Now, brothers and sisters, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain. For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, and then to the Twelve. [1 Corinthians 15:1-5 (NIV)]
I came across an article questioning whether we have to believe certain things to be a Christian or is it enough just to trust God. The author believed that Christians don’t have to “assent intellectually” to the facts of traditional Christian teaching or agree with the Christian creeds. “Faith” to the author is simply placing one’s confidence in “Spirit” (not the Holy Spirit) and following Jesus’ teaching is more important than believing certain things about Him. Having nothing to do with dogma or creeds, Christianity was seen as a wisdom tradition and way of life rather than a belief. Claiming they were “man-made” and date from the 4th century and Emperor Constantine, the author believed Christianity’s creeds should be disregarded.
A creed (or confession of faith) is simply a statement of what we believe; every time we share what we believe with others, we are confessing a creed. The first creed predates Constantine by at least 1,600 years and was given to us by God. The Hebrew Shema, found in Deuteronomy, declares the fundamental belief of Judaism: “Listen, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord alone.” [6:4] To be recited every morning and night, this declaration of belief remains the cornerstone of the Jewish faith. Throughout the Hebrew Scriptures, we find worshippers recalling the Lord’s faithfulness with confessions of faith like that in 1 Kings 18:39 that, “The Lord—he is God! Yes, the Lord is God!” The belief that, “The Lord is our God, the Lord alone,” is a cornerstone of Christianity, as well!
In the New Testament, we also find confessions of faith or creeds. Christianity’s fundamental belief was confessed by Peter when he stated that Jesus was “the Christ, the Son of the living God,” [Mat 16:16] and again when Nathaneal acknowledged Jesus as “the Son of God…the King of Israel!” [John 1:49] When other followers deserted Jesus, the Lord asked the twelve if they would leave. Peter responded, “You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.” [John 7:68-69] Although short, these confessions of faith were creeds.
The earliest creeds of the church can be found in the epistles of Paul. His words in today’s verse from 1 Corinthians 15 appear to be an early creed. That he “received it,” means Paul wasn’t the original author and, since he’s reminding them, it predates Paul’s first trip to Corinth (49-50 AD)! In his first letter to Timothy, Paul emphasized the importance of preserving and proclaiming the truth and includes what historians believe to be an early hymn summarizing the theology of the incarnation.[3:16] In Philippians 2:5-11, we find another early hymn explaining the dual nature of Jesus. It’s believed that Ephesians 4:4-6, “There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call—one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all,” were an early creed that was recited by new converts when they were baptized. If we believe Scripture is God-breathed, those words of belief aren’t man’s—they’re God’s!
The article’s author contends that belief and faith are two different things and that belief is not essential for faith. I think the Apostle Paul would disagree. Belief is intellectual acceptance that something is true and faith is trusting in the promise of that belief and they seem to be two sides of the same coin. If I believe the boat is sea-worthy, it’s my faith in it that gets me to sail it out to sea. On the other hand, if I don’t believe it’s sea-worthy, I wouldn’t have faith enough to take it sailing. Faith involves trust, commitment, and action and, without knowing and believing the promises of God, how will we have faith enough to trust them? Our creeds are the foundation of Christianity and help us know exactly what it is in which we have faith! It’s that knowledge that keeps us from falling for the false “feel-good-anything-goes” theology we find in the world today!
Those four verses are some of the most confusing ones in Scripture. Who are the sons of God, the daughters of men, the Nephilim, and how did they come to be mighty men (or as some translations say giants)? The Nephilim appear to be a race of formidable beings associated with extraordinary physical stature and fearful reputation. Mentioned briefly twice in Scripture, we find them in Genesis, just before the flood, and again in Numbers (post flood). Nephilim comes from naphal, meaning to fall. One school of thought holds that the “sons of God” were fallen angels who mated with human women (the daughters of man) and produced a hybrid race of giants called Nephilim. The apocryphal book of Enoch claims these offspring were giants standing thee hundred cubits (450 feet) tall. They had such insatiable hunger that they ate humans as well as one another. Having taught humans medicinal magic, astrology, divination, and other sinful practices, it was their evil ways that caused the flood! Written around 300-100 BC, the book of Enoch never was accepted as part the Hebrew Scriptures and never has been in the Christian canon.
After being asked, “How different would the world look if everyone got what they deserved?” I started wondering. Even as a child, I knew people didn’t get what they deserved. When I was ten, I watched on television as nine black students tried to enroll in an all-white school in Little Rock, Arkansas; they were blocked by the National Guard and an angry mob of 400 angry whites. Two years earlier, on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama, Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her seat to a white woman. I grew up in Detroit and, while discrimination and segregation were more subtle than in the South, it existed. I lived in a large home with a big yard on a tree-lined street but any bus trip “downtown” told me that the people of color didn’t live in neighborhoods like mine. There may not have been “colored” drinking fountains or “white only” bathrooms but there was a six-foot high, one-foot wide, and half-mile long wall segregating one black community from a neighboring white one. Many other invisible and more impenetrable walls existed within our divided city.
As much as I enjoy reading the works of authors like C.S. Lewis, A.W. Tozer, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and N.T. Wright, I admit to not always understanding exactly what they’re saying. Nevertheless, thinking me an expert, a friend sent me an article written by a well-known Christian theologian and asked for my thoughts. Unfortunately, I had none because I couldn’t make sense of it. When I reluctantly admitted my bewilderment, my friend admitted the same. Although we both tried to understand the author, neither of us could discern his point. He appeared to have used a great many fancy words to say very little. While another scholar might make sense of his words, we two reasonably intelligent believers couldn’t. Unfortunately, some pastors, theologians, Christian writers, and fellow believers unnecessarily complicate faith and our relationship with God.
This proverb about iron sharpening iron reminds me of Sunday dinners when I was a girl. After the roast beef was placed in front of my father, he picked up the carving knife and a steel rod. With dramatic flair, he would run the knife back and forth against the steel before carving the meat. For the perfect slice of beef, he used iron to “sharpen” iron.
We were discussing when and how we came to believe in the existence of God. Those who’d been brought up in families of faith said there never was a time they weren’t aware of God’s presence. Others spoke of believing in God because He is visible in His creation—in flowers, majestic mountains, birds, sunrises and sunsets, the vastness of space, or the miracle of birth. One came to believe in God while attending Vacation Bible School with a neighbor and another met God through a campus ministry. After apologizing in advance for “grossing” us out, one woman shared her experience while in medical school.
Devotions of the Heart 