in which the sacraments are efficacious by virtue of participation in them. The Lord's Supper is a means by which the church manifests itself as one body, and baptism effects membership in the church and displays the shape of the church and its position over against the world.

The Means of Grace

This article explains how the preaching of the gospel and the sacraments are two gifts God gave to his church for her growth.

The Visible Word

Is there value in showing a video in a worship service in order to press home the truth of the Scriptures? This article shows that God has given the church the sacraments as the Word for our eyes.

Baptism

In this article, the place of the sacraments is discussed. A brief account is given of the origin of baptism and the Lord's Supper. Special focus is laid on the sacrament of baptism, especially its covenantal aspect. The matter of infant baptism is also addressed.

The Sacraments

What constitutes a sacrament? There are four elements, and the article explains them

Seeing Is Believing: Signs and Seals of the Covenant of Grace

What are sacraments? Sacraments are tokens of the Lord's love leading believers to communion with God. This article explains the meaning of sacraments as signs and seals, and as means of grace. It then looks at the meaning of baptism and the Lord's Supper and how they function as signs and seals.

Using the Sacraments

"The sacraments are holy, visible signs and seals. They were instituted by God so that by their use he might the more fully declare and seal to us the promise of the gospel." The article explains aspects of this definition from the Heidelberg Catechism (LD 25) to bring forth the meaning of sacraments.

The Means of Grace

What are the instruments that the Lord normally uses to generate and sustain faith in the hearts of fallen human beings? It is the preaching of the gospel and the administration of the sacraments. These are the means of grace. This article explains them.

Word and Sacrament in Worship

What is the role of preaching and the sacraments in the worship service? Through these means, God assures believers of the promises of Scripture. The author also discusses the practice of the altar call - does this practice also confirm the gospel?

Basics of the Reformed Faith: The Sacraments

What are sacraments? This article shows that sacraments are visible signs and seals of God’s invisible grace promised to his people in the gospel. Both baptism and Lord's Supper point us to the work of Christ.

The Sacraments Matter

The sacraments are an important part of church worship. A failure to guard the Lord's Supper table and to celebrate the sacraments in a biblical way led to the formation of the Christian Reformed Church, when she seceded from Reformed Church of America in 1857.

The Idea and Importance of the Sacraments (3)

Not only does God tell us about His love and grace, but He also makes them visible to us in the sacraments. This article discusses the sacraments and the church and why there are only two sacraments.

The Idea and Importance of the Sacraments (2)

Not only does God tell us about His love and grace, but He also makes them visible to us in the sacraments. This article discusses sacraments as seals and as a means of grace.

The Idea and Importance of the Sacraments (1)

Not only does God tell us about His love and grace, but He also makes them visible to us in the sacraments. This article is about the sacraments as signs of grace.

The Means of Grace

The preaching of the gospel and the sacraments are two gifts God gave to His church for her growth.

The Sacraments

Article 33 of the Belgic Confession is about the sacraments. The author looks at the necessity and the nature of the sacraments.

Genesis 15 - Our Covenant God: A God of Promises

Looking at Genesis 15, this article shows how God binds Himself to His people in the covenant through the promise of salvation. In this article, the author shows how this promise comes both verbally and visually, linking it to the preaching of the Word and the sacraments (baptism and the Lord's Supper).

The Four-Door Labyrinth - The Sacraments

Many divisions between church denominations can be traced back to differences in four doctrines: sola scriptura, freewill, the relationship between the Old and New covenant, and the sacraments. In this article, the author discusses the different positions on whether or not the sacraments are a means of grace.

Paedocommunion and the Reformed Confessions

This article looks at paedocommunion (children at the Lord's Supper). The author starts by looking at the relation of the Word and the sacraments, then at the nature of the sacraments, and then at the specific purpose of baptism and the Lord's Supper. After this introduction, the author looks at the proper recipients of the Lord's Supper.