Weekly Emmaus City Culture Q&As | Part 1, Q&A 16

EMMAUS CITY CULTURE Q&AS | PART 1: GOD, CREATION AND FALL, LAW CONTINUED

Each week, we are adapting Redeemer's New City Catechism with modern language, including the questions and answers, along with the commentary and prayer. Our goal is to make these easily accessible for all ages, as well as those with various levels of education in Worcester. 

Since we don't want this to be just information transfer, but life transformation by God's Word and Spirit, we purposely changed the word catechism to culture as we pray for God to help us creatively display and declare the good news of Jesus in our communities. 

Here are the previous weeks' Q&As:

• Q&A 1: What is our only hope in life and in death?
• Q&A 2: Who is God?
• Q&A 3: How many persons are there in God?
• Q&A 4: How and why did God create us?
• Q&A 5: What else did God create?
• Q&A 6: How can we glorify God?
• Q&A 7: What does the law of God require?

• Q&A 8: What is the law of God stated in the Ten Commandments?
• Q&A 9: What does God require in the first, second, and third commandments?
• Q&A 10: What does God require in the fourth and fifth commandments? 
• Q&A 11: What does God require in the sixth, seventh, and eighth commandments?
• Q&A 12: What does God require in the ninth and tenth commandments?
• Q&A 13: Can anyone keep the law of God perfectly?
• Q&A 14: Did God create us unable to keep His law?
• Q&A 15: Since no one can keep the law, what is its purpose?

Cheers to 2014 and many becoming more like Jesus together. For other updates, like and follow Emmaus City on Facebook.

Emmaus City Culture | Part 1, Q&A 16

Question 16

What is sin?

Answer 16

Sin is rejecting or ignoring God in the world He created, and not being or doing what He requires in His law.

1 John 3:4

Everyone who sins breaks the law; in fact, sin is lawlessness.

Commentary

From the moment we become aware of God as God and of ourselves as other, the alternative of choosing ourselves instead of God is opened. This sin is committed daily by young children and poor and uneducated people as well as by rich and thoughtful people, by those who live alone in solitude no less than by those who live in society: it is the fall in every individual life, and in each day of each individual life, the basic sin behind all particular sins: at this very moment you or I are either committing it, or about to commit it, or repenting of it. We try, when we wake, to lay the new day at God’s feet; [but] before we have finished shaving, it becomes our day and God’s share in it is felt as a tribute which we must pay out of ‘our own’ pocket, a deduction from the time which ought, we feel to be ‘our own’.

Adapted from The Problem of Pain by C.S. Lewis (New York: HarperCollins, 1940), 70.

Prayer

Lord, don’t deprive me of Your heavenly blessings.

Lord, deliver me from eternal torments.

Lord, if I have sinned in mind or thought, in word or deed, forgive me.

Lord, deliver me from littleness of soul and hardness of heart.

Lord, deliver me from every temptation.

Lord, enlighten my heart which evil desire has darkened.

Lord, I, being human, have sinned: You, being God, in loving kindness forgive me.

Lord, send down Your grace to help me, that I may glorify Your holy name.

Lord my God, even though I have done nothing good in Your sight, help me, according to Your grace, to make a beginning of good in me.

Lord, sprinkle on my heart the dew of Your grace.

Lord of heaven and earth, remember me Your sinful servant, with my cold and impure heart, in Your kingdom.

Lord, receive me in repentance.

Lord, don’t leave me.

Lord, lead me not into temptation.

Lord, give me good thoughts.

Lord, give me tears, a taste of death, and a sense of peace.

Lord, give me awareness to confess my sins.

Lord, give me humility, selfless love, and obedience.

Lord, give me endurance and gentleness.

Lord, plant in me the root of all blessings: the fear of You in my heart.

Lord, promise that I will love You with all my heart and soul and in all things obey Your will.

Lord, shield me from evil men and demons and evil desires and all other unlawful things.

Lord, You know Your creation and what You have willed for it; may Your will also be fulfilled in me a sinner; for You are blessed forever. Amen.

Adapted from “A Prayer by John Chrysostom: According to the Number of the Hours of the Day and Night” (notice there are 24 of them) in A Manual of Eastern Orthodox Prayers (New York: St Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1983), 14–15. John Chrysostom (347–407). Archbishop of Constantinople, John was born in Antioch. He was given the title Chrysostom which means “golden mouth” because of his eloquent preaching. He is recognized by the Eastern Orthodox Church and the Catholic Church as a saint and Doctor of the Church. Chrysostom is known for his Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom, and his vast homiletical works including 67 homilies on Genesis, 90 on the Gospel of Matthew, and 88 on the Gospel of John.

Coming next week: Q&As 17 and 18: What is idolatry? and Will God allow our disobedience to go unpunished?

– Sully

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