(W-4.4003c) The task of identifying the essential tenets was easier when American Presbyterians were dealing only with the Westminster Standards (Confession + two catechisms). Today the Presbyterian Church (USA) has a Book of Confessions—eleven documents spanning almost 2,000 years—which makes the task more difficult. The PC(USA) is now going through a time of upheaval—probably an historic paradigm shift—which makes the conversation over essentials crucial for the church. The Fellowship of Presbyterians has recently drawn up a list of “essential tenets,” which puts the task front-and-center.
The most straightforward way to identify essential tenets is to link them closely to the key insights of each creed or confession in its historical context. The following proposal does that, taking the form of rewriting “The Church and Its Confessions,” Foundations Chapter 2 of the current PC(USA) Book of Order (F-2). Neither the PC(USA) Book of Order nor the Fellowship list of tenets takes the approach proposed here. Both of them could.
On the face of it, the Book of Order, F-2, gives us no compelling reason to take the confessions seriously. Section F-2.01 assigns them a limited role in the church, highlighted by their historical origins. Section F-2.02 then subordinates the confessions to the Bible and invites an ongoing reform of them. The next three sections (F-2.03-.05) rank the confessions from those universally accepted by all Christians (the Catholic creeds, Apostles’/Nicene, from the Early Church) to those less-widely accepted (by 16th Century Protestants), to those held only by people in the Reformed tradition (no time frame). The substance in each section is minimal and incomplete. Overall, the chapter diminishes the value of the confessions, portraying them as secondary documents, stuck in the past, imminently changeable, and, except for the two ecumenical creeds, increasingly sectarian. Sectarian claims, we know, don’t work today.
The Fellowship list of essential tenets follows the same track. Section I establishes the Word of God as “The Sole Authority for Our Confession.” Section II identifies Trinity and Incarnation as “The Two Central Christian Mysteries.” Section III elaborates “Essentials of the Reformed Tradition.” The list aims for the core of the confessions, without grounding individual tenets in a particular confession or context, and so risks creating a confession above the confessions. Once again, the list contrasts universal tenets (Sect. II) and those more narrowly held (Sect. III), leaving Reformed tenets largely sectarian and tribal.
Section III borrows its topics from the PC(USA) Book of Order F-2.05, but elaborates these as an order of salvation: creation, sin-and-fall, salvation through Christ, faith, the transformed life of individual-church-and-world, looking to eternal life at the end. This sequence (order) of salvation probably cannot avoid an Arminian theology of response, and works righteousness as well. Surprisingly, in speaking of salvation as human transformation, the Fellowship tenets sound very much like their liberal counterparts. The document states openly the distinctly Modernist-Pietist confidence (1650-1950/present) that, united with Christ, we can share his divine nature, like him mediate and extend God’s redeeming love or grace to others, and be holy as he is holy. The high Christology of Section II does not protect us from an inflated doctrine of humanity in Section III: with salvation the uniqueness of Christ is simply spread to humanity. The only difference between right and left here is how extensively salvation takes effect.
The Fellowship list of essential tenets is well-intentioned, thoughtful, and well-crafted. We still have to ask: Are these the essential tenets set forth by our confessions? Are they a confession above the confessions or even an attempt at a new one? Do they address where the Gospel may really be at risk in the 21st Century?
“Essential tenets,” I believe, do have a place in the Presbyterian Church. They signal, as the Fellowship clearly recognizes, that the main issues before us are theological, not programmatic. As the Fellowship list demonstrates, however, PC(USA) liberals and conservatives have much more in common than what divides them. The larger theological and ecclesiastical problems we face today arise from what they hold in common, not their differences. Our partisan disputes only hide the points at which the Gospel itself is at risk, amidst a major, historic paradigm shift from one era to another. Turning back to the confessions and the essentials they teach can help us rediscover the Gospel for our own time, place, and setting. This alternative proposal is an effort in that direction, a Third Way into the future, if you will, for Presbyterians together seeking the Lord’s will for the whole Christian Church in our time.
Three other perceptions inform the following proposal:
1. The confessions cannot and do not say everything we believe. They address mainly the issues under fire at times when the Gospel was at risk. They show us again and again where the heart of the Gospel lays.
2. Since confessions arise most often at specific moments when the Gospel was at risk, essential tenets, even in their most universal truth claims, are clearest and most readily understood in terms of the historical situation and the confessions from which they come.
3. Neither the Reformed tradition nor its confessions are inherently sectarian. Reformed confessions at their best reflect the universal intent to find, confess, and live the truth of the Gospel for a given moment. Faith itself drives believers to understand every moment in terms of God’s majestic presence, gracious activity, and saving purposes.
Re-writing Foundations: The Church and Its Confessions.
2.01 The Origin of Confessions
The creeds and confessions of the Presbyterian Church originate with believing Christians striving to make sense of their lives within the presence and purposes of God. Centered upon Jesus Christ, they hold dear the Gospel which defines their lives by his Life. At particular times, places, and historical situations the Church has to declare the truth of this Gospel in clear and unequivocal terms, especially at moments of confusion, dispute, or hardship. With careful attention to Scripture, discernment, thought, prayer, and discussion, faithful Christians put into words the points at which the Gospel is most at risk. Then they invite all Christians, everywhere, and for all time, to join in confessing that truth for that moment in those words. So confessing the Gospel for that moment links a “great cloud of witnesses” (Heb 12:1) across the ages, shapes and forms Christians today, and prepares Christians to face the issues of the faith in a different time and place.
2.02 The Role of Confessions for a Confessional Church
a. Jesus Christ, as presented in the Scriptures, is the true, active head of the Christian Church and Lord over all of life. Therefore, the Scriptures, interpreted and enlivened by the Spirit, are the true revelation of the Gospel and the final authority for the life and governance of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). All other authorities, including the confessions, are subordinate to the Scriptures. The confessions are nonetheless part of the church’s Constitution and authoritative for the ordained officers, councils, and governance of this church.
b. By these statements the church declares to its members and to all people who it is, what it believes, and what it resolves to do. The confessions assist the church in the worship and service of God. They guide the church in its study and interpretation of the Scriptures. They join Christians together as a community centered in the truth of the Gospel. They guide the ordained officers of the church in the daily practice of their ministries. At times of major confusion, change, challenge, or temptation they provide occasions for the church to seek understanding, clarify its doctrine, and publicly confess its faith in Jesus Christ. They bring the Christian community back to the central affirmations of the Gospel.
2.03 The Confessions of the Early Church
The Constitution includes the Nicene and Apostles’ creeds from a time when the Christian Church declared its faith amidst a pagan culture. Christians far and wide have confirmed Trinitarian language for God ever since. Central to the Gospel is the incarnation of God as the human Jesus Christ, whose birth, life, death, and resurrection are the decisive act of God for the salvation of the world. According to the Scriptures, God is to Jesus as inseparably as Father is to Son, in the line of God’s everlasting covenant with David (II Samuel 7:13-14a). God the Father and God the Son come together in the unity and power of God the Spirit. Christians thus baptize all disciples into the name and mystery of the Father and of the Son and of the Spirit (Matt. 28:19)—the one, true, living God, in whom we live and move and have our being.
2.04 The Confessions of the Protestant Reformation (1517-1650)
The Constitution includes six confessions from the Protestant Reformation, namely, the Scots Confession (1560), Heidelberg Catechism (1563), Second Helvetic Confession (1566), plus the Westminster Confession of Faith, Shorter, and Larger Catechisms (1646f). During this time the church sought to reform its own confused and divided message, misplaced worship, and corrupt practices. Central to the Gospel is the affirmation, based on the Scriptures alone, that Jesus Christ is the sole Savior of sinners, Head of the Church, and Lord over life. United with Christ by the gift of faith, Christians find their lives in communion with God and in community with one another. The Protestant watchwords—Christ alone, faith alone, Scripture alone, grace alone, and the Christian community centered in Christ (Word, Sacraments, and Ordered Ministries)—continue to move and guide Christians in their walk with God.
2.05 The Confessions of Modernism-Pietism (1650-1950/present)
The Constitution includes three, more recent confessions as well, from a time when the surrounding culture tried to co-opt the Gospel for itself. Under Nazism, the Church affirmed (Barmen Declaration, Germany, 1934) as central to the Gospel that Jesus Christ, as presented by the Scriptures, is the only true source of revelation and redemptive life. Christians recognize and listen to his voice alone, and they follow him as their Lord and sole Head of the Church. Similarly, in a technological world mystified by human brokenness, often accepting it as normal, the Church affirmed (Confession of 1967, USA, 1967) as central to the Gospel that Jesus Christ—as both Old and New Testaments bear historical witness to him—reconciles all things to God (Colossians 1:10). Within God’s Trinitarian framework, Christ thus gives to the world its hope for life, and to the Christian Church its mission. The mission of reconciliation extends to the salvation of sinners and to healing brokenness everywhere. A Brief Statement of Faith (1996) marked the reunion of American Presbyterians, long-separated after the American Civil War (1860-65).
2.6 A Living, Reformed Tradition
a. The confessions of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) manifest a living tradition, rooted in the living God. Central to this tradition is the affirmation of the majesty, holiness, and providence of God who in Christ and by the power of the Spirit creates, sustains, rules, and redeems the world in the freedom of sovereign righteousness and love. Other great themes related to God’s sovereignty include:
The election of the people of God for service as well as for salvation;
Covenant life marked by a disciplined concern for order in the church according to the Word of God;
A faithful stewardship that shuns ostentation and seeks proper use of the gifts of
God’s creation; and
The recognition of the human tendency to idolatry and tyranny, which calls the people of God to work for the transformation of society by seeking justice and living in obedience to the Word of God.
b. In keeping with the call of a living God to be faithful in every age, especially when the Gospel is at risk, the Presbyterian Church (USA) welcomes new confessions. Ecclesia reformata, semper reformanda secundum verbum Dei, that is, “The church reformed, always to be reformed according to the Word of God” in the power of the Spirit.
Merwyn Johnson, is visiting professor of theology, Union Presbyterian Seminary in Charlotte, N.C., and retired professor of theology, Erskine Theological Seminary in Due West, S.C.
