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Category: Doctrine

About Roger – TalkofJESUS.com Doctrine & teaching

What do Christians believe?

Doctrine = Teaching

What do you know about Biblical teaching and preaching?

WHAT DOCTRINES DO YOU BELIVE?

WHAT DOCTRINES DOES YOUR PASTOR PREACH (or avoid)?

The Apostles Creed 2 We Believe in Jesus Christ
JESUS

We believe in…
1. God
2. Jesus Christ
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Our outline for this SERIES is taken from the Old Roman Creed (vide ante) from which the Apostles' Creed was adapted and possibly in use before the mid-2nd century. 
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The Apostles’ Creed

I believe in

Jesus Christ, His Only Son, our Lord,

What is faith in Jesus Christ?

Q30 of the New City Catechism

Kid’s Answer:

Receiving and resting on him alone for salvation as he is offered to us in the Gospel.

Trinity: the PERSON of JESUS

As Scripture states:

GOD IS ONE IN ESSENCE,

and as the Gospel reveals,

THREE IN PERSON.

More on Trinity from R.C. Sproul

What do we believe by true faith?

Q31 of the New City Catechism

Q31 ANSWER: (words of the Apostles’ Creed)

Who IS this JESUS?

Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham – Matthew 1:1b

When Jesus came into the region of Caesarea Philippi, He asked His disciples, saying,

“Who do men say that I, the Son of Man, am?”

Gospel of the Apostle Matthew 16:13 NKJV

This question and self-designation of Jesus Christ — iēsous, meaning “Jehovah is salvation” from the Hebrew root, yᵊhôšûaʿ or Joshua with the same meaning — reveals a great mystery that in His incarnation JESUS IS also the Son of Man.

Who is the Son of Man?

“God is not a man, that He should lie,
Nor a son of man, that He should repent.
Has He said, and will He not do?
Or has He spoken, and will He not make it good?

Numbers 23:19 NJKV
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Yet the Messiah of Israel IS the Word of God and cannot lie.
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‘Ya`akov became the father of Yosef, the husband of Miryam, from whom was born Yeshua, who is called Messiah.

Matthew 1:16 Hebrew Names Version

(Yes, Matthew Levi, Simon Peter, and Miryam the mother of Jesus Christ are all Jews.)

King David, a thousand years before, asks,

What is man that You are mindful of him,
And the son of man that You visit him?

Psalm 8:4

His Jewish disciples whom Jesus asks know this self-designation of Yeshua from the Prophet Ezekiel about 600 years before.

“Son of man, I am sending you to the children of Israel, to a rebellious nation that has rebelled against Me; they and their fathers have transgressed against Me to this very day.

Ezekiel 2:3 NKJV

“Son of man, go to the house of Israel and speak with My words to them.

“Son of man, receive into your heart all My words that I speak to you, and hear with your ears.

And He said to me: “Son of man, these are the men who devise iniquity and give wicked counsel in this city.. “Therefore prophesy against them, prophesy, O son of man!”

son of man occurs 93 times in 93 verses in the book of ‘Ezekiel’ in the NKJV.

..he asked his talmidim, saying, “Who do men say that I, the Son of Man, am?”

They said, “Some say Yochanan the immerser, some, Eliyah, and others, Yirmeyahu, or one of the prophets.”

Matthew 16:13b-14 HNV

He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?”

Simon Peter answered and said,

“You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”
Matthew 16:15-16 NKJV

The Son of God

And she gave birth to her first-born son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn. – Gospel of Luke 2:7 RSV

Hard to imagine — this Son of Man, the Son of God!

υἱός – huios– a son
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MORE insight in linked definition above
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1. male issue (one begotten by a father and born of a mother)
2. son of man
  - Christ seems to have preferred this to the other Messianic titles, because by its lowliness it was least suited to foster the expectation of an earthly Messiah in royal splendour.
3. son of God
4. those who revere God as their father,
  - .. governed by the Spirit of God,
Examine closely every aspect of the life of JESUS from manger to the cross and you will witness both humanity and deity — Christ the Son of Man—Christ the Son of God.

Roger@TalkofJesus.com
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NEXT:
we will see why JESUS is 
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His Only Son

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.

In him was life; and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.

And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.

Gospel of John 1:1-5,14 KJV

Comment on Scripture – Share the Gospel
December 22, 2025
The Apostles Creed 1 We Believe in God the Father
I believe in

God the Father Almighty,

What is God?

Q2 of the New City Catechism

Kid’s Answer:

God is the creator of everyone and everything.

Of course any simple or complex answer falls short of describing Almighty God. But the Apostles’ Creed adds:

Maker of Heaven and Earth.

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth… And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.

Genesis 1:1-3 excerpt KJV

The Lord God created every thing and all life!

God — ONE God.

There IS no other being — an Existing One — capable of speaking any created being of substance into existence.

Therefore, THE LORD GOD is neither plural, as in, “gods,” nor is ‘god‘ in all creation and creatures, as some falsely claim.

Hear – šāmaʿ -שְׁמַע
- Do you hear what I hear? – a well-known Christmas song
- You with ears to hear, let him hear… – Jesus, the Messiah
- Today, if you will hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion. – Hebrews 3:15
- And oft-repeated by sons of a chosen people of all the earth — our spoken truth of monotheism (One God worshiped):
Hear, O Israel: Our God YHWH—YHWH [is] one!

Deuteronomy 6:4 LSV

Hear, H8085 O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD:

שָׁמַע shâmaʻ, shaw-mah’; a primitive root;
- to hear intelligently
- (often with implication of attention, obedience, etc.; causatively, to tell, etc.):
- .. witness
God IS ONE!

There are no other gods (though the world worships them).

Yea, they made their hearts as an adamant stone, lest they should hear the law, and the words which the LORD of hosts hath sent in his spirit by the former prophets: therefore came a great wrath from the LORD of hosts.

Zechariah 7:12 KJV

The One God

WHY is the One God of monotheism the first key doctrine of the Apostles’ Creed?

To begin, God speaks authoritatively through Scripture. The word ‘God’ occurs more than 20,000 times in the BIBLE.

Jesus, born of a Jewish mother, Mary — through Joseph to whom she was betrothed, a son of the house of David — received His covenantal circumcision on the eighth day

— the incarnate Messiah of Israel would have recited the šāmaʿ and later taught directly from it.

the MANY gods of a polytheistic world

Like the Jews, the early saints lived in a polytheistic world, as do Christians now in the Common Era.
- ROMANS worshiped many gods.
- GREEK gods were created from their ancient myths.
  - (Even Zeus was born from other gods, therefore created and not an eternal being.)
330 million gods, ~20 deities of India,

(where Hinduism remains practically the State religion).

Largest number of Buddhists live in ‘modern‘ China plus Buddhism is the State religion of at least four Asian nations

and practiced in other countries —

yoga, meaning “to yoke” or “union” (from the Sanskrit root yuj), has its genesis in ancient India,

Karma Yoga (the yoga of action),

Bhakti Yoga (the yoga of devotion), and

Jnana Yoga (the yoga of knowledge) – source: yoga.org

The Father Almighty

And when Abram was ninety years old and nine, the LORD appeared to Abram, and said unto him,

I am the Almighty God;

walk before me, and be thou perfect.

Genesis 17:1 KJV

Hear of Israel (Jacob, that is), sons of David, of Moses, of Jacob and Isaac — and ALL sons of our father Abram, who the LORD named, Abraham:

Creator of heaven and earth

Not only is the One God and Father of all fathers, including the Father of Israel, Abraham, the ALMIGHTY, IS Creator of the heavens and the earth.

God is NOT the earth. Nor is the Almighty many gods of the heavens named for suns and planets and meteoric phenomena beyond the reach of man’s understanding.

Have we not all one father?

hath not one God created us?

why do we deal treacherously every man against his brother, by profaning the covenant of our fathers?

Malachi 2:10 KJV

Yet THE LORD GOD will bring a Redeemer to Israel and reveal a new covenant to the nations in a Person who was from the beginning.

In the beginning was the Word,
and the Word was with God,
and the Word was God.
Gospel of John 1:1 KJV

Trinity — Father, Son, Holy Ghost (or Holy Spirit)

As Scripture states:

GOD IS ONE IN ESSENCE,

and as the Gospel reveals,

THREE IN PERSON.

More on Trinity from R.C. Sproul

Next: Jesus Christ, Our Lord
December 21, 2025
The Apostles Creed: We Believe in One LORD
The Apostles’ Creed is foundational to our Apostolic Christian faith (even though Jesus’ Twelve Apostles didn’t write it).

TalkofJESUS.com has previously examined and defined creeds and Trinity, but today we’ll briefly connect this fundamental of the faith to authority and truth of Apostolic faith from Scripture.

Talk of JESUS .com

Creeds and Credo

How do we know if our fellow worshipers also believe what we do?

Although creeds were originally individual (credo from the Latin, I believe), they shortly became statements of doctrine in which groups set forth their essential beliefs.

Zondervan Pictorial Encyclopedia of the Bible, Tenney, v.1,p.1025

We believe in…

That’s how (regardless of the frequency and regularity of our corporate affirmations) the Apostle’s Creed and other affirmations of faith came about.

Therefore, as part of weekly worship, baptism and other corporate gatherings of believers WE sometimes affirm our CREED together:
- YOU witness publicly in worship of the LORD GOD that WE believe in this.
- So, DO YOU?
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Do YOU really believe this? It's a fair question — a foundational question of WHAT YOU BELIEVE concerning God and Jesus Christ (regardless of recitation as ritual or perhaps never having confessed your faith pubically at all). 
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Structure of Christian CREEDS

Here’s a brief outline of the fundamental objects of our faith found in The Creed:

I BELIEVE or WE BELIEVE IN:
1. God
2. Jesus Christ
3. the Holy Spirit
  - and the Virgin Mary
4. Jesus was crucified
  - and was buried
5. He rose from the dead
6. He ascended to heaven
7. He sits in the favored place of God the Father
8. He will judge the living and the dead.
Here, the weightiness of what we have just confessed must certainly convict the faithful soul. Then follows a reiteration and underlining of the same fundamental faith:

(I or WE believe in:)
- The Holy Ghost
- The Holy Church
- The remission of Sins
- The resurrection of the Flesh
- (The Life everlasting).
source: apostles-creed.org

The early CREEDS of the Church include:
- Nicene Creed – AD 325
- The creed of Marcellus – c. AD 340
- Apostles’ Creed – AD 340
  - AD 400 – Rufinus adds, ‘the Father almighty’ and
  - ‘the life everlasting.’
- Chalcedonian Creed – AD 451
- sources: apostles-creed.org &
  - Zondervan Encyclopedia, Tenney
  - more.. from Grockipedia
The early church taught what is basically in the Apostles creed, yet, they never had a written form of their teaching and called it “The Apostles Creed.” It was not till heresies and divisions in the church that any creeds were established.

The very first established creed that was accepted throughout the church as a whole was the Nicene Creed. The Nicene Creed was established by the Ecumenical church in 325 A.D.. The Apostles creed was established shortly after.

source:

The Apostles’ Creed

Our outline above used for this SERIES taken from the Old Roman Creed (vide ante) from which the Apostles’ Creed was adapted and possibly in use before the mid-2nd century.

Christians proclaiming Apostolic faith adhere to the narrow path of Scriptural orthodoxy. (I am not the first to have said so.)

Roger@TalkofJesus.com

These essays are concerned only to discuss the actual fact that the central Christian theology (sufficiently summarized in the Apostles’ Creed) is the best root of energy and sound ethics.

G.K. CHESTERTON – ORTHODOXY (pub. AD 1908)

Chesterton also quipped:

There is only one unanswerable argument against Christianity: Christians.

ORTHODOXY (pub. 1994), forward by Philip Yancy, p.xii

The Apostles’ Creed and other affirmations of faith were adopted corporately by the Church to refute permeating heresies plaguing believers since the time of the Apostles.

Roger@TalkofJesus.com

NEXT: I believe in God

Trinity

Talk of JESUS . com

Comment on Scripture – Share the Gospel
December 20, 2025