By Rev. Simon Jooste As South Africa’s second-largest metropolis (after Johannesburg), Cape Town not only has a rich history but is also a melting pot of scenic views, cuisines and skin colours. She boasts incredible beauty but also thrombotic veins of prejudice and inequality, which are still fed by theContinue Reading
THE Reformed faith includes reference to total inability, unconditional election, the limited efficiency of Christ’s satisfaction, irresistible grace and the perseverance of the saints not as the sum total of the church’s confession, but as elements that can be understood only in the context of a larger body of teachingContinue Reading
Dear Friend in Christ, We would like to take this opportunity to re-/introduce Reformed Church Southern Suburbs (RCSS), now a congregation of the United Reformed Churches in North America (URCNA). RCSS began as a mission work in Cape Town, South Africa, under the oversight of Reformed Church Bellville in 2012,Continue Reading
In Belgic Confession article 29, the Reformed Churches identify three marks of the true church and seven marks of the true Christian. The second mark of the true church says: “It makes use of the pure administration of the sacraments as Christ instituted them.” Regarding baptism, we confess: For that reason weContinue Reading
The resurrection is central to the Christian faith, as the apostle Paul tells us, For if the dead are not raised, neither has Christ been raised: and if Christ has not been raised, your faith is meaningless; you are still in your sins. Then they also that have fallen asleepContinue Reading
A dominant Roman cultural influence that shaped ancient Corinth was the pater familias: the power exerted by the oldest living male in the household. His control was not only legally sanctioned but often autocratic and even violent. In such a family, one did not question authority, one did not haveContinue Reading
Reformed Church Southern Suburbs in Cape Town will host a conference with the theme “Apartheid of church and state: global perspectives” on 11 and 12 August 2023. The conference features a line-up of respected Reformed theologians and pastors, including RCSS’s Simon Jooste. More information about the conference will be releasedContinue Reading
Simon Jooste I am the pastor of a multi-cultural English-speaking Reformed church on the southern tip of Africa in a city called Cape Town. Since 1652, when the first Dutch settlers landed in the Cape, the church has struggled to fulfil the Great Commission amid common cultural enterprise with itsContinue Reading
The tensions and inconsistencies that I have attempted to illustrate in this book review beg another question: What kind of reformation is The Gift of Life after? The answer Professor Vorster appears to provide is one of “flourishing personhood” that roots out of church and society the dehumanizing idols of racism, sexism,Continue Reading
At this point it is worth asking: what informs Professor Vorster’s overarching moral vision? Throughout The Gift of Life, the contention is that definitions of human dignity found in the liberal democratic and human rights traditions can be translated into Christian value (84, 97). In other words, humanist conceptions of equalityContinue Reading
North-West University Professor J. M. Vorster’s The Gift of Life: Towards an ethic of human personhood (2021) represents a crowning of his career as a Reformed pastor, theologian, and ethicist in the South African context. I review this volume as a fellow office-bearer within the Reformed Churches in South Africa (RCSA) withContinue Reading
By Simon Jooste, pastor of RCSS Embodiment is central to salvation, so is suffering in the body. Without the incarnation, passion, and ongoing enfleshed intercession of Christ, there is no redemption. This was the heartbeat of the apostle Paul’s preaching in ancient Corinth, a city pulsing with ideas and illicitContinue Reading