As you might imagine, many of our Christian creeds and Confessions of Faith grow out of conflict and debate in the church. When teaching in the church began to split into camps, as it were, councils were called for the purpose of resolving the source of the divergent teaching. We even have an example in Acts 15 when a council met in Jerusalem to determine, from Scripture, whether or not Gentiles needed to be circumcised in order to become Christians.
There are more Councils called throughout the ages for a similar purpose. Councils met, for example, in Nicaea (325 AD), Constantinople (351 AD), and Chalcedon (451 AD), and more. They each served a particular purpose. The Council of Nicaea, for example, addressed the particular heresy of Arianism that taught that Jesus was not fully divine. It didn’t produce a thorough doctrine of the person and work of Christ because it wasn’t supposed to, that wasn’t its purpose.
Something we might not consider but that makes perfect sense, there’s always a chance that a decision made at one Council, since it wasn’t designed to say everything possible, will lead to different confusing and erroneous teaching later.
The Council of Chalcedon was called for the purpose of addressing the question of how the humanity and deity of Jesus Christ are supposed to…work (for lack of a better word). On one side was the temptation to blur all lines between his humanity and his deity. On the other side, there were those who wanted to drive too large a wedge between the two natures of Christ, even to the point of contending that Jesus was basically two persons sharing one body. If you’re familiar enough with the Westminster Shorter Catechism (written nearly 1200 years after the Chalcedonian Creed), we affirm that Christ “the Son of God became man and so was and continues to be God and man in two distinct natures and one person forever” (WSC 21). Well, we can say that with confidence because the Council of Chalcedon formulated that kind of language back in the 5th century.
Since we’re about to launch into a new sermon series in the Gospel of John and will be considering John 1:1-18 this coming Lord’s Day, I really wanted to use the Chalcedonian Creed (click here to read it). What it teaches about the nature of Christ is incredibly thoughtful and thorough. However, it’s also wordy and a little too cumbersome for reciting corporately. Therefore, I’m giving it to you here to that you can take a look and learn and grow and then rest easy knowing that we will affirm our faith together this Sunday with the Nicene Creed instead.