Psalm 8 Romans 8:14-17, 28-30
I believe in God, the Father almighty, maker of heaven and earth
(Preached on January 2, 2022)
Over the next several weeks we will look at the affirmation of faith that we use most often which is the apostles creed. The apostles' creed is an important document, one of the first confessions of the faith. The creed has a convoluted history that spans from the 2nd to the 9th century, it was important as the majority of Christians were illiterate so the reciting of Lord’s Prayer, 10 Commandments, and then a Creed helped them define their faith as a community and individuals. It’s possible the draft started in 180 AD to refute theological claims that the early church didn’t want people following.
Either way, the creed is something that allows us Christians to put together how we understand our faith, how we are linked in our tradition in our history and our heritage. It gives us the essentials of our faith, and when we are struggling ourselves hearing it together lifts up the words that we struggle with may be and as we look to sentences or phrases of this create over the next few weeks I hope to share some light and some insight into this as we look to God scripture and how it came about to talk about these parts of our faith.
There has been lots of debate over the centuries of where this creed came from and has been used in the church for the congregation to affirm their baptism as others come to be part of the church. It is the oldest creed created and held by the church and has been used in Western Christian churches for a long time. Justo Gonzalez put it well by saying, “It would be helpful to think of the Creed not so much as a personal statement of faith but rather as a statement of what it is that makes the church be the church, and of our allegiance to the essence of the gospel and therefore to the church that proclaims it.”
The Reformers decided to keep the Apostles Creed as they separated from the Catholic Church as a way to unite themselves with the early church and what they hold as beliefs. They then wrote catechisms like the Westminster and Heidelberg in order to parse out these beliefs that came from scripture and this early creed.
The Presbyterian Church holds many creeds to be ways to help guide the church in what we believe and put to words that belief. There are 12 creeds or catechisms in the Book of Confessions to help guide our understanding of the church reformed and always reforming. We, as a church, have used the words of the Apostles most often but it is important to lift up those words that others over the years have put understanding to our faith and how we seek that understanding of God, Jesus, the Spirit, and the church.
As we start with these ancient words we start with God.
God first as father. This is because Jesus called God Abba, Father, started the Lord’s prayer with Our Father…It is a helpful image that makes sense in a lot of ways. First, is that father is one that takes care of the household, making sure it thrives and continues on. It is wise and strong. Another importance of God being a father is that not all fathers on earth are equal. There are many that are absent, abusive, harsh and God is one that we can turn to and see beyond the heartache. If one has an earthly father that is wonderful then God as father is also important as even more loving and gracious. God as father is one that is parent. There are images of God having a motherly appeal as well and allows us to know that we are all connected as brothers and sisters, siblings in Christ.
God as father is set up by Jesus in the parable of the prodigal son as one that opens with loving arms those who stick around and those who leave and come back.
Paul writes in this Romans 8 scripture about God the father, and that we are heirs to the kin-dom, we are connected, given the opportunity to be righteous and glorified in the kin-dom of God.
The creed starts with God the Father and then moves to Almighty as another descriptor of God.
Almighty is there to give the omnipotence, omnipresence, and power of God. One that made heaven and earth. One that is all-knowing, all present, all powerful and sovereign.
This is also spelled out in the Romans passage of the Almighty-ness of God. N.T. Wright states that
“The whole passage seems designed to remind us both of the sovereignty of God and of the fact that this sovereignty is always exercised in love. “
God being almighty is one that is so powerful that God can certainly do anything but because God loves each of us, God gives us the grace to live as those who can leave or stay, God gives us the freedom to choose God. God is there for all people because God loves all creation but doesn’t manipulate, force, or coerce.
The Heidelberg Catechism spells out the creed and asks about this first article of belief and states
“I trust God so much that I do not doubt he will provide whatever I need for body and soul, and will turn to my good whatever adversity he sends upon me in this sad world. God is able to do this because he is almighty God and desires to do this because he is a faithful Father.”
The answers all come from a variety of scriptural references to help guide where this all came from in our understanding of God.
Each of us hold certain truths as part of our personal faith from those things that inspire us in scripture, hymns, spiritual songs, creeds, and prayers. Many people think they have to figure faith out for themself and either leave the church or leave behind things that they grew up with in order to search out their own personal beliefs outside of what they were taught or grew up around. And for some it is a journey of self discovery and understanding about the God who created but for many the journey feels empty, harsh, and one to give up.
James Howell describe it as how it would be like trying to climb Mount Everest and deciding to do it alone, it is something that takes a group of people together to reach understanding. A serious mountain climber doesn’t go alone but is surrounded by a community to go each step at a time. This is true for us as well. We can try to go alone and read the Bible and have our own faith and beliefs but that is not how God intended as father almighty. God intended us as siblings to gather together and figure it out together. The Apostles Creed was written by a group of people, not just one. The Bible even was not written by just one person inspired by God but by a variety of peoples that took centuries to collect and be what is today.
We have briefly looked at God as father and almighty and then comes: maker of heaven and earth. This is the declaration of God creating the world as written in Genesis stories and the passage in Psalm 8. There are many creation stories from different cultures, the Hebrews were trying to make sense of their purpose and how the world came into being and was given these words of comfort that is was their God that created all things, called them good, that the psalmist cries out praise of the majesty of God’s work for all creation and then thinks about how humans were given a special purpose and God thought of humanity as beloved and loved and therefore we as children of God are to love the creation that was put before us. The creation we see now, the creation that happened before our time, and the creations to come as we understand our life on earth as finite.
The term maker of heaven and earth is to say God created everything. As the Nicene Creed, the creed written in 325 accepted highly in the eastern orthodox church and is part of the creed said in Roman Catholic and many protestant churches. This Nicene creed calls on everything as stating, “of all that is , seen and unseen.” Meaning that God is the creator of the physical and the spiritual. God has created, is creating, and will be creating those things we see and understand and those things we have yet to understand. There is allowance in this statement for science to be a part of our understanding of the created world, not something to be pushed aside but to embrace and lean into that God is part of that as well.
As much as God is in the arts, as seen in Psalm 8 God is part of the science of it all as well. God is part of the physical world and as maker of heaven God is part of the spiritual world that we are in and we enter in as earth as it is in heaven.
When we state what we believe I hope these words become more than just words on a page, words recited, words memorized and said over and over but that you understand your connection to a deep, rich, ancient tradition. That your personal faith is but part of this creed. That we can say these words and mean them or appreciate the faith of the community when we struggle with part or all of the words.
To claim God the Father Almighty, Maker of Heaven and Earth is a start to what we believe but is part of the larger wisdom from scripture and those who gathered to collectively understand how to put into words that which we believe in order to better understand connection and community rules of living.
I hope you think of these things but then see how scripture talks about God.
Who is God to you?
How do you relate to God, is God father to you?
Is God almighty?
How do you relate to creation and understand God’s role in creation?
I look forward to the challenge this is to take about the creed and see how scripture and history looks at these words that have been said for centuries and how we can understand them and apply them to not only our belief but our life as well.
May you find ways to affirm God as Father or Parent. That if God is parent then we are siblings, we are all family as believers. May you find ways to see the Almighty nature of God, and may you see the majesty in God the creator of heaven and earth.
BONUS:
Children’s Sermon
We call it the Apostles’ creed because legend says that the apostles, Jesus’ friends, put the Creed together. And how did they do that? By thinking about this – show a puzzle.
This is a puzzle that has a few pieces still to put together. And that’s how puzzles work – we look at the picture and try to use different pieces to put it together.
Look! Here’s our finished puzzle. Each piece was needed to show the rest. And that’s how this creed works. The creed is made up of different part of Jesus’ story and why Jesus’ story matters. Each piece is important because, without it, we won’t know fully how God loves us. We recite it each week because it helps remind us just how much Jesus loves us and why Jesus is important. And we also recite it because, sometimes, there are different parts of the puzzle that don’t make a lot of sense to us, or parts we don’t understand. Or parts that we don’t necessarily think are true that day. The creed isn’t here as a test – as if we have to understand or get or fully believe every single part to call ourselves a Christian. The Creed matters for us because it’s a complete picture of who Jesus is. And when we don’t understand pieces of the puzzles, we know that the person next to us might get it. And we might understand the pieces of the puzzle that the person next to us doesn’t get. The creed helps remind us that we are all, as a community, growing closer to Jesus. All of us, together, are needed to figure out who God wants us to be. The creed is, then, what we as a community, teach and share, the fullness of Jesus’ story. The creed is a picture of Jesus and faith that helps us see Jesus – and live out the Christian faith.
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