A Questionnaire for Christians

This questionnaire is intended to be like a mirror. It is an experiment in self-knowledge. If you wish to undertake the experiment, please answer each question as honestly, simply, and briefly as you can. Write your answers down, so that you remember them and cannot later fool yourself into thinking you answered in another way. Do not read anything that comes after these questions until you have written your answers.

1. Who are you? What is your true self, your real identity?

2. Why do you exist? What is the purpose of your life?

3. Define your way of life.

4. What is truth?

5. What is life?

6. In the light of #5, what is death?

7. List the three greatest living persons, in your opinion.

8. What living person do you think is now exercising the most important and effective influence on the world, making the greatest difference, for good or evil?

9. Who is the first person you naturally tend to turn to for help when a problem arises in each of the following areas of your life? (a) business (b) friends (c) family (d) finances (e) health (f) mental health

10. What living person has had the greatest influence on your life?

11. What is the most successful cure for each of the following problems? (a) drug addiction (b) alcoholism (c) hypochondria (d) psychosomatic diseases (e) boredom (f) fear (g) loneliness (h) feeling unloved (i) despair (j) feeling worthless and unproductive

12. What would you tell a friend who had an incurable disease?

13. How can someone who lacks wisdom acquire it?

14. How can a person who is evil become good?

15. Why did God make the world?

16. How can a person know God?

17. How much can a person know of God? What is God like?

18. What is the Christian Church?

19. Christianity seems to be just one religion among many in the world: something particular, partial. How universal is it, really?

20. What is Christianity? What is the kerygma, the Christian proclamation? What does a Christian preach?

Now compare your answers with those of the New Testament by looking up the following passages. Before proceeding to the next question, think about the significance of each New Testament answer, and about how your answer compares with it.

Take the questions in reverse order, as follows: (20) Colossians 1:27, 28; 1 Corinthians 2:2. (19) Colossians 3:11. (18) Ephesians 1:23. (17, 16) Colossians 1:15, 19; 2:3. (15) Colossians 1:17. (14, 13) 1 Corinthians 1:30. (12) John 11:1–44, especially 24 and 25. (11, 10) Philippians 4:19. (9, 8, 7) Luke 24:5; Matthew 28:20. (6) Philippians 1:21. (5, 4, 3) John 14:6. (2) Ephesians 4:13. (1) 1 John 3:1; John 15:3; Colossians 3:3; Galatians 2:20.

CONCLUSION: 1 John 5:21.

(11.10.11.10.D)

O GOD, OUR FATHER, RULER OF ALL NATIONS

O God, our Father, Ruler of the Nations,

The Leader of our country from its start:

How richly you have blessed us, beyond measure!

We come to you with full and grateful hearts:

O help us now to wisely use our plenty.

Forgive us for our greed and for our waste,

And teach us how to share what you have given,

Till poverty and hatred be erased.

Around us are the forces of corruption,

Our vision fails, direct us by your hand.

Inspire in us the faith that led our fathers,

And guided them to found this mighty land.

Our leaders need your courage and your wisdom,

O speak again through men whose lives are just,

Until your will is done across this nation,

And we can truly say, “In God we trust!”

We thank you that our land is blest with freedom,

This testing ground for true democracy.

And pray that in the course of human struggle,

We’ll always stand for truth and liberty.

For here the cries of dissidence and protest

Can mingle with the rousing shouts of praise.

But in this very freedom, grant us wisdom

To keep your laws and serve you all our days.

America, the beautiful, the mighty,

America, the land of liberty!

O, Father, keep us mindful of our blessings,

And never let us turn away from you.

Surround us with your cleansing, healing Spirit.

Forgive our sin and purge our apathy.

Now use us as an instrument of blessing

To all the Earth—America, the Free!

MRS. MONCRIEF JORDAN

Copyright 1975 by the Hymn Society of America

Used By Permission

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