Reformed Joanna Gaines?

When you walk into my house in Coralville, IA, you enter right into the living room–the central space of gathering where we spend most of our evenings, where our small group of 20s and 30-somethings meet every other Thursday night, where our miniature Bernedoodle (Rizzo) lounges on the coach most afternoons. My wife tells me that the proper adjectives for the decor in this space are “farmhouse” or “rustic.” (I’ll let you guess who does most of the decorating). For those that have ever seen the HGTV show with Chip and Joanna Gaines, Fixer Upper, it hits those Magnolia Farms vibes. 

But among all the house plants and worn white-washed barn wood, there in the center of the wall as you enter the living room is a large white canvas with painted black letters in a Courier New font. It reads: 

Q: What is our only comfort in life and in death?

A: That I am not my own, but belong–both body and soul, in life and in death–to my faithful Savior Jesus Christ.

“Jesus Christ” is in a beautiful cursive script, but you get the picture. 

As I’ve mentioned before, I didn’t grow up in the Reformed Church. I never went to Catechism class–not a single time. In fact, when my Presbyterian Church I grew up in held confirmation classes, I intentionally skipped out of those too! I never read Q&A1 of the Heidelberg Catechism until after I seminary, until after I had applied here at New Life. But in this historic catechism, I have found great comfort for both my ministry and my family.

I’ve spoken these words of comfort over individuals who were dying from cancer, widows who had just lost their husbands, parents mourning a miscarriage, and most recently, I’ve received these words as they burst forth from my eldest daughter’s lips. Her Christian school uses the New City Catechism which adopts questions from both the Westminster and Heidelberg Catechisms and updates the language to the vernacular. But now even she knows, at such a young age, that her only hope in life and in death is “That we are not our own but belong, body and soul, both in life and death, to God and to our Savior Jesus Christ.” 

The words of the Heidelberg aren’t an aesthetic choice for our house. They are a declaration that I never want my family or anyone else who enters my living room to forget. That no matter what may come, we can find comfort in both life and in death, knowing that we belong to Jesus.