Monday, September 26, 2005
John 11:27 She said to Him, "Yes, Lord, I believe that You are the Christ, the Son of God, who is to come into the world."
I BELIEVE
By nature, all people have a belief in a "god." Both our conscience within, and the world without clearly reveal to us the existence of God. But what the world and our conscience cannot tell us is who that God is. It is only the Word of God that can reveal who that God is, and what He has done for us and the rest of our human race. The Bible reveals that it is the triune God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit who is the God that we all know to exist.
Over the centuries, many confessions have been made about this God. In our text we have a confession made by Martha. We may also remember the confessions made by Peter, Thomas and many others recorded for us in the pages of Holy Scripture. These confessions of faith are a statement of what those individuals believed. Martha says, "Lord, I believe . . ."
These confessions of faith are also known as "creeds" (the word credo is the Latin word meaning "I believe"). Creeds began very short but grew in length over time, as the need arose to combat error and defend the truth of God's Word. Such creeds have been used through the centuries as confessions of individuals, and groups of individuals. The Creeds that we use (like the Apostles', Nicene, and Athanasian, as well as our Lutheran confessions) are not inspired by God, but are the confessions of humans based on the truth of God's inspired Word. They are summaries of the doctrines of the Bible, they aid us in our understanding of Scripture, and our instruction of our children, and they distinguish the True God from the heathen religions around us.
In following devotions we will be studying the parts of the Apostles' Creed, in which we confess our belief in the one true God. In this Creed the basics of the Christian faith are summarized in simple Scriptural language beginning with the creation of the world in the beginning, and ending with the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting in heaven. May the LORD strengthen us as we study the words of Scripture, and confess what it teaches!
