Evangelical Reformed Fellowship

1. What is the chief end of man?

Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and enjoy Him forever. (1 Co 10:31; Ps 73:25-26)

2. What rule has God given to direct us how we may glorify and enjoy Him?

The Word of God which is contained in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments is the only rule to direct us how we may glorify God and enjoy Him. (Ep 2:20; 2 Tm 3:16; 1 Jo 1:3)

3. What do the Scriptures principally teach?

The Scriptures principally teach what man is to believe concerning God, and what duty God requires of man. (2 Tm 1:13; Ec 12:13)

4. What is God?

God is Spirit, infinite, eternal, and unchangeable, in His being, wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth. (Jn 4:24; Jb 11:7; Ps 90:2; 1 Tm 1:17; Js 1:17; Ex 3:14 ; Ps 147:5; Rv 4:8; Ex 34:6)

5. Are there more Gods than one?

There is only one God, the living and true God.

(Dt 6:4; Jr 10:10)

6. How many Persons are there in the Godhead?

There are three Persons in the Godhead: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit; and these three are one God, the same in essence, equal in power and glory. (Mt 28:19; 2 Co 13:14)

7. What are the decrees of God?

The decrees of God are His eternal purpose, according to the counsel of His own will, whereby for His own glory He has foreordained whatsoever comes to pass. (Eph 1:11-12)

8. How does God execute His decrees?

God executes His decrees in the words of creation and providence. (Rv 4:11; Dn 4:25)

9. What is the work of creation?

The work of creation is God’s making all things of nothing, by the word of His power, in the space of six days, and all very good. (Gn 1:1;  He 11:3; Ex 20:11)

10. How did God create mankind?

God created mankind, male and female, after His own image, in knowledge, righteousness and holiness, with dominion over the creatures. (Gn 1:27; Co 3:10; Eph 4:24; Gn 1:28)

11. What are God’s works of providence?

God’s works of providence are His most holy, wise, and powerful preserving and governing all His creatures, and all their actions. (Ps 145:17; Is 28:29; He 1:3; Ne 9:6; Ps 103;19; Mt 10:29)

12. What special act of providence did God employ towards humanity in its original condition?

When God created man, He entered into a covenant of life with him on the condition of perfect obedience, forbidding him to eat the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, upon penalty of death. (Ga 3:12; Gn 2:17)

13. Did our first parents continue in their original condition?

Our first parents, being left to the freedom of their own will, fell from their original condition by sinning against God, by eating the forbidden fruit. (Ec 7:29; Gn 3:6-8)

14. What is sin?

Sin is disobeying or failing to conform to the law of God in any thought, word, or deed. (1 Jn 3:4)

15. Did all mankind fall in Adam’s first sin?

Because the covenant made with Adam was not only for himself but for all his posterity, all mankind descending from him by ordinary generation sinned in him and fell with him in his first transgression. (1 Co 15:22; Ro 5:12)

16. Into what condition did the fall bring mankind?

The fall brought mankind into a state of sin and misery. (Ro 5:18)

17. What is the nature of mankind’s sinful condition brought about by the fall?

The sinful condition of mankind resulting from the fall consists of the guilt of Adam’s first sin, the loss of original righteousness, and the corruption of his whole nature, which is commonly called original sin, together with all actual sin which proceeds from it. (Ro 5:19; Ro 3:10; Ep 2:1)

18. What is the misery of mankind’s sinful condition?

All mankind, by their fall, lost communion with God, are under His wrath and curse, and so made liable to all the miseries in this life, to death itself, and to the pains of hell forever. (Gn 3:8, 24; Ep 2:3; Ga 3:10; Ro 6:23; Mt 25:41)

19. Did God leave mankind to perish in the state of sin and misery?

Out of His own good pleasure, God, from all eternity, elected some to everlasting life, entered into a covenant of grace to deliver them out of the state of sin and misery and to bring them into a state of salvation by a Redeemer. (2 Th 2:13;  Ro 5:21)

20. Who is the Redeemer of God’s elect?

The only Redeemer of God’s elect is the Lord Jesus Christ, who being the eternal Son of God, became man and so was and continues to be God and man, in two distinct natures and one person forever. (1 Tm 2:5; Jn 1:14; 1 Tm 3:16;  Co 2:9)

21. How did Christ, being the Son of God, become man?

Christ, the Son of God, became man by taking to Himself a true body, and a reasonable soul, being conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit in the womb of the virgin Mary, and born of her, yet without sin. (He 2:14; Mt 26:38; He 4:15; Lk 1:31, 35; He 7:26)

22. What offices does Christ execute as our Redeemer?

Christ as our Redeemer executes the offices of a prophet, a priest, and a king, both in His state of humiliation and exaltation. (Ac 3:22; He 5:6; Ps 2:6)

23. How does Christ execute the office of a prophet?

Christ executes the office of a prophet, in revealing to us, by His Word and Spirit, the will of God for our salvation. (Jn 1:18, 20:31, 14:26)

24. How does Christ execute the office of priest?

Christ executes the office of a priest in His once offering up Himself a sacrifice to satisfy divine justice and to reconcile us to God, and in making continual intercession for us. (He 9:28, 2:17, 7:25)

25. How does Christ execute the office of a king?

Christ executes the office of a king, in subduing us to Himself, in ruling and defending us, and in restraining and conquering all His and our enemies. (Ps 110:3; Mt 2:6;  1 Co 15:25)

26. What was Christ’s humiliation?

Christ’s humiliation was in His being born, and that in a low condition, made under the law, undergoing the miseries of this life, the wrath of God, and the cursed death of the cross, in being buried, and continuing under the power of death for a time. (Lk 2:7; Ga 4:4; Is 53:3; Mt 27:46; Ph 2:8; Mt12:40)

27. What was Christ’s exaltation?

Christ’s exaltation was in His rising again from the dead on the third day, in ascending up into heaven, in sitting on the right hand of God the Father, and in coming to judge the world at the last day. (1 Co 15:4; Mk 16:19; Ac 17:31)

28. How are we made partakers of the redemption purchased by Christ?

We are made partakers of the redemption purchased by Christ, by the effectual application of it to us by His Holy Spirit. (Jn 1:12; Ti 3:5-6)

29. How does the Spirit apply to us the redemption purchased by Christ?

The Spirit apples to us the redemption purchased by Christ, by working faith in us, and thereby uniting us to Christ in our effectual calling. (Ep 2:8, 3:17)

30. What is effectual calling?

Effectual calling is the work of God’s Spirit where He convinces us of our sin and misery, enlightens our minds in the knowledge of Christ, renews our wills, and persuades and enables us to embrace Jesus Christ as He is freely offered to us in the gospel. (2 Tm 1:9; Ac 2:37, 26:18; Ez 36:26; Jn 6:44-45)

31. What are the benefits in this life for those who are effectually called?

For those who are effectually called, the benefits in this life are justification, adoption, sanctification, and the many other benefits which accompany or flow from them in this life. (Ro 8:30; Ep 1:5; 1 Co 1:30)

32. What is justification?

Justification is an act of God’s free grace wherein He pardons all our sins and accepts us as righteous in His sight, only because of the righteousness of Christ imputed to us and received by faith alone. (Ro 3:24; Ep 1:7;  2 Co 5:21; Ro 5:19; Ga 2:16; Ph 3:9)

33. What is adoption?

Adoption is an act of God’s free grace whereby we are received into the number of the children of God and have a right to all of the privileges thereof. (1 Jn 3:1;  Jn 1:12; Ro 8:17)

34. What is sanctification?

Sanctification is the work of God’s Spirit, whereby we are renewed in the whole man after the image of God, and are enabled more and more to die unto sin and live unto righteousness. (2 Th 2:13; Ep 4:24; Ro 6:10-11)

35. What are the benefits which in this life do accompany or flow from justification, adoption, and sanctification?

The benefits which in this life do accompany or flow from justification, adoption, and sanctification, are the assurance of God’s love, peace of conscience, joy in the Holy Spirit, increase of grace, and perseverance to the end. (Ro 5:1,2,5; 14:17; Pr 4:18; 1 Jn 5:13; 1 Pt 1:5)

36. What benefits do believers receive from Christ at their death?

The souls of believers are at their death made perfect in holiness, and do immediately pass into glory, and their bodies, being still united to Christ, do rest in their graves until the resurrection. (He 12:23; Ph 1:23; 2 Co 5:8; Lk 23:43; 1 Th 4:14; Is 57:2; Jb 19:26)

37. What benefits do believers receive from Christ at the resurrection?

At the resurrection, believers being raised up in glory shall be openly acknowledged and acquitted in the day of judgment and made perfectly blessed both in soul and body in the full enjoying of God to all eternity. (1 Co 15:43; Mt 10:32; 1 Jn 3:2; 1 Th 4:17)

38. What shall be done to the wicked at their death?

The souls of the wicked shall at their death be cast into the torments of Hell, and their bodies lie in their graves until the resurrection and the day of judgment. (Lk 16:22-24; Ps 49:14)

39. What shall be done to the wicked at the day of judgment?

At the day of judgment, the bodies of the wicked being raised out of their graves, shall be sentenced together with their souls to unspeakable torments with the devil and his angels forever. (Dn 12:2; Jn 5:28-29; 2 Th 1:9; Mt 25:41,46)

40. What did God at first reveal to man for the rule of his obedience?

The rule which God at first revealed to man for his obedience was the moral law which is summarily comprehended in the Ten Commandments. (Dt 10:4; Mt 19:17)

41. What is the sum of the Ten Commandments?

The sum of the Ten Commandments is to love the Lord our God with all our heart, all our soul, all our strength, and all our mind, and to love our neighbor as ourselves. (Mt 22:37-40; Mi 6:8)

42. Is any man able to keep perfectly the commandments of God?

No mere man since the fall is able in his life to keep perfectly the commandments of God, but does daily break them in thought, word, and deed.(Ec 7:20; Gn 8:21;  Js 3:2, 8)

43. What does every sin deserve?

Every sin deserves God’s wrath and curse, both in this life and that which is to come. (Ep 5:6; Ps 11:6)

44. How may we escape His wrath and curse due to us for sin?

To escape the wrath and curse of God due to us for sin, we must believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, trusting alone in His blood and righteousness. This faith is accompanied by repentance for the past and leads to holiness in the future. (Jn 3:16; Ac 20:21)

45. What is faith is Jesus Christ?

Faith in Jesus Christ is a saving grace, whereby we receive and rest upon Him alone for salvation, as He is set forth in the gospels. (He 10:29; Jn 1:12; Ph 3:9; Is 33:22)

46. What is repentance unto life?

Repentance unto life is a saving grace whereby a sinner, out of a true sense of personal sin and apprehension of the mercy of God in Christ, does with grief and hatred of his sin turn from it unto God, with full purpose to strive after new obedience. (Ac 11:18, 2:37;  Jl 2:13; Jr 31:18-19; Ps 119:59)

47. What are the outward and ordinary means whereby the Holy Spirit communicates to us the benefits of redemption?

The outward and ordinary means whereby the Holy Spirit communicates to us the benefits of Christ’s redemption are the Word, by which souls are begotten unto spiritual life, and Baptism, Communion, and Prayer, by all of which believers are further edified in their most holy faith. (Ac 2:41-42; Js 1:18)

48. How is the Word made effectual to salvation?

The Spirit of God makes the reading, but especially the preaching of the Word, an effectual means of convincing and converting sinners, and of building them up in holiness and comfort, through faith unto salvation. (Ps 19:7; 1 Th 1:6; Ro 1:16)

49. How is the Word to be read and heard, that it may become effectual to salvation?

That the Word may become effectual to salvation, we must attend to it with diligence, preparation, and prayer, receive it with faith and love, lay it up in our hearts, and practice it in our lives. (Pr 8:34; 1 Pt 2:1-2; Ps 119:18; He 4:2; 2 Th 2:10; Ps 119:11; Js 1:25)

50. How do Baptism and Communion become effectual means of grace?

Baptism and Communion become effectual means of grace, not from any virtue in them, or in him who does administer them, but only by the blessing of Christ, and the working of the Holy Spirit in those who by faith receive them. (1 Co 3:6,7; 12:13; 1 Pt 3:21)

51. What is Baptism?

Baptism is a sacrament of the New Testament, instituted by Jesus Christ to be unto the person baptized a sign of his fellowship with Him in His death, burial, and resurrection, of His being ingrafted into Him, of remission of sins, and of his giving up himself unto God through Jesus Christ, to live and walk in newness of life. (Mt 28:19; Ro 6:3; Co 2:12; Ga 3:27; Mk 1:4; Ac 22:16; Ro 6:4-5)

52. What is Communion?

Communion is a sacrament of the New Testament, instituted by Jesus Christ wherein, by giving and receiving bread and wine according to His appointments, His death is shown forth, and the worthy receivers are, not after a corporeal and carnal manner but by faith, made partakers of His body and blood, with all His benefits, to their spiritual nourishment and growth in grace. (1 Co 11:23-26; 10:16)

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Evangelical Reformed Fellowship

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