The three Creeds, Nicene Creed, Athanasius’s Creed, and that which is commonly called the Apostles’ Creed, ought thoroughly to be received and believed: for they may be proved by most certain warrants of holy Scripture. The pursuit of a wholesome goal of sound doctrine, increasingly valued and ever incisively probed, healthy living permeated by love for God and others, in the unity of the Holy Spirit and expressed in a churchly context, is at the heart of Christ’s purpose for us here and now.

We believe “in one holy catholic and apostolic church” appears in what is today known as the Nicene Creed, compiled at the First Council of Constantinople in AD 381. It was there that the Trinitarian controversy was resolved after having raged through most of the fourth century. Among its declarations concerning the Son and the Holy Spirit, the indivisible Trinity, came statements on the church and the sacraments. This creed received ecumenical approval, originating in the Greek church, received and approved also by the Latins and consequently acknowledged and confessed down through the centuries ever since.

This creed was based on an earlier one issued by the Council of Nicaea in AD 325, which had met to counter Arius and his sympathizers, who asserted that the Son was not coeternal with the Father but was a creature—a superior creature, of course, since He was God’s primary agent in the creation of the universe, but a creature nonetheless. The original creed of Nicaea, which should be distinguished from our Nicene Creed, said nothing about the church and sacraments and little about the Holy Spirit, whose status had not yet come up for discussion. What the Council of Constantinople did, in inserting claims about the church, was to recognize that ecclesiology is connected to the heart of the gospel, an outflow of the revelation of God as Trinity.

The Nicene Creed asserted that the church is one. There is only one people of God throughout all times. The church is holy, since it belongs to God. It is catholic, found throughout the world, not merely in Israel. It is Apostolic, founded on the ministry and teaching of the Apostles. Some might balk at giving credence to a statement devised by man, thinking that its particular claims are external to the gospel itself. Why should allegiance be requested to a confession of bishops when the Scriptures are the very Word of God and sufficient for all purposes in this life?

Such an objection misses the point that the product of the Council of Constantinople was the result of the accumulated biblical exegesis of the early church and of its bishops, who themselves were pastors, engaged in preaching several times a week to their parishioners. Moreover, this exegesis was integrally connected with the gospel, as borne out by the assertion earlier in the creed that God’s revelation was “for us men and for our salvation.” It follows the biblical example of Apostolic preaching in Acts, where in each case of reported sermons by Peter, the Apostle mentions the Apostolic witness to Christ’s resurrection, thereby including the witness of the foundational leaders of the church, as integral to the gospel message (Acts 2:32; 3:15; 5:32; 10:40–41).

Moreover, the statement “one holy catholic and apostolic church” is based on Paul’s discussion in Ephesians 2. There he maintains that the church of Jesus Christ is one body. Not even the division between Jew and gentile can breach it, for by His death on the cross, Jesus broke down the dividing wall of hostility, evidenced in the law of commandments, and made the two into one new man in Christ (Eph. 2:14–16). The church is holy, since it belongs to God, its Head and Ruler is Christ the Son, and it is indwelt by the Holy Spirit as His temple (vv. 21–22). It is catholic, for catholic literally means “universal”—the church is found throughout the world, in accordance with God’s eternal plan and in fulfillment of Christ’s commission to make the nations of the world His disciples (Matt. 28:19–20; Eph. 2:17). It is Apostolic, since it is founded on the Apostles and prophets, their teaching being its bedrock, their authority delegated by Christ Himself and thus equivalent to His own (Eph. 2:20). Hence, a repudiation of the Constantinopolitan formula is effectively a rejection of the biblical portrayal of the church of Jesus Christ and of the authority of Christ, its Head.

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