Beliefs
Below is a listing of all the major creeds and confessions I adhere to throughout the history of the church. There are other councils who formulated confessions throughout church history. However, because of massive errors, I cannot affirm their confessions of faith. The Council of Trent would be one.
There are a few statements (particularly on infant baptism, the perpetual virginity of Mary, and a few other things) in which I am in disagreement on in these creeds. However, though there are a few essential as well as non-essential statements I do not adhere to in a couple of these creeds and confessions, with the vast majority of everything that is said, I am in total agreement, especially as it relates to the nature of God, the nature of man and salvation.
It is my belief that these statements, though not in any way equal to the authority of Scripture, as it alone is our final infallible authority, are nevertheless authorities on the Christian faith throughout the ages since Christ ascended into heaven. They put forward that silver thread of orthodoxy that the Lord has preserved through the ages by His bride, the church, in raising up people that defended the truth in all diligence; all in order that she may not fail in the task of taking the Gospel to the four corners of the Earth and proclaiming the truth of God unhindered by the work of Satan to suppress it.
Something interesting you may notice about these confessions is that from the first century until now, chronologically the confessions got fuller and more expansive. They started out with addressing the fundamentals of the Christian faith in the early church, then the confessions moved on to the nature of God, Jesus, man, and salvation as more and more heresies began arising on these various points. Then once you get to the Reformation confessions, they explode in covering the whole of our faith. I have also included recent confessions in evangelicalism that I believe to be necessary in refuting the errors of our day.
It is my prayer that everyone read these not as old, dry, dusty doctrinal statements, but as living and breathing statements which our church fathers, doctors and many lay people were martyred for over the ages. Men and women have died over these doctrines! What a concept, huh? All that to say they are not unimportant matters. These are not to be read simply as a matter of history, but rather as a systematic defense and explanation of that Olde Timeless Truth in the Scriptures that has saved many of the souls of men: that is, the very Gospel itself.
- Apostles’ Creed – First Century A.D.
- Nicene Creed – 325 A.D.
- Definition of Chalcedon – 451 A.D.
- Athanasian Creed – ~500 A.D.
- Canons of Orange – 529 A.D.
- Anathemas of the Second Council of Constantinople – 553 A.D.
- Augsburg Confession – 1530 A.D.
- Heidelberg Catechism – 1576 A.D.
- Belgic Confession – 1618 A.D.
- Canons of the Synod of Dordt – 1619 A.D.
- Westminster Confession of Faith – 1646 A.D.
- London Baptist Confession of Faith – 1689 A.D. (First Ed. 1644)
- Chicago Statement On Biblical Inerrancy – 1978 A.D.
- Danvers Statement – 1988 A.D.
- Cambridge Declaration – 1996 A.D.
- Together for the Gospel Statement – 2006 A.D.
- What We Believe About the Five Points of Calvinism – John Piper
