G. C. Jeffers

I believe in one God

Ethical monotheism is a late development. I’ve written, elsewhere, about my doubts. One of them being that the connection between morality and religion is new. Sure, obey the gods so the crops will grow or your enemies will fall in battle. But, obey the gods because the gods are the arbiters of righteousness?

That’s different. The Hebrews were first, in their raw demand that YHWH act justly.

And the Greek Philosophers searched the depths of wisdom and found Theos. He reigns alone.

the father almighty

A metaphor, of course. And rough cut of the infinite love and care that God has for creation. I’ve always thought of might as related to war. But might means strength and came into English from the German machen which means “to make.”

Enshrined in the creed is this qualifying sentiment: God is like a parent with infinite ability and will to create. As David Lang preached this past Sunday at Highland God has created, is creating, and will create.

maker of Heaven and Earth

God’s will yielded fruit. All that is, whether temporal or eternal was devised by a parent with infinite ability and will to create. Nothing is random or without design. Nothing is a waste. All things mean.

There is, of course, the fundamentalist sense that God created all things in the blink of an eye, intending them to be now just as they are. But plumbing the depth of the natural world yields the subtlety of God the designer. He is not merely an artificer, nor a factory robot. He is an architect.

and of all things visible and invisible

A restatement of the previous line, to be sure. But the creed, written to summarize the Faith in a few of words as possible, isn’t needlessly redundant. God is the maker of all that we know, and most certainly of all that we don’t know.

Of all things that were, are, or will be. World without end.