July 17, 2005
This I Believe Series: Exploring the Apostles Creed
FAITH TO LIVE ON
JUSTIFICATION FOR THIS SERIES
One of the great questions facing Christians of our age is this: is there specific content to Christian faith? Many Christians, who call themselves Theological Pluralists, have made an effort to claim that theological doctrines and dogma necessarily leads to divisiveness and intolerance. Once you have said that the doctrines are fundamental to faith, you are necessarily ruling out people who do not share those beliefs. Rather we should allow our faith to be only minimally based on doctrine, and maximally based on love, acceptance, and the guidance of the Spirit. Doctrines of the past should be left in the past as the teachings of dead white Christian bigots who often behaved badly (think of the Crusades or Inquisitions). So there is a fundamental question in the church as to the role to be played by Christian doctrine.
As you may have guessed, I disagree with the above position. I am not a theological pluralist and I believe we need to treat the creeds of the church as treasures of the past to be explored and enjoyed. For this reason, I want to begin today a sermon series on the Apostle’s Creed. Creeds do not need to be feared as terrible barriers to tolerance and love. Boundaries, when they are not overly restrictive, are not necessarily a barrier to freedom – they can be very helpful to retain freedom.
Nicky Gumbel of the Alpha Course tells a story about a time he was press-ganged to referee a soccer match for his son because the referee hadn’t arrived. They didn’t have clear markers for the field or goals and he wasn’t clear on the rules. “Out of bounds!” one kid would shout. “No it wasn’t!” Nicky didn’t know, so he said, “Play on!” “Foul!” one kid would shout. Another said, “Not so!” “Play on” Nicky shouted. By the time the ref arrived with all the proper field markers, the match had turned into a bloody brawl. But the ref. set out the field marking, blew his whistle, and laid down the law. And the kids ended up having a great time. Question: were they free with the rules marked out or without?
The doctrine of the church, especially as it has been enumerated in the Apostle’s Creed, is actually a wonderful set of boundaries within which there is terrific freedom to explore – a veritable field of play. The field must be marked out clearly for this to work. Theological Pluralism leaves the church intellectually like the soccer match before the arrival of the ref – a bloody brawl. Theology can and should be playful and explorative and this freedom is only possible within the boundaries laid out by the church. So let’s explore these markers together, shall we? In doing so, I’ll be making use of the Oxford Theologian Alister McGrath’s excellent book, “I Believe: Exploring the Apostle’s Creed.”
THE NEED OF THE CREED
The word “creed” itself is based on the Latin for the first word of many creeds, “Credo in Deum” – “I believe in God.” The English word “creed” derives from the Latin credo. And a creed is a short statement of exactly what is believed. You might ask, “Why not just say: “we believe the Bible – cover to maps.” But the fact is there are many differing interpretations of the Bible. Whose interpretation of the Bible is always the question. Besides, the earliest creedal statements appear in the New Testament itself. The need for shorter statements of faith come very very early in the history of the church and the origins of the first creeds are the NT itself. The earliest creed was simply “Jesus is Lord” (Rom 10:9; 1 Cor 12:3; 2 Cor. 4:5, Phil 2:11). Anyone who confessed this was a Christian.
I must add that this short phrase is theologically substantive. I’ll not explain exactly how right now, but it means much more than, “Jesus is Lord of my life.” It is a specific confession of who Jesus was in terms of Jesus’ relation to God. But as time went on, the implications of this confession needed to be teased out. What exactly did Christians believe about God? What about the Holy Spirit? What about God’s role as Creator?
The Apostle’s Creed was an early attempt to explain what we mean by saying, “Jesus is Lord” more specifically. The Apostle’s Creed was not written by the Apostles and only came into its present form in about the 4th century. But while it is not technically the writing of Peter or Paul, it is a splendid summary of what the apostle’s taught concerning the gospel. This is especially critical in a day and age of such books as The Da Vinci Code, and other books which make wildly inaccurate and completely preposterous claims about what early Christians believed. The Da Vinci Code is written by a journalist who makes historical errors which can be called nothing less then howlers (he calls the DSS Christian texts!). Yet his book is seen by a huge contingent of academic religionists as serious in the sense that it introduces people at large to a perspective of Jesus which is radically at odds with what the church has traditionally believed. This variant perspective, often called the Gnostic Jesus, does have considerable academic backing and support.
In other words, in exploring the Apostle’s Creed, we are saying that we believe in this particular Jesus - not the Jesus of the Gnostic gospels, the Jesus of many scholars in the ivory towers of the academy. We believe the Jesus of the Apostle’s Creed is a much truer reflection of the actual Jesus of history. While we do not know everything about the historical Jesus, we believe that the Apostles’ Creed is a much more accurate reflection of what the apostles of Jesus actually believed. You may not have read the Da Vinci Code, but it is being made into a movie soon which will spread this Gnostic understanding of Jesus broadly. We reject this Jesus in favor of the Jesus of the Apostle’s Creed. This brings us to the question: What is the purpose of the Creeds?
THE PURPOSE OF THE CREEDS
Creeds were originally developed as a catechism for people preparing for baptism. It was meant to be a brief summary of Christian faith. However, it is not meant to be a substitute for personal faith. It is intended to give specific substance to faith that already exists. You cannot become a Christian by reciting the creed. The creed provides a summary for faith that already exists.
The creeds also help us to recognize and avoid inadequate versions of Christianity. Some persons may reject (or over emphasize) the Holy Spirit. Others may insist that Christian faith is primarily about God the Father, and reject the existence of the Son and Holy Spirit as members of the Trinity. The Apostle’s Creed reminds us that there is more to our faith than of these things. These other versions of Christianity may not be wrong so much as they are inadequate.
Another critical feature of the Creeds is to remind us of the communal side of faith. The creed reminds us that we belong to a community of shared beliefs. It helps to correct an unhealthy attitude of individualism. We see this in much of popular religion. We find the attitude that God has a pipeline of truth that comes directly to me. This kind of spiritual arrogance is completely unbecoming of Christian faith. I have such a limited perspective, such limited experience, such limited knowledge. I know I could go astray into some weird religious practice. The David Koresch’s and Jim Jones’ of our world should remind us all of the dangers of highly arrogant individualized religion.
Any of us can go spiritually astray through our own individualism and pride. The Creeds help us to stay centered in the wisdom of the ages. To be a Christian, McGrath reminds us, is to belong to a believing community that goes back through the ages right back to the upper room where Jesus met with his disciples (John 21). By putting faith in Jesus Christ you have become a member of a body, the Church, which has used this creed to express its faith for sixteen centuries. This gives us a sense of historical belonging and perspective. You are not the first person to believe in Jesus; you will not be the last. Think of the millions of others who have found in the Apostle’s Creed a statement of their personal faith. You share their faith, and you use words to express it that have been translated and shared with hundreds of other languages and time periods. We find comfort in that community.
I BELIEVE
The creed opens with the powerful statement: “I believe.” This assertion is repeated at two other times. Before we examine what exactly is believed, let’s talk about belief itself.
First: faith means assent. Faith is believing that certain things are true. Before we say what we believe about God, we must first affirm the existence of God. “I believe in God” means something like “I believe that there is a God.” It means more than “I’m of the opinion that there is a God out there somewhere in the universe.” Credo in Deum means something more like, “I put my trust in God.” Faith is more than a cerebral assent; like “I believe something exists.”
Faith implies trust. Christians don’t just believe; we believe in someone. Faith is both our recognition that something wonderful has happened through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Faith is an act of the will, not simply the intellect. It is a decision to trust in the God revealed in Jesus Christ. Just as an anchor secures a ship to the ocean floor, faith anchors us to the God who exists and resting securely in doing so. This brings me to our next point.
Second: Faith means commitment. It is helpful to remember that the creed was originally used to prepare candidates for baptism. It was meant to be a public profession of faith in God, Jesus Christ and in the Holy Spirit. The Apostle’s Creed not only tells the world what we believe about God but that we do in fact believe. “I believe in God” implies “I have committed my life to this God and now I belong to this God.”
The scriptures encourage believers to think of faith in terms of a personal and corporate relationship to God. Faith is our commitment to a God who has, in Christ, publicly committed himself to us and will not abandon us. It is a joyful and willing self-surrender to God – a throwing open the doors of our lives and inviting God to enter, not as only guest but as Lord. Just as God has committed himself to us, so we are called by our apostolic confession of faith to be so dedicated to him.
Third: Faith means obedience. We are called to be doers of the word and not hearers only. Paul speaks in Romans of the obedience that comes from faith (1:5). Faith is like the root of a tree; if it is sound it bears good fruit. Faith and obedience do not exclude each other, faith and good works to not either. While we do not come to faith by doing good deeds, but real faith gives rise to good deeds quite naturally just as a tree planted in good soil naturally bears good fruit. “Faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by good action, is dead” said the apostle James (2:17). Faith then, is actively seeking to express itself in the way we live, not just in the way we think.
Application
Faith is not just believing in God; it is about trusting God and allowing God to transform our lives. It is possible to have encountered faith on the intellectual level without applying faith on the personal level. The classical example of this comes from John Wesley. After he had been ordained priest in the church of England, and had served on the mission field, he realized that his faith was intellectual only, and that of a servant rather than a child of God. He wrote in his journal of what he considered to be his conversion experience:
On May 24, 1738, I went very unwillingly to a society in
Wesley was a believer before this time but seriously in need of a deeper experience of grace. He needed to personally accept forgiveness and faith, and to be completed in his salvation. He needed to know his sins forgiven, to know he was a child of God, to feel assurance of salvation, etc. Many Christians are similarly aware of God’s love generally but not specifically. They know God forgives sins but they have never specifically repented of their sin and asked for forgiveness. They are well on their way to faith but have been arrested on the journey. For them, “I believe in God” means “I’m fairly confident there is a God somewhere out there” but not necessarily, “I hereby place my complete confidence in that God.”
If you find yourself described here, great things in faith await you! Life is going to become much more interesting and relevant if you open your heart to a deeper knowledge of Christ. You may find your heart strangely warmed by God’s empowering love. Suppose you had developed a toxic blood poisoning. Penicillin is an antibiotic that can cure this condition. But believing that penicillin can cure you isn’t enough to cure you. It is only be believing and taking the capsules that you will be saved. It is the same with faith in Christ reflected in the Apostle’s Creed. Believing that it can transform your life is one thing; allowing it to do so is another.