A Simple Way to Pray: The Apostles' Creed

 The Apostles' Creed

I believe in God, the Father almighty,

      creator of heaven and earth.

I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord,

      who was conceived by the Holy Spirit

      and born of the virgin Mary.

      He suffered under Pontius Pilate,

      was crucified, died, and was buried;

      he descended to hell.

      The third day he rose again from the dead.

      He ascended to heaven

      and is seated at the right hand of God the Father almighty.

      From there he will come to judge the living and the dead.

I believe in the Holy Spirit,

      the holy catholic church,

      the communion of saints,

      the forgiveness of sins,

      the resurrection of the body,

      and the life everlasting. Amen.

     This is now the third and final post that looks at Martin Luther’s prayer advice to his barber. Luther was one of the key leaders of the Protestant Reformation of the early 1500s, and one of the leading theologians of all time.

     He was also a pastor who had a deep relationship with Christ, and wanted others to experience the same deep intimacy that God holds out to all people. Luther’s advice to his barber is to ground his prayer in the words of the Lord’s Prayer, first of all, then to move on to the Ten Commandments, and, finally, to The Creed.

    Prayer can start with the Lord’s Prayer, Ten Commandments, or the Creed, but it finds real traction when the Holy Spirit steps in and prays through a person. Luther’s suggestions in this letter to his barber are to be seen as suggestions that open the door for the Spirit to step in and pray through you.
We’ve already looked at Luther’s teaching on the Lord’s Prayer and the Ten Commandments. Luther’s final suggestion to his barber is that if he still feels drawn to prayer after praying through those first two texts that he turn his attention to The Creed as a springboard for prayer.



     When Martin Luther is talking about “The Creed” he is referring to the defining statement of faith known as the Apostles' Creed. The Apostles' Creed was written in Rome, around the year 150. It was
intended to distinguish Christians from the various heretical groups of that time. Anyone who was able to say the Apostles' Creed was considered a person of orthodox faith.

     In some sectors within contemporary Protestantism there is an automatic reaction against creeds. Creeds are sometimes seen as artificial and external statements that a person can memorize and recite without any of the conviction that comes from an inward experience of a transformed life. A creed can be seen as mere lip service or as a barrier to a real and living faith. When it was written, the Apostles' Creed was a life giving and easily remembered statement of faith that was incredibly valuable in a sometimes confusing religious environment.

     One can look at the Apostles' Creed as an artificial and foreign statement, or one can look at the Apostles' Creed as one example of God’s ongoing guidance with the church. My own approach to the Creed is that it is not Scripture, but it reflects the best discernment and leading of the Holy Spirit as understood by a gathering of people who were looking for God’s instruction. The Apostles' Creed has been reaffirmed by generations of Christians as divine teaching for almost two thousand years. As a result, it is a weighty statement for us to consider.

     For Luther, the Apostles' Creed provides a simple way of praying through the essentials of Christian faith. He divides the Apostles' Creed into three articles. These three articles are Creation, Redemption and Sanctification and they correspond to the three Persons of the Trinity, God the Creator, Christ the Redeemer, and the Spirit the Sanctifier. He suggests that his barber prayer through each article in the same way that he did the Ten Commandments, through the four strands of instruction, thanksgiving, confession, and prayer of petition.

     So you can recite the first article of the Creed:

I believe in God, the Father almighty,

      creator of heaven and earth.

     And then begin your meditation on that passage.

     This first article teaches us in a very few words that we are God’s creation, God’s handiwork. Our life and breath are sustained by God. While the physical world around us might be bubbling over with biological causes and processes, we are more than biology alone. We are spiritual beings whose life exists eternally in the handiwork of God. Because we are God’s creation and God is our life-
source, we did not create ourselves. We did not merit or earn our existence. Rather, our life is bounded by God, and, so, to God’s service and adoration it should be directed. Luther says that this teaching is

“the soul’s garden of pleasure, along whose paths we enjoy the works of God.” 

     In God we live and move and have our being and as we look at the world around us we see other people and creatures all of whom, like us, derive their life from God and are ultimately God’s handiwork. If there was ever a reason for Christians to be the most zealous in caring for the earth, the animals, and those who suffer, it is because all of these are God’s handiwork and have their eternal destiny in God, just as we do.

     We can thank God who creates and sustains us, because God provides for our daily needs. God has given us ingenuity, God has given us hands and feet and eyes and mouths that we can use to serve God and care for others and this gives us great joy and gratitude.

     But we can also confess that we do not always treat God’s good creation with respect. We plunder the earth. We are often more concerned with our own comfort and life-style than we are with the lives of people who live in other countries. We don’t always honor our own bodies as if they were God’s handiwork. We abuse ourselves physically and emotionally by not fully considering and reflecting with gratitude on God’s workmanship and daily sustenance in our lives.

     Thus, we can pray and ask God to give us hearts that see divine fingerprints in our lives and in all of the created world. We can ask God to teach us how to honor the world God has made and to honor it as we should.

     And if time and inspiration allows, we turn to the second article of the Apostles' Creed, which focuses on Christ the Redeemer:

I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord,
      who was conceived by the Holy Spirit
      and born of the virgin Mary.
      He suffered under Pontius Pilate,
      was crucified, died, and was buried;
      he descended to hell.
      The third day he rose again from the dead.
      He ascended to heaven
      and is seated at the right hand of God the Father almighty.
      From there he will come to judge the living and the dead.

     In the first article of the Apostles' Creed, we were taught to see ourselves as a part of God’s creation, as God’s handiwork and to never forget that truth. Now we are taught to view ourselves as redeemed, and never doubt that. We are taught that God’s mission and purpose in the world is one of reaching out to us, snatching us out of a life of insignificance, and placing eternity in our hearts.

     We can be grateful that Christ’s work is one of salvation and that Christ will accomplish God’s will regarding us.

     And we can move to confession. We can confess that he seek to usurp Christ’s role and earn salvation on our own terms. We seek to follow moral codes to earn God’s favor, we seek to follow the path of religious performance rather than respond humbly to God’s grace. We can confess all this because Christ alone is the source of redemption, and Christ’s yoke is easy.

     We can then make prayerful petition that God will always draw us back to grace and faith. We can ask God to give us hearts that are grateful to God for our eternal livelihoods.

     Then we can turn to the third article of the Apostles' Creed, which teaches us of the Holy Spirit’s work of sanctification and that brings the church together in fellowship.

I believe in the Holy Spirit,

      the holy catholic church,

      the communion of saints,

      the forgiveness of sins,

      the resurrection of the body,

      and the life everlasting. Amen.

     To be sanctified is to be made holy, it is to begin to see the world as God sees it and to begin to have a life that corresponds with God’s will. This is the ongoing work of the Holy Spirit, which exists in us personally and in the community of saints known as the Church.

     We can be grateful that God is not a piece of historical fiction but comes to those with open hearts and unites us with others all across the globe who seek after God’s will.

     We confess that we often stop the full work of the Spirit by picking and choosing what we want God to do in our lives and not submitting our full lives to God’s work in the way that a potter shapes a clay vessel.

     We pray that we will endure and persevere in faith and in our seeking of the Spirit’s work in our lives. We pray that we will uphold the work of the body of Christ in the world until we remain eternally in God’s glorious presence.