What I Have Learned by Memorizing the Nicene Creed

Growing up in the Catholic Church, I had to memorize prayers, creeds, and responses. I had started walking with the Lord as a thirteen year old at a Protestant summer camp, but continued to honor my mom by attending the Catholic Church with her on a weekly basis. When I was in confirmation class, I was challenged by the questions that the group leaders were asking and began to really look at what I believed versus what the Church was telling me to believe. It was in the years following that I found myself in a variety main line Protestant Churches, few of which recited any creeds or formal prayers.

Upon reading the syllabus for my class this semester, I was challenged to know (and would be graded on knowing) the Nicene Creed and the Definition of Chalcedon. My first instinct was a cringe and then a sigh of relief that I already knew one by memory. I struggle with memorizing anything and as a teacher I struggle with the reality that students have to memorize things, especially in a world with the Internet constantly at our fingertips. So why in the world would it be a good thing to memorize creeds. It wasn’t just memorizing them. It was about knowing, believing, and living it out in my daily life.

Knowing the Nicene Creed was simple as it was stuck in my head, with the perfect stanzas, breaths, pauses, and pitches. But did I really know it? Because knowing it meant that I knew what it was about and the story behind the words I had put to memory. As part of the class reading assignments, we read about the heresies that led to the writing of the creeds and it was in the reading that I began to understand why it was so important to those in the early years of the church that “We believe in one God.” They didn’t believe in three gods, but one Triune God in three persons. Many had argued against it and the thinkers and philosophers of that time could not wrap their heads around the mystery of the Trinity. Learned people fought against the idea because no where in the bible will one find the word “trinity” but God reveals himself as the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. To know the Nicene Creed meant I had to begin to wrap my head around what led to the writing of it.

Believing the Nicene Creed is something I was incredibly comfortable with, as I had said the creed weekly in Catholic Mass for nineteen years of my life. It was actually easier to believe than to know and comprehend what it meant. Believing meant that I trust and live by faith that there is one God who made heaven and earth. He is also the same God that is the Son, eternally begotten of the Father, who was born of the Virgin Mary, and died on a cross and was resurrected for us and for our salvation. And he is, furthermore, the Holy Spirit that indwells in each believer. It was a few weeks into the semester when I was part of the online community for the IF Gathering. The one thing that they said that they believed was the Nicene Creed. “Why?” I questioned, as if it weren’t enough. But when I read why they have this as their statement of belief, I was affirmed that I believed this as well.

In response to great division and theological disputes in the first three centuries of the church, a council formed to bring unity and agreement over the most essential doctrines of Christianity. One of the creeds that has stood the test of time is the Nicene Creed. This creed became a guiding statement of faith for the Church. We now find ourselves divided over many many things - and yet about the most important things we whole heartedly agree.

(If Gathering Website: http://ifgathering.com/who-we-are/)

All of that is true, but I think as I began to know and understand the background of the creed, I understood that we as Christians can find unity with what we believe, if this is what we really believe.

Living out the Nicene Creed isn’t simply repeating it in unison as it once was in my childhood. To live out the Nicene Creed is to live out the Gospel of Jesus Christ, to live out the biblical truth from Genesis to Revelation, to rest assured in the deity and humanity of the one that walked this Earth, Jesus Christ. Loving others because of the Holy Spirit means that I am dying to myself and loving others as Christ loved the church, living sacrificially. 

Knowing what was written and the history behind why it was written drove me to deeper belief and trust in what the church fathers believed and trusted. It has given me a greater enthusiasm to not only know this creed and repeat it, but to sacrifice myself daily for the sake of others knowing the God of the Universe, the Father Almighty, the Lord Jesus Christ, the life giving/breathing Holy Spirit.

As you look over the words of the Nicene Creed below, I encourage you to dig deeply and struggle with what you really believe. What would it look like for all Christian Churches to agree on one Creed, one belief statement? This is what the Fathers of the Faith wanted. Would the creedal statement look like this, or is this not enough?

THE NICENE CREED (A.D. 381)

We believe in one God,
the Father, the Almighty,
Maker of heaven and earth,
of all that is, seen and unseen.
We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ,
the only Son of God,
eternally begotten of the Father,
God from God, Light from Light,
true God from true God,
begotten, not made,
of one Being with the Father.
Through him all things were made.
For us and for our salvation
he came down from heaven:
by the power of the Holy Spirit
he became incarnate from the Virgin Mary,
and was made man.
For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate;
he suffered death and was buried.
On the third day he rose again
in accordance with the Scriptures;
he ascended into heaven
and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead, and his kingdom will have no end.
We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son.
With the Father and the Son he is worshipped and glorified. He has spoken through the Prophets.
We believe in one holy catholic and apostolic Church. We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins. We look for the resurrection of the dead,
and the life of the world to come. Amen.

http://www.iclnet.org/pub/resources/christian-history.html.