Creedalism: Safety In An Abundance of Counselors
Proverb 11:14 reminds us that ‘where there is no guidance, a people falls, but in an abundance of counselors there is safety.’
This principle could readily be observed in the leadership of churches that have a properly functioning presbyterial form of government, according to the Scriptures. By God’s design, the guidance and wisdom of a plurality of elders ensures that decisions are arrived at with more care and love than if they were to be left to the judgment of one single individual.
An official statement released by a church’s eldership necessarily bears more ministerial authority than the opinions of one of their number, expressed in a blog post, regardless of how many people have read it or shared it.
The Scriptures remind us that we must test everything and hold fast to what is good. (1 Thessalonians 5:21). Having an abundance of counselors helps us in this. Not only can they put their heads and hearts together, deciding on matters armed with the Scriptures and aided by the Holy Spirit, they are also able with God’s help to keep each other in check against folly and error.
By extension, the same manner of confidence and trust in tested and faithful guides also applies to our view of our Creeds and Confessions. We are very explicit that these statements are infinitely subordinate to the authority of the Scriptures, our alone rule of faith. Nevertheless, they are to us faithful guides and helps that have stood the test of time, tumult, and tyranny. Moreover, these have the backing, if you will, of countless faithful pastors and teachers who have likewise been guided by them, embraced them, and taught them throughout our family history.
It is not creedolatry to hold these helps to our faith in such high regard. As I have said, we do not hold them anywhere near the level of Scriptures in status and authority. Nevertheless, we do hold them as above the opinions of individual Christians. As Dr Craig Carter once remarked, speaking to a class full of students, ‘the Nicene Creed is not above the Bible but it is above you.’
I’m not very good with math but I think I can manage this one by way of illustration: in the contest between the views of one modern teacher versus the views of a host of teachers throughout church history, we must always regard the latter with more honor and initial confidence. As John Calvin once put it in a letter to Cardinal Jacopo Sadoleto,
‘[A]lthough we hold that the Word of God alone lies beyond the sphere of our judgment, and that Fathers and Councils are of authority only in so far as they accord with the rule of the Word, we still give to Councils and Fathers such rank and honor as it is meet for them to hold, under Christ.’
To this, we can add the fact that the historic Creeds and Confessions that have survived within Protestatism due to popularity and usefulness were and continue to be backed by multiple generations of a plurality of counselors and congregations.
I am aware that not all Creeds and Confessions agree with one another. This is why we have different denominations and traditions within Protestantism. But I am assuming that the same principles that I have discussed above apply within each respective tradition.
What this may seem to reveal is that there are some among us who are stauncher creedalists or confessionalists than others. My view on this is different. I am convinced that everyone is a creedalist. A believer, by definition, is a confessionalist. The difference lies not in the disposition but in the content. Some of us are, to borrow an expression from Chad Van Dixhoorn, doctrinal maximalists.
We want to be as transparent and detailed about what we believe in our statements as is practically and pragmatically possible. Others prefer broader statements that allow for more wiggle room. Still others prefer to have statements as mere placeholders, tacitly affirming the inescapability of being creedal people. In this conception, it is not the case, then, that some of us have creeds while others do not, rather it is a case where some of us have written down ones while other have them somewhere else.
