Heidelberg Catechism.
The imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth. Gen. 8, 21.
Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think anything as of ourselves; but our sufficiency is of God. 2 Cor. 3, 5.
QUESTION 9.
Does not God then wrong man, by requiring of him in His Law that which he cannot perform?
ANSWER.
No: for God so made man, that he could perform it; but man, through the instigation of the Devil, by wilful disobedience deprived himself and all his posterity of this power.
And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise; she took of the fruit thereof and did eat; and gave also unto her husband with her, and he did eat. Gen. 3, 6.
QUESTION 10.
Will God suffer such disobedience and apostasy to go unpunished?
ANSWER.
By no means; but He is terribly displeased with our inborn as well as actual sins, and will punish them in just judgment in
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