The Apostles’ Creed has lasted throughout the centuries because God has always been the creed’s kind of God, and because Christians have always been going through the same experiences as the first Christians who set up the Creed. God has always been the creator, the only true creator, and he always will be creator. He didn’t become Father for the first time the day Jesus was born. The Son of God came into this world from the depths of the eternal Father. The Holy Ghost did not come into existence when Jesus left this earthly scene. It was by his Holy Spirit that God first created the worlds for purposes enwrapped in his Son. Because God has always been and always will be Father, Son, Holy Ghost, I know that he will not change his mind toward his world. His Word in the Christ of the Creed will never become false or outmoded. His last word about the universe will be the same as his first word. Man-made gods may come and go. They are as fickle as human fancies. But this eternal God, whom I know through Jesus, enables me to go about my business, living with a good deal of joyful confidence. I know how things are. I know what to expect.
That’s why I’m not surprised that the same kinds of things that happened to New Testament Christians can also happen to people today, even to me. The Word of Christ which remained with us after he disappeared as a bodily presence has been operating in his church and world ever since. This same Word has been implanted in me like a seed of Christ by faithful parents, friends, and servants of the Lord. The ageless Creator Spirit is at work with that Word, growing something of Christ in me day by day, shaping up in me something of Christ’s compassion and love for reality. He rebukes me and stretches me, subtracting here and adding there. Somehow I can say that Christ really dwells in my heart. Under these circumstances I’ve just got to believe in the Father God, because the Spirit of his Son keeps reaching out to him from within me. I must acknowledge Christ as the Son of God because I know that it is Christ’s Spirit in me that has set my no-good heart a-yearning for his Father and home. Who could convince me that his Spirit has not done this? Who else could turn my life on, as he has?
Wherever the Word of Christ has gone throughout the centuries, Christians have appeared. In making Christians, the God of the Creed proves himself. The outgoing God who so loved men that he laid aside his own glory and came into the thick of human life still goes out to all men through me and his church. The Creed’s story is relevant to the whole human race. All men are creatures of a fatherly kind of God. All men wrestle with the same kind of human nature that was worn by God the Son. The Spirit of truth and love is a healing power for everyone. The Creed of the Trinity is indeed a Creed for apostles: men sent out by God to the whole world.
Books by Dr. John A. Ross
