First Presbyterian Church, Roanoke
Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Catechism

Students in the second and third grades are responsible for learning the first 20 questions in the Catechism.  The Catechism is provided on this website.  Please print the Catechism page and work on the first 20 questions below.  This will be a great help to your child and will help reinforce what we are teaching in Sunday school. 

A First Catechism (Children's Edition)
 
BELONGING TO GOD:  A First Catechism

1. Who are you?  I am a child of God. 
2. What does it mean to be a child of God?  That I belong to God, who loves me. 
3. What makes you a child of God?  Grace -- God's free gift of love that I do not deserve and cannot earn. 
4. Don't you have to be good for God to love you?  No.  God loves me in spite of all I do wrong. 
5. How do you thank God for this gift of love?  I promise to love and trust God with all my heart. 
6. How do you love God?  By worshiping God, by loving others, and by respecting what God has created. 
7. What did God create?  God created all that is, seen and unseen. 
8. What is special about human beings?  God made us, male and female, in the image of God. 
9. What does it mean that we are made in God's image?  It means we are made to reflect God's goodness, wisdom, and love. 
10. Why, then, do we human beings often act in destructive and hateful ways?  Because we are turned away from God and fallen into sin. 
11. What are the results of sin?  Our relationship with God is broken.  All our relations with others are confused. 
12. What is sin?  Sin is closing our hearts to God and disobeying God's law. 
13. How does God deal with us as sinners?  God hates our sin but never stops loving us. 
14. What did God do to help us?  God chose the people of Israel to make a new beginning.  They received God's covenant and prepared the way for Jesus to come as our Savior. 
15. What is the covenant?  The covenant is an everlasting agreement between God and Israel. 
16. What is in this agreement?  When God called Abraham and Sarah, God promised to bless their family, which was later called Israel.  Through the people of Israel, God vowed to bless all the peoples of the earth.  God promised to be Israel's God, and they promised to be God's people.  God vowed to love Israel and to be their hope forever, and Israel vowed to worship and serve only God. 
17. How did God keep this covenant?  God led Israel out of slavery in Egypt, gave them the Ten Commandments through Moses, and broght them into the land that God had promised. 
18. What are the Ten Commandments?  The Ten Commandments are the law of God.  When God gave them to Moses,  God said, I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery:

  • You shall have no other gods before me.

  • You shall not make for yourself an idol.

  • You shall not make wrongful use of the name of the Lord your God.

  • Remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy.

  • Honor your father and your mother.

  • You shall not murder.

  • You shall not commit adultery.

  • You shall not steal.

  • You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.

  • You shall not covet what is your neighbor's.
     

19. What is the main point of these commandments?  You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, and strength; and you shall love your neighbor as yourself. 
20. Did the people keep their covenant with God?  Though some remained faithful, the people too often worshipped other gods and did not love each other as God commanded.  They showed us how much we all disobey God's law.