Within the 400kms that separate the Free Reformed churches of Albany and Armadale in Western Australia lies the farming town, Kojonup. Each Easter Monday in the 1970s,[i] church members would meet there to hear and discuss a speech about a Bible or church topic. In 1976 Rev. G van Rongen held a speech there titled Strangers?, a word he preferred to ‘pilgrims’, though the two were sometimes used interchangeably. His speech was a reaction to some ministers in the GKv (RCN)who said that Christians were ‘strangers’ and ‘pilgrims’. Those ministers believed that rather than focusing on our earthly task (our cultural mandate) we should instead focus on our souls. With appeals to Scripture passages they said we are strangers on earth and they saw the Christian’s life as a pilgrimage, a journey in which we hasten to get to heaven.
The idea that the Christian’s life is a pilgrimage appears to be echoed in the Free Reformed Churches of Australia and in our Canadian sister churches recently with a focus on Christians being pilgrims whose life is a journey, a pilgrimage to heaven.[ii] Rev van Rongen’s engagement with this issue in 1976 would therefore seem to have relevance for today.
Are we strangers on this earth and should we see our life’s journey here as a pilgrimage? It is true that we feel like strangers in relation to godless people around us. Yet Rev. van Rongen said that we are not strangers in relation to this earth, since God has placed us here with a task to fulfill. If we merely see our life as a pilgrimage, as a passage to our home in heaven, we devalue the importance of our task, of our cultural mandate here on earth. He cautioned against drawing a parallel between the Israelites’ pilgrimage to the temple, or their experiences as strangers, and the notion that our lives on earth are a heaven-bound pilgrimage.
Of course, there are passages in the Bible which speak about people who are on a journey or pilgrimage, or who are living in a strange environment in which they feel like strangers. For example, Hebrews 11 points to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob living in Canaan as strangers. All Israel lived as strangers in Egypt for 430 years after which they were on a journey to the promised land. Israelites would go on a pilgrimage to the temple. And when David was fleeing from Saul, he sometimes sought refuge in other countries where he lived as a stranger. The Israelites in exile were strangers in the areas where Nebuchadnezzar had settled them. And in the New Testament, Christians fleeing the persecutions were also strangers in the countries to which they fled.
However, says Rev. van Rongen, you can’t point to such examples and say: see, these texts show that we are strangers on this earth, that we are just pilgrims who are travelling through till we get to heaven and who keep, as it were, our bags packed as we await the return of our Lord or await our turn to get to heaven. Such a view, he said, ignores the fact that “the nation of Israel took possession of Canaan as its own inheritance”. Referring to a range of relevant Bible texts, he showed that they related to life on earth.
For example, Hebrews reminds us that we are not wandering pilgrims, endlessly searching for a home. Here on earth we have, in Christ, already arrived at Mount Zion, the city of the living God. Rev. van Rongen says that just as Israel experienced God’s presence after the exodus, we now live with the assurance that Christ has fulfilled the shadows of the Old Testament and opened the way into the heavenly sanctuary. This means our identity is secure: even while we are on earth, we are citizens of the New Jerusalem (Phil. 3:20). While the world may see us as strangers because it resists Christ’s kingship, our true position is one of belonging. We live here not in uncertainty but in confidence, knowing that God dwells with us and that our prayers and offerings are welcomed in His presence.
Of course, unless the Lord returns first, our souls will go to heaven to await His second coming. But the danger in seeing our lives as merely a pilgrimage in which we are ‘en route’ to the promised land is that it tends to ignore the fact that the Lord has put us on this earth with a mandate. That mandate is to be fruitful and multiply and develop the earth. It is to live as people who show in all they do that they submit to their King, Christ the Lord. They confess Christ, they dedicate themselves to serving God, they fight against sin (LD 12), they are stewards of all God has entrusted to their care (e.g. Lk 12:42-48). In that way they promote a Christian culture in their daily lives, their daily work, their social life, politics, education, etc. It is a response to the mandate given already in the beginning.
Hence we’re not strangers in relation to this earth. If anything, it’s the unbelievers who are strangers because they refuse to acknowledge Christ as Lord. And because there’s so many of them compared to believers, we may feel like strangers. Yet this is God’s earth, on which He has placed us to serve Him. It is on this earth that we, together with the souls in heaven, await the day when Christ will return and cleanse this world and renew it, and we will live here forever.
Those who see this life as a pilgrimage tend to focus on spreading the gospel. That is, of course, very important. Rev. van Rongen argues that it is a mistake, however, to separate the preaching of the gospel from the cultural mandate. He calls it a false dilemma: the ‘mission mandate’ is not only about spreading the gospel of salvation but about teaching people “to obey all that I have commanded you” (Mt 28:20). Those who were once outsiders, as described in Ephesians 2:12, are now brought into the community of God’s people. This inclusion not only grants them the promises of the covenant but also places them under its obligations.
Rev. van Rongen emphasizes that the gospel naturally calls for cultural activity. For example, Ephesians 4:28 urges believers to abandon theft and instead work honestly with their hands, which directly connects to the cultural mandate given in Genesis. That mandate, he explains, is rooted in two fundamental aspects of human life: family and daily work. Humanity was commanded to multiply, fill the earth, and cultivate it. Yet, through sin, corruption entered these areas, as seen in the story of Lamech, which illustrates how family life and labour were distorted. Thus, spreading the gospel cannot be divorced from the cultural mandate, since both are important.
Man was created as God’s representative on earth, which implies a covenant relationship between humanity and God, says Rev. van Rongen. This covenant itself affirms the existence of a cultural mandate, since it ties human labor and daily life directly to divine service. The Old Testament sacrifices illustrate this connection: offerings were often the fruits of human work—produce from the fields and livestock from the stables—presented as tribute to God. Thus, culture (from the Latin colere, meaning to cultivate) and worship (cultus) are inseparably linked. Without human labor and cultivation, worship would lack substance, showing that covenantal life is deeply rooted in everyday work and family responsibilities.
From the perspective of God’s Kingdom, the cultural mandate remains central, says Rev. van Rongen. Scripture portrays God as King, guiding creation from the lost paradise toward the renewed paradise of Revelation. Humanity is set to work within this divine project, continuing the mandate first given in Eden. This command was reaffirmed after the Flood in Noah’s time (Genesis 9) and during Israel’s wilderness journey (Deuteronomy 6). In Eden, God gave a blessing accompanied by a command; later, He gave a command accompanied by a blessing, showing the enduring nature of this responsibility under His sovereign rule.
The conclusion is clear: believers must continue fulfilling the cultural mandate, as Ecclesiastes 9:10 exhorts, doing whatever their hands find to do. Christians should not let the notion that our life is a pilgrimage in which we keep our bags packed, as it were, while we hasten towards a heavenly destination, distract us from the reality that God placed us on this earth with a cultural task. Nor should Christians—although they are in the minority and hence feel like strangers—surrender their inheritance (this earth) to an unbelieving majority that disregards God’s purposes.
Though society increasingly undermines family life and dismisses faithful labour as outdated, obedience to the cultural mandate remains essential. Daily work and family responsibilities are not meaningless, says Rev. van Rongen, but restored through Christ, who makes life worthwhile. For those who recognize this, life at home and in work is never dull. At the same time, believers acknowledge that God’s Kingdom will not be fully established by human effort but will come through divine intervention. Therefore, they live faithfully in their mandate while praying earnestly, “Come, Lord Jesus”, awaiting the complete fulfillment of God’s promises in Christ.
[i] I suspect these ‘Kojonup Days’ commenced in the 1960s and ended in the 1980s.
[ii] The 2025 Women’s League Day focussed on the need to have a ‘pilgrim mindset’ which sees this earth as not being our home but that we’re pilgrims passing through to a heavenly homeland. As Rev. S. ‘t Hart wrote: “Like Israel in the wilderness, we too are travellers, pilgrims, on the way to the Promised Land” (US 29/11/2025). Dr J. van Vliet of the CRTS said, “Looking ahead, we have organised a conference for January 9-10, 2026, entitled ‘Pressing On: Spiritual Care for Pilgrims’” (Una Sancta 18/10/2025). According to a notice in the FRCA of WA District Bulletin (9/11/2025) the CRTS conference will have a presentation by Mark Jones, author of The Pilgrim’s Regress, to help equip people “in this life’s hard pilgrimage on the way to everlasting glory”.