Archive for January 31st, 2008
Ussher:
1)
Q. What is the office of Christ?
A. To be a mediator betwixt God and man.
Q. What was required of Christ for making peace and reconciliation
betwixt God and man?
A. That he should satisfy the first covenant whereunto man
was tied.
Q. Wherein was Christ to make satisfaction to the first covenant?
A. In performing that righteousness which the law of God
did require of man; and in bearing the punishment which was
due unto man for breaking of the same law.
Q. How did Christ. perform that righteousness which God’s law
requireth of man?
A. In that he was conceived by the Holy Ghost, without all
spot of original corruption; and lived most holy all the days of
his life without all actual sin.
Q. How did he bear the punishment which was due unto man for
breaking God’s law?
A. In that he willingly, for man’s sake, made himself subject
to the curse of the law, both in body and soul; and, humbling
himself even unto the death, offered up unto his Father a perfect
sacrifice for the sins of the world.
Q. What is required of man for obtaining the benefits of the Gospel?
A. That he receive Christ Jesus whom God doth freely offer
unto him.
Q. By what means are you to receive Christ?
A. By faith, whereby I believe the gracious promises of the
Gospel.
Q. How do you receive Christ by faith?
A. By laying hold of him and applying him with all his
benefits to the comfort of mine own soul.
Ussher’s “The Principles of Christian Religion,” cited by Alexander Mitchell, Catechisms of the Second Reformation, (London: James Nisbet & Co., 1886), 144.