Monday, October 22, 2007

The Apostle's Creed & Bible Story Telling


Sometimes people wonder if Bible Story Telling instead of traditional reading and preaching is orthodox or even doctrinally sound, etc?

One answer to those questions is as close as the Apostle's Creed.

It summarizes the Gospel of Jesus Christ by summarizing the story of the Bible. It focuses on the historical unfolding of God's mighty acts in narrative form and isn't nearly as "doctrinal" as we're used to if we're students of the catechisms and confessions.

Why is that?

Far be it from me to know for sure, but I'll tell you what I believe.

While men like to argue, define, analyze and pontificate - all which lend themselves to doctrinal expression and are necessary in their place (witness the development present from the Apostle's Creed to the Nicene Creed)- the Gospel of Jesus Christ is a historical reality. The Creed is confessing what God has done historically in Creation and Redemption.

The Creed serves not as a witness to my confessional sophistication but as the breathless eyewitness account of a tour de force, God's striding through history in the person of Jesus Christ the Lord to rescue the world from its madness and create a New People who experience the forgiveness of sins, resurrection on the Last Day and life everlasting. In other words it summarizes the Gospel Message from Genesis to Revelation in a few lines when we would spend volumes.

Telling individual stories from the Bible is telling part of this story that we confess in the Apostle's Creed (and Nicene). The individual stories only have purpose and meaning when they are told not just for their own sakes, but when they also relate to the overall message of the Bible we find so briefly stated in the creed.

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