Photo by Inbal Malca on Unsplash
(A four-minute read.)
A few weeks back, I decided I wanted to have my kids and myself memorize the Apostles’ Creed so we could recite it together regularly. Part of the reason I decided I wanted to do this is because of a growing conviction about the importance of being grounded in ideas about God apart from our feelings or actions.
I firmly believe we not only need to know truth, we also need to embody it. But embodying it begins with knowing it.
My kids also memorize a fair amount of Scripture for their schooling, of course; but learning the Apostles’ Creed can also help ground them in the reality of what God has done apart from what they do. Repetition has a convicting and forming effect (which is why most Saturday evenings, at sunset, we also recite the fourth commandment together).
Perhaps you grew up reciting the Apostles’ Creed every week. More than likely, if you’re part of my faith community (which many of my readers are), you were—and perhaps still are—wholly ignorant of it, since Seventh-day Adventists have never been ones to embrace, much less recite, ancient creeds.
Everyone is pretty clear that the Apostles’ Creed was not written by Jesus’s first apostles but was probably first developed around the fifth century (and perhaps even later). But historians have detected traces of it much earlier.
There are a few phrases in the Apostles’ Creed that I’d articulate differently (and have therefore modified for my family), but this is how the modified version goes that I’m teaching my kids:
I believe in God, the Father almighty,
creator of heaven and earth.I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord,
who was conceived by the Holy Spirit,
born of the Virgin Mary,
suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified, died, and was buried;
he descended to the dead [original: into hell].
On the third day he rose again;
he ascended into heaven,
he is seated at the right hand of the Father,
and he will come to judge the living and the dead.I believe in the Holy Spirit,
the holy universal Church [original: holy catholic church],
the communion of saints,
the forgiveness of sins,
the resurrection of the body,
and the life everlasting.
Amen.
I think everything expressed in this Creed fully harmonizes with Scripture (which is the litmus test for a good Protestant) and I thus feel good about reciting it.
Of course, of particular relevance right now is that line “born of the Virgin Mary.” Affirming this idea, which lies at the heart of the Christmas message, is a huge act of faith. It defies reason and challenges our enlightened intellect.
Virgins don’t get pregnant. We know that.
And yet I affirm it, believe it, and place my confidence in it.
As I shared a few weeks ago, a life that never believes anything that reason or test-tubes can’t confirm is a boring, unsatisfying, and narrow-minded life anyway—at least it seems to me. Stepping into the wonder and mystery of such an audacious claim is exhilarating and energizing in its own way. It’s also, to some extent, an act of courage.
This line is the corollary of the one that comes before it of course. The reason Jesus was “born of the Virgin Mary” is because he was “conceived by the Holy Spirit.” The bold claim is that Jesus had a divine origin, predating his existence on earth.
He was fully human, yes. But he was also fully divine (“truly God and truly man,” as the Chalcedonian Creed, written around the same time, says).
Apart from this reality, I’d submit, there’s no hope.
And what do I have to lose by affirming it?
Looking silly to other people? That’s fine.
Having my reason and logic offended? I trust they’ll get over it.
So this holiday season, I’m recommitting myself to that bold and stupendous claim—that Jesus was not simply a compelling and revolutionary man who taught an ethic of love.
He was, at the very core of his being, “conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary.”
He was, indeed, God himself—come to earth on a divine mission to solve a cosmic and transcendent problem.
Shawn is a pastor in Maine, whose life, ministry, and writing focus on incarnational expressions of faith. The author of four books and a columnist for Adventist Review, he is also a DPhil (PhD) candidate at the University of Oxford, focusing on nineteenth-century American Christianity. You can follow him on Instagram, and listen to his podcast Mission Lab.
Amen!