The Creeds and Confessions in the Life of the Church

How do the early church creeds and the Reformed confessions fit into the life of the local church? As someone who came to Reformed convictions but had not been raised in a Reformed context, this was a question I had needed to ponder. I slowly came to my own conviction that the faith as expressed in the Westminster Standards best communicated the truths of Scripture – and therefore was keen on incorporating this confession of faith into my own life of faith.

Personally, this meant that my wife and I began to read through the Westminster Standards together to ensure that we were on the same page. A short stint as members in the local United Reformed Church helped us to acquaint ourselves with the continental Reformed tradition and their usage of the Three Forms of Unity in their Lord’s Day gatherings (alongside my wife growing up in the CRC and her acquaintance with the Heidelberg Catechism from her childhood catechesis). An international move later, when we joined our local congregation in the Free Church of Scotland, I was eager to have more teaching on the Westminster Standards – but was quickly disappointed. Catechetical instruction was mostly non-existent; references to our Standards were almost unheard of. Were my expectations off base? How should I properly think of the role of these standards in the life of the local church? These questions led me to conduct a brief and informal survey with friends and acquaintances in various Presbyterian denominations: International Presbyterian Church, Free Church of Scotland, Presbyterian Church in America, Orthodox Presbyterian Church, and the Vanguard Presbyterian Church.

In the Reformed church, we have a rich tradition from which we can draw and learn, yet in many of the places I looked it seemed like confessional adherence and teachings were being overlooked or outright rejected. One respondent to my query suggested that in his context, the standards and catechism carried ‘negative baggage' from the past century when it was taught through rote memorization but not believed. Another suggested that perhaps the disparity between the use of the Westminster Standards and the Heidelberg Catechism is due to the ‘devotional’ nature of the latter compared to the former. In churches in Scotland, a few of the respondents indicated that while they love and appreciate Westminster, they were beginning to introduce Keller’s New City Catechism for catechetical instruction.

Taking a step back and considering trends more broadly perhaps suggests missional pragmatism is behind some of the disuse or change. In a desire to be relevant or more easily understood, the catechism used and taught is changed to something newer, or often catechetical instruction is dispensed with all together.

The words of Alexander Stewart in the early years of the twentieth century might help us think this through a little more clearly:

In a time of religious declension … there is always a tendency to remove the landmarks of definite theological belief. Truth is held with a loose grasp. Its power has not become a matter of experience. Depth of conviction and clearness of enunciation give place to the specious attractions of speculative inquiry. The unyielding rock is abandoned for the shifting sands. Men lose the ‘plainness of speech’ which is a fruit of the evangelical hope and give utterance to what faith there is in them with faltering words and apologetic tone. The formulation which set forth the convictions of a more spiritual age come to be regarded as an oppressive yoke. There follows the cry for emancipation. Liberty is made to lend its name to laxity. Thus, it often happens that a revision of the Church’s creed is really a concession to unbelief. (The Free Church of Scotland: 1843–1910 — A Vindication [1910], 65. Read the full quote here.)

We’ve been living amidst religious declension for quite some time. Biblical literacy, and literacy more broadly, has been in decline for years. As our understanding of the Bible has lessened, as a generation turned away from the creeds and confessions of the church of old, clear articulations of faith have fallen on hard times. Questioning and doubting, scoffing and disbelief became the mark of a mind unfettered and seeking truth wherever it may lead. ‘Me and my Bible’ is another way of saying the same thing: I am the arbiter of truth and can determine what is right on my own.

Such religious and theological illiteracy is a startling thing to stand against. Where do we begin? How do we show our people the importance of the creeds and confessions for the life of the church?

The overall thoughts and desires from all those with whom I corresponded was the same: we’ve lost something in the diminishing use of the catechisms and confession and there is much to be gained by integrating these historic documents back into our regular teaching and emphasis. While the outworking of that may look different in varying contexts all were keen on ensuring faithfulness to these historic subordinate standards. Four main practices were highlighted by the various respondents:

Responsive Confessions of Faith in Worship

One way to ensure the confession and catechism is being brought to the fore in the lives of our people is by utilizing them in responsive readings during the gathered worship. Incorporating the public, congregational reading of the confessions and catechisms will allow the church to begin seeing their regular utility and it will bring the standards to the front of their thoughts every week. When I was visiting Oakland Hills OPC outside of Detroit in November 2024, we read aloud a portion of the catechism relating to the sacraments, which helped think more clearly about what we were going to be doing when we took the Lord’s Supper a little later on in the service.

References to the Standards in Sermons

Not all Presbyterian churches will utilize the recitation of a confession of faith during the gathered worship (i.e. more traditional Scottish churches and Reformed Presbyterians, due to their understanding of the regulative principle) but all P&R churches will include a sermon. One of the most natural ways to incorporate our creeds and confessions and catechisms is by referencing them in our sermons. It also provides a natural way to do it without shoehorning it elsewhere. The confession and catechism has an abundance of Scripture references. Search them and refer to it when it works. While the fine folks at Orlando Reformed Presbyterian Church won’t recite the confession as a congregation during the gathered worship, Nathan Eshelman will certainly quote and refer to the confessions and catechisms throughout his sermons – and joyfully discuss them again later in his home over lunch. (Check out his book on the topic, I Have a Confession put out by Crown & Covenant.) Another option is to preach through the confessions or catechism over the course of a year. To our benefit, Boekestein, Cruse and Miller have done the church a great service in writing Glorifying and Enjoying God, a devotional book that compiles the shorter catechism into fifty-two Lord’s Day readings.

Teaching the Standards in Sunday School or During a Mid-Week Meeting

Assuming the Standards are the best summary of the Scriptures, then it is worth considering taking the time to teach through them in a dedicated setting: Sunday school before or after morning worship, or perhaps at a mid-week meeting. This gives the benefit both of reading the Standards as a church while allowing the minister to undertake the task of more fully fleshing out the implications of the Standards and showing the biblical basis for its statement.

Impressing the use and importance of the Standards in family worship

Family worship wasn’t really something that was emphasized in the tradition in which I was raised, but coming into the P&R world made me realize how significant it is. Historically there has been a great emphasis on family worship because family worship is a means of training the family in how we do public worship. From the words read, to the songs sung, to the prayers prayed – each aspect of family worship is teaching the family and will go on to shape public worship. (As an aside, this is one reason why we should also emphasize singing the psalms in family worship – to help normalize them being sung in public worship … but perhaps that’s a point for another day.) Thus, we should be encouraging and equipping our families and our churches to engage in family worship and to train their families in the utilization of the Westminster Standards, for their good and God’s glory.

There is a need to recover and utilize the Westminster Standards. In a day of lax theological formulations and widely divergent beliefs, it’s essential for pastors and elders to be pointing their congregants to these scripturally-saturated formulations that have stood firm for the past (nearly) 400 years. While we may not face a unique circumstance (one of my respondents recalls reading Witsius and Colquhoun lament the same lapse, and I seem to recall Philip Doddridge commenting likewise), it’s a challenge we must confront for the good of the Church.

By God’s grace, may we see a revived interest in the robust and scripturally-saturated confession that we have inherited from our fathers in the faith.

Colin Fast is a Canadian, married to an American, living in the Highlands of Scotland. He is a father, preacher, writer, reader, and Editorial Manager at Christian Focus. Colin is the author of Track: A Student’s Guide to Reading and Applying the Bible. He and his family are members of Tain and Fearn Free Church of Scotland.