The Katekhismos Project

The Katekhismos project is a series of 52 poems responding to each of the questions and answers contained in the New City Catechism. The catechism has been developed by Timothy Keller and Sam Shammas, drawing on the Westminster Confession, the Heidelberg Catechism and others.

God, creation and fall, law

Question 1: What is our only hope in life and death?

Question 2: Who is God?

Question 3: How many persons are there in God?

Question 4: How and why did God create us?

Question 5: What else did God create?

Question 6: How can we glorify God?

Question 7: What does the law of God require?

Question 8: What is the law of God stated in the Ten Commandments?

Question 9: What does God require in the first, second and third commandments?

Question 10: What does God require in the fourth and fifth commandments?

Question 11: What does God require in the sixth, seventh and eighth commandments?

Question 12: What does God require in the ninth and tenth commandments?

Question 13: Can anyone keep the law of God perfectly?

Question 14: Did God create us unable to keep his law?

Question 15: Since no-one can keep the law, what is its purpose?

Question 16: What is sin?

Question 17: What is idolatry?

Question 18: Will God allow our disobedience and idolatry to go unpunished?

Question 19: Is there any way to escape punishment and be brought back into God’s favour?

Question 20: Who is the Redeemer?

Christ, redemption, grace

Question 21: What sort of Redeemer is needed to bring us back to God?

Question 22: Why must the Redeemer be truly human?

Question 23: Why must the Redeemer be truly God?

Question 24: Why was it necessary for Christ, the Redeemer, to die?

Question 25: Does Christ’s death mean all our sins can be forgiven?

Question 26: What else does Christ’s death redeem?

Question 27: Are all people, just as they were lost through Adam, saved through Christ?

Question 28: What happens after death to those not united to Christ by faith?

Question 29: How can we be saved?

Question 30: What is faith in Jesus Christ?

Question 31: What do we believe by true faith?

Question 32: What do justification and sanctification mean?

Question 33: Should those who have faith in Christ seek their salvation through their own works, or anywhere else?

Question 34: Since we are redeemed by grace alone, through Christ alone, must we still do good works and obey God’s Word?

Spirit, restoration, growing in grace

Question 35: Since we are redeemed by grace alone, through faith alone, where does this faith come from?

Question 36: What do we believe about the Holy Spirit?

Question 37: How does the Holy Spirit help us?

Question 38: What is prayer?

Question 39: With what attitude should we pray?

Question 40: What should we pray?

Question 41: What is the Lord’s Prayer?

Question 42: How is the Word of God to be read and heard?

Question 43: What are the sacraments or ordinances?

Question 44: What is baptism?

Question 45: Is baptism with water the washing away of sin itself?

Question 46: What is the Lord’s Supper?

Question 47: Does the Lord’s Supper add anything to Christ’s atoning work?

Question 48: What is the church?

Question 49: Where is Christ now?

Question 50: What does Christ’s resurrection mean for us?

Question 51: Of what advantage to us is Christ’s ascension?

Question 52: What hope does everlasting life hold for us?