On behalf of your Christian brothers and sisters, welcome to the homepage of the Reformed Evangelical Synod of America.
Our calling is to live out the mandate of our Lord known as the Great Commission to make disciples of all the nations. It is our conviction that we serve the Risen Lord; the One who empowers His people to spread His worship and glory across the nations and through the generations among those who consider themselves classically evangelical, reformed, and vitally connected to the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic church.
We welcome you to join us on the journey.
+Chuck Huckaby
Bishop
Reformed Evangelical Synod of America
This creedal statement is often associated with Athanasius of Alexandria, a bishop in the fourth century, and a fervent defender of the doctrine of the Trinity which, in his era, was under attack by many factions within the Christian Church. While he almost certainly did not compose this creedal statement, many of his teachings can be found within it. While this Creed gained only spotty acceptance in the Churches of the East, it is considered one of the foundations of Trinitarian Theology in the Western Church.
The following text is a generally accepted translation of this creedal statement, but is amended, following the example of the Russian Orthodox, to omit the ‘filioque’ clause which plagues the acceptance of this document by many Eastern Churches.
In keeping with Anglican liturgical tradition, this Creed may be fittingly proclaimed in services on Trinity Sunday, and at other times or settings as appropriate.
Whoever wishes to be saved must, above all else, hold to the true catholic faith.
Whoever does not keep this faith pure in all points will certainly perish forever.
Now this is the true catholic faith: We worship one God in three persons and three persons in one God, without mixing the persons or dividing the divine being. For each person — the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit — is distinct, but the deity of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is one, equal in glory and coeternal in majesty. What the Father is, so is the Son, and so is the Holy Spirit.
The Father is uncreated, the Son uncreated, and the Holy Spirit uncreated; The Father is eternal, the Son eternal, and the Holy Spirit eternal. And yet they are not three who are eternal, but there is one who is eternal, just as they are not three who are uncreated, nor three who are infinite, but there is one who is uncreated and one who is infinite.
In the same way the Father is almighty, the Son is almighty, and the Holy Spirit is almighty. And yet they are not three who are almighty, but there is one who is almighty. So the Father is God, the Son is God, the Holy Spirit is God. And yet they are not three Gods, but one God. So the Father is Lord, the Son is Lord, the Holy Spirit is Lord; yet they are not three Lords, but one Lord.
Just as Christian truth compels us to confess each person individually to be God and Lord, so the true Christian faith forbids us to speak of three Gods or three Lords.
The Father is made of none,
neither created nor begotten.
The Son is of the Father alone;
not made nor created, but begotten.
The Holy Spirit is of the Father;
neither made, nor created, nor begotten, but proceeding.
So there is one Father, not three Fathers; one Son, not three Sons; one Holy Spirit, not three Holy Spirits. And within this Trinity none comes before or after; none is greater or inferior, but all three persons are coequal and coeternal, so that in every way, as stated before, all three persons are to be worshiped as one God and one God worshiped as three persons. Whoever wishes to be saved must have this conviction of the Trinity.
It is furthermore necessary for eternal salvation truly to believe that our Lord Jesus Christ also took on human flesh.
Now this is the true catholic faith: We believe and confess, that our Lord Jesus Christ, God’s Son, is both God and Man. He is God, eternally begotten from the nature of the Father, and he is man, born in time from the nature of his mother, fully God, fully man, with rational soul and human flesh, equal to the Father, as to his deity, less than the Father, as to his humanity; and though he is both God and Man, Christ is not two persons but one, one, not by changing the deity into flesh, but by taking the humanity into God; one, indeed, not by mixture of the natures, but by unity in one person.
For just as the reasonable soul and flesh are one human being, so God and man are one Christ, who suffered for our salvation, descended into hell, rose the third day from the dead. He ascended into heaven, is seated at the right hand of God the Father almighty, and from there he will come to judge the living and the dead. At his coming all people will rise again with their own bodies to answer for their personal deeds. Those who have done good will enter eternal life, but those who have done evil will go into everlasting fire.
This is the true catholic faith.
Whoever does not faithfully and firmly believe this cannot be saved.
HISTORICAL WESTERN TEXT
The following words form the historical Western text of the portion of this Creedal Statement which is found in italics in the above electronic text.
The Father is neither made not created,
nor begotten of anyone.
The Son is neither made nor created,
but is begotten of the Father alone.
The Holy Spirit is neither made nor created nor begotten,
but proceeds from the Father and the Son.
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