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my faith

To begin:  It seems difficult -- if not impossible -- for me to write my own confession of faith.

The very idea of a personal doctrinal statement of Christian faith seems to me to be oxymoronic.  The Christian faith is "once for all delivered" (Jude 1.3).  It is the Gospel passed down in the Church (1 Corinthians 15.3).  The best I could ever do is to convey the heart of that Gospel and my consent of it, rather than composing some private (or even perhaps denominational) statement of a cluster of beliefs.

The idea of a single person's faith confession is even more problematic because the Bible and the early church that produced it orbit around several hymns and creeds, which offer a whole host of affirmations that every Christian agreed to for the first three centuries of the Church.  How could I do any better than what they have already given us?

What makes writing a confession of faith even more complicated is that early Christians -- the apostles of Jesus Christ and their successors -- didn't always agree and were quite willing to speculate freely and broadly about theology.  In order to maintain their unity, they kept dogma (what everyone has to believe) to a bare minimum:  Just eight simple sentences after three centuries!  Sure, if you venture beyond the broad confines of those sentences, you can land yourself in fractured unity (what we call schism), but even then it's difficult to say much beyond those eight sentences.

And even when they have produced a confession of faith that gave much beyond those eight sentences, they were just saying what their particular band of schism was trying to emphasize (ever read through the various Protestant confessions of faith and get the impression that you've stumbled on a family arguing about things that only matter inside the family?  That if you were in a different family, you'd be saying different things?)  

See, if I could offer a confession of my Christian faith, the best I could give you would be the statements of the "Symbol" of our faith -- the Apostles' Creed.  I could probably even venture to affirm its fuller expression in the Nicene Creed.  The Nicene Creed was formalized in 325 and finalized in 381 -- all Christians at that time agreed upon these dogmas as the essentials of our faith.  Anglicans affirm it every Sunday in worship (and even every morning and evening as part of the Daily Office).  That's probably the best place to start, because I believe fundamentally that all good theology originates in worship and prayer.

But that also means my confession of faith is communal.  It's not private.  That's why the Nicene Creed begins, "We believe ..."
  1. We believe in one God, the Father almighty, maker of heaven and earth, of all things seen and unseen.
  2. We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the only-begotten, begotten of the Father before all ages. Light of Light; true God of true God; begotten, not made; of one essence with the Father, by whom all things were made;
  3. Who for us and for our salvation came down from heaven, and was incarnate of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became a man.
  4. And he was crucified under Pontius Pilate, and suffered, and was buried.
  5. And the third day he rose again, according to the Scriptures; and ascended into heaven, and sits at the right hand of the Father; and he shall come again with glory to judge the living and the dead; whose Kingdom shall have no end.
  6. We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son; who with the Father and the Son is worshiped and glorified; who has spoken through the prophets.
  7. In one holy, catholic, and apostolic church I acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins.
  8. I look for the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come.
I affirm all this every day of life with all the faithful in a resounding, "AMEN!"  May it be so!

All of that makes me say that if we Christians have anything to point to in regards to our faith, it is Jesus, that one whom the New Testament writers all affirm is the only perfect theology.
  • "The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth."  (John 1.14)
  • "No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son, who is himself God and* is in closest relationship with the Father, has made him known."  (John 1.18)
  • "The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation."  (Colossians 1.15)
  • "For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form."  (Colossians 2.18)
  • "In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom also he made the universe.  The Son is the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word.  After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven."  (Hebrews 1.1-3)
All of that to say, Jesus Christ is the final authority of my our faith and practice.  All of the witnesses we have inherited have said as much.
  • The written word of God -- the Scriptures -- inspired by the Holy Spirit and interpreted as Jesus Christ as the center point to the Gospel testimony as true and full.
  • The body of Christ -- the Church, at once local and universal -- has been empowered by God's Spirit to be witnesses (even to the death of the martyrs) to proclaim this faith we have received as true and full.
  • The Spirit of truth -- the Holy Spirit -- maintains the ministry Jesus began on earth through Jesus' grace-filled disciples as true and full witnesses to this Gospel of Jesus Christ.
This Gospel of the Word-made-flesh -- in both Jesus' words and work -- has been recorded in the four Gospels to reveal the true nature of God the Holy Trinity.  This "finished work" in God in Jesus Christ extends from his birth to his ascension and enthronement.  This Gospel proclaims:
  • Christ's definitive self-revelation of the cruciform God who is, by nature, co-suffering, the radically forgiving Lord of all creation, with unfailing love and mercy.  This God was in Christ, the living Sacrifice who emptied himself and laid down his life to reconcile us to himself (Romans 5.6-10; Philippians 2.5-11; 1 John 4.9-10; 2 Corinthians 5.19).
  • Christ’s decisive victory over the power of sin, the condemnation of the law, the bondage of the devil and the sentence of death (John 12.31; 16.11; Colossians 2.13-15; Hebrews 2.15).  He is the risen King who holds the keys to death and hades (Revelation 1), which were swallowed up in his victory (1 Corinthians 15.54).
  • Christ’s complete identification with humankind.  Assuming and participating fully in human nature (Hebrews 4.14-15), Christ stood in as substitute -- doing for us what we could not do for ourselves -- loving God and fulfilling the law of love perfectly, while overcoming Satan, sin and death on our behalf.  He identified with us so that we might identify with him -- we die with him that we might rise with him.  And so we experience his grace and participate in his divine nature (2 Peter 1.4).  As we behold him, we are transfigured into the image and likeness of Christ (2 Cor 3.18) by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Just as I affirm with all the faithful Christians across the ages this faith we have received, Jesus himself (quite likely every day of his earthly life) affirmed his Jewish faith in the one soverign God's, creator of all, call to covenant kindness to the whole world, as enshrined in the Shema:

"'Hear O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one.  Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.'  This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it:  'Love your neighbor as yourself.'  All the Law and Prophets hang on these two commandments."  (Matthew 22.37-40)

Alongside this, I believe the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) is a synopsis of Jesus' teaching -- the micocosm of our faith -- and is the central text of the New Testament community's learning from Jesus.   In it, he distills and again fulfills the whole of the Law and the Prophets, and lays the foundation for the Kingdom of God.  I endeavor to live and pray two portions of that text daily, as central to my confession of faith:
  • "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.  Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.  Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.  Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled.  Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.  Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.  Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.  Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.  Blessed are you when people revile and persecute you, and say all kinds of against you falsely for my sake.  Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you."  (Matthew 5.3-12)
  • "In this manner, therefore, pray:  'Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be Your name.  Your kingdom come.  Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.  Give us this day our daily bread.  And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.  And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.  For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever.  Amen."  (Matthew 6.9-13)