Yesterday I asked whether or not the Apostle’s Creed should function as the minimum confession for Christian fellowship (here). There were plenty of great responses on this blog as well as on other blogs (e.g. the person who noted that the Old Roman Symbol is likely older). Some thought I was setting the bar too low (e.g. here). Others thought it was too high (here). I do not know if what I said was so much my statement on what “ought” to be the basis for fellowship as it was a pondering aloud of what seemed to be the actual boundaries within which I have functioned.
I continued to think to myself about this matter. I asked myself, “What did the earliest churches hold in common?” I am not going to say this is the only confession, but this is where I started: (1) Jesus is Lord and (2) Jesus had been raised from the dead.
Jesus is Lord: For Jews this would have been the fulfillment of messianic hopes. Jesus may not have acted exactly as each and every Jew expected the Messiah to act. This is because it seems that messianic expectations in early Judaism were diverse and nuanced. That being said, the earliest Jewish Christians understood Jesus to be “the Christ, the son of the living God”.
The Apostle Paul seems to have understood faith in Christ not as a simple verbal confession that this is an accurate answer to a trivia question. Rather, he saw faith as allegiance. To be a Christian was to declare allegiance to Jesus, the Jewish Messiah, as Lord of the world. For the Apostle one must be able to confess that “Jesus is Lord” (Rom. 10.9). This is something that loyalist to Christ do now, freely. This is the confession that those who are not loyal to the King will confess when his reign is fully established. As he wrote elsewhere, “…so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow, of those who are in heaven and under the earth, and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” (Phili. 2.10-11)
So we see that salvation is more than right belief about Christ. Rather, it is a loyalist confession of allegiance to Christ, first and foremost.
Jesus has been resurrected: Along with the Lordship of Christ we see that the Apostle demands that one believe that God raised Jesus from the dead (Rom. 10.9). Jesus’ Lordship is established by his resurrection (Rom. 1.1-6). If Jesus was not raised from the dead the whole apostolic proclamation is at stake (1 Cor. 15.12-19)!
All four evangelist put emphasis on the resurrection as the event that ends their narrative for all intents and purposes. The Book of Acts is essentially the story of how Jesus continued his reign by the Holy Spirit through his people. I have always understood the resurrection to be the core dogmatic confession of Christianity. As N.T. Wright has recalled his cab driver once saying, “If Jesus has been raised from the dead, everything else is rock and roll!”
In part, what I was saying in yesterdays post is not that I am a doctrinal relativist but rather that I believe salvific confession is more than cognitive affirmations. Salvation is political allegiance. It is allegiance to Israel’s Messiah, Jesus Christ, whom God has crowed as Lord of the world. Since Jesus is Lord it is an imperative that we pledge allegiance to his Kingdom because this is God’s decision and to deny Christ is to rebel against God!
I am not saying that this is all one affirms and then one can sit on their hands. There is so much this confession implies. It implies that if Christ is King there is a Kingdom. If Christ was raised there is something we must know about future expectation like fulfilled reign, a judgment, and so forth. If Christ was raised by God there is a God we must know. This is the primary. This is the beginning confession. It is the starting point of entering the Kingdom of God.
What about the other doctrines? Those matter as well, but there is something we must consider: if the Spirit has brought a person to confess Christ as Lord then we must rely on that same Spirit to lead said believer into further truth. If a person does not affirm this or that core doctrine, creeds, or council this does not mean they are not part of the people of God, the church. It could (if the person has begun to reject God as more is made know to them) but it doesn’t necessarily do so.
Thoughts? What do you think of this as a primary (not necessarily a final, not the only, not merely the first) confession?
the archives near Emmaus 
“Salvation is political allegiance. It is allegiance to Israel’s Messiah, Jesus Christ, whom God has crowed as Lord of the world. Since Jesus is Lord it is an imperative that we pledge allegiance to his Kingdom because this is God’s decision and to deny Christ is to rebel against God! ”
And with that, I am convinced. Your position is basically articulating where I stand.
Confession/repentance comes first, and then teaching subsequently after. Just like the ordering of the Gospels when you consider it; Jesus and his cousin John the baptist are preaching “hell-fire & brimstone,” and by the end, Jesus is teaching (still) at the Near Emmaus moment. 🙂
I feel like I’m a little late to an ongoing conversation you’re been having with your readers and with yourself on these issues so forgive me if you have addressed the following question earlier:
While I understand you are attempting to describe, “the actual boundaries within which I have functioned” regarding standards for fellowship and are open to fine tuning them, have you thought about the reasons you feel the need to define those limits? How do these boundaries function? In other words instead of trying to answer the question who to exclude from fellowship I’d like to know why you would exclude persons from fellowship to begin with. What does that do for those who are included in your fellowship, what does it do to those excluded?
“I asked myself, “What did the earliest churches hold in common?” I am not going to say this is the only confession, but this is where I started: (1) Jesus is Lord and (2) Jesus had been raised from the dead.”
I’m not sure this is, strictly speaking, true. Early Ebionite communities would have rejected the first and many (perhaps not all) early Gnostic churches would have rejected the second.
@Dan: These boundaries function like all boundaries. There is a sense of who is in and who is out. This is not the primary point, but rather an example of the type of allegiance expected from the apostolic proclamation of the gospel.
There was condemning heresy very early. While we cannot say every individual Christian of Ebionite or gnostic persuasion was lost we can be fairly confident that these movements as a whole are rightly condemned.
@Rod: It is sort of a faith seeking understanding approach. One doesn’t need to know and affirm all orthodoxy to enter the kingdom, but if we want to know God we will be confronted with further truth along the journey and that confrontation will test the reality of our faith.
Brian,
This guy certainly wouldn’t agree with you. http://jackhammer.wordpress.com/2010/12/30/a-leaky-container-and-its-spoiled-contents/
Not that I agree with him, mind you. I just thought you’d be interested to see his perspective.
Brian,
On this sense of who is in and out: what does this sense do to those who are ‘in’ making them more receptive to the apostolic preaching of the gospel? What does this sense do to those who are ‘out’ making them more receptive to the apostolic preaching of the gospel? I’m not seeing exactly how that is supposed to work.
On the Gnostics and Ebionites: Why can we be confident that they have been rightly condemned? They certainly represented a large segment of of the earliest churches and they did not hold in common the two beliefs that you had discussed as being held in common by the earliest churches. So if these beliefs are not primary because of their universality in early Christian communities, why should we consider them primary?
@Jason: Thank you for sharing. If I understand it correctly he see true ecclesiology as essentially the self governing of individual churches, for better or worse. I guess there is some yes and no to that. I go to a non-denominational church that would be self governing, but I don’t think it is the only way to do it.
@Dan: There would be a few historical reasons for denouncing both the gnostics and the Ebionites. Let me begin with the Ebionites. It appears that the earliest gathering of apostles and church elders would be the Acts 15 council. It is hear that the church finally made a decision regarding Gentile Christians. It would appear to me that the Ebionites refused to comply by maintaining Judaistic boundary markers which prevented the Kingdom of God from welcome Gentiles. Their first heresy would be simply not recognizing the implications of the New Covenant Spirit.
Does that mean each and every Ebionite was not saved? No way to know such a thing, especially since our knowledge of the sect is so limited. But there is good reason for their disappearing into history. They were wrong. They were not in step with the apostolic council. They were against the gospel’s foremost implications in bringing down the wall between Jews and Gentiles.
As to the gnostics this is difficult because there is not really one group known as the “Gnostics”. Gnosticism is several heretical sects tied together through some commonalities. Their greatest errors are the opposite of the Ebionites. They retold the Christian story ripping it from its roots.
Now Paul may be accused of something similar, and that is another debate, but I think anyone who has read Paul knows that as radical as his thoughts may have been he was still a Jews amongst Jews.
Gnosticism reinvented the whole narrative of Torah at times. Some gnostics made the good evil and the evil good (e.g. Cain was a good person.). The God of Israel was depicted as evil which would have stood in direct contrast to the apostolic claims we see both in the documents that now make our New Testament as well as what we see from the earliest church theologians.
It denounced the created order (something that sadly many Christians do today, especially many with dispensationalist eschatologies). There was more Platonic dogma than Jewish dogma, or I should say a Platonic narrative rather than a Jewish narrative. And for all intents and purposes it departed drastically from Jewish monotheism toward a form of polytheism.
Again, each group would stand condemned for this or that error. When I suggest that the Lordship and resurrection of Christ are primary confessions we must note that this is done in the context of the story of Israel, something most gnostics, and folk like Marcion, wished to erase.
I think we need to include such gospel-oriented doctrines as complementarianism, inerreancy and the like. How will the gospel ever survive if we don’t include issues like these in our boundary markers?
/sarcasm
Clearly this issue has been a little more than upsetting for me: http://www.anwoth.org/series/the-adjusted-gospel-of-t4g/. Thanks for letting me rant briefly.
Brian,
This last response is very helpful, thanks.
Your position is more complex than it had first appeared. It seems that your standard must meet these criteria:
1) The primary confession must have its origins in some, but not necessarily all, early Christian communities.
2) The primary confession must not conflict with an orthodox Christian reading of the witness of the Hebrew Bible. (There needs to be exegetical and theological legwork done here for what constitutes an orthodox reading)
3) The primary confession must not conflict with an orthodox Christian reading of the witness of the New Testament. (There needs to be exegetical and theological legwork done here for what constitutes an orthodox reading)
4) The primary confession must be proclaimed currently by some, but not necessarily all, modern Christian communities. (Would it require a continuous proclamation since the time of the earliest Christian communities?)
Two and three make this very tricky. It seems like you’d need a whole biblical theology to actually work this out to apply to individual communions!
@Will: Ha! Oh yes, I forgot about those vital doctines! 🙂
@Dan: One of the struggles of narrowing this sort of thing down is the one Marc Cortez noted in my post on the Apostle’s Creed: there is a difference between (1) salvation, (2) fellowship, and (3) orthodoxy. As concerns salvation this is something that God knows and I do not. I do not know if there will be some gnostic Christians resurrected to eternal life, or some Arians, and what not. I do not think I would fellowship with gnostics then or now since I see it as a great distortion and I am very sure they are not orthodox.
So yes, it is a bit more complicated and it is something I intend on addressing more in depth about a week from now.
As regards (1) yes, it should originate in one of the communities that proved to be orthodox (I do not see Ebionites and/or most gnostic sects included).
As regards (2) this is trickier, but I do think we have a fairly consistent meta-reading of the Hebrew Scriptures from those communities that proved to be orthodox.
As regards (3) this is a debate we can have over time, but I will say now that I do not think the Ebionites read our now NT well (one may argue they could have used Mt.). I do not see the gnostics as getting much of anything right and there understanding of Christ is hardly Jewish and most Platonic. We can ponder others over time if the subject arises.
As regard (4), maybe you can clarify what you mean for me, because I am not sure I am grasping it.
“As regards (1) yes, it should originate in one of the communities that proved to be orthodox (I do not see Ebionites and/or most gnostic sects included).”
Then it appears this is not a necessary condition for fellowship or orthodoxy. What early figures in the church said is being relevant is wholly dependent on condition 4.
“As regards (2) this is trickier, but I do think we have a fairly consistent meta-reading of the Hebrew Scriptures from those communities that proved to be orthodox.”
I’d be really interested to see what this orthodox meta-reading would entail.
“As regards (3) this is a debate we can have over time, but I will say now that I do not think the Ebionites read our now NT well (one may argue they could have used Mt.). I do not see the gnostics as getting much of anything right and there understanding of Christ is hardly Jewish and most Platonic. We can ponder others over time if the subject arises.”
Again, I’d be interested to see what this reading of the New Testament would be.
Regarding four: In order for the standard to be valid it must be currently professed. This is one of the reasons that you gave for dismissing the gnostic and ebionite readings, they no longer exist, they lost the historical fight. God in his providence preserved the faith (Presumably throughout human history). This is why I think that my first condition was now a misreading of your position. It’s not really important what early Christian communities believed or professed. What is essential is what contemporary Christian Communities believe and profess.
Basically I think your conditions for fellowship are an orthodox reading of the scriptures (Although I’m not really sure what this entails for you) which is shared by some contemporary Christian community.
@Dan:
(1) No, I wouldn’t say that the first is dependent upon the fourth. Rather, as F.F. Bruce said about these communities, “They deserved to lose” to history. If the Spirit guided the church we can feel confident that gnostic groups and Ebionites that would have been disastrous to Christian doctrine over the years had they won the day rightly disappeared as God led his church. Again, gnostic groups are light years away from the apostolic church, and I think most good historians would note this. Ebionites are likely closer, but again they tried to keep Christianity an etho-centric religion which it appears from the Pauline and Lukan writings was exactly not what the early church recognized as a characteristic of the New Covenant.
(2) The overarching reading of the Old Testament from a Christian vantage point seems to have many details. Some examples may be the call of Abraham to bless the world, Israel’s role in doing this while remaining loyal to the Creator/Covenant God, according to Paul the Law’s temporary role of constituting Israel, the New Covenant promise of the indwelling Spirit, and the Messiah. The resurrection further led to reinterpretations of the Old Covenant based on the apocalyptic Christ event. We need to see the OT primarily through this event.
(3) An overarching “NT theology” is difficult, but there do seem to be some basics: (1) Jesus is Lord; (2) God raised Jesus from the dead; (3) Jesus’ parousia and the coming judgment; (4) the promised Holy Spirit has arrived; (5) the Gentiles are now part of the people of God; (6) mission; (7) certain rites of initiation and remembrance such as baptism and communion. That’s off the top of my head.
And no, not every epistle will capture all these elements. That is not what I am trying to say.
I think your final conclusion is a bit cart-before-the-horse. Modern communities, that reflect particular orthodox doctrines, exist because the apostolic doctrine that was essential for the church to survive was preserved by the Spirit. But this is a conversation that needs a post in itself. Maybe 2011 will bring it.
Brian,
1) I may have misunderstood your initial motivation for your inquiry here. It seemed that you had become uncomfortable with a purely textual (Hebrew Bible and New Testament) sources for your criterion for orthodoxy and fellowship. You believed a historical approach was necessary as well, rooted in the confessions of pre-Nicean Christian communities. The fact of the matter is pre-Nicean Christianity is very diverse. Gnostic and Ebonite Christians worshiped in the same churches and synagogues as proto-orthodox Christians. According to latter day Orthodox theology they certainly are light years away theologically but that wasn’t how it was viewed in the early christian church itself. Valentinus was almost made Bishop of Rome! If you judge this history in terms of later established Orthodox texts and theology you’re not really engaging the history of the early Christian Church. You’re begging the question.
2) This seems like a fairly standard orthodox Christian reading of the text and so does 3.
The problem is, this brings you back to the place you started, a standard devised from purely textual sources (Hebrew Bible and New Testament). The historical investigation is self selecting out individual persons and traditions on the basis of fidelity to your interpretation of the text and their present existence, which, in addition to being attributed to divine providence, also happens to be the theological space you presently inhabit.
I can appreciate your position but fail to understand the need you feel to bring in a historical argument which really doesn’t add anything to it.
@Dan:
This does not prevent us from asking whether or not someone like Valentinius aligns with the teachings we find in the synoptic gospels and/or the Pauline epistles, for example. So I can see what you are saying, but I don’t think I am doing exactly what you are saying. There is a difference between trying to determine if there was a proto-orthodoxy from a historical perspective (I think there was) and the theological question of whether nor orthodoxy today is the legitimate child of proto-orthodoxy.
“There would be a few historical reasons for denouncing both the gnostics and the Ebionites. Let me begin with the Ebionites. It appears that the earliest gathering of apostles and church elders would be the Acts 15 council. It is hear that the church finally made a decision regarding Gentile Christians. It would appear to me that the Ebionites refused to comply by maintaining Judaistic boundary markers which prevented the Kingdom of God from welcome Gentiles. Their first heresy would be simply not recognizing the implications of the New Covenant Spirit.
Does that mean each and every Ebionite was not saved? No way to know such a thing, especially since our knowledge of the sect is so limited. But there is good reason for their disappearing into history. They were wrong. They were not in step with the apostolic council. They were against the gospel’s foremost implications in bringing down the wall between Jews and Gentiles.”
Brian
Just how do you come to the conclusion that the Ebionites refused to comply. The Ebionites were not those that were being addressd here, it was those holding on to the traditions of the jews.There was no requirement for a NONJEW to be circumcised (Isaiah 56)to be apart of the old or renewed covenant.The Ebionites were the original christians who did nt adhere to the oral law, the ones in acts 15 were. Paul himself was said to be a leader of this group by one of there other names they were known by. These groups divided after the wars because of the hatred towards anything jewish