Term
| Q. 1. What is man’s primary purpose? |
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Definition
| A. Man’s primary purpose is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever. |
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Term
| Q. 2. What authority from God directs us how to glorify and enjoy him? |
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Definition
| A. The only authority for glorifying and enjoying him is the Bible, which is the word of God and is made up of the Old and New Testaments. |
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Term
| Q. 3. What does the Bible primarily teach? |
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Definition
| A. The Bible primarily teaches what man must believe about God and what God requires of man. |
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Term
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Definition
| A. God is a spirit, whose being, wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth are infinite, eternal, and unchangeable. |
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Term
| Q. 5. Is there more than one God? |
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Definition
| A. There is only one, the living and true God. |
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Term
| Q. 6. How many persons are in the one God? |
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Definition
| A. Three persons are in the one God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. These three are one God, the same in substance and equal in power and glory. |
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Term
| Q. 7. What are the decrees of God? |
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Definition
| A. The decrees of God are his eternal plan based on the purpose of his will, by which, for his own glory, he has foreordained everything that happens. |
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Term
| Q. 8. How does God carry out his decrees? |
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Definition
| A. God carries out his decrees in creation and providence. |
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Term
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Definition
| A. Creation is God’s making everything out of nothing by his powerful word in six days-- and all very good. |
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Term
| Q. 10. How did God create man? |
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Definition
| A. God created man, male and female, in his own image and in knowledge, righteousness, and holiness, to rule over the other creatures. |
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Term
| Q. 11. What is God’s providence? |
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Definition
A. God’s providence is his completely holy, wise, and powerful preserving and
governing every creature and every action. |
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Term
| Q. 12. What did God’s providence specifically do for man whom he created? |
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Definition
| A. After the creation God made a covenant with man to give him life, if he perfectly obeyed; God told him not to eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil or he would die. |
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Term
| Q. 13. Did our first parents remain as they were created? |
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Definition
| A. Left to the freedom of their own wills, our first parents sinned against God and fell from their original condition. |
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Term
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Definition
| A. Sin is disobeying or not conforming to God’s law in any way. |
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Term
| Q. 15. By what sin did our first parents fall from their original condition? |
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Definition
| A. Our first parents’ sin was eating the forbidden fruit. |
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Term
| Q. 16. Did all mankind fall in Adam’s first disobedience? |
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Definition
| A. Since the covenant was made not only for Adam but also for his natural descendants, all mankind sinned in him and fell with him in his first disobedience. |
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Term
| Q. 17. What happened to man in the fall? |
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Definition
| A. Man fell into a condition of sin and misery. |
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Term
| Q. 18. What is sinful about man’s fallen condition? |
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Definition
| A. The sinfulness of that fallen condition is twofold. First, in what is commonly called original sin, there is the guilt of Adam’s first sin with its lack of original righteousness and the corruption of his whole nature. Second are all the specific acts of disobedience that come from original sin. |
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Term
| Q. 19. What is the misery of man’s fallen condition? |
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Definition
| A. By their fall all mankind lost fellowship with God and brought his anger and curse on themselves. They are therefore subject to all the miseries of this life, to death itself, and to the pains of hell forever. |
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Term
| Q. 20. Did God leave all mankind to die in sin and misery? |
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Definition
A. From all eternity and merely because it pleased him God chose some to have
everlasting life. These he freed from sin and misery by a covenant of grace and brought them to salvation by a redeemer. |
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Term
| Q. 21. Who is the redeemer of God’s chosen ones? |
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Definition
| A. The only redeemer of God’s chosen is the Lord Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God, who became man. He was and continues to be God and man in two distinct natures and one person forever. |
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Term
| Q. 22. How did Christ, the Son of God, become man? |
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Definition
| A. Christ, the Son of God, became man by assuming a real body and a reasoning soul. He was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit in the womb of the Virgin Mary, who gave birth to him; yet he was sinless. |
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Term
| Q. 23. How is Christ our redeemer? |
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Definition
| A. As our redeemer, Christ is a prophet, priest, and king in both his humiliation and his exaltation. |
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Term
| Q. 24. How is Christ a prophet? |
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Definition
| A. As a prophet, Christ reveals the will of God to us for our salvation by his word and Spirit. |
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Term
| Q. 25 How is Christ a priest? |
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Definition
| A. As a priest, Christ offered himself up once as a sacrifice for us to satisfy divine justice and to reconcile us to God, and he continually intercedes for us. |
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Term
| Q. 26. How is Christ a king? |
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Definition
| A. As a king, Christ brings us under his power, rules and defends us, and restrains and conquers all His and all our enemies. |
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Term
| Q. 27. How was Christ humiliated? |
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Definition
| A. Christ was humiliated: by being born as a man and born into a poor family; by being made subject to the law and suffering the miseries of this life, the anger of God, and the curse of death on the cross; and by being buried and remaining under the power of death for a time. |
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Term
| Q. 28. How is Christ exalted? |
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Definition
| A. Christ is exalted by his rising from the dead on the third day, his going up into heaven, his sitting at the right hand of God the Father, and his coming to judge the world at the last day. |
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Term
| Q. 29. How are we made to take part in the redemption Christ bought? |
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Definition
| A. We take part in the redemption Christ bought when the Holy Spirit effectively applies it to us. |
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Term
| Q. 30. How does the Holy Spirit apply to us the redemption Christ bought? |
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Definition
| A. The Spirit applies to us the redemption Christ bought by producing faith in us and so uniting us to Christ in our effective calling. |
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Term
| Q. 31. What is effective calling? |
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Definition
| A. Effective calling is the work of God’s Spirit, who convinces us that we are sinful and miserable, who enlightens our minds in the knowledge of Christ, and who renews our wills. This is how he persuades and makes us able to receive Jesus Christ, who is freely offered to us in the gospel. |
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Term
| Q. 32. What benefits do those who are effectively called share in this life? |
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Definition
| A. In this life those who are effectively called share justification, adoption, sanctification, and the other benefits that either go with or come from them. |
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Term
| Q. 33. What is justification? |
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Definition
| A. Justification is the act of God’s free grace by which he pardons all our sins and accepts us as righteous in his sight. He does so only because he counts the righteousness of Christ as ours. Justification is received by faith alone. |
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Term
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Definition
| A. Adoption is the act of God’s free grace by which we become his sons with all the rights and privileges of being his. |
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Term
| Q. 35. What is sanctification? |
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Definition
| A. Sanctification is the work of God’s free grace by which our whole person is made new in the image of God, and we are made more and more able to become dead to sin and alive to righteousness. |
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Term
| Q. 36. What benefits in this life go with or come from justification, adoption, and sanctification? |
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Definition
| A. The benefits that in this life go with or come from justification, adoption, and sanctification are: the assurance of God’s love, peace of conscience, joy in the Holy Spirit, and growing and persevering in grace to the end of our lives. |
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Term
| Q. 37. What benefits do believers receive from Christ when they die? |
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Definition
| A. When believers die, their souls are made perfectly holy and immediately pass into glory. Their bodies, which are still united to Christ, rest in the grave until the resurrection. |
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Term
| Q. 38. What benefits do believers receive from Christ at the resurrection? |
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Definition
| A. At the resurrection, believers, raised in glory, will be publicly recognized and declared not guilty on the day of judgment and will be made completely happy in the full enjoyment of God forever. |
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