The Shorter Westminster Catechism is one of the best summaries of the Reformed faith ever written for its clarity and depth. Today, the Pastors offer some concluding thoughts about its significance for contemporary Christians who seek to think deeply about their faith.
You can also download a PDF version of the Shorter Catechism here: https://bit.ly/3Bf072r.
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Transcript
00:00:00:03 – 00:00:24:45
Michael Gewecke
I think it is a invitation for Christians to not be afraid, to think, to think deeply, to engage difficult questions, to see where they lead.
00:00:26:38 – 00:00:45:10
Clint Loveall
Hey, everybody, welcome back to the Pastor Talk podcast as we finish our series on the Westminster Shorter Catechism and some thoughts on the Westminster Catechism, the whole thing in general. Thanks for being with us. If you’ve not listened to the series, today may or may not be very helpful. You might want to go back and catch some of those other episodes.
00:00:45:10 – 00:01:11:54
Clint Loveall
But as we come to the conclusion, you know, Michael, there was a day in which I think Westminster and particularly this shorter catechism, really functioned in a lot of Presbyterian churches. I know it was a part of it wasn’t necessarily the foundation of, but it was a part of my own confirmation experience, you know, 40 years ago. I think that’s largely probably not the case in this day and age.
00:01:11:54 – 00:01:42:07
Clint Loveall
There are still branches of the Presbyterian tree, like the PCA, Presbyterian Church of America, where the catechism plays a more active role. But I think for us, it is largely now less of a guiding document and more of a resource. Not that that’s necessarily a bad thing. I suppose you could argue either side of that transition, but I’m not sure your average Presbyterian knows much about this, which is probably unfortunate because it is a rich resource.
00:01:42:07 – 00:01:57:37
Clint Loveall
It’s not the kind of thing that we hold everyone up to, but it is it is, I think, helpful for people occasionally to make their way back to it and to see the essence of where we come from as Presbyterians.
00:01:58:10 – 00:02:29:42
Michael Gewecke
You know, we in the reformed tradition come from a very intellectual, heady sort of perspective. We not to say that we fixate on that entirely, but if we have offered anything to the church, it is a consistent determination to think carefully, to think deeply, to think systematically about the things of the faith and so it is natural then to see that reflected in the shorter catechism.
00:02:29:42 – 00:03:00:50
Michael Gewecke
I mean, and we tried to point out places throughout the study where clearly there had been a lot of thought put into even the nuance of one word and how it could transform an entire answer. And you’re not going to be shocked to know that this is the shorter catechism. So there is a larger catechism which is going to be in a similar format to this that is expanded and in some cases, you know, three or four times the length of the answers we had in this catechism.
00:03:01:10 – 00:03:28:17
Michael Gewecke
But that’s not it. That catechism comes from the confession, which we’ve named this the confession. And you could argue that we probably shouldn’t have done that. We should have called it the catechism. But some of that is because this is a the shorter catechism was a helpful way to study the big ideas of the confession. But if you want to dive into the deep end of the pool, you would go to that confession and you would read it as the theological statement that it is.
00:03:28:17 – 00:03:55:44
Michael Gewecke
But I think the beauty of this catechism specifically the shorter one, since it’s really intended in its brevity to be accessible, to be able to be taught to people of all ages. I think that there is a practical devotional aspect to it, which I think helps correct some of the potentially less than helpful assumptions about the intellectual nature of our tradition.
00:03:55:44 – 00:04:14:04
Michael Gewecke
If you came to this only as a theological text, I think my opinion you would be leaving on the table a lot of spiritual wisdom and insight that has real practical value. And I hope that if you’ve been with us in this journey that you’ve felt encouraged by that along the way.
00:04:14:36 – 00:04:49:15
Clint Loveall
Yeah. And I think to that end, Michael, if it is a helpful reminder that what we’ve looked at in the shorter catechism, which is a very broad summary of Westminster in general, is designed to be the briefest look, you know, it’s just over ten pages. The larger catechism is 40 pages. So, you know, and whereas we saw answers in sentences in the larger catechism, you’re going to see answers in paragraphs, sometimes multiple paragraphs.
00:04:49:37 – 00:05:17:24
Clint Loveall
Both of those things are a summary for the confession, the Westminster Confession, which is a significant document, a huge document, including that there were northern and southern traditions. So there are points in the Westminster Confession where you get a break in the text and it shows you what the Northern Church wrote and followed as Westminster and what the Southern Church wrote and followed as Westminster.
00:05:17:24 – 00:05:41:13
Clint Loveall
And they diverge at times. And those are largely cultural issues that were among the time. So there is marriage and divorce, for instance. There’s a significant difference in how the northern and southern church and all of that is available to us. And again, I think we live in an era for Presbyterians where these things are not necessarily yardsticks.
00:05:41:13 – 00:06:07:48
Clint Loveall
In other words, even at the presbytery level, I think we generally don’t use these as the rulers by which we measure people’s ideas. It used to be that when you came into a presbytery, you were asked if there was any part of Westminster you didn’t agree with and if you had any. They were called scruples. If you had any disagreements with Westminster, you were expected to claim those.
00:06:07:48 – 00:06:30:54
Clint Loveall
And then the presbytery would argue with you over whether or not they represented going beyond the pale or too far to be ordained or to be in that presbytery. I don’t I don’t remember the last time I’ve heard Westminster mentioned in that context. And I think the good news in that for us is they’re not a hammer, they’re a library.
00:06:31:12 – 00:07:09:00
Clint Loveall
They’re an opportunity for us to explore the people who wrote these documents were thoughtful, faithful, intelligent people. And there is a difficulty in the distance between time and language and some of those things. But there is a richness in these documents I think is very helpful for us at all levels, whether it be the simplest, the shorter catechism as we’ve gone through, whether it be the next step of the larger catechism or whether it be all the way diving in to the Westminster confession itself.
00:07:09:55 – 00:07:15:55
Clint Loveall
I think there’s a wonderful resource here that we probably don’t make use of enough as Presbyterians.
00:07:16:01 – 00:07:36:25
Michael Gewecke
I think that’s true, and I don’t think we’re going to spend our time here today going through and rehashing everything that we’ve had. You know, that those conversations are recorded, they’re available. We would invite you to join us and have discussion with us, go to the comments and we would be happy to follow up with you. But I want to point out where we began.
00:07:36:25 – 00:07:55:13
Michael Gewecke
There’s something meaningful in that. Clint. Just the first question was the chief end of man man’s chief and is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever that we began with at the very beginning of our study of the characters. We talked then about how this was so essential to our reformed understanding of the faith in the larger sense.
00:07:55:30 – 00:08:39:59
Michael Gewecke
But also how it would be an amazing theme. Our guide, a crimson thread throughout this entire catechism. And if you’ve been with us through the journey, I hope you’ve seen how that’s true. And regardless of whether you have or not, I hope that you could understand the amazing power of beginning there. I’ve recognized saying that as humans, the best life that can be lived is to recognize and give glory to God who is beyond our imagination, who has done for us what we could have never done for ourselves, and simultaneously to recognize in that glorying in that humility that we will find in that ability to live beyond our self into the life of the
00:08:39:59 – 00:09:10:28
Michael Gewecke
one who calls us out of this sin wracked life that we experience that in that invitation is the true, unique opportunity to enjoy, to have the the gift of life abundant, to see with gratitude a world that we couldn’t have seen otherwise. I think that that is both the theological center but also the practical affect of a life touched by the gospel.
00:09:10:28 – 00:09:42:32
Michael Gewecke
And that is what this catechism is inviting us into. You called it the library. It’s a it’s a guide, it’s a tutor. If we’re willing to listen. It has very practical day to day guidance for what it looks like to be people who at the center of our lives keep God in the right place and then out of that place to live life in an authentic, true way that that reflects that inner goodness that we receive the glory that is deserving of God.
00:09:43:22 – 00:10:17:07
Clint Loveall
One of the benefits, I think, of the shorter catechism, Michael, is that it does keep us closer to the simplicity of our tradition. And so it it doesn’t it doesn’t cover the exhaustive continuum of what it means to be Presbyterian. That would be a very difficult discussion. But at its core, the simplicity of of these questions still resonate with what it means to live the Christian life.
00:10:17:07 – 00:10:40:17
Clint Loveall
And there are church historians who might chuckle at the idea that we start our statement with joy, that as Presbyterians, that has not always been our legacy, but it is our calling. And I think for the Divines to recognize that and to start us on that first step, that we are to glorify God and that in glorifying God, we find our true joy.
00:10:40:35 – 00:11:08:07
Clint Loveall
We find our our true purpose. We find rejoicing. As a result, we don’t bring joy to God. We receive joy from glorifying God and I think our people. That’s still true. There aren’t Presbyterians who would argue, you know, if we broke into the Westminster confession, even the larger catechism, we would undoubtedly find things where Presbyterians have now divided their ideas.
00:11:08:34 – 00:11:38:47
Clint Loveall
That’s much less true in the shorter catechism. In the shorter catechism, we stay much closer to the core of who we have been, and for the most part, that is still who we are, or at least who we aspire to be. And I think you know, one of the benefits of focusing on that simplest version is that it does put us in the place where we have the fewest disagreements and the place where there are the fewest changes of opinion.
00:11:38:58 – 00:12:03:37
Clint Loveall
And I think it helps us resonate with our tradition. It reminds us that we even in the core of our faith, maybe especially in the core of our faith, have long, deep roots as Reformed Presbyterian, Christians and and in the modern world, that’s not always celebrated. And it is a thing that matters. And I think it’s an important opportunity that Westminster offers us.
00:12:03:46 – 00:12:38:54
Michael Gewecke
And that simplicity has another effect. Beyond that, even, I think it has the way of keeping us from going down rabbit trails and getting fixated on things that aren’t essential. The the boiling down, the simplicity of this document. I think, does force us to reckon with some very basic things of the faith that we are tempted to enter into all of the culture war conversations before we read our Bible, for instance, and this catechism will not let us get off with that.
00:12:39:09 – 00:13:01:48
Michael Gewecke
It will not let us be people who are not engaging the scriptures, not learning what they had to say, not being formed by the revelation of God that comes to us through those scriptures or prayer. We spent an entire session talking about prayer, looking at just the Lord’s Prayer. In the shorter catechism. We could spend ten questions on that.
00:13:01:48 – 00:13:33:46
Michael Gewecke
I think it’s easy for us to get hooked and fixated on the issues of today instead of fixating on the deep well of the traditions of the faith, the calling of what it means to be Christian, to read the Scripture and to pray. These are just two examples that I think the catechism holds us to. And if we’re willing to hear in that simplicity the critique of our temptation, let me call it to over Complexity II.
00:13:33:46 – 00:13:55:51
Michael Gewecke
And then in that complexity, turn the thing into something that we would prefer instead of the fundamentals that we’re called to. I think that this may be, for some of us, a clarion call, a wake up call, a reminder that what matters is how we respond to the gifts that God has given us. And those gifts are often missed.
00:13:55:51 – 00:14:16:57
Michael Gewecke
The gift of the table, the gift of the scriptures, the gift of prayer. These are things that if we hear in the simplicity, the call to return to them, we might discover that that might reshape our response to some of the you know, quite frankly, conversations and topics that just naturally get more play in our present moment.
00:14:17:51 – 00:14:47:11
Clint Loveall
Yeah, it’s interesting, Michael, I’m sitting here sort of thinking about the dichotomy, I guess, of a document called Catechism that probably is not thought of very often as devotional material, but I think one could do that. I think one could it wouldn’t land for every section, but I think one could read a question or a couple of questions a day and meditate on it.
00:14:47:43 – 00:15:10:37
Clint Loveall
And they would find really, as we’ve said all along, great depth here. You know, I’m thinking of a question like number three here, which says, what do the scriptures teach? They teach what man is to believe, what people are to believe and what duty to God requires of us. So what do we have there? We have doctrine, but we connect it with discipleship.
00:15:10:37 – 00:15:39:01
Clint Loveall
We have what we are to believe, but we also then have the idea that what we believe influences how we behave. So I deeply respect that the authors here, Mary, always what we think and what we do. And as Presbyterians, you know, we have a long tradition of being. We like to think of ourselves as thinkers. But even in subtle ways, the catechism reminds us that that’s not enough.
00:15:39:01 – 00:16:19:28
Clint Loveall
Believing in the right things is important, but it’s only a starting point. And so I appreciate in a document that is wholeheartedly a teaching document, it tries even itself to point beyond ideas to practices, to what it is like to pray in the spirit, to what it is, what it means to celebrate again, the Lord’s Supper, or to see a baptism, or to encounter the ideas of obedience to the law, but not as not as a punitive thing, but as an invitational thing, as a way to live as a path that we can go.
00:16:19:55 – 00:16:45:18
Clint Loveall
And I think Westminster does an exceptional job of that one really could read this as a daily devotional. It wouldn’t always it wouldn’t always be profound. But if you gave it if you if you sat with it and listened to it, it would often lead you to deep places. And I think people would be surprised by that.
00:16:45:45 – 00:17:13:19
Michael Gewecke
I agree 100%. And growing up in a Christian tradition myself, that would have pointed to a document like this as dead religion would have said, you know, that’s a whole lot of words, but it has no practical value. I think that coming to the shorter catechism, as opposed to maybe the confession, which does require some slogging, I mean, if we’re going to be honest, it requires some historical knowledge, requires some ability to navigate historic theological tradition.
00:17:13:19 – 00:17:42:39
Michael Gewecke
There’s a lot in that text, and it is in many ways behind the words of this text that at some points we point that out. But what the shorter catechism does to your point is I think it shows us how what we believe requires something of what we do, because what we believe transforms the kind of people that we are and how we will live in the world in which we are put.
00:17:42:39 – 00:18:30:36
Michael Gewecke
And it’s another way of rephrasing. Clint, I think what you just said, but it’s it’s to point out that there is something uniquely beautiful being offered here. And this is the amazing gift of having many Christian families, many different perspectives and many ways of emphasizing aspects of the gospel. If I’m going to, in the spirit of summarizing, point out some of the distinctive offer here, I think it is a invitation for Christians to not be afraid, to think, to think deeply, to engage difficult questions, to see where they lead, and to trust that as you think deeply, as you apply your best effort to the Scriptures and to prayer, to the historic tradition, that what
00:18:30:36 – 00:18:57:50
Michael Gewecke
you’ll discover is that that will, along the way be forming you as a disciple who looks like Jesus looked, who gives authentically, who serves wholeheartedly, who gives joyously. I think what this docu ment serves to offer our Christian, regardless of what tradition that you’re in, is that you do not need to be afraid of thinking deeply. Because all things that are true came from God.
00:18:58:13 – 00:19:23:36
Michael Gewecke
This document never said that, but I think it is a prevailing theme throughout. I think it’s between every line that if you apply the best of the mental faculty to our faith and to our world, God is ultimately the foundation of everything that is true. And so if you make your way closer to whatever is true, you’re going to be on your way to being closer to God.
00:19:23:36 – 00:19:42:03
Michael Gewecke
And there’s a kind of confidence, I assure thee, that is written throughout this. And I, quite frankly think we live in a moment in which we could all use a good shot of that, a reminder that, you know, God’s got it under control. And if God is indeed truth, then we have nothing to fear in the pursuit of that truth.
00:19:42:25 – 00:20:13:44
Clint Loveall
Yeah, And I think we could even perhaps take that a step further. Michael, I think a document like this also challenges the idea that, you know, all opinions, all perspectives are equally valid. And I think we have to be careful with it. But a document like Westminster does remind us that there are answers that are better than other answers, that we do live in a tradition that says we believe this to be correct.
00:20:13:44 – 00:20:41:47
Clint Loveall
Now, that’s always tempered by the idea that we are fallen people, that we can be misguided. It is always dependent upon the grace and guidance of God to correct us when we’re wrong. But but we do with that caveat. We do stand confidently and say in the light of our tradition, we believe this to be true. We believe these behaviors to be right.
00:20:41:47 – 00:21:35:25
Clint Loveall
We believe these behaviors to be wrong. That that we we do receive from this document a kind of clarity about some of our opinions and about some of our practices that I think is helpful, but is in many ways deeply counter cultural to the moment we’re in, in which we think, you know, true is whatever people think about something and everybody’s opinions are equally valid and and this pushes back on that to some extent, I think, and says, you know, we have through trial and error, gotten to these places and this we believe this we stake our church on in this moment, again, always open to the guidance of God’s spirit.
00:21:35:51 – 00:22:02:45
Clint Loveall
But but equally committed to the truth we understand in the current moment. And I think that’s a helpful reminder. I think, you know, it is it’s not fundamental ism because it is it it it is under the idea that we might be wrong, but it is also not wishy washy. There is a there is a solid ness to this that I think we need in this moment.
00:22:03:28 – 00:22:26:49
Michael Gewecke
Yeah, I think that’s true. And I think not only is that true, I think we have something to learn from the tone of the document because it is very confident in the statement of we believe, but it is also not incredibly confrontational to those who don’t. You don’t see a lot of attack language because it doesn’t need to know.
00:22:26:49 – 00:22:30:45
Clint Loveall
It’s an inside document. It’s for it is for believers.
00:22:30:55 – 00:23:15:05
Michael Gewecke
Right. And yet says, you know, this is what we stand upon. This is what we are confident in. And that’s sufficient. And by the way, I would only argue sufficient. It’s beyond our ability to hold that we are always in the face in this tumultuous process of coming back to being reminded of learning the depth of again or a new depth of, and that transforming who we are, I think to pretend as if you would ever get Westminster catechism in your heart and done as if you could somehow like lock it down and be an expert in it would be, in my opinion, a fundamental misunderstanding of what’s happening here.
00:23:15:10 – 00:23:39:37
Michael Gewecke
This is in so many ways, I think, an invitation into a much larger conversation so that if you wanted, you could, by way of each question, look at the answer and see that as a doorway into a deeper understanding of the faith that would involve Scripture. It was involves your community. It would involve the history of the church.
00:23:39:43 – 00:24:02:31
Michael Gewecke
You would involve so much more than just a couple words on the page. And that’s what makes this timeless, is that they weren’t concerned so much, at least as we receive it today. They weren’t concerned so much in battling the heretics outside the church as they were in providing a solid foundation upon which the Christian community could grow and thrive.
00:24:02:43 – 00:24:12:21
Michael Gewecke
Where can we begin to build our lives with confidence? And if you read this document as an invitation to that kind of confidence, it is transformational.
00:24:13:37 – 00:24:41:16
Clint Loveall
It is. I mean, it’s a personal document. It is designed to strengthen one’s personal faith, one’s personal belief, one’s personal theological system. And I think it’s interesting, Michael, a lot of our listeners, I think a lot of people in our day and age would be kind of struck by the idea that the for Westminster, what we’ve looked at, the shorter catechism they understood, was probably for kids.
00:24:41:16 – 00:25:11:25
Clint Loveall
I mean, these yeah, these were the questions designed and crafted for children who were learning the faith. And, you know, there is a challenge in that for the adults of our era. On the other side, the danger of a document like this is that we get to the point where somebody gets through Westminster and maybe they’ve literally memorized the answer to every question, but if they’re not guided by it, it does them little good.
00:25:11:34 – 00:25:46:01
Clint Loveall
It it this if all this ever did was provide rote answers to faith questions without deepening faith, it would have failed miserably, as would have the person memorizing the question. So it is a tool, but that’s all it is. It points beyond itself. It summarizes some of the basics of the Christian faith, I think exceptionally well, better than many other things in in some cases better than any other things that have tried to do particular parts of it.
00:25:46:01 – 00:26:17:04
Clint Loveall
It is as good as almost anything out there and better than most. However, it given that it’s only a tool, it cannot be something that we rest on. It is only the invitation to proceed deeper and more complete in our faith. And so we have to see its limitations. But those limitations are largely on our side of the relationship, not on the documents side.
00:26:17:06 – 00:26:41:49
Clint Loveall
You know, I don’t know. It’s an interesting question, Michael, where do we leave off with this? What what do we offer? People would be fascinating to hear from people who have listened. Was there a question that troubled them? Was there one that inspired them? Was there a favorite? Was there something that really spoke to them? I think, you know, again, I think if you give this document a serious reading, at some point it’s going to do multiple things.
00:26:41:49 – 00:26:50:45
Clint Loveall
It’s going to convict you, it’s going to encourage you, it’s going to educate you. I’d be interested about our listeners experience with it if they’ve done that.
00:26:51:16 – 00:27:16:17
Michael Gewecke
Yeah, I was going to say, I think that it’s worth noting at this point in the conversation as we come to conclude here today, you know, we don’t take for granted all that you’ve spent time with us. Some of you have made it through the entire session, every session all the way up to this point. And that is a great encouragement and hope that you found this to be a rewarding experience, that our time together has been fruitful.
00:27:16:35 – 00:27:36:32
Michael Gewecke
I would love I mean, concretely, if you’re with us in a place where there’s comments, you know, it’d be really great. Go into the comments we read that, tell us what questions maybe stuck out to you, what is challenged you, what questions remain. And I would also point out that this is one of those documents that would be helped by coming back to in a decade.
00:27:36:32 – 00:28:09:07
Michael Gewecke
You know, if we’re so blessed to in ten years, continue on in our faith, in our life, this is the kind of thing that’s worth returning to. And I hope that maybe this will be a moment in which you can look back on your life and say that you did come to, if not a turning point to a point of reengagement, a way, an invitation to think about your faith and to live out your faith in new and authentic ways, I think that that’s not only a hope, I think that’s what this catechism was intended to do.
00:28:09:32 – 00:28:17:11
Michael Gewecke
And I hope that along the journey, the short time that we spent going through it together, that you’ve been encouraged and challenged with it.
00:28:17:43 – 00:28:46:40
Clint Loveall
Yeah, we had some questions launching into this, whether anyone would be interested in a document like this in a study like this. We hope that for somebody it’s been interesting, it’s been helpful, it’s been challenging, it’s been all of those things. I do think it is one of the great fruits of the Presbyterian tradition. The Westminster Confession also produces great fruits, but you have to look a lot wider.
00:28:46:42 – 00:29:16:01
Clint Loveall
It’s just a much bigger field. The benefit of the shorter catechism is that it’s condensed down, and so I hope there’s been something for you that mattered in this, and we’d love to hear that. But thank you for being a part of this. Thank you for your time, your patience. Thank you for interacting with us. We’re grateful to be able to do these things and our hope is always that they help each of us move forward in our own faith and discipleship.
00:29:16:24 – 00:29:36:19
Michael Gewecke
Remember that we continue on with our daily Bible study that is Monday through Thursday. And remember that in just a few weeks here, we will be kicking off a new series and we’re excited to share information about that with you in the coming days. But until then, be blessed. We look forward to our future time together with you and grateful for the time that we got to share thus far.
00:29:36:21 – 00:29:44:15
Michael Gewecke
Thanks so much. Thanks for.