Heidelbergian Children's Catechism (age 8- 10 years)
Lord's Day 47
time we are focusing on the first petition of the Lord’s Prayer: Ha\\owed be your name. Your mother is a good parent; she does many nice things for you, she takes care of you, she helps you when you need help, and she Iistens to you when you want to tell her something. How do you think she wou\d fee\ if you never ten her how much you really like her? What if she never sees that you would gladly do something for her? That would make her sad. Thankfully, that is not how you are! People know that you really love your mother a lot and they can see it, too. Now let’s talk about God. There is no end to what you can say about Him. He is our heavenly Father; He loves us; He is almighty, for He can do what He wants; He is good toward us, and He takes care of us; He is willing to forgive our sins; He is patient with us; He keeps his promises. Because of all these good gifts, God’s name must be hallowed. We should honour God when we listen about the great things He has done and when we read about Him in the Bible.
Now, how would God like it if He never heard from us? lf He never heard that we are happy and thankful for all the good things He does? That would make Him sad. His name would not be hallowed. Thankfully, we really try to be his joyful and thankful children. And we should also live in such a way that people around us notice that. Imagine a child of God who does evil and nasty things. Imagine that this child of God is so mad that he even swears. Do you know what people would say? They would wonder why they see this person go to church with a pious face but on Monday he is a different man. They would say that in the church it is just as bad as anywhere else