Brothers and sisters,
Please find herewith the latest ministry news from Kraaifontein Baptist Church in South Africa.
Africa’s Gift to the Nicaea Conference
We want to praise the Lord for his help in the recent theology conference we organised. In celebration of the 1700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea, we arranged a theology conference dedicated to better understanding and worshipping our Triune God. The conference was held 2–4 September 2025 at the Reformed Church in Hout Bay. The speakers and their topics included:
- Introduction: Africa’s Gift to Nicaea (Corné Blaauw, Kraaifontein Baptist Church).
- What has Nairobi to do with Nicaea? The Importance of the Doctrine of the Trinity in Africa (JB Krohn, Krux Ministries).
- The Old Testament Background to the Trinity (Daniel Simango, BISA).
- The New Testament Exegetical Roots of Nicene Trinitarianism (Pete Smuts, BISA).
- Trinitarian Creedal Formulations before Nicaea (Carel Pienaar, Gracefields Church).
- Arius Redivivus? Lessons from Athanasius for Combating Arianism Then and Now (Frederik Mulder, Institute for Reformation SA).
- Hilary of Poitiers and the Bulwark of Eternal Generation (Shayne de Lange, Honeyridge Baptist Church).
- Calvin, Autotheos, and Westminster Assembly on the Trinity (Mark Jones, Faith Reformed Presbyterian Church).
- The Reception of Nicaea in the Heidelberg Catechism (Adriaan Neele, Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary).
- Nicaea as Normative Trinitarianism in Puritan Theology and Polemics: Francis Cheynell (1608–1665) and the Nicene Fathers (Riaan Boer, Presbyterian and Reformed Church of South Africa).
- The Trinity and the Covenant of Redemption (Antonio Coppola, Mukhanyo Theological College).
- The Church and the Trinity: The Creed and Church Unity in Calvin’s Ecclesiology (Thapelo Khumalo, George Whitefield College).
- The State and the Trinity: Constantine’s “Nice” Political Play (Simon Jooste, Reformed Church of the Southern Suburbs).
- How Nicaea Shapes the Christian Life (Paul Hartwig, Lakeside Chapel).
- Nicene Echoes in the Church’s Hymnody (Corné Blaauw, Kraaifontein Baptist Church).
The goal was to provide encouraging and deep theological content to pastors, theology lecturers and students, and interested Christians. The content was both Reformed and Evangelical. In South Africa, there are not many contexts to do serious theological work that is evangelical, since the universities are so liberal. Thus, the goal of the conference was to bring together serious academics, Evangelical ethos, Reformed character, and desire to serve the church. We sang Trinitarian hymns together in praise of God. There was a wonderful fellowship of about 140 Reformed and Evangelical believers. The talks for this conference will be uploaded onto the YouTube channel, Cape Town Theology Conference. All fifteen talks will be uploaded in due course.
Please pray for the organisation of this conference for next year. We hope to schedule it on a more convenient date. The topic for 2026 will be “The Christian Doctrine of Creation.” If you are interested this year’s videos or would like to learn about next year’s conference, please contact me.
Church Ministry
Concerning preaching and teaching, we have continued to do a series on the Holy Spirit, which ended 14 July 2024. The structure for this series was inspired by John Owen’s Volumes 3 and 4, which I think are still the best works available on the Holy Spirit. The series through Matthew’s Gospel is slowly coming to an end, and we praise the Lord that we have been working through Matthew’s Gospel for more than six and a half years.
At the beginning of the year, we taught our congregation on “How to Read the Bible,” which was mostly reflections from Psalm 119. Much of the rest of 2025 was taken up with a series on “The Christian Life,” which were meditations on Romans 12–15. Recently, we started a series on “Our Triune God,” reflecting on what it means that God is three persons and one God, and what it means for our salvation, Christian life, prayer and devotion. We are also thankful to the Lord for the many fruitful relationships we have with other local churches that are willing to help us in preaching when there is a need.
Pray for the effective preaching of God’s word in our congregation.
The Lord has been gracious in adding to our number, both those who have been saved and recently baptised, but also new members. Most years, we start the year with an eight-week membership course where new attendees come to understand the basics of what we believe and practice.
Pray that God will continually add to our number those who he is saving in our area.
We are also thankful for the Lord’s blessing on each of the Bible study ministries in our church. We have recently seen an increase in the number of children who have been attending our church.
Pray that the right teachers might be appointed to lead these little ones to Christ.
We praise the Lord for several mothers who are expecting babies in this next season.
Pray that the Lord will be with them in the delivery, strengthening them in the labour, and binding the families together in deeper devotion to Christ.
We have recently added another deacon to our church leadership, and continue to feel the need for more leaders (both elders and deacons) to take on the responsibility of leadership roles in the church.
Pray that the Lord will help us in this mentoring and equipping process so that the right men will be appointed to serve.