Westminster Shorter Catechism #100-101

100:
Q: What does the preface of the Lord's prayer teach us?
A: The preface of the Lord's prayer, which is, Our Father which art in heaven, teaches us to draw near to God with all holy reverence and confidence, as children to a father able and ready to help us; and that we should pray with and for others.

101:
Q: What do we pray for in the first petition?
A: In the first petition, which is, Hallowed be thy name, we pray that God would enable us and others to glorify him in all that whereby he makes himself known; and that he would dispose all things to his own glory. 
"Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created."

It's hard to believe, but we are coming now to the closing sections of the Westminster Shorter Catechism! I'm already thinking about what to blog through in 2017, but we'll get to that later. For now, we're moving into the sections of the catechism which break down and investigate the sections of the Lord's prayer. These blog posts won't be long, as I think the catechism here is pretty self-explanatory. 

Question 100 shows us a wonderful comfort. It echoes the words of Hebrews 4:16, "Let us with confidence draw near to the throne of grace". Why? Because this is, indeed, our heavenly Father that we are praying to. This is, for us his children, not a throne of judgment, but rather, a throne of grace upon which sits our Father. Our loving, caring, all powerful, all sovereign, all wise, all compassionate Father will withhold no good thing from his children! Our Father is the Father who created all things, who governs all things, and who will work all things for the good of those who love him. So we can, with confidence, draw near to his throne. 

On one final note, notice too, question 100 makes a point in emphasizing the corporate nature of this prayer. God is not "my Father" singular, he is "our Father", which reemphasizes the liturgical structure, by the way, that we talked about in the previous blog post. The implication of this plural language is exactly what the catechism says. We should pray both with and for others. Prayer is not only a means of grace for individuals, but one by which the people of God can and should participate in corporately. 

Question 101 looks at the first petition of the prayer, "Hallowed be thy name". What are we asking, or saying, to God when we pray this petition? We are asking him to glorify himself! We are asking God to receive all glory in all things. We are asking him to conform our wills to his-for his glory. We are asking him to make his glory known to us and to all of creation so that everyone and everything will bring him glory. We are asking God to bring about in our lives what the very first question in this catechism says is the goal of our entire existence-that we would glorify God and enjoy him forever. 

This blog was written by Andy Styer

Westminster Shorter Catechism #99

Q: What rule has God given for our direction in prayer?
A: The whole word of God is of use to direct us in prayer; but the special rule of direction is that form of prayer which Christ taught his disciples, commonly called, the Lord’s prayer.

Acts 2:42: And they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.

I think it’s good that the catechism makes mention that the whole of Scripture is useful in instructing us to pray. I remember one time in college we were examining a prayer prayed by an Old Testament prophet (I believe it was Samuel). At the end of reading the passage I joked, “Man! Samuel prays like a Presbyterian!” My professor laughed and said, “Why do you think that is?” “Obviously”, I said, “because he was a Presbyterian!” All joking aside, examining the prayers in Scripture, one does begin to pick up certain patterns and formulas to what prayer should be. So when the Westminster Divines point to the whole of the Bible as a model and instruction for prayer, a “rule” for what prayer should be, they are right in doing so! But, of course, the Lord’s Prayer is given to us by Jesus Christ himself as the “ultimate” model of prayer. In giving us the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus really is giving us a framework and pattern for prayer that truly has been used throughout the whole of Scripture. There’s nothing new in the Lord’s prayer as far as the structure goes. What Jesus gives us is a model of prayer that is based on the biblical patterns and structures used throughout the Scriptures.

Now, as I said in the last blog post, the Lord’s Prayer can be used in two ways. The first is a model for prayer. The Lord’s prayer can and should give us a structure to our prayers. We see in the prayer elements of praise (hallowed be thy name), we see in it a submission to God's will (thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven), supplication (give us this day our daily bread), repentance (forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us), and so on. Over the next several weeks, we'll discuss these elements of the prayer and see how they can shape our own prayer lives. 

The second way that the Lord's prayer can and should be used is as a prayer in and of itself. God's people should be praying the Lord's prayer as it was given. In fact, Jesus himself commands this in Luke 11, when as he's about to give the prayer he says, "When you pray, say..." And the prayer itself is, indeed, given in a liturgical structure, thus indicating that Jesus is saying, "Hey, this is a prayer you ought to be saying often!" The church has historically understood the prayer in these terms. So much so, in fact, that the ancient Didache, a first century treatise which contains supposed teachings of the Apostles, states that the prayer should be said by Christians at least three times a day!

It's for these reasons that the Reformed church, as well as Catholic, Orthodox, Anglican, Lutheran, and just about every other major branch of Christianity has, for centuries, included the Lord's prayer as a liturgical element in their weekly gathered worship services. This is the reason why I used Acts 2:42 as a Scripture reference for this question. It shows us that the early believers dedicated themselves to "the prayers". That little word, "the" before the word "prayers" indicates that these were structured, memorized prayers used for liturgical purposes. Quite likely, these prayers included the Lord's prayer. Going back to that college class I mentioned in the beginning of this blog, as we began discussing the Lord's prayer, the professor asked, "How many of you attend a church where the prayer is said every week?" Sadly, only two of us raised our hands (the other person who raised his hand attended a Reformed Baptist church). The professor then asked, "what are some of the objections to not saying the prayer every week?" The most common objection was, "well if you say it every week, it can become meaningless!" This is certainly a reason that many of us hear when it comes to using any repeated elements of worship, not just the Lord's prayer! But our professor had a great response to this. He said, "Isn't that an issue of the heart with the worshiper, not an issue of the Lord's prayer itself? Why is our solution to this problem simply to not use the prayer at all? Shouldn't our solution be, rather, to address the heart issues of our worshipers who find this prayer to be meaningless if we repeat it too much? This prayer was given to us by Jesus Christ himself! How could it ever become meaningless!?" 

It's a wonderful point, isn't it? This prayer was, indeed, given to us by Christ himself. There really could be no better way to pray than to pray the words of Christ! 

This blog was written by Andy Styer

Westminster Shorter Catechism #98

Q: What is prayer?
A: Prayer is an offering up of our desires unto God, for things agreeable to his will, in the name of Christ, with confession of our sins, and thankful acknowledgment of his mercies.
Psalm 10:17 O Lord, you hear the desire of the afflicted; you will strengthen their heart; you will incline your ear.

The catechism is setting us up here for it’s section on the Lord’s Prayer. We see hints of the Lord’s prayer in how this answer is structured. “Prayer is an offering up of our desires unto God, for things agreeable to his will” is pointing towards the phrase, “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven”. “With confession of our sins” reflects the portion of the Lord’s Prayer, “Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors”. “Thankful acknowledgment of his mercies” points towards the section, “Give us this day our daily bread”. And in the coming weeks, we will explore in depth the Lord’s Prayer, all of its major sections (which the catechism breaks down by discussing four major requests in the prayer), and see how the prayer is both a model for us to use and is, indeed, a prayer in and of itself that we should make use of regularly.

But prayer is more than what the catechism lays out here, and I’d like to expand a bit upon this catechism by looking at two aspects of prayer not addressed in the catechism, at least directly. Because I think that too often we view prayer as a duty and a spiritual discipline. It is both of those things, but it’s a duty and a discipline given to us graciously for our own growth and good, and for God’s glory.

First, prayer is a means of grace. We already talked about how the means of grace are given to God’s people for their discipleship and nourishment. As a means of grace, prayer is vitally important to the life of a child of God. It is equally important, in fact, as the Word read and preached and the administration of the sacraments. God works through prayer to shape and mold our desires and feed our faith. As a means of grace, prayer is one of the ways that Christ himself communicates the benefits of our redemption!

Secondly, prayer is a privilege. Do we think about prayer in this way? As the book of Hebrews declares, we have a great high priest through whom we have been given access to the throne of God. There is one mediator between God and man, the Lord Jesus Christ. And when we go to God the Father in the name of the Son and by the power of the Holy Spirit, we are entering into the Holy of Holies itself and able to come before the maker of all things to lay our cares, our concerns, our desires, our hopes before him. And, remarkably, God hears us. The Holy God hears us, cares for us, and will be faithful to answer us. How can we not see prayer as a privilege? Imagine how special you would feel if the president of the United States invited you into his personal living quarters to talk to him? Here is the God of all creation saying, “Come my child, speak to me. I will listen, and I will answer”.

Lastly, something the catechism does mention, is that prayer is something we do in the name of Christ. We come to God the Father, the God of all creation, through God the Son. There is no other name by which we can come. Why are we not consumed by the holiness of God when we come into the presence of the Father in prayer? No reason, other than we are coming in the name of our great High Priest, Jesus Christ, who has made satisfaction for all our sins and who has clothed us in his robes of righteousness. When Christ died on the cross, you will remember the curtain in the temple which divided the outer court from the inner "Holy of Holies" was torn from top to bottom. This symbolized the reality that now, through Jesus Christ, all of God's people (not just Israel's high priest) could come into the very presence of the holy God himself and not be consumed, because we have one mediator between God and man-the Lord Jesus Christ. 

If prayer is all these things (and more!), then why are we so lazy with it? Why is it so hard for us? May God give us the grace daily to pray without ceasing, to make full use of this means of grace for our good and for his glory.

This blog was written by Andy Styer

Worth Reading

James 4:13-17

Do you come to our gathered worship service expecting God to speak to you through his Word? We encourage you to prayerfully read through the passage that will be preached prior to the service to help you prepare.

Ingratitude, Ethics, and Porn?

Gratitude is more important than we think and ingratitude is more serious than we think. “The contrast Paul draws between the one who offers thanksgiving and one who worships idols is striking. A failure to be thankful is one of the distinguishing marks of unbelief.”

Yes, Go to Church on Christmas Day

So, Christians, we have a special opportunity this year to point our family and friends to the Gospel of Jesus Christ by not neglecting to meet together with the saints on Christmas Day. If we desire for the world to stop taking Christ out of Christmas, then we need not do the same through our actions on Christmas Day.

And this one too: A Plea to Pastors: Don’t Cancel Church on Christmas

The Best Day of the Week...For Your Kids

Several years ago, I was leading a seminar on family worship at a conference and a man told me, “As a child, I always dreaded Sundays. My parents made it miserable.” I was sad to hear about his experience and the only thing I could think to say was, “Well, then they were obviously doing something wrong!” By way of contrast, Joel Beeke once explained that he woke his children up every Sunday and say, "It's time to get up. Today is the best day of the week!" …

Here are eight ways we can help our children view Sunday as being the best day of the week:

This blog was written by Andy Styer

Westminster Shorter Catechism #97

Q: What is required to the worthy receiving of the Lord's supper?
A: It is required of them that would worthily partake of the Lord's supper, that they examine themselves of their knowledge to discern the Lord's body, of their faith to feed upon him, of their repentance, love, and new obedience; lest, coming unworthily, they eat and drink judgment to themselves.
1 Corinthians 11:28 Let a person examine himself, then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup.

Now that the Thanksgiving holiday is past us for another year, and we've gotten over the humps of some pretty big catechism questions, I hope to catch up and get this blog back on schedule over the next few weeks. 

This week's question is a "biggie" as well. Some may not realize the debates around the question of who is worthy to receive the Lord's Supper. Some will argue that if our children are, indeed, members of the covenant community, if they have received the sign of that community, then why should we keep them from the covenant meal? After all, children, even infants, were more than likely participants in the covenant meals of Israel, be it the Passover or the peace offerings. This idea is not a new thought in the Christian church. The practice of including infants in the Lord's Supper is seen very early in the Church's life. And while we do not know if it was the apostolic practice, we do know that by the end of the 2nd century, it was at least a somewhat common practice. But others will argue that the reason we do not include infants in the Lord's Supper is because the meal, according to New Testament texts, requires some level of discernment. This is the position of the Westminster divines, and also the stated position of the Presbyterian Church in America. You can read our position paper on this topic here. 

Given the position of the PCA and of the Shorter Catechism, our goal here is to not engage in the discussion of who should partake of the Lord's Supper, but rather, as the catechism asks, what is required of those who would partake. The catechism states that there are several things we must discern before partaking. First, we are to discern the Lord's body. Do we understand what we are feeding on and drinking of when we partake of the elements of the supper? Do we understand that the bread is the body of Christ, broken for us? Do we understand that the cup is the new covenant in Christ's blood, poured out for us, that apart from the death of Jesus Christ, there is no atonement for sin and no forgiveness? We are also to discern, that is, to examine, our own faith. Are we trusting in Christ for our salvation? This is a meal for the people of God. Those who are looking elsewhere for their hope, those who are putting their faith in anything but Jesus Christ should not participate in the meal.  Furthermore, we should examine ourselves for the outworking of faith. Do we live lives of repentance, do we see the workings of love-love for God and for our neighbor? This includes the question, "are we at peace with our brothers and sisters in Christ?" This is the context of 1 Cor. 11 where Paul gives the command to examine ourselves. He writes in 11:18 that he hears of divisions among the Corinthian Christians. This should not be! The Lord's Supper is not only a reminder that we are reconciled to God, but also a reminder that, as Paul writes in 1 Cor. 10, because there is one bread, we who are many are one body. If you are not at peace with your brother or sister in Christ, you need to, as Jesus says in Matthew 5, leave your offering at the altar and first be reconciled to your brother. To not do this is to eat and drink judgment upon yourself. Finally, we are to examine our obedience to the commands of God. This is not a question of whether or not we have sinned, but rather, it is to search ourselves to see if we have in us a desire to serve and obey the true and living God. If we do not have this desire to obey, if we do not have evidence of love in us for God and for our neighbor, if we do not live lives of repentance, then we should be questioning whether we have the faith that is required to participate in the covenant meal.

Let me just close with this thought. The table of the Lord is not a table of merit. The process of discerning, of examining yourself, is not meant to keep those who are truly trusting in Christ away from the table. The process of examination is meant to remind us that the Lord's Supper is not just another meal, as the Corinthians were treating it, but rather, it is a means of grace meant to strengthen and encourage, to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ, to God's covenant people. It is not designed to keep the struggling Christian, the Christian who feels weak in their faith, the Christian who feels beaten down by their struggles against sin, the Christian who is plagued with doubts and fears, away. These are the people who need the meal, who need the spiritual nourishment of the body and blood of Christ, and these are the people who are invited to come! We do not "earn" the privilege to come to the table of the Lord. You don't get to come because, in your mind, you sinned less this week than you did last. Too often, these levels of examination have been used by people to pervert what the Lord's Supper is about. The call to examine ourselves has been twisted in a way that makes people afraid to come to the table. The reality is, everyone who comes to the table of the Lord is a poor and beaten down sinner. The reality is, everyone who comes has, at some point in their life, felt weak in their faith, has struggled to hold on to our confession. We all need the grace that the meal gives us. We all need the repentance and faith that the meal encourages. This meal is given to us because of our weakness, not in spite of it! Or have we forgotten that we have a great High Priest who is able to sympathize? A High Priest who was tempted in every way? Jesus Christ, the giver of this meal, knows our weaknesses and sympathizes with us.  So we who are hoping and trusting in Jesus Christ alone for our salvation, who-though we sin often and sin boldly-are living lives of repentance, who, though we fail, truly do desire to live obedient lives for the glory of our God and King, may come and eat and drink! We may come and participate in the great peace offering of God and know that we are at peace with the Father through the Son. We may come and have our souls nourished, our faith fed, and our assurance strengthened as we commune with Jesus and with our brothers and sisters. 

This blog was written by Andy Styer