A call to return to the centre that never moved.
Introduction
The word Christian today stretches like elastic. It can mean anything from “I once prayed a prayer” to “I like Jesus’ vibe” to “I believe He is God Incarnate.” Someone may affirm Jesus as a moral teacher, a cosmic life coach, a political revolutionary, or a personal cheerleader, and still claim the label Christian.
But historically, that is not how the Church understood the word.
From the earliest centuries, the Church guarded a clear, non-negotiable centre: Jesus Christ is truly God, truly man, crucified, risen, and reigning within the eternal Trinity. Anything less was not Christianity, it was sentimentality, philosophy, or personalised spirituality.
That is why the Nicene Creed exists.
It is not “one option” among many.
It is the boundary of Christian belief itself.
Recovering it may be one of the most urgent tasks of our generation.
Why the Nicene Creed Exists
The early Church did not write creeds out of boredom. They wrote them because something precious was under threat: the identity of Jesus Christ Himself.
Arius taught Jesus was a created being.
Sabellius collapsed the Trinity into one Person wearing different masks.
Gnostics denied the real incarnation.
Others denied the resurrection.
Heresy was not an intellectual disagreement, it was a pastoral disaster.
If Christ is not fully God, He cannot save. If He is not fully man, He cannot heal our humanity.
If the Spirit is not God, He cannot sanctify.
The Nicene Creed (AD 325; expanded 381) answered with a declaration so clear, so unflinching, that it still stands as the theological North Star of Christianity:
“God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God… of one substance with the Father.”¹
These are not poetic flourishes. They are guards around the gospel. The Creed is the Church saying: This is who Jesus truly is, and anything less is not the Christian faith.
Christianity Without Nicene Boundaries Becomes Unrecognisable
Broad “Christianity” today often drifts into three errors:
1. Moralistic Christianity
Jesus the example, not the Saviour.
2. Therapeutic Christianity
Jesus the comforter, not the Lord.
3. Progressive Christianity
Jesus the symbol of affirmation, not the incarnate Word who judges and redeems. In each case, Jesus loses His identity, and when Christ is dethroned, everything collapses: salvation holiness the doctrine of God the meaning of the cross the authority of Scripture the purpose of the Church
The Nicene Creed is the antidote.
It refuses to let us sculpt Jesus into an avatar of our preferences.
Scripture’s Own Creeds Point Us to Nicene Christianity
Long before AD 325, the Church already confessed high Christology drawn straight from Scripture.
Christ is eternally divine; “In the beginning was the Word… and the Word was God” (John 1:1).
Christ is the exact imprint of God’s nature; “[He is] the radiance of the glory of God” (Heb. 1:3).
Christ is worshipped as God, “Every knee shall bow… every tongue confess Jesus Christ is Lord” (Phil. 2:10–11).
Christ reigns eternally, “His kingdom shall have no end” (Luke 1:33).
The Nicene Creed simply takes what Scripture declares and places it in unambiguous, non-negotiable form.²
It is Scripture arranged as armour.
Why Nicene Christianity Is the Gold Standard
1. It clarifies the identity of Jesus
Without Nicene Christology, Christianity dissolves into religious preference.
2. It upholds the Trinity
The creed prevents us from reducing God to:
three gods (tritheism), one Person with three roles (modalism), or a hierarchy where the Son is a lesser being (Arianism).³
3. It anchors Christian identity in conferral
If Christ is not God, He cannot confer identity. If Christ is not man, He cannot restore identity. If the Spirit is not God, He cannot indwell identity.
4. It creates global, timeless unity
Christians across continents and centuries speak one faith in one voice.
5. It stops Christianity becoming whatever culture wants
The Creed confronts modern syncretism with immovable clarity.
Broad Christianity vs. Nicene Christianity
Here is the simplest way to say it:
Broad Christianity = “I like Jesus.”
Nicene Christianity = “I bow to the Triune God revealed in Jesus Christ.”
One is opinion.
One is revelation.
One is constructed.
One is conferred.
Nicene Christianity is not one tradition among many, it is the definition of Christianity itself.
The Call of Our Moment: Return to the Centre
We do not need new truths. We need old truths rediscovered. The Nicene Creed is not a museum artefact. It is a map back to the real Christ. And when we lose the real Christ, we lose: salvation, coherence, identity, holiness, and the gospel itself.
The Church does not need reinvention.
It needs reorientation.
Back to Christ.
Back to the Trinity.
Back to the Creed.
Call to Action
Read the Nicene Creed this week.
Pray it.
Sit under it.
Let its clarity untangle the noise of modern Christianity.
And ask yourself the question that has always divided the Church:
Is my Christianity Nicene?
Or is it merely broad?
Only one will hold when the world shakes.
The Nicene Creed (AD 381):
We believe in one God, the Father Almighty,
maker of heaven and earth, of all things visible and invisible.
And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all ages; Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made; of one substance with the Father; through Him all things were made.
For us and for our salvation He came down from heaven, and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became man.
He was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, suffered, and was buried; and on the third day He rose again according to the Scriptures.
He ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
And He will come again with glory to judge the living and the dead; His kingdom shall have no end.
And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord and giver of life, who proceeds from the Father (and the Son), who with the Father and the Son is worshipped and glorified; who spoke through the prophets.
In one holy Church; we acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins; we look for the resurrection of the dead and the life of the age to come.
Amen.
LINK TO NICENE CREED
https://ccel.org/ccel/schaff/creeds2/creeds2.iv.i.i.ii.html
A Prayer for Returning to the Centre
God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
Yahweh who was, and is, and is to come,
Renew my mind, I pray.
Teach me not only what I believe, but why You alone are the coherent Truth in whom all things hold together.
Draw me out of every shallow, cultural, or inherited version of Christianity that does not reflect the glory of who You truly are.
Forgive me for the places where I have let convenience replace conviction, where sentiment replaced Scripture, and where my faith became shaped more by my culture than by Your Word.
Realign my heart with Your revelation, the Christ of Scripture, the Christ of the Creeds, the eternal Son who is Light from Light, true God from true God.
Create in me again a pure heart, a heart that trembles in awe, delights in Your presence, and finds joy in serving You without performance or pretence.
Lead me into worship that is not self-shaped but Spirit-shaped.
Form my identity not by my feelings, my past, or my culture, but by Your conferring voice that names me in love and truth.
And anchor me, Lord Jesus, Messiah, King, Redeemer, in the centre that never moves.
In Your majestic, holy, sovereign Name, Lord Jesus Christ,
Amen.
TRACK TO ENJOY
Footnotes
1) J. N. D. Kelly, Early Christian Creeds (London: Longman, 1972).
2) John 1:1; Hebrews 1:3; Philippians 2:10–11, ESV.
3) Athanasius, Orations Against the Arians, trans. John Henry Newman (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing Co., 1892), 1.4–6; Lewis Ayres, Nicaea and Its Legacy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004); Robert Letham, The Holy Trinity: In Scripture, History, Theology, and Worship (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R Publishing, 2004); Christopher R. Seitz, “The Rule of Faith as Hermeneutic,” in Word Without End (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998); Kevin J. Vanhoozer, The Drama of Doctrine (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2005); Herman Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics, vol. 1, trans. John Vriend (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2003), 29–54.
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