Is your gospel preaching primary and fundamental?

In speaking of the Lord's Supper as "an epitome of the gospel of redemption", Vos notes that he could not then (and perhaps we cannot now) say that "there is no need of such a witness of the sacrament because the ministry of the Word always and everywhere proclaims the central truth of the gospel with sufficient clearness and emphasis...I am sure that there are churches in which a great many other things can be heard, yet where one could listen in vain for the plain preaching of the cross as the God-appointed means for the salvation of sinners."

But he is at pains to point out that he is not suggesting that "in all such cases there need be the preaching of false doctrine which involves an open and direct denial of the evangelical truth." What is all too possible - and what is personally pertinent and searching - is that "there may be such a failure in the intelligent presentation of the gospel with the proper emphasis upon that which is primary and fundamental as to bring about a result almost equally deplorable as where the principles of the gospel are openly contradicted or denied. There can be a betrayal of the gospel of grace by silence." (my emphasis)

And so, he adds,

I sometimes feel as if what we need most is a sense of proportion in our presentation of the truth; a new sense of where the centre of gravity in the gospel lies; a return to the ideal of Paul who determined not to know anything among the Corinthians save Jesus Christ and him crucified. This does not mean that every sermon which we preach must necessarily be what is technically called an evangelistic sermon. There may be frequent occasions when to do that would be out of place and when a discourse on some ethical or apologetic or social topic is distinctly called for. But whatever topic you preach on and whatever text you choose, there ought not to be in your whole repertoire a single sermon in which from beginning to end you do not convey to your hearers the impression that what you want to impart to them, you do not think it possible to impart to them in any other way than as a correlate and consequence of the eternal salvation of their souls through the blood of Christ, because in your own conviction that alone is the remedy which you can honestly offer to a sinful world.

Grace and Glory, p.237f

Why the devotional may not be so much in evidence (Vos)

Are we sure that we feel with the frequency and intensity which our greater privileges demand the desire to meet with God? Or are we satisfied with that indirect relation to him which our service of him in his kingdom and our daily study of his Word leads us to sustain? I need not tell you that there is a tendency at the present day to make our religious life seek the surface, the periphery; to detach it more or less from its centre which lies in the direct face-to-face communion of the soul with God. The devotional is not so much in evidence as it has been another periods of the church's history... 

[One of the causes of this] lies in the stupendous multiplication of the out-going activities which the present practical age makes it incumbent upon every minister of the gospel to pursue. With all the centrifugal forces playing upon us, no wonder if sometimes the one centripetal force which ought to driver us to the heart of God for the cultivation of our own devotional life is less felt in our experience. And yet it is absolutely essential for us that we should not only have our seasons of communion with God, but that all the time we should carry with us into our outward and public work in some degree a living sense of our nearness to God and of his nearness to us, because in this way alone can we make our service in the Lord's Kingdom truly fruitful and spiritual. If the savour of this is wanting in our work, if we do not bring to the world when we come to it the unction and peace acquired in prayer, we cannot hope to impart any permanent blessing or to achieve any lasting results.

Geerhardus Vos, Grace and Glory, p.179f

Seeking God

It is certainly striking that these expressions of passionate desire to come into living fellowship with God are found in the Old Testament rather than in the New. Is it not possible that we, because we have the privilege of approaching God at all times without restrictions, are sometimes in danger of underestimating its value or even neglecting its exercise? Must not a David put us to shame when he cries in Psalm 63: 'O God, thou art my God, earnestly will I seek thee: my soul thirsts for thee, my flesh longeth for thee in a dry and weary land where no water is. Because thy loving-kindness is better than life my lips shall praise thee'? If he longed like this for the less, how much more earnestly ought we to cultivate the greater?

Geerhardus Vos, Grace and Glory, p.173f

A rule of thumb for the new and the old (Leithart)

Paul's letter to the Galatians is an important text for reflecting on the continuities and discontinuities of redemptive history. On the one hand, Paul argues for a massive discontinuity between Israel and the church, insisting that the coming of Christ decisively undermines the division of Jew and Gentile (Gal. 2:11-16; 3:23-29). At the same time, Paul is at pains to show that this change is precisely in keeping with the purposes of God already expressed to Abraham (3:1-14), so that the "new thing" is inherently a very old thing, a thing older even than the law, which was added as a means for realising the Abrahamic promise (3:19). From Galatians, one might draw this rule of thumb: any "new thing" in the church that is not simultaneously the realisation of some "old thing" represents a false path.

Peter Leithart, 1&2 Kings (SCM Theological Commentary on the Bible), p.253

the poise and stability of the eternal

Commenting on the "peacefulness and serenity enveloping the figures of the patriarchs" (in the Genesis narratives), Geerhardus Vos reflects that,

There is something else here besides the idyllic charm of rural surroundings. What enviable freedom from the unrest, the impatience, the feverish excitement of the children of this world! Our modern Christian life so often lacks the poise and stability of the eternal. Religion has come so overmuch to occupy itself with the things of time that it catches the spirit of time. Its purposes turn fickle and unsteady; its methods become superficial and ephemeral; it alters its course so constantly; it borrows so readily from sources beneath itself, that it undermines its own prestige in matters pertaining to the eternal world. Where lies the remedy? It would be useless to seek it in withdrawal from the struggles of this present world. The true corrective lies in this, that we must learn again to carry a heaven-fed and heaven-centred spirit into our walk and work below.

Grace and Glory, p.118f

Not by the power of resistance, nor heroic resignation...

Whether the call was to believe or to follow, to do or to bear, the obedience to it sprang not from any earth-fed sources but from the infinite reservoir of strength stored up in the mountain-land above. If Moses endured it was not due to the power of resistance in his human frame, but because the weakness in him was compensated by the vision of him who is invisible. If Abraham, who had gladly received the promises, offered up his only-begotten son, it was not because in heroic resignation he steeled himself to obedience, but because through faith he saw God as greater and stronger than the most inexorable physical law of nature...Through faith the powers of the higher world were placed at the disposal of those whom this world threatened to overwhelm, and so the miracle resulted that from weakness they were made strong.

Geerhardus Vos, Grace and Glory, pp.106f

Lovingly work the field

One of the ways to recognise narcissism within ourselves is to notice when we have not yet accepted the field, the sphere of action, that God has given us—the opportunities and the limits of life in this body, this community, this set of relationships … this place where we have been called by God to serve. Narcissistic leaders are always looking longingly at someone else’s field as somehow more worthy or more indicative of success. They are always pushing the limits of their situation rather than lovingly working the field they have been given. … Our unwillingness to live within limits—both personally and in community—is one of the deepest sources of depletion and eventual burnout. That’s the bad news.

(Ruth Haley Barton, quoted in Disappearing Church by Mark Sayers, p.136)

"Make it your ambition to lead a quiet life...[and] mind your own business..." 1 Thess. 4:11