G*M
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Lesson 2
The Misery of Man
Lord's Day II-IV
Lord's Day II-IV are the first part of the Heidelberg Catechism. Questions 3
-11 are dealt with here. In this part, the misery of man comes up for
discussion.
Lord's Day II
Q. 3.Whence knowest thou thy misery?
Answ. Out of the Law of God. (a).
(a) Rom.3:20
What is misery?
What actually is misery? It means that we are in a wretched or extremely
unhappy situation. There are many examples: war, hunger, quarreling,
unemployment, addiction, homelessness, poverty, illness and death. There is
much trouble, sorrow, and misery in this world. All this misery is the
result of sin. But true, actual misery is much more far-reaching. We can
read this in Genesis 3: We lack God. Because of the fall of man, we are
without God in the world. The cause of all misery is sin, the falling away
from God. We lost God's gracious goodness and His wrath rests upon us. After
the fall, a curse was laid upon man. In Romans 3:9-20 we can read how great
our misery is.
Knowledge of Our Misery Out of the Law
Most of the time we don't feel our misery. We do not act like miserable
people. Often we live on cheerfully. Hence, we have the question: "Whence
knowest thou thy misery?" The answer is, "Out of the Law of God". This is a
biblical answer. In Romans 3:20 we read: "For by the law is the knowledge of
sin." We do not learn our misery out of the newspaper, but out of the Law
of God. We find an example in Romans 7:7, where Paul writes that he had not
known sin but by the Law. A law is a rule to live by. God, our Creator gave
us the Ten Commandments (Ex.20:1-17 and Deut.5:6-21). The Law can be
compared with a mirror. A mirror shows us what we look like. The Law of God
is such a mirror. The Holy Spirit shows us by the Law of God how miserable
we are.. We will never again be able to live according to that Law. The more
I see how God wills me to be, the more I feel how sinful I am. I will then
say: "Is that me? So wretched?"
Q. 4. What does the Law of God require of us?
Answ. Christ teaches us that briefly in Matt.22:37-40, "Thou shalt love the
Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy might,
and with all thy strength. This is the first and great commandment; and the
second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these
two commandments hang all the Law and the prophets".(a)
(a) De.6:5, Le.19:18, Ma.12:30, Lu.10:27.
The Law Requires Love
We have seen that we learn to know our misery out of the Law of God. What
does that Law require of us? Love! Perfect love toward God and our neighbor.
That is the summary of the Law of God.
To Love God
In His Law, God requires first and foremost that we love Him from the bottom
of our heart. We must love God in everything we do, want and think of. In
His Law, God requires more than just the outward deed. It matters why and
how we do something. God requires from us that we serve Him with all our
hearts. The Lord Jesus says so in Matt.22:37-40. He was not the first to say
that the crucial point is love. He just repeated what Moses already said in
Deut.6:5: "And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and
with all thy soul, and with all thy might."
To Love Our Neighbor
In the second place we must love our neighbor as ourselves. By our neighbor,
we understand all people, but especially all those with whom we associate
every day. This also includes all our enemies. A clear example is the
parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37). As a creature of God, each
person is to love himself. This means to reject harmful things and promote
good things. We should deal with our neighbor in this way as well. We must
love our neighbor as ourselves. So in summary, the Law of God requires us to
love God above all and our neighbor as ourselves.
Q.5. Canst thou keep all these things perfectly?
Answ. In no wise ;(a) for I am prone to hate God and my neighbor.(b).
(a) Ro.3:10, 20, 23. 1 Jo.1:8, 10.
(b) Ro.8:7. Ep.2:3. Tit.3:3. Ge.6:5 and 8:21. Jer.17:9. Ro. 7:23
God's Requirement
So we must learn to know our misery out of the Law of God. This Law requires
love toward God and our neighbor. Can we comply with this? Can we do
everything God requires from us in His Law? Can we love God above all and
our neighbor as ourselves? This is what God requires. God requires
perfection. He is not satisfied with anything less. Because He is God and
Goodness itself, He can not tolerate evil. Not even a little, because He has
created us perfect.
Haters of God and Our Neighbor
Can I keep all these things perfectly? The answer to this question is: "No".
Here the student gives an honest answer. One can only give such an answer
if the Holy Spirit works in one's heart. From ourselves we think that we can
keep this Law. We are usually satisfied with ourselves.
We can not keep the Law of God perfectly. And why not? Because by nature we
hate God and our neighbor. That is our misery! "By nature" means that it is
innate. "Prone" means that we cannot and will not do otherwise. We are born
as haters of God and our neighbor. "Living in malice and envy, hateful and
hating one another" (Titus 3:3).
Happily, God often restrains this hatred and wickedness. It is not our
goodness if we are not hateful or wicked, but God keeps us from evil,
because anything good in this world comes from God.
Lord's Day 3
Q.6. Did God then create man so wicked and perverse?
Answ. No, by no means, but God created man good, (a) and after His own image
, (b) in true righteousness and holiness, that he may rightly know God his
Creator, heartily love Him and live with Him in eternal happiness to glorify
and praise Him (c).
(a) Ge.1:31.
(b) Ge.1:26,27.
(c) Ep.4:24, Co.3:10, II Co.3:18
Created Good
We will now look for the cause of our wickedness. Does this wickedness come
from God or from us? In Job 34:10 we read: "Far be it from God that He
should do wickedness and iniquity." So the fault is not in God and neither
in our creation by God. How then did God create man? In Genesis 1:31 we read
"very good, perfect." That means without blemish in body and soul.
After God's Image
Man was created after the image of God. In our answer we read that man was
created in true righteousness and holiness. This shows us that the image of
God consisted in spiritual attributes. Righteousness or equity means that in
Paradise man perfectly met all the requirements of God's Law. Everything
was good between God and man. Sin did not exist. Man possessed holiness.
Holiness indicates that man was entirely God-oriented. Man was created with
a pure knowledge of God, with a holy mind and a good will. And only in this
way, could man know his Creator rightly, that is, perfectly. Through the
possession of God's image, man was distinguished from animals, capable of
having perfect communion (= intercourse) with God. Having this image of God
man was able to love his Creator and to live with Him in eternal happiness,
to glorify and praise Him eternally. To love Him heartily means that man
neither could nor wanted to do otherwise. Man would live happily with God to
glorify and praise Him for ever and ever.
Q. 7. Whence then proceeds this depravity of human nature?
Answ. From the fall and disobedience of our first parents, Adam and Eve, in
Paradise (a); hence our nature is become so corrupt, that we are all
conceived and born in sin.(b).
(a) Gen. 3, Rom. 5:12, 18, 19.
(b) Ps. 51:7, Gen. 5:3.
Man's disobedience
The origin of sin is not in God and in His creation, but in man himself.
Adam had been created without sin and without shortcomings. Neither was he
created to die one day, but to live eternally in glorious Paradise. This
applied to Adam, Eve, and to all their descendants.
Voluntary Love Required
But God had not created Adam and Eve in such a way that they could not sin.
For God did not want to receive an enforced obedience and love, simply
because they then could not do otherwise. No, God wanted obedience and love
of their own volition.
Therefore he left the choice with Adam. He made a covenant with Adam. With
this He put Adam to the test: Adam and Eve were allowed to eat from all the
fruits of the trees in Paradise, except of one tree, which stood in the
midst of Paradise. This was "the tree of knowledge of good and evil." God
forbade Adam and Eve to eat of the fruit of that tree. If Adam and Eve loved
God voluntarily and perfectly by not eating of this tree, they would live
eternally in perfect happiness. But if they were disobedient and ate of this
tree, then they would have to die and lose God's favor.
Adam and Eve were created perfectly good and were therefore capable of
obeying. well, There was no temptation from within to sin either. They only
had to resist the temptation from without. And the reward was unprecedented
bliss: the eternal enjoyment of God's favor and communion - eternal life
which they would never lose.
The covenant also implied that Adam's obedience would be imputed to all his
posterity and the reward would also be given them.
But if he should sin, then this disobedience and its punishment would also
be imputed and given to his posterity. In this covenant Adam, the ancestor
all mankind, represented the whole human race which had to be born yet. He
was their covenant head. As he could earn salvation in this covenant, we
call this the covenant of works.
The Fall
But alas, Adam did not remain obedient Satan moved man to be disobedient.
Satan said, "You can be like God". Then Eve listened to the devil and so did
Adam. Adam and Eve did what Satan whispered in their ears and they ate of
the forbidden fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. By doing this
Adam broke the covenant and impugned God's sovereign authority since the
tree was the token of God's authority. Not eating of that tree signified
that only God determines what is good and evil. But Adam wanted more. He
wanted to be like God: he himself wanted to determine what is good and evil.
Through this one deed Adam became a sinner. By doing this he destroyed the
masterpiece of God's creation, the perfect man. Adam became sinful: from now
on he was prone to sin. And through his disobedience all men became sinful.
Conceived and born in Sin
Through the sin of Adam and Eve, our nature, became so corrupt that all of
us are born in sin and iniquity. We read this in Psalm 51:5: "Behold, I was
shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me". Here David does
not only speak about the sin he has committed, but he also confesses to have
a sinful heart. Not only are our deeds, words and thoughts wrong, but our
nature is sinful. Man lost God's image and through this he became a sinner.
"To sin" means: "to miss one's mark". Through sin man misses the mark for
which God created him: to live to God's honor and to obtain eternal
happiness.
Q. 8. Are we then so corrupt that we are wholly incapable of doing any good,
and inclined to all wickedness?
Answ. Indeed we are (a); except we are regenerated by the Spirit of God. (b).
(a) Gen.8:21 and 6:5, Job 14:4 and 15:14, 16, 35, Joh.3:6, Isa.53:6.
(b) Joh.3:3, 5, 1Cor.12:3, 2Cor.3:5.
Lost God's Image
By his deep fall man lost God's image. There is no righteousness or holiness
in him anymore. Granted, man is a rational being, which means that he
remained gifted with reason and judgment. Man has still some knowledge of
God and of good and evil. His conscience still speaks. But man is powerless
to do any good. What is more, he is prone to all evil. It is impossible for
fallen man, who is spiritually dead through sin, to return to God. And
really, man does not want to. He persists in his first sin and wants to
determine himself what is good and evil. Man is incapable of raising himself
out of this fall. Paul writes to the Ephesians, "And you has he quickened
who were dead in trespasses and sins" (Eph.2:1).
Regeneration
What must happen then? Man must be born again by the Holy Spirit. This is
not reincarnation, but a total spiritual renewal in this life. God must work
a wonder. He must renew the heart of a man altogether. Jesus taught: "
Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see
the kingdom of God". (John 3:3). Regeneration must take place. A new
beginning must be made by God.
When Nicodemus heard about regeneration he did not understand what Jesus
meant. It is the same with us. It is a spiritual and not a natural birth.
Regeneration is making alive, a birth through Word and Spirit, an inner
renewal, a new creation. Man is so utterly lost that nobody but God can save
him. Regeneration is not an act of man, it is an intervention of God. A
miracle must happen to man: his heart must be renewed. Only in this way will
the image of God be restored in man.
Lord's Day IV
Q. 9. Doth not God then do injustice to man, by requiring from him in His
Law , that which he can not perform?
Answ. Not at all (a); for God made man capable of performing it (b); but man
, by the instigation of the devil (c), and his own willful disobedience,
deprived himself and all his posterity of those divine gifts.
(a) Eph.4:24.
(b) Gen.3:13, 1Tim.2:13,14.
(c) Gen.3:6, Rom.5:12.
An impossible Requirement?
Is it not an injustice to oblige someone to do that which he cannot do? Is
this not unfair and unmerciful? In His Law the Lord commands us to do things
impossible for fallen man to do. Isn't God unjust then? No! God made man
capable of doing what the Law commands. But through the fall, Adam and his
descendants lost those gifts. Paul says, "Wherefore, as by one man sin
entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men,
for that all have sinned" (Rom.5:12).That we cannot keep the Law any more is
no excuse, but guilt. We are not forced to sin, but we sin voluntarily.
All Men are Sinners
When God demanded obedience, Adam acted on behalf of all men. Alas, he was
disobedient, and judgment came upon all of us. We call this original sin.
This means that Adam's sin is imputed to us. But also that through his fall,
we inherit a sinful nature. In Adam we all did sin. Man listened to the
devil, who urged us to transgress God's Law. But at the same time we
ourselves became willfully, that is with malicious intent, disobedient to
God's Law. It is our own fault that we cannot do anymore what God requires
from us.
Q. 10. Will God suffer such disobedience and rebellion to go unpunished?
Answ. By no means; but He is terribly displeased (a) with our original as
well as actual sins; and will punish them in His just judgement temporally
and eternally (b), as He has declared, "Cursed is everyone that continues
not in all things, which are written in the book of the Law, to do them".(c)
(a) Gen.2:17, Rom.5:12.
(b) Ps.50:21 and 5:6, Nah.1:2, Ex.20.5 and 34:7, Rom.1:18, Eph.5:6.
(c) Deut.27:26, Gal.3:10.
The Wrath of God
The Lord is not only the Lawgiver, but also our Judge. He is terribly
displeased with our sins. He has a holy abhorrence of sins and He punishes
them. Moses says, "Who knoweth the power of Thine anger? Even according to
Thy fear, so is Thy wrath" (Ps.90:11). Sin arouses wrath in the holy God. He
is not indifferent in respect to evil. God punishes evil. This punishment
has to do with our original sin, which is our innate sinful nature. But it
also concerns our actual sins. By actual sins, we do not only mean sins
committed in deed, but also sins of thoughts and words. We are born as
sinners and every day we add more sins. And so our debts become as high as
the heavens. Would God then leave them unpunished? No, sin stirs up God's
wrath. We read in the epistle to the Romans, "For the wrath of God is
revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who
hold the truth in unrighteousness" (Rom.1:18).
Punishments
The Lord judges with a righteous judgment. He is perfectly fair. God is
righteous, and therefore He must punish sin. Two kinds of punishment are
mentioned: temporal and eternal. All of us receive temporal punishments
during our lives: illnesses, adversities, calamities and death. All the
miseries in this life are the consequences of sin. It is not God's fault
that we suffer, but it is ours. Eternal punishments are those that everyone
must suffer who dies without faith in Christ.
Q. 11. Is not God then also merciful?
Answ. God is indeed merciful (a), but also just (b); therefore His justice
requires that sin which is committed against the Most High Majesty of God,
be also punished with extreme, that is, with everlasting punishment of body
and soul.
(a) Ex.34:6,7 and 20:6.
(b) Ps.7:10, Ex.20:5 and 23:7 and 34:7, Ps.5:5,6, Na.1:2,3.
God is merciful
God is merciful. Moses called out when God appeared unto him on Sinai, "The
Lord, The Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in
goodness and truth." (Ex.34:6). Everything in God is holy and perfect, also
His love. God's love is not like much human love, which often consists in
nothing but indulgence. God's love is not in conflict with His wrath. God's
love is a holy love: He loves holiness and therefore He hates sin. He can
never call straight that which is crooked.
God is Also Righteous
The love of God is sincere and is not in conflict with His authority and
justice. God is not only love, but God is above all God! He is merciful but
also righteous. David calls on Him, "O righteous God!" (Ps.7:10). Let us
consider for once, against whom we have sinned. The Lord is full of majesty
and glory. He is the King of kings. We have sinned against such a God. We
have ventured to stand up against the highest of authorities. Don't we
therefore deserve the severest punishment?
Eternal Death
The most serious punishment is death. God spoke to Adam, "For in the day
that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die" (Gen. 2:17). Did it happen
like this? Yes, when the first man had sinned, he became separated from God
and His communion. This is spiritual death. He lost God's favor. And at the
end of his life death came. That is corporal death. He had to die. Eternal
separation from God would have to follow, under God's awful wrath. This is
eternal death. It would have been just if the history of man had ended here.
But…God in His mercy (compassion) thought of a way of deliverance.
Questions with lesson 2 (Lord's day 2-4)
1. What is our misery? (answ.3)
2. From where do we learn our misery? (answ.3). Read Romans 3:20
3. What does the Law require of us? (answ.4). Try to summarize this in one
word
4. Read the parable of the good Samaritan in Luke 10:25-37. Who put into
practice "to love
thy neighbor"?
5. What is meant "by nature"? (answ.5)
6. What does "to keep perfectly" mean? (answ.5)
7. Why does it say in Titus 3:3 "We ourselves also were sometimes"?
8. What happened with man after this "sometimes"?
9. How did the Lord create man? (answ.6)
10. What is righteousness? (answ.6)
11. What is holiness? (answ.6)
12a. What sin does David refer to in Psalm 51:5?
12b. And what sin in Psalm 51:3 and 4?
13. What miracle must happen to man? (answ.8)
14. What covenant did the Lord make with Adam in Paradise? (answ.9)
15. Mention two kinds of punishments. (answ.10) | x****g
发帖数: 4008 | 2 Thanks for sharing
3
【在 G*M 的大作中提到】
: Bible Course - Christian Doctrine
: Lesson 2
: The Misery of Man
: Lord's Day II-IV
: Lord's Day II-IV are the first part of the Heidelberg Catechism. Questions 3
: -11 are dealt with here. In this part, the misery of man comes up for
: discussion.
: Lord's Day II
: Q. 3.Whence knowest thou thy misery?
: Answ. Out of the Law of God. (a).
| j********1
发帖数: 2073 | 3 Thanks for sharing
3
【在 G*M 的大作中提到】
: Bible Course - Christian Doctrine
: Lesson 2
: The Misery of Man
: Lord's Day II-IV
: Lord's Day II-IV are the first part of the Heidelberg Catechism. Questions 3
: -11 are dealt with here. In this part, the misery of man comes up for
: discussion.
: Lord's Day II
: Q. 3.Whence knowest thou thy misery?
: Answ. Out of the Law of God. (a).
| m****u
发帖数: 1689 | 4 Thanks for sharing
3
【在 G*M 的大作中提到】
: Bible Course - Christian Doctrine
: Lesson 2
: The Misery of Man
: Lord's Day II-IV
: Lord's Day II-IV are the first part of the Heidelberg Catechism. Questions 3
: -11 are dealt with here. In this part, the misery of man comes up for
: discussion.
: Lord's Day II
: Q. 3.Whence knowest thou thy misery?
: Answ. Out of the Law of God. (a).
|
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