I also would like to add my thanks to the board and to the organization for making possible this forum of the magazine for the publication of the truth of the gospel of peace. I’m thankful tonight as well for the keynote address that we heard, which was not only stirring and established beyond any doubt the reformation that God has worked, but which I believe also represents an advance in our understanding of what has happened in the Protestant Reformed Churches, not only in the last few years but for our generation. And it struck me as something I had not seen before but is immediately obvious once it is pointed out: that the devil’s tactic to introduce the lie was to make the reputation of man the thing, so that we fear the reputation of man and coddle the reputation of man; and in all of our care for the reputation of man, it becomes impossible to condemn the lie. I’d like to acknowledge the advance that we have been led in tonight by God through our speaker in that understanding.

And that fits in with the brief comments that I would like to make about the magazine. I want to call attention to one characteristic of the magazine that we must maintain by the grace of God. That characteristic is the polemical nature of the magazine. Sword and Shield is a fighting magazine. It intends deliberately to go to war. If anyone ever forgets that, you need only look at the cover and the soldier hastening to the battle; and the title of the magazine, Sword and Shield; and remember that this magazine intends to be polemical. That is the character of the magazine that is hated—absolutely despised—by those who are not friends of the magazine but its foes. They hate that the magazine fights. But the magazine must fight. It must fight. Regardless of whether the editors or the board or the association like to fight, the magazine must fight.

That is because reformation, which the Lord has worked, is war. Reformation is war. It is war against the lie. It is war against the host of Satan. It is war against the false church. It is war against the flesh. Reformation is war, and the magazine must fight. And the reason that reformation is war is because reformation stands in the cause of the truth. The Lord Jesus Christ, by his sovereign power, works reformation by establishing the truth. And the Lord Jesus Christ is a man of war. His garments are dyed red with the blood of his enemies. His sword, which proceeds out of his mouth, is sharp, and it cuts. The Lord Jesus Christ is a man of war, and his truth is a warring truth.

That too is remarkable because the truth of the Lord Jesus Christ is the most peaceful thing there could be for the believer. There is nothing more peaceful for the believer than the truth of Christ, because the truth of Christ is the truth of justification; and being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. And the truth of Jesus Christ is his fellowship with his people, his communion with them, so that in Jesus Christ we have great peace and with Jesus Christ we have great peace. That is the truth by which the Lord Jesus Christ has picked us up and carried us along in this reformation.

But that truth, which is of utmost peace to the believer, is a bloody truth. It is a warring truth because that truth condemns in no uncertain terms every lie that is opposed to it. And that truth condemns the lie for the sake of the sheep, for we are in danger of being deceived by the devil’s deceit, his stunning deceit; and, as was pointed out tonight and emphasized tonight, the stunning victory that the devil had in our mother church. So I would like to encourage us in the word of God regarding the polemical nature of this magazine and that we not shy away from the battle and the bloodiness of it and the continued fighting character of the magazine. May God grant us the grace that we not withhold our sword from blood but that we continue to trumpet the truth to the condemnation of every lie.

Thank you.