Fleshly Words Well-Pleasing to God

Some have expressed concern that Evangelical and Reformed churches offer to God man-made creeds, catechisms and confessions of faith, and it’s put forth, shouldn’t the Scriptures be our sole spoken word offered in the public service of worship?

Many claim the authority of Scripture—let’s recite sections of Scripture, say, a Psalm or one of Paul’s letters; that’s Scripture! We do not at all disparage the authority of the Bible when we cite the man-made creeds and confessions, any more than discredit or depreciate the office of the pastor when he’s in the pulpit preaching, teaching and exhorting. Just as faithful man-made words from the pastor in the pulpit make for a well-pleasing offering of worship, so are the faithful man-made words offered by the whole of the congregation with her collective confessing voice.

Biblical, expository preaching proclaims, expounds and applies Jesus Christ—and all full of Scripture, scriptural portions, allusions and points; in a like manner, historic creeds of faithful men as they are confessed are freighted full of Scripture and scriptural portions. In this way, the vocabulary word-choice and the specific phraseology of Christian doctrine recited in the creeds builds up God’s people with equipping as God’s visible people of history.

Confessions of the church make strikingly clear that the visible, historic church marks herself as earthly and this-worldly and tells God and one another that she’s catholic throughout the globe (He’s Lord of all places and peoples) and catholic down through the generations (He is Lord of time).

God is Lord in history and works through history; He works through those with bodies, brains and bowels. He works for “us men and our salvation.” The creeds and catechisms are the fruit of the church’s hands. Men and women who confess their faith are not afraid of fleshly, man-made words. God gave us the gift of the church, let's be the church.

G. Mark Sumpter