Creed(s): More Than a Band

by Aaron

What value did the creeds have for the church (during the time that they were created and used the most)?

This is an easy and short answer….maybe.

The English word “creed” comes from the Latin word “Credo” which simply means, “I believe.” The most popular of all creeds is the Apostles Creed, which starts with the words, “I believe in God the Father…”

The word Creed is actually never applied to any protestant denomination. Faith statements that were specific to denominations were called “confessions;” such as the Westminster Confession of Faith (Reformed) or the Augsburg Confession (Lutheran).

In the simplest way possible to explain, the creeds came out of the church formulating a stance against heresies. They believed people needed something they could memorize that could be taken with them so they knew when the gospel was being threatened.

The Nicene Creed came out of (essentially) the Arian Heresy (that denied the deity of Christ). The creed that came out of the council of Chalcedon (Chalcedonian Creed) was about the monothelite (or Monophysite) heresy (where they hammered out the dual nature of Christ...fully God, fully man).

The purpose of the creeds was to make these truths accessible, memorable, and to pass them on. They are great confessions of truth and faith.

Lastly, The Creeds and Confessions produced by the Christian Church over the centuries are not inspired additions to Scripture nor in any way replacements for the words of Christ, His apostles, or the prophets which preceded them.

Peter Kreeft in Fundamentals of the Faith has a Chapter all about Creeds (it’s Chapter 17 in case you are curious).

Chalcedonian Creed (451 AD)

Following, then, the holy fathers, we unite in teaching all men to confess the one and only Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. This selfsame one is perfect both in deity and in humanness; this selfsame one is also actually God and actually man, with a rational soul {meaning human soul} and a body. He is of the same reality as God as far as his deity is concerned and of the same reality as we ourselves as far as his humanness is concerned; thus like us in all respects, sin only excepted. Before time began he was begotten of the Father, in respect of his deity, and now in these "last days," for us and behalf of our salvation, this selfsame one was born of Mary the virgin, who is God-bearer in respect of his humanness.

We also teach that we apprehend this one and only Christ-Son, Lord, only-begotten -- in two natures; and we do this without confusing the two natures, without transmuting one nature into the other, without dividing them into two separate categories, without contrasting them according to area or function. The distinctiveness of each nature is not nullified by the union. Instead, the "properties" of each nature are conserved and both natures concur in one "person" and in one reality {hypostasis}. They are not divided or cut into two persons, but are together the one and only and only-begotten Word {Logos} of God, the Lord Jesus Christ. Thus have the prophets of old testified; thus the Lord Jesus Christ himself taught us; thus the Symbol of Fathers has handed down to us.