Good Morning Brothers and sisters,
When I was in my teenage years one of my favorite pastimes was on Saturday eveningsitting down with my dad and watching a good ol’fashioned western! Dad and I would start the movie after mom had gone to bed (because she couldn’t stand the genre) and we would watch late into the night. But always arise early the next morning to attend church.
Of course our favorite movies were the ones containing legendary actor John Wayne. We would watch as this titan of the saddle would rush in and save the day each time. Whether he was a cavalry officer recuing a wagon train from disaster, a small town sheriff taking on a hoard of desperadoes, a rancher driving a herd of cattle through trial and tribulation, or a lone gunfighter with a heart of gold helping some wayward soul. It was all pretty much the same, the good guy wins, the bad guy loses, and the hero always got the girl!
In John Wayne’s final movie “The Shootist” he utter a famous line, “I won’t be wronged. I won’t be insulted. I won’t be laid a-hand on. I don’t do these things to other people, and I require the same from them.” Many have attributed this line to John Wayne’s personal creed and it certainly sounds like a creed to me! It sure sounds like a bible verse, “So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets; Matthew 7:12.”
But what exactly is a creed? Webster defines the word simply as, “a statement of the basic beliefs of a religious faith.” And for the church there are numerous creeds out there, the two most famous being the Apostles Creed and the Nicene Creed. Recently, it has become popular among more “mainstream” churches to say that they do not have creeds, or to say that they do not recite creeds in their church services.
What they’re really saying is that they do not have any liturgy in their service or don’t recite the “traditional” forms of creeds. Some churches state, “No creed but Christ, no book but the Bible.” Which I would point out is in fact a creed itself! To simply say, “We do not believe in creeds” is in itself a creed!
All this stems from a well-meaning but misguided desire to separate the church from the traditional past of liturgy and move into a more expressive form of worship. But by doing so we actually distance ourselves from the earliest practices of the Christian Church. Many view the earliest creeds as coming hundreds and hundreds of years after Jesus, and thus not fully to be trusted or relied upon or “too old fashioned”.
This actually isn’t true. The most famous Christian Creed, The Apostle’s Creed was officially utilized in the church around 180 AD, that’s only two generation removed from Jesus Christ, less than 150 years! And actually there are even earlier creeds than that one! One in particular was used in the church with 20 years of Christ’s resurrection.
“kyrios Iesous” is the creed I’m referencing, though you probably can’t read it because it’s in Greek. It translates to, “Jesus is Lord.” This simple creed can be found throughout the New Testament:
1 Corinthians 12:3 – “No one can say Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit.”
Romans 10:9-13 – “If with your mouth you confess Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved…For whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved.”
Philippians 2:11 – “and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”
All of these scriptures point to the idea that even the earliest form of the Christian church had a basic code of faith to life by and to do ministry with. It may be a simple phrasing, but it is a creed just the same! Jesus is Lord is an extremely powerful statement of belief. For if Jesus is Lord, then he is in supreme control not only of our own lives, but that of the entire world. Christ being Lord means that all he commands us to do is to be obeyed, and whatever path he lays before his followers must be traversed. For a believer to truly proclaim, “Jesus is Lord,” is a statement of belief (or a creed) that stands the test of time.
Perhaps in our desires as a church or even Christians to be “more modern” or “relevant” we can lose sight of the foundational connections we have to the earliest form of the church. We scoff at our denominational polity, or remark how “old fashioned” the creeds we proclaim in worship might be. But the reality is this, if you cannot proclaim your belief in Christ and declare it amongst the world, then your faith is empty and even more dangerously, possibly non-existent.
So, whether your creed be the ones laid aside by the early church leaders, or the simple declaration that “Christ is your savior,” it still holds the same importance and necessity within your life. Each Christian MUST believe in the lordship of Jesus and declare it publicly and spiritually, whether they be Catholic, Protestant, Methodist, or non-denominational. To say you don’t believe in creeds is to say you don’t believe in statements of belief, which is utter nonsense considering that every word Christ spoke is a statement of belief for all Christians.
John Wayne may have on screen been able to clean up a lawless town singlehandedly, or save a stagecoach with a simple wave of his rifle, or even rescue a wagon train from destruction by a simple cry of “charge!” But at the end of the day he walked off set and returned to his normal life as an actor. Everything he did on screen was drama. On the other hand, everything Christ did was true and real. He saved an entire world from destruction and an entire people (past present and future) from death. So to proclaim the Creed “Jesus is Lord” is perhaps the least we can do as a church and as Christians.
So my question to you my brothers and sisters is this, “what is your creed?”
Have a great week!
Pastor Mike McVey
First United Methodist Church, Fairfield TX
ASC Chaplain – United States Coast Guard
Chaplain – Texas Game Warden Service
(P.S. If you would like to contact or receive Pastor Mike’s weekly newsletter simply email him at pastormike@fumcfairfield.org)
