New City Catechism Question 1

This will hopefully be the first in an ongoing series reflecting on the questions and answers to the New City Catechism which was put together by Redeemer Presbyterian Church in NYC and The Gospel Coalition.  Link to it can be found here.  

Q: What is our only hope in life and in death?
A: That we are not our own but belong, body and soul, both in life and death, to God and to our Savior Jesus Christ

So a couple things in the way of background: first, the New City Catechism draws loosely from two of the main catechisms of the Reformation (the Heidelberg and the Westminster).  Second, I memorized most of the Westminster Shorter Catechism when I was growing up (that was how many Sunday afternoons were spent), and while I have sadly forgotten a lot of it, much of the richness and truth of it have seeped down into my heart and have helped form the foundation of me and what I believe.

This question is very similar to the first question of the Heidelberg (substituting "hope" for "comfort" and is a little shorter).  I find it interesting that the answer to the question is that we "belong" to God, rather than saying something to the effect that we are loved by God.  At first blush it seems that the joy of being a Christian is that God loves us.  But I think that saying we "belong to God" gives a shape and definition to what it means to be loved by God; it is not a nebulous feeling of affection but action that changed us from being enemies to being in the family.

Belonging to God carries for me a connotation of being cared for.  It reminds me of the blessing that Moses gives to Israel right before his death and at the end of their wandering in the desert, "The Eternal God is your refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms" (Deut. 33:27).  Our hope in life is that we belong to a God who is a shepherd that guides us to places of rest and nourishment; a God who is with us through the dark periods of life.  And similarly our hope in death is that we belong to a God and Savior who conquered death.  David in Psalm 16 says that he will rest secure because God will not "abandon him to the realm of the dead, or let your faithful one see decay".  By belonging to God, I know and can hope in the fact that one day I will be resurrected (body and soul) in a body untainted by the fall.

Our hope is that we belong to a God who cares for us and is with us in this broken, hurting life, and who has promised (and will certainly fulfuill that promise) to raise us up again and wash away all the pain and hurt.

In thinking about this answer, it is easy for me to skip over the first part of the answer, "That we are not our own".  The comfort in that is what I have mentioned above: that God is the one who is in control, and the burden does not fall on me to have everything in my life and others lives work out okay.  But not being my own carries with it the connotation that I don't get to decide the rules I get to live my life by, or ultimately the paths that my life takes.  The response to living in the care of God is that I say, "God, help me to live how you call me to in the Bible.  Help me fight the temptation to explain away or put conditions on your command to live a holy life."  The response is also that I can't live my life in pursuit of my own career advancement or personal glory. 

I am a Christian not simply because I love God or follow Jesus, but because I belong to God.

I am not my own.

What is This?

So we will see how this goes, and how many posts we actually make to this.  But the general gist of most of the posts on here will be reflections by one or both of us on something.  Maybe a song, or a passage, or an article, or anything else that we may have been talking about or thinking about.  We have had a couple ideas for different things in the pipeline.

You will see that Kristina is much more articulate and will actually read over what she wrote before hitting "publish", while John probably won't.  You'll also probably see that John is more likely to get bogged down or tied up in theological generalities.

Anyhow, I hope that we have fun doing this, and actually follow through with it, and that maybe someone likes reading it.

J&K