Questions from Our Readers

Abridge usually connects two areas separated by, let’s say, a valley or a river. In order for ships to pass through waterways, sometimes the bridge has a mobile part which can be lifted up. I still remember as a youth when I lived in the Netherlands that close to our home the bridge over the canal was lifted manually by two “bridge-men” (brugwachter, in Dutch). By hand they turned and turned the lever over and over until…“the bridge was pulled up.” Today this is done mechanically, sometimes controlled by just one person at a distance, managing several bridges.

The meaning of the saying, “the bridge pulled up” is a typical “Dutchism” as we call statements or sayings which are derived from the Dutch language, and we try to make something English-sounding out of them. It’s fine to do so, but when they refer to something spiritual, we better know what is meant. It is understandable that especially young people who have no connection with Holland anymore sometimes wonder what such expressions mean. As ministers we certainly may use them because they often point in one sentence to a spiritual matter which otherwise perhaps might take a long time to explain. Still, we must be alert to the fact that especially in congregations where our Dutch heritage has become something buried deeper in the past that many hearers have no inkling what is meant. Then it is better to explain the saying or refer to an English equivalent. Of course, the English language has a wealth of such type of sayings as well.

What usually is meant by “the bridge pulled up” is its reference to the world. Remember, there is a bridge that, by nature, connects our heart to the world, meaning the things of the world—its pleasures, its joys, its vanities, and yes…its emptiness. Remember, it is this world, mentioned in Matthew 13:22 that chokes the Word. In 1 John 2:15-17 the Apostle John exhorts us not to love the world, neither the things that are in the world because the world passes away, and the lust thereof. “But he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.” Now, “the bridge pulled up” refers to doing the will of God versus loving the world. When the Lord by His Spirit works in the heart of a sinner, the love for the world is changed to the love for God and all His commandments. It refers to the principle of new obedience, new desires, and new outgoings of the heart, worked by the Lord.

Dear friends, has the bridge to the world already been pulled up or does the world glow for us and have our full attention? Are we walking to and fro and halting between two opinions? The Bible clearly exhorts us not to love the world, neither the things that are in the world. “If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15b).

Does this mean that the world has no more influence in the heart and life of God’s children even “after the bridge has been pulled up?” Far from it! Repeatedly, they find themselves cleaving to the dust, and in their own heart and thoughts they meet more world than godliness. Their life is often so far removed from what Paul writes in Philippians 3:20 “for our conversation is in heaven.” Despite all this, if you would ask such souls if they would want to go back to the world and enjoy its pleasures as in the past, they would answer, “No, because ‘the bridge has been pulled up.’” This means: that road is closed! It shows something of the “sincere joy of heart in God, through Christ, and with love and delight to live according to the will of God in all good works” (Heidelberg Catechism, Lord’s Day 33). May that life where “a bridge has been pulled up” be more visible today in the Church and be more in exercise in secret and in public. Perhaps our young people also would become more jealous to walk in the way that is so pleasing in the Lord’s eyes. p

Please send your questions to Rev. H. Hofman, 112 Pratt Road, Kalamazoo, MI 49001, or hofman@premieronline.net.

That God should pass by wise and noble persons, of sweeter disposition, better talents, guilty of less vice, and that the lot of free grace should fall upon you— oh, astonishing love of God!

—Thomas Watson

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