6 The Church, Forgiveness and Eternal Life
6
The Church,
Forgiveness
and Eternal Life
This chapter concludes our look at the creed by examining its final five statements about the church, forgiveness and eternal life.
The Ideas Explained
A. The holy catholic church
We now come to faith in the church, the body of Christ. To believe in Jesus Christ is to believe in and belong to a dynamic community that spans the centuries. The Greek word ekklēsia, used in the New Testament to refer to the church, denotes not a building but a group of people. It literally means “those who are called out.” The church consists of those who have been called out of the world into a community of faith—those whom God has “called ... out of darkness into his wonderful light” (1 Peter 2:9). To become a Christian is to enter into this community of support, encouragement and love.
It is traditional to speak of the “four marks of the church”—in other words, four characteristic identifying features. The creed here notes two, implies one more and omits reference to the fourth. For the sake of fullness, we shall consider all four.
1. The church is one. This is implied by the creed’s reference to “the church” rather than “churches.” All Christian churches are based and founded on the one and only foundation of Jesus Christ himself. There is no other foundation on which they can stand. We could say that the Christian church is that body of people that acknowledges Jesus Christ as its head (Colossians 1:18). Even a casual glance at modern Western society shows that there are many different churches or denominations. Yet to the extent that these are genuinely Christian, they are all part of the one church. The disunity of the churches does not deny the fact that the church is one.
In recent years, under increasing pressure from secular society, many Christian churches have come to realize that what they have in common is far more precious and important than what divides them. There is a growing recognition that Christians are at liberty to disagree over certain matters—things that are not essential to the gospel—while taking a common stand on the essentials of the gospel. For example, I am an Anglican; but it is of infinitely greater importance to me that I am a Christian than that I am an Anglican. “There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to one hope when you were called—one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all” (Ephesians 4:4-6).
2. The church is holy. Holy is a word that turns most people off. It suggests sanctimoniousness or a “holier than thou” attitude. To some it even suggests that the church is full of self-satisfied bores. And is the church really holy? C. S. Lewis documents this attitude well in The Screwtape Letters, in which a new convert goes to church, expecting to find it full of saints—and instead discovers that it is full of ordinary people like himself!
But to understand this aspect of the church, we need to recover the true meaning of the word holy. This point is so important that I will reserve discussion of it for the following section, which deals in depth with “the communion of saints.”
3. The church is catholic. Many people find this part of the creed difficult to accept. Since the time of the European Reformation of the sixteenth century, many people have come to use the word catholic to mean “Roman Catholic.” In fact, this isn’t implied. The Greek word katholikos means “according to the whole,” or “universal.” If I were to say that a friend of mine has “catholic tastes,” I don’t mean that he prefers to attend a requiem mass rather than a prayer meeting! It just means that his tastes range very wide. In saying that the church is catholic, we are affirming that its message is valid and relevant to every age and every situation. It is not as if there was one church with a message suited to the needs of the second century and another with a message suited to the needs of the twentieth—it is the same church, throughout the ages and across the world, which seeks to apply the same gospel in any situation it may happen to meet. Catholic is an affirmation of the universal validity and relevance of the gospel.
4. The church is apostolic. In other words, it continues steadfastly in the faith and teaching of the first apostles (Acts 2:42) and gladly accepts the Great Commission entrusted to them (Matthew 28:16-20). The faith and the tasks of the apostles have become ours. “The faith that was once for all entrusted to the saints” (Jude 3) has now been entrusted to us for a time, before we pass it on to those who will follow us. We, and all other Christians, are stewards of the same gospel once entrusted to the apostles.
Taken together, these four “marks of the church” point to a worldwide body of believers whose sole foundation is Jesus Christ, who have been entrusted with the apostles’ faith and responsibilities to proclaim the gospel throughout history, knowing that it is of continued vital relevance to the human race.
B. The communion of saints
In the previous section we looked at some aspects of the Christian understanding of the church. The present section allows us to examine one feature of this in more detail. The previous section dealt with the church as a body; we are now concerned with ourselves as members of that body.
As we have seen, the New Testament writers never use the word church with a building in mind. When Paul writes to the churches at Corinth or Galatia, for example (1 Corinthians 1:2; Galatians 1:2), he is writing to groups of people, not to a building. (The early Christians had no special buildings of their own, set apart for worship; they seem to have met in each other’s homes.) The church is not a static building but a dynamic pilgrim people who are constantly moving on in faith and obedience. It includes those who have gone ahead of us and those who will follow. It is a great fellowship of faith, spanning the ages and the continents.
The creed now develops this aspect of the Christian understanding of the church. Communion is the old English word for “fellowship”—and that identifies a key role of the church. Among its many functions, the church is there to support its members.
What does fellowship mean? The Greek word used in the New Testament to express this idea (koinõnia) has the basic meaning of “sharing.” At one level it means “sharing joys and sorrows.” It is usually much easier to cope with sadness if you are able to share it with someone else. He or she may be able to offer you good advice or even practical assistance—but somehow just the act of sharing a problem often seems to work wonders. Knowing that someone else is remembering your difficulties in their prayers can be of enormous comfort. Those who are strong in the faith and rich in spiritual gifts have responsibilities toward those who are weak in the faith and who lack these talents. God’s gifts are given for the building up, or edification, of the Christian community (1 Corinthians 14:3-5)—and that implies a willingness to share them.
But fellowship operates at another level as well (Romans 12:13; Ephesians 4:28; 1 Timothy 6:18; Hebrews 13:16): the level of material goods and wealth. The apostles held all things in common (Acts 2:44-45). Each member of the earliest church gave according to his or her ability, and each received according to his or her need. There is no need to confuse this with secular socialist philosophies. It is a reminder of the need for mutual commitment within the Christian fellowship. Those who are strong have responsibilities toward those who are weak, just as those who are rich have responsibilities toward those who are poor. In early Christian communities, widows and orphans were singled out as needing special care and compassion (for example, Acts 6:1; James 1:27). To believe in “the fellowship of saints” is to be committed to the practical consequences of this fellowship.
Paul often begins his letters by addressing the “saints” whether at Rome (Romans 1:4), Corinth (2 Corinthians 1:1) or Ephesus (Ephesians 1:1). But what is a saint? Groucho Marx once remarked that he wouldn’t want to join a club that would have him as a member! Many of us feel the same way about the church as a fellowship of saints. If I am a saint, then there is nothing special about it. If all believers are saints, the idea of a saint seems to be devalued. Perhaps it is natural that some people find this a genuine problem. The two lines of argument that follow may be helpful.
First, the word saint just means “someone who is holy.” Christians are holy, not because of anything they are in themselves but because of the One who has called them. The fact that we are holy has nothing to do with our personal merit or sanctity of life; it has everything to do with the fact that we have been called by a holy God and have responded to him. We are holy because of our calling, not because of our nature. Think of the moon, which shines by reflecting the light of the sun. As the Apollo moon mission of the 1960s made clear, the moon is a dead world. It possesses no light of its own. But it can reflect the light of the sun. Christians are holy in much the same way that the moon shines at night—by reflecting something (or someone) else. God’s holiness can be reflected in our lives, even if we ourselves are sinners.
To declare that we believe in “the communion of saints” does not mean that we believe in a holy club; it means that we believe in a holy God who has called us as individuals into a community, within which his work of renewal and regeneration can take place. To be called by God is deeply humbling and is not in any way a cause for pride or arrogance. God calls us while we are sinners into a community within which his work of healing can begin. We are called to be holy (1 Corinthians 1:2), not because we are holy. “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners” (Mark 2:17). Augustine of Hippo, a great Christian writer of the late fourth and early fifth centuries, remarked that the church is rather like a hospital. It is full of sick people who are desperately hoping to be cured. The church is a fellowship of forgiven sinners who confidently hope, by God’s grace, to become a fellowship of saints.
Second, think of a saint—and hence of yourself—as someone who is consecrated to God. Let’s explore this idea and see how it helps. The basic meaning of consecration is “being set apart.” Think of a Communion service. At some point during the service the bread and the wine are consecrated. The bread and wine remain bread and wine, but they are set apart to serve a special purpose. The words spoken by Jesus at the Last Supper are recalled, as is his commandment to “do this in remembrance of me” (Luke 22:19). Then, shortly afterward, the bread and wine are distributed to the members of the congregation. The bread and the wine are meant to remind believers of the suffering and death of Jesus Christ, upon which our salvation rests.
Consecration means being set apart to remind people of Jesus Christ. We do not suddenly become holy and righteous; indeed, sin remains a major threat to our Christian lives. But despite our sin, we have been set apart from the world. We have been called out of that world (remember we saw that the Greek word for “church” means “called out”) in order to remind that world of its Savior and Lord. Being members of the “communion of saints” means that we have been called from the world to proclaim the saving love of God for that world.
So there is no problem in speaking of the church as “the communion of saints.” Of course it is a “fellowship of sinners” as well! But it is a fellowship of forgiven sinners who are in the process of becoming holy. The German Reformer Martin Luther taught that Christians are “righteous and sinners at one and the same time” (simul iustus et peccator). We are righteous on account of God’s having clothed us with his righteousness—but inside we are still sinners. God justifies us on the basis of his gift of righteousness, rather than on the basis of any righteousness we may possess. Although we are sinners, God is still able to renew and regenerate our fallen natures. Just as workers on a building site might cover their work with tarpaulins to protect it from the elements, so God shelters his work of renewal and regeneration within us with the external covering of his righteousness. Although we remain sinners externally, we thus live in hope, knowing that God is at work within us, renewing and rebuilding us from within. Luther argues that justified sinners are like people who are ill and have been entrusted to the care of a competent physician. They are righteous “not in fact, but in hope” (non in re sed in spe). The signs of recovery and sanctification within us point to our future perfection in righteousness, just as a patient under the care of a good physician can rest assured of being cured as he or she detects signs of recovery.
Nevertheless, most of us know of some individuals—whether historical figures from the past, or people now living—who have deeply impressed us by their faith, their quality of life and their faithful devotion to God. Somehow it seems right to speak of them as “saints” in some special way. The witness of their lives is both an encouragement and a challenge: an encouragement because it demonstrates what God can indeed do and achieve with fallen human nature; and a challenge because we have yet to allow him to do this with us!
C. The forgiveness of sins
In this section the creed compresses its understanding of what Jesus Christ achieved on the cross. No attempt is made to explain the idea or elaborate on it. However, in this terse phrase we are to find summarized the full richness of the New Testament understanding of the work of Jesus Christ.
The New Testament uses a wide range of images to express the richness of its understanding of the work of Christ. “The forgiveness of sins” is mentioned as an example of these images and is not meant to exhaust them. The Nicene Creed—a somewhat longer and more detailed version of the creed—adds to this brief statement, telling us that Jesus Christ became human “for our salvation,” adding another concept to that of forgiveness. Taken together, these biblical concepts of the achievement of Jesus Christ aim to explain what was going on between God, Christ and sinful humanity in the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus.
What is remarkable about these concepts is that they are able to explain the complexity of the achievement of Jesus Christ in terms or ideas that we already know from everyday life. The New Testament writers did exactly what every good preacher should do—use illustrations and analogies drawn from their experience to help “unpack” their theology. To understand fully what happened on the cross, we have to follow the New Testament carefully as it builds up a picture of what was going on by using a wide range of illustrations, each of which casts light on one particular aspect of our subject. It may well be that one individual finds one illustration more helpful than another—but this does not entitle him or her to argue that this illustration, and this illustration alone, is good enough to stand on its own as a description of what was going on.
Let us begin by looking at four concepts the New Testament uses to bring out the meaning of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
1. Forgiveness of sins. It is no accident that the creed selects this idea to summarize the work of Christ. It is perhaps the most powerful and familiar concept used to explain the significance of Christ’s death and resurrection for believers. Forgiveness of sins can be interpreted in two ways: legally and personally. The legal use of the term is probably most familiar from the parable of the merciless servant (Matthew 18:23-35). Here forgiveness is understood in terms of the remission of a debt. Forgiveness of sins may thus be regarded as a legal concept, involving the remission of a penalty or debt. Jesus wiped out our guilt by his death on the cross. Whatever penalty was due for human sin has been fully met by the obedient death of Christ on the cross.
The second sense of the term is closely related to the idea of reconciliation. Forgiveness is what is necessary for a personal relationship to be restored to its former state after a hurtful disagreement or misunderstanding. Forgiveness involves someone taking the initiative. If there are two persons who once enjoyed a close relationship but now have drifted apart, that relationship will remain broken unless someone attempts a reconciliation. Someone has to take the initiative and approach the other party, acknowledging that the relationship has gone wrong, recalling how precious and important that relationship once was, affirming their love and concern for the other—and asking them to restore the relationship. If the other party is not prepared to restore the relationship, no progress has been made. If forgiveness is offered but not accepted, the relationship remains unaltered. If, and only if, both parties agree to restore the relationship will forgiveness be achieved. Similarly, we must decide to accept God’s forgiveness. All this is evident from our own experience of personal relationships. By making an appeal to personal relationships, the New Testament grounds our relationship with God in everyday experience.
We could say that sin is what comes between us and God, and threatens to wreck our relationship with him. “Your iniquities have separated you from your God” (Isaiah 59:2). Sin is a barrier erected from our side between ourselves and God. Our sin separates us from God. The creed, however, affirms a central and joyous insight of the New Testament—this barrier can be broken down, and has been broken down by God.
At the moment of Jesus’ death the curtain in the temple at Jerusalem was torn down (Matthew 27:51). The curtain prevented ordinary people from gaining access to the innermost part of the temple. It seemed to deny them access to the presence of God. In the tearing of that curtain at the moment of Jesus’ death, many commentators see the full meaning of that death dramatically symbolized. The barrier between human beings and God has been broken down by the death of Jesus Christ. To believe in the forgiveness of sins is to believe that God can break down all the barriers between us and him if we will let him.
2. Reconciliation. “God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ” (2 Corinthians 5:19). This famous statement draws our attention more closely to the idea of reconciliation. The word and the idea are very familiar. Reconciliation is fundamental to human experience, especially in personal relationships. The parable of the prodigal son (Luke 15:11-32) is perhaps the supreme illustration of the importance of reconciliation in the New Testament. It illustrates vividly the reconciliation of father and son and the restoration of their broken relationship. As with forgiveness, we note that reconciliation offered but not accepted fails to heal a broken relationship. God offers us reconciliation through the death of Jesus Christ; we must accept that offer if our relationship with him is to be healed and transformed.
3. Salvation. This word is used frequently in the New Testament (such as Acts 13:26; Ephesians 1:13; Hebrews 1:14) to express the basic idea of deliverance, preservation or rescue from a dangerous situation. The verb save is used outside the New Testament to refer to being saved from death by the intervention of a rescuer, or to being cured from a deadly illness. It can also refer to being kept in good health. The word salvation is thus used by the Jewish historian Josephus to refer to the deliverance of the Israelites from Egyptian bondage.
Salvation expresses two central notions. The first idea is rescue or deliverance from a dangerous situation. For example, the Israelites were delivered from their captivity in Egypt at the time of the exodus. In the same way, Christ is understood to deliver us from the fear of death and the power of sin. The name Jesus means “God saves”—and it is clear that the New Testament means “saves from sin” (Matthew 1:21). Second, salvation points to the idea of “wholeness” or “health”. Thus it is sometimes difficult to know whether a passage should be translated in terms of salvation or wholeness—for example, should the Greek version of Mark 5:34 be translated as “Your faith has made you whole” or “Your faith has saved you”? When someone who has been ill is healed, he or she is restored to his or her former state of health, of wholeness. The creation stories of Genesis make it clear that God created people in a state of wholeness and that this wholeness was lost through the Fall. Just as healing involves restoring someone to health, so salvation involves restoring human wholeness, restoring us to the state in which we were first created by God. In many respects the gospel is like a medicine—something that heals us.
4. Redemption. To redeem something is to buy it back. When Paul uses the word he is thinking of the redemption of slaves, a familiar event in New Testament times. A slave could redeem himself by buying his freedom. The word used to describe this event could literally be translated “being taken out of the slave market.” The word expresses the idea of restoring someone to a state of liberty—at a price. Christ’s death and resurrection set us free from our bondage to sin and death. Paul’s repeated emphasis that Christians are slaves who have been “bought at a price” (1 Corinthians 6:20; 7:23) makes the full force of the idea of redemption clear: we have been freed from bondage to sin at the cost of the death of Jesus Christ. Real redemption is something precious and costly, God’s greatest gift to his people.
These, then, are some of the ways the New Testament speaks of the meaning of the death of Christ for believers. Their full richness, complemented by that of other concepts and images not discussed here, is called to mind by the section of the creed we have just considered.
D. The resurrection of the body and the life everlasting
The creed ends on a positive note, with a clear statement of the Christian hope. It opened with a statement of faith in God; it now concludes with a statement of hope that we will one day stand in the presence of that same God.
The creed links two ideas as it gives expression to the Christian hope. Earlier it proclaimed the reality of the resurrection of Jesus Christ; now it affirms the common Christian hope that all believers will one day share in his glorious resurrection. Christians will be where Jesus now is. Jesus’ words to his disciples, as the hour of his own death drew near, are very important here: “Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms.... I am going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am” (John 14:1-3).
What is the connection between the resurrection of Jesus and our future resurrection? It is helpful to consider the idea of adoption in exploring this point. Paul uses this legal image for two purposes (Romans 8:15, 23; 9:4; Galatians 4:5; Ephesians 1:5).
First, it expresses the difference between “sons of God” (believers) and the Son of God (Jesus Christ). A father in Paul’s day was free to adopt individuals from outside his natural family and give them a legal status of adoption, thus placing them within the family. Although a distinction would still be possible between the natural and adopted children, they have the same status in the eyes of the law; they are all members of the same family, irrespective of their origins. Paul uses this image to indicate that through faith believers come to have the same status as Jesus (as sons of God), without implying that they have the same divine nature as Jesus. Faith brings about a change in our status before God, incorporating us into the family of God, despite the fact that we do not share the same divine origins as Christ.
Second, it expresses the idea that adopted children have the same inheritance rights as a natural son. The adopted children are entitled to receive the same inheritance as the natural son. Paul points out that the inheritance Jesus received from his Father is suffering and glory. Christians may expect to receive the same from his hand. “Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and coheirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory” (Romans 8:17). In other words, resurrection and eternal life are the inheritance of Christians (1 Peter 1:3-4). What Jesus obtained by his obedience will one day be ours. He is the “firstfruits” of the dead (1 Corinthians 15:20-23)—that is, the first of a rich harvest (for the idea of “firstfruits,” see Exodus 23:16). Christ has been raised; we shall be raised as those who share in him. In thinking of the resurrection of Christ, we are actually looking ahead to our own resurrection on the last day.
But what of “life everlasting,” the creed’s old-fashioned way of speaking about “eternal life”? Having affirmed that we will one day share Christ’s resurrection, the creed now hints at what form our existence will take. “Eternal life” might seem to suggest little more than life that goes on and on and on. Doesn’t that sound terribly boring? It probably does, if you think of eternal life as an infinite extension of our present lives. But that isn’t really what is meant. The Greek language, in which the New Testament is written, has two words for life. One (bios) means “mere biological existence”; the other (zōē) means “life in all its fullness.” What we are being offered is fullness of life (John 10:10), which not even death itself can destroy. We are not being offered an endless extension of our biological existence but rather a transformation of that existence.
Eternal doesn’t mean throughout all time; it means outside time. “Eternal life” means life with God, outside the confines of space and time. As it is virtually impossible for us to conceive what it must be like to live outside space and time, it is understandably difficult to think about eternal life. However, the main point is this: eternal life means that our present relationship with God is not destroyed or thwarted by death, but is continued and deepened by it.
Yet we must not think of eternal life as something that lies totally in the future. It is something we can begin to experience now. It is certainly true that eternal life in all its fullness is something we can only hope to gain in the age to come (Luke 18:30). Nevertheless, we are able to gain a foretaste of that eternal life now.
Jesus’ words to Martha (John 11:25-26), just before the raising of Lazarus, are especially important here: “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die.” In the first part of this statement Jesus declares that anyone who believes in him will come to life—a life that is not terminated by death itself. In the second part, however, Jesus proclaims that whoever believes in him will come to life in such a way that death cannot cancel that life. To believe is to be born again, to come to newness of life that endures for ever and ever. To come to faith in Jesus Christ is to begin a new relationship with God that is not abolished by death but is actually deepened—death sweeps away the remaining obstacles to our experiencing the presence of God. This is not to say that our resurrection has already taken place (2 Timothy 2:18); it is to say that we may catch a glimpse of what eternal life is like here and now. Eternal life is inaugurated, but not fulfilled, in our present life as believers. To enter fully into eternal life is not to experience something totally strange and unknown. Rather, it is to extend and deepen our experience of the presence and love of God.
Finally, note that the creed ends with a single word: Amen. This reminds us that the creed is as much a prayer as a statement of faith. It is a prayer for deepening our faith in and commitment to the God whose greatness we have just considered. To say “Amen!” to the creed is to pray that the power and presence of God might touch our lives, deepen our love for him and enhance our understanding of his gospel. Earlier we saw that faith involves more than assent—it involves trust and obedience. The creed will have done its job, and done it well, if it propels us out into God’s world, determined to serve him with the same faithfulness and dedication as those who first used this creed all those centuries ago.
The Ideas Applied
A. The holy catholic church
To believe in the church is to recognize the need for support structures for faith. Individual Christians are not meant to exist on their own; they are meant to be part of a community. Cyprian of Carthage, a famous early Christian martyr, once wrote: “No one can have God as his father who does not have the church for his mother.” In other words, to acknowledge God as our Father means joining a community of people who share that faith and whose historical roots lie firmly in the New Testament. While stressing the importance of a personal faith, the New Testament has no time for individualism, whether the eccentric type that led some to become cave-dwelling hermits in days of old or a more modern kind that stresses self-sufficiency.
The world is an increasingly hostile place for faith to exist. As early as 1942, the greatly respected English writer C. S. Lewis described faith as existing on “enemy territory.” Writing during World War II, when much of continental Europe was occupied by Nazi armies, Lewis suggested that faith is like a resistance movement that is fighting an invading power—secularism. That invading is determined to stamp out any resistance it meets. Since then, Western culture has become much more aggressively secular. Those committed to secular values have a vested interest in destroying the credibility of the Christian faith—and that means your personal faith as well.
Many Christians find the new aggressiveness of secular culture deeply disturbing. It seems to call their faith into question. The hostility of much of modern Western society seems very threatening. It causes many Christians to become despondent. At best, the world seems indifferent to their faith; at worst, it treats it as absurd.
It is very common for Christians to find themselves isolated at work or ridiculed for their faith. They are very conscious of the fact that their faith marks them out as “abnormal” in the eyes of their colleagues. It’s almost as if you have to apologize for believing in God. Christian values and presuppositions are gradually being squeezed out of every area of modern Western culture. “Christianity is a fighting religion” (C. S. Lewis). Faith, like a resistance movement, has to survive in a very hostile environment.
But it can survive—and it survives best in community rather than in isolation. Try to think yourself into the situation faced by the first Christians during the New Testament period. They were faced with hostility on every side. They were ridiculed as fools. They were very few in number. Try to think yourself into their situation, and imagine how incredibly despondent you might feel about it! Yet the first Christians were not unduly worried by these problems. They weren’t overwhelmed by the hostility of their environment. The resurrection of Jesus set those difficulties in perspective. The God who raised Jesus from the dead was with them and on their side. And they had each other for support and encouragement.
We should not feel intimidated or threatened either. In fact, the secular culture’s new hostility to the gospel makes it easier for us to identify with the Christian communities we read about in the New Testament letters. Their situation is very like ours in many respects. So take comfort from the experience of the early Christians and let yourself be inspired and encouraged by their words and examples. And above all, let their concern for living out the faith in a community, in a church, affect the way you live.
So appreciate the pastoral importance of support groups. Make sure you don’t get isolated, left to cope with society’s pressures on your own. You need to be encouraged by other Christians. You need to spend time with other people whose worldview is the same as yours. This is particularly important for Christian students at college or university, where pressure from secular beliefs and values can be considerable. It is also important for professionals in any field, where it is common for Christians to feel pressured to conform to prevailing professional norms rather than an obligation to obey the gospel. Time and time again the gospel and such norms can come into conflict. You need to be supported by others, and you need to support others. The world aims to isolate you, to demoralize you, to break down your confidence in yourself and the gospel (read John 17:14-18). You need to be able to discuss problems you have in common—such as how to cope with the pressure brought on Christians by society in general, by your colleagues at work, or by your family and friends in particular.
Don’t just go to church; get involved in home groups, Bible study groups, special interest groups, retreats and camps. Encourage your fellow Christians and let them encourage you. Think of the church as your extended family, somewhere you can belong.
Finally, a word of warning. As historians have pointed out, it is very easy for faith in Jesus Christ to degenerate into loyalty to a church. Somehow Jesus seems to recede into the background as the institution of the church becomes of paramount importance. Loyalty to a specific denomination, or even devotion to a specific building, can come to be of greater importance than loyalty to Jesus Christ. Try to keep things in perspective!
B. The communion of saints
Draw comfort and support from others! That is one of the practical consequences of the doctrine of the “communion of saints.” Read Hebrews 11:1—12:3 and realize that you share in the faith of these great figures of old. You all belong to the same great family. They have all been through the trials, struggles and temptations of faith before you. They are now “a great cloud of witnesses” (Hebrews 12:1) cheering you on as you run the same race. Try to visualize the scene: you are in a great Roman amphitheater, with the racecourse ahead of you and crowds shouting their support and encouragement as you aim to complete the race and gain your crown of laurel.
You can draw encouragement from the past in other ways. It can often be helpful to draw up a spiritual family tree. Try to identify the people who were important in helping you come to faith. Perhaps one person was of vital importance; perhaps several people helped you come to faith gradually, over a long period of time. But remember that each of them was also helped to faith by someone—and each of them by someone else! Perhaps you could find out who they were. By doing this, you will discover a vast network of faithful believers, many of whom may already be dead, who have contributed in some way to bringing you to faith.
That’s what the “communion of saints” is all about. It is a vast network of faithful individuals who play their part in working out God’s purposes. You share in that faith, and you share in that work.
C. The forgiveness of sins
Real forgiveness is a costly and precious thing. It is easy to pretend to forgive someone—you can just paper over the cracks and ignore the real problems. But real forgiveness goes to the heart of the problem. It identifies the cause of the hurt and pain between two people. It is difficult for both the forgiver and the forgiven. For the forgiver it means trying to cope with the pain and offense caused by the other. It means recognizing that healing of the relationship must take precedence over personal injury and slight. Many people find it painfully difficult to forgive someone who has really hurt them. It is easy to forgive someone for something trivial; but when that person has really wounded you, it is much more difficult. Try, then, to imagine how difficult it is for God to forgive us. Try to understand how much God must love us if he is prepared to do this. The fact that we find it so difficult to forgive people at times brings home to us how marvelous a thing divine forgiveness is.
For the forgiven, it involves admitting that something is wrong and taking responsibility for it. It means coming to terms with the considerable hurt we may have caused someone else. It involves humility and repentance and a willingness to try to avoid causing such hurt in future. No wonder many people find forgiveness so difficult! But it brings renewal of a relationship which would otherwise be lost or become meaningless. God’s offer of forgiveness affirms how much we matter to him. Condemnation and love are mingled in that gracious and precious offer made to us through the cross. The sins of the past are set firmly behind us, forgiven, so that we may turn in humble confidence to the future of faith.
Having considered how costly true forgiveness is, we must come to terms with the gospel demand that we too should be forgiving. There is a sense in which God’s forgiveness of our sins depends on our forgiving those who sin against us (Matthew 6:14-15; 18:23-35). We must forgive as the Lord forgave us (Colossians 3:13). An unwillingness to forgive others can be a serious obstacle to personal growth (it is easy to harbor grudges for ages) and can also threaten the unity of the Christian community. “Be forgiving” is no easy platitude; it is essential to the well-being of individuals and communities.
D. The resurrection of the body and the life everlasting
Everyone lives in hope. In fact, without hope for the future, life can be unbearable. A particularly poignant exploration of the importance of hope may be found in Nevil Shute’s novel On the Beach. A nuclear war has devastated the Northern Hemisphere. Australians, initially unaffected, gradually realize that they will be wiped out by the radioactive fallout that is drifting their way. The situation is hopeless. With great insight Shute explores the ways human beings respond to a hopeless situation. Many of his characters deny what is going to happen. “There’s got to be hope,” one person cries out as she desperately seeks assurance that all will be well.
Many people instinctively feel this way in the face of death and extinction. There’s got to be hope. Yet nothing on earth seems able to provide it. Here the Christian proclamation of resurrection and eternal life is of crucial importance. It is not just that it is true; it is also urgently relevant to human existence. It meets a vital human need. It is important that the Christian hope gets a hearing in today’s world. “Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have” (1 Peter 3:15). Evangelism and personal witness are of critical importance. Your lifestyle—the attitudes you adopt toward life and death—can proclaim your firm grasp of the Christian hope as well as, if not better than, any words you might use.
Remember that the English word hope is ambiguous. “I hope it won’t rain” means “It would be very nice if it didn’t rain—but I have a sinking feeling it will.” That is hope in its weak sense—a faint and forlorn wish. But there is a strong sense of the word as well. Hope in its full-blooded sense means “a sure and confident expectation.” The Christian hope is indeed confident and assured. To “put our hope in the living God” (1 Timothy 4:10) is to look to him in confidence and trust, knowing and relying on his faithfulness and constancy. It is this hope that has inspired Christian endurance down the ages (1 Thessalonians 1:3). And it is this same hope that can sustain you in times of joy and sorrow.
Finally, as we bring this study of the creed to an end, remember that we have not been dealing with ideas but with the living God. To wrestle with the creed is to fathom the wonders of God’s saving love for us, as we trace the story of Jesus Christ and its implications for us. The creed must be allowed to touch our hearts as much as to inform our minds—and to prepare us for the day that we shall stand in the presence and power of God.
Key Bible Passages
A. The holy catholic church
1 Corinthians 12:4-31: Paul’s teaching on the church as the body of Christ
Ephesians 5:25-33: Paul uses marriage to illustrate the relationship between Christ and the church
Colossians 1:18: A reminder about who is in charge!
B. The communion of saints
Acts 4:32-37: An insight into the life of the early church
Romans 12:3-11: Paul’s teaching on how Christians are to relate to one another
Ephesians 4:11-16: The purpose of leadership within the church
Hebrews 11:1—12:3: A roll call of those who have gone on ahead of us
C. The forgiveness of sins
Isaiah 59:1-15: Why forgiveness is necessary
Matthew 18:23-35: When forgiveness is impossible
2 Corinthians 5:18-21: Passing on the good news
1 Peter 1:14-17: The high standards to which we are called
D. The resurrection of the body and the life everlasting
John 11:21-27: Jesus’ response to death
1 Corinthians 15: The implications of the resurrection of Jesus
Revelation 21:1—22:6: Something to look forward to!
Questions for Group Discussion
1. Begin by reading Hebrews 11:1—12:3 together. In your opening prayer, give thanks to God for the heritage of faith that you share with his people, known and unknown, throughout history.
2. What are the four characteristic marks of the church? Why are they important?
3. How could you more fully belong to and get involved in your church?
Why is this aspect of the Christian faith so important?
4. What does it mean to be a “saint”?
5. Who are the individuals who have really helped you in your life of faith? Have you ever been able to thank them?
6. Why is real forgiveness so difficult both to offer and to accept? How does this apply to you in your relationship with God?
7. In what way will Christians one day share in the resurrection of Jesus? How is this possible?
8. What aspects of eternal life are you enjoying now? And what are you looking forward to in the future?
For Further Reading
Hebblethwaite, Brian. The Christian Hope. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1985. An excellent survey of the central issues. Well within the grasp of the educated layperson.
Jackman, David. Understanding the Church. Eastbourne, U.K.: Kingsway, 1987. A useful guide to the complexities of the church, at both the theoretical and practical levels.
Küng, Hans. The Church. 1968. Reprint, London: Search, 1994. An excellent introduction to the theory of the church. Written from a Roman Catholic perspective, it contains many helpful insights.
Ryle, J. C. Holiness. Reprint, Phillipsburg, N.J.: Presbyterian & Reformed, 1979. A classic dating from the nineteenth century. Full of insights into the struggle for holiness.
Stott, John. The Cross of Christ. Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 1986. A superb account of the meaning of the cross of Jesus, developing many of the themes related to forgiveness.
Tidball, Derek. Skillful Shepherds: An Introduction to Pastoral Theology. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Ministry Resources Library, 1986. Includes an excellent guide to the various pastoral skills needed in developing and deepening fellowship.