This We Believe
What Are Creeds and Why They Matter
Creeds are an important part of the Christian tradition. However, they are often afterthoughts in Wesleyan and Methodist churches particularly when looked to as doctrinal statements. Historically, this can be attributed to Methodist churches not being creedal churches. Creedal churches are churches in which their foundational statements of faith are the historic Christian creeds.
“But wait!” you might protest, “we say the Apostles’ Creed every Sunday in our Methodist church!” That may be true, however, Wesleyan and Methodist denominations generally do not have anything directing creeds are doctrine, even if creeds are recited as part of worship and published in hymnals. There is one outlier among Methodists, the new Global Methodist Church. They affirm the Apostles’ Creed, the Nicene Creed, and the Chalcedonian Definition as “foundational documents for doctrinal standards,” effectively making the GMC a creedal church.1 Aside from this new example creeds are not doctrinal standards in any other major Wesleyan or Methodist churches that I know of.
What makes this intriguing is that John Wesley, a Church of England priest, was a creedal Christian. Wesley scholar Billy Abraham noted, “Wesley’s theology is an intellectual oasis lodged within the traditional faith of the church enshrined in the creeds.”2 Something I have discovered in my own time in the Anglican church is that the necessity of the creeds is still fundamental to the Anglican faith, and indeed is to the faith of the vast majority of Christians worldwide. In the ACNA, creeds are the foundation of our catechism. The Nicene Creed, recited weekly in worship, must be affirmed by confirmands.3
But Wesley rightly observed in his sermon The Way of the Kingdom that mere intellectual assent to the creeds may make one orthodox in belief, yet have “no religion at all” or even be “a stranger to the religion of the heart.”4 Wesley essentially applies to the creeds that which Paul applies in 1 Corinthians 13: “If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understanding all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing (ESV).” James also corroborates this in 2:19 of his letter, “You believe that God is one. Good! Even the demons believe—and they shudder” (CSB). Demonic faith is a faith that can be “orthodox”, or correct in belief, yet heteroprax — wrong in practice. This faith practiced by hypocrites is what Sts. Paul and James, as well as John Wesley, caution us about in their writings.
Though John Wesley consecrated and commissioned Thomas Coke to minster as superintendent to the Methodists in North America and provided much of what would be the foundation to what would become the Methodist Episcopal Church, the grandmother church of all American Methodists, somehow the creeds did not make it in as Coke, Francis Asbury, and others established the new American denomination on Christmas Day, 1781. The dangers of not clearly defining the Apostolic Faith can be seen when those charged to defend them fail to affirm the creeds as basic, orthodox Christian beliefs. For example, UMC Bishop Joseph Sprague was well documented denying the Virgin birth and physical bodily Resurrection of Christ, both doctrines present in all creeds.5 While Bishop Sprague is far from the first bishop in history to deny creedal doctrines as we’ll explore, and certainly won’t be the last, one can infer the dangers to the Church that are presented when someone is charged with upholding the Apostolic doctrine of the Church and is a liar by lying through the questions asked of them in their presbyter and episcopal ordinations. Perhaps they were truthful but later ceased to believe those doctrines. Either way, Paul demands a bishop to be above reproach (1 Timothy 3:2). There is at minimum a conflict of interest as one is either an Apostolic bishop, upholding the Apostolic Faith, or a ‘bishop’ of a different religion (Matthew 6:24). I would go as far as to say these are the ones Jesus warns us of in the Sermon on the Mount, the “wolves in sheep’s clothing”… or maybe more appropriately wolves wearing purple cassocks (Matthew 7:15).
What is a Creed, anyway?
A creed, as stated earlier, is simply a statement of faith. Creeds were usually crafted for a specific purpose: to distinguish orthodox Christianity from heresy. The Nicene Creed in particular, the pinnacle of the creeds, was crafted to define orthodox belief about the person and work of Jesus Christ in opposition to Arianism, which claimed Jesus was created. While it is easy for us modern folks to know a church’s beliefs quickly thanks to denominations and websites, the Christian faith was distinguished from heresy for over a thousand years by the worshipping communities’ corporate confession of the creeds. If you were a Christian in Ephesus who traveled to Rome on business, how would you know if the “church” you were visiting was orthodox and not Arian? Because they confessed the creeds, taught them, and were baptized affirming them, just like the majority of Christians worldwide continue to do today! Creeds still serve the purpose of distinguishing orthodox Christianity from innovation and heresy.
Reciting creeds is also an act of worship. As Dr. Donald Fairbrairn, Professor of Early Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, puts it: “a creed is a pledge of allegiance to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Creeds answer the question, “In whom do you believe?” more than the question “What do you believe?””6 This is why, in most churches, we say a creed after the sermon and before Holy Communion. No matter what is said from the pulpit, we ground ourselves in who God is before coming to the Table to receive the Body and Blood of the One whose nature we affirm in the creeds. This focuses us on God, the true God. As we recite the creeds we can have confidence in who God is and what will come to pass. After all, it doesn’t make much sense to hear the Word of God, celebrate His presence in the Sacraments, or anything else if we don’t know (or agree on) who God is.
Additionally, creeds are tools of catechesis. A common objection to the use of creeds is one rooted in extreme biblicism, or the idea that the Bible is alone sufficient as a confession and the creeds are not, therefore, “biblical.” This view unfortunately misunderstands the creeds which are drawn directly from Scripture. J.I Packer notes that the Apostles’ Creed is, “a power-point declaration of the basics of the Christian message - in other words the Gospel itself.”7 He contends that we in the American church have replaced our ancient declarations of faith with a man-centered “ABC” creed of our own (All have sinned, Believe in Christ, Confess Christ as Lord) that is insufficient as a statement of belief. It may do well to define how we can be saved, but says little about Who is doing the saving! Even if we say something like “all we need is the Bible” or “no creed but Christ” we cannot avoid creating what surmounts to a creed of our own design. These “new creeds” ultimately fall short of accomplishing what the time-tested summaries of faith the church already has access to have accomplished. They disconnect us further from the church that has gone before us, further from the Scriptures the creeds affirm, and further from the boundaries of orthodoxy.
“…we face pagan ignorance about God every bit as deep as the early church faced in the Roman Empire. The ABC approach is thus not full enough; the whole story of the Father’s Christ-exalting plan of redeeming love, from eternity to eternity, must be told, or the radical reorientation of life for which the gospel call will not be understood, and the required total shift from man-centeredness to God-centeredness, and more specifically from self-centeredness to Christ-centeredness will not take place. All that the Creed covers needs to be grasped and taught, as an integral part of the message of the saving love of God.”
- J.I. Packer
There are three creeds known as the Ecumenical Creeds. They are the Apostles’ Creed, Nicene Creed, and the Athanasian Creed. Additionally, the Definition of Chalcedon mentioned previously is not a creed, but is a statement made at the Fourth Ecumenical Council, and therefore has much overlap with the Ecumenical Creeds (more on that below). I won’t be inserting the text of every creed in this article as that would really constrain the length, but they will be linked on each header so you can quickly find them.
The Apostles’ Creed
The Apostles’ Creed is the most ancient and concise of the Christian creeds. Its earliest iterations, called the Old Roman Creed, can be traced back to manuscripts attributed to the early 2nd century, though it was likely written before that. While modern scholars do not give much credit to the legend that each Apostle wrote an article of this creed, the early Church clearly believed it communicated their teachings. As time passed, the creed became the normal formula for training new converts preparing for baptism, a practice called catechesis. These new converts, called catechumens, would publicly confess their faith using the creed before their baptism. This was viewed by the Church as the catechumens being “built on the foundation of the apostles” (Ephesians 2:20) and being “devoted to the apostles' teaching” (Acts 2:42), as was the pattern of the earliest Church.
The Apostles’ Creed affirms the very Gospel itself. It affirms each person of the Trinity as God, various doctrines about Jesus including his divine conception, the Virgin birth, His crucifixion, death, burial, descent, resurrection on the third day, ascent to the right hand of the Father, and role as Judge. It also affirms there is one catholic Church, the communion of saints, forgiveness of sins, and a future resurrection and eternal life. It is the best concise summary of the Christian faith we have.
The Nicene Creed
The Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed, often just referred to as the Nicene Creed, is perhaps the most foundational creed in the Christian Church. The original form was crafted by the First Ecumenical Council, the First Council of Nicaea. This is also the ecumenical council with the most false information floating around on the internet. A common meme might say something like: “At Nicaea, Constantine selected the books for the Bible, burned the rest, and killed everyone who didn’t agree.” Seriously. And before you dismiss this as a misunderstanding confined to atheist meme pages and subreddits, Wesley Huff, a Canadian apologist, notes this claim is so mainstream it actually appears in Dan Brown’s best-selling book The Da Vinci Code. He made a really great graphical summary of what did happen at this council, which I will include below. (He also has a breakdown of the graphic and more on the origin of this myth on his blog if you want to read more.) However, the story of the Nicene Creed and its importance to the Church is not simply told by looking at the Council of Nicaea but requires a deeper dive into the first four ecumenical councils.
The Council of Nicaea (First Ecumenical Council)
As the graphic notes, this council primarily dealt with coming to an orthodox understanding of exactly who Jesus is and what His nature is. The background of this disagreement about the nature of Christ started in the Alexandrian Church. Arius, a priest in Alexandria, and his proponents were teaching that Christ was a created being and did not exist eternally. St. Athanasius and others argued against this, stating Christ is eternal and not a created being, He is truly God. According to a popular legend, the Bishop of Myra, St. Nicholas (yes, our St. Nick of fame) gave Arius a punch to the face when he publicly denied the eternal existence of Christ at the council. The total consensus of the council (only two bishops out of 318 and Arius dissented) was that Arius was wrong and his teachings were heretical. He was banished and his works were ordered to be destroyed. Whether or not you agree with the order to burn his works, you can see how great big lies (Constantine burned books of the Bible) can be told and believed by many with their origins in small truths (Arius’ works were ordered to be burned).
The council crafted the Nicene Creed as a baptismal creed with the express intent to define orthodoxy and exclude Arianism from orthodoxy. Up until this point, early forms of the Apostles’ Creed was the primary creed used in baptism and worship alongside other creeds being used regionally. This creed united Christians everywhere in the Ephesians 4:5 sense; “one Lord, one Faith, one baptism.” In the creed, Jesus is defined as “true God from true god” explicitly “begotten, not made, of one Being with the Father.” If these claims don’t go far enough to exclude Arianism, the creed as written in AD 325 also states “But as for those who say, There was when He was not, and, Before being born He was not, and that He came into existence out of nothing, or who assert that the Son of God is of a different hypostasis or substance, or created, or is subject to alteration or change – these the Catholic and apostolic Church anathematize.”
The First Council of Constantinople (Second Ecumenical Council)
If you know the Nicene Creed, that last part might surprise you up a little. Despite Arius’ condemnation at Nicaea, he wasn’t done. He and his compatriots eventually accepted the creed and were welcomed back into the Church. Then, former Arian bishops forced St. Athanasius into exile for a time. Emperor Constantine died and his son, Constantius II, took his reign as emperor. He was a vocal proponent of Arianism. Another council was needed to course correct, and after Constantius II passed away after only a little over twenty years on the throne Theodosius ascended to the throne, a firm Nicene Christian. Thus, a Second Ecumenical Council was called in AD 381, also known as the First Council of Constantinople. Some had attempted to respond to Arianism by compromise, contending that Jesus had a human body only and a divine mind only, which became known as Apollinarianism, from its chief proponent Apollinaris. Also on the agenda in Constantinople was the doctrine of the Holy Spirit, which was under attack from the Pneumatomachi, who denied the divinity of the Holy Spirit. The Constantinopolitan Council reaffirmed the views of the Nicene Council, firmly rejected the innovations, and declared the new views promulgated since as heretical.
Thus, the creed written in AD 325 was expanded, adding an article on the Holy Spirit and the Church, respectively. The anathema was removed. We don’t know exactly why as most records of the deliberations from the AD 381 council are lost. In fact, it is the later Fourth Ecumenical Council that confirms for us both versions are received. Thus, the AD 381 version, more properly called the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed, became the standard for its totality. It is the only creed affirmed by the whole Church—Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, and Protestant—as authoritatively adopted by commonly recognized ecumenical councils as the definitively binding statement of the Christian faith.
The Council of Ephesus (Third Ecumenical Council)
AD 381 is not the end of the story for the Nicene Creed, however. In AD 431 another council was called to deal with Nestorianism, the belief that Christ has two separate persons, one human and one divine. These heretics believed they were solving a theological problem, namely, that Mary did not bear God (Theotokos; God-bearer), but only Christ (Christotokos; Christ-bearer). This time, it was Nestorius, the heretic, who requested the council to be called to prove his position was in fact the orthodox position. The council disagreed and stated that there is one person in Christ, his human and divine natures exist in perfect harmony in hypostatic union, and Mary is indeed Theotokos as she gave birth to the fully divine and fully human Jesus Christ.
Interestingly for the Nicene Creed at this council, they declared it is “unlawful for any man to bring forward, or to write, or to compose a different Faith as a rival to that established by the holy Fathers assembled with the Holy Ghost in Nicaea”.8 This claim by the council is profound. For those of us from evangelical backgrounds, to think of an ecumenical council of bishops and clergy as led explicitly by the Holy Spirit is, in many ways, contrary to the way we think. Yet, we would not deny that “where two or three are gathered” the Spirit is present. The Council of Nicaea, as the First Ecumenical Council, was also somewhat miraculous. While there had been councils and meetings before (look no further than Acts 15) this was the first time Christianity had a truly ecumenical council, meaning including everyone, since becoming a world religion present on at least three continents at the time. The logistics of bringing 318 clergy from all over the world to one place and meeting for three months in AD 325 is a very remarkable feat. Some denominations claim it at times cannot be done today with all our modern technology and transit. Not to mention they came to a complete consensus (minus the two whose views were on trial). When is the last time you saw 316 clergy come to a consensus about anything, especially doctrine? When you think about it, it is not so strange to believe that “the holy Fathers” were indeed “assembled with the Holy Ghost in Nicaea”.
A Quick Note on Filioque
If you already know Nicene Creed, then you might also know about the filioque controversy. Everyone should be at least aware of it, though understanding it completely isn’t necessary, so let’s examine it briefly.
This may be a surprise but Latin and Greek are two different languages. The Church in the West, being Latin-speaking, found that the Nicene Creed translated into Latin could technically still allow for Arianism, so some churches began clarifying that the “Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son (filioque)”, adding to the article on the Spirit and reaffirming Christ’s divinity again. Depending on how you translate that back to Greek, it could imply that the Spirit “comes out of” the Son or the Spirit’s coming “is caused” by the Son. The former view is problematic, and the latter is not so much. The Western Latin-speaking Church began to apply this change universally. Eventually, Rome adopted it in 1014. For the Eastern Greek-speaking Church, their position on this change is essentially ‘Hang on, you can’t just go changing the creed we all agreed on all willy-nilly.’ The addition of the word filioque is one of the reasons for the Great Schism in 1054, dividing the Church in the Latin-speaking West from the Greek-speaking East.
The Eastern Orthodox still to this day do not accept the Nicene Creed with the filioque as the ecumenical Nicene Creed, but as an innovation. Protestant churches, originating from reforming Roman Catholicism, received the creed with filioque. Since the dawn of ecumenicism some Protestant churches have recently come to the conclusion that filioque is doctrinally acceptable, but recognize it is not the standard adopted at the First Council of Constantinople in AD 381. This is largely part of an effort to revive ecumenical dialogue with the Eastern Orthodox churches. Some Protestant churches have been encouraging their congregations to remove the filioque in worship. While for some this change may be motivated by ecumenicism, and I do love unity in the Church, I agree more with the ideal that we should practice what we have received from tradition unaltered unless necessary, hence omitting filioque. This is essentially the position most Anglican churches take, including the ACNA, however, your mileage may vary from congregation to congregation as it is a recommendation.9
The Athanasian Creed
The Athanasian Creed is aptly named after the previously mentioned 4th-century Alexandrian bishop and defender of the faith, St. Athanasius. While there is little evidence the saint himself wrote the creed, it clearly reflects the orthodoxy he and the others of his time upheld in the face of Arianism. Interestingly, this is the only creed of the Ecumenical Creeds written originally in Latin and is not from a hereto known council. As such, it is not recognized by the Eastern Orthodox Church as binding though it is often found in their prayer books (minus filioque of course, which the Athanasian Creed also contains). In many ways, the Athansian Creed is the doctrine of the Council of Ephesus and Chalcedon (the Third and Fourth Ecumenical Councils) in creedal form.
The Chalcedonian Definition
While not a creed itself but rather a commentary on the creeds, which is why it gets the designation ‘definition’, the Chalcedon Definition is significant because it is a product of the Fourth Ecumenical Council at Chalcedon which reaffirmed the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed in its full form. Many Protestants consider this council to be the last of the truly ecumenical councils. Therefore, the teachings of this Council are particularly important for the entire Church today as their canons and definitions, and those of the three previous councils, define what is universally recognized Christian belief across Roman Catholicism, Eastern Orthodox, and Protestantism. As our present divisions would come about hundreds of years after this council, it is essentially the starting place for common doctrine and ecumenical conversations today. The Chalcedonian Definition itself is relatively short and explains in further detail the Nicene definition of Jesus Christ as “true God from true God.”
Why Chalcedon Is So Important
It is interesting that the Global Methodist Church has chosen the Chalcedonian Definition as part of its Foundational Documents. Commenting on the Transitional Book of Doctrines and Discipline of the Global Methodist Church, Rev. Walter Fenton says, “The Apostles’ and Nicene Creeds and the Definition of Chalcedon are printed so it is clear the Global Methodist Church is rooted in the classical confessions of Christian orthodoxy. Its members are to regularly affirm the faith that Christ followers have proclaimed down through [the] ages. With other Christian denominations[,] the Methodist movement traces its theological heritage all the way back to the New Testament.”10
In my estimation, this is an attempt by the authors of doctrine in the Global Methodist Church to rectify the glaring problem with many Methodist and Wesleyan churches: while apostolic Christianity was supremely important to John Wesley (what he called “primitive Christianity”), it has not always been so important in Methodism, especially in regards to official formularies. By identifying with the Chalcedonian Definition and the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed, the GMC is essentially binding itself to the first four ecumenical councils and the Apostolic Faith they defended, which Methodism has historically only had a cursory connection to through its roots in Anglicanism, not a formulaic one in its doctrine and canons. This offers Methodists an opportunity to retrieve insights largely lost to them to answer questions like: ‘What faith have we received?’, ‘How does Wesley’s insistence on “primitive Christianity” shape our movement?’, and ‘Can we identify the faith of the Apostles and identify with it?’. Guardrails that should have always been in place are being reclaimed.
Apostolic Faith
“The Church is apostolic as it guards the good deposit of faith that was given by Christ to the apostles (1 Timothy 6:20). Just as the apostles were called to bear witness to what they had seen and heard, we are called to bear faithful witness to Jesus Christ, to pass on intact that which we have received.” - The Faith Once Delivered: A Wesleyan Witness ¶146
What is so important to recognize about the ecumenical councils is that they were not defining new doctrine. They searched the Scriptures and the Apostolic Fathers for “primitive Christianity”. This is exactly what John Wesley did and exhorted Methodists to do. In fact, any attempt to create new doctrine is utter nonsense. The Christian faith does not change. If we aren’t receiving “the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints” (Jude 1:3), how can we have confidence the faith we are practicing is Christianity? How can we discern when wolves are in sheep’s clothing? The creeds, and the ecumenical councils, go a long way to assuring us our faith is the same faith received by the Apostles who walked, talked, and lived with Jesus. To borrow a definition from Rev. Ben Jefferies, an ecumenical council is “one that promulgates and defines the Faith of the one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church in such an orthodox manner that it is received by the universal church as bearing witness to the Faith that has been held from the beginning.”11 Creeds do not give us the Apostolic Faith, Scripture does that. Rather they keep us from making the same heretical mistakes all over again that have already been made. Lord willing, they aid us in running the same race as those who already have crossed the finish line and inhabit the Destination we are moving toward. May we all become better adherents to the Apostolic Faith.
https://globalmethodist.org/what-we-believe/
Abraham, W. J. Wesley for Armchair Theologians. Westminster John Knox Press, 2005, pp.2.
2019 Book of Common Prayer, pp. 176
Wesley, John. “The Way of the Kingdom” in The Sermons of John Wesley: A Collection for the Christian Journey. United States, Abingdon Press, 2013. Available at: http://wesley.nnu.edu/john-wesley/the-sermons-of-john-wesley-1872-edition/sermon-7-the-way-to-the-kingdom/
https://web.archive.org/web/20150313054259/http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2003-02-19/news/0302190091_1_sprague-bishop-bruce-ough-heresy-charges.
Apostle’s Creed: “born of the virgin Mary… The third day he rose again from the dead.”
Nicene Creed: “he became incarnate by the Holy Spirit and the virgin Mary… The third day he rose again, according to the Scriptures.”
Athanshian Creed: “He is human from the essence of His mother, born in time… he arose from the dead.”
https://credomag.com/2021/02/the-chalcedonian-definition/
Packer, J.I. Affirming the Apostles’ Creed. Crossway, 2008, pp. 15.
Canon VII, The Council of Ephesus in Schaff and Wace (eds.). A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1887, pp. 231. Retrieved from: https://ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf214/npnf214.x.xvi.x.html
See: Resolution 35.3, 1978 Lambeth Conference; College of Bishops Resolution Concerning the Nicene Creed, Documentary Foundations of the ACNA.
https://globalmethodist.org/first-things-first-part-one-of-the-transitional-book-of-doctrines-and-discipline/
https://northamanglican.com/all-that-is-not-true-about-nicea-ii/
As a wesleyan do you see creeds as normative in a more originalist or living document sort of sense?