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Reformed

THEOLOGY

PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH (USA)

A Glossary of Common Terms and Phrases

The Presbyterian Church (USA), in obedience to

Jesus Christ, is open to the reform of its life, its

practice, its beliefs and its governance. The

church affirms:

“

Ecclesia reformata,

semper reformanda secundum verbum Dei

.”

“The church reformed, always to be reformed

according to the Word of God” in the power of

the Spirit.

THE

REFORMED

CHURCH

According to one classical definition, theology is:

“faith seeking understanding”

“fides quaerens intellectum”

Faith is knowledge of and trust in the living God who

ever remains a mystery beyond human comprehension.

In Jesus Christ the living, free, inexhaustibly rich God

has been revealed as sovereign, holy love. To know

God in this revelation is to acknowledge the infinite and

incomprehensible depth of the mystery called God.

 CHRISTIAN

THEOLOGY

ACCOMMODATION

The idea that God adapts revelation so that it can be grasped by

finite creatures. Calvin, with whom this idea is often associated,

explains that anthropomorphic images and metaphors of God

found in the Bible, such as describing God as having hands or

being jealous, are the result of God’s accommodation to our

weakness. According to Calvin, the Incarnation is the primary

instance of accommodation. In the humanity of Christ God “has

accommodated himself to our little measure lest our minds be

overwhelmed by the immensity of his glory.”

ADOPTION

God makes God’s people God’s children (see Galatians 4:4-5).  At

several points, Paul speaks of Christians as having been

“adopted” into the family of God (Romans 8: 15, 23; Galatians 4:

5). It is widely thought that Paul is here drawing on a legal

practice, common in Greco-Roman culture (yet, interestingly, not

recognized in traditional Jewish law). According to many

interpreters of Paul, to speak of “believers” having been adopted

into the family of God is to make the point that believers share the

same inheritance rights as Jesus Christ, and hence will receive the

glory that Christ achieved (although only after first sharing in his

sufferings).

ASCENSION

Scripture (Luke 24:51; Acts 1:9-11) and the Nicene and Apostles’

Creeds declare that after his resurrection Jesus “ascended into

heaven.” The doctrine of the ascension of the risen Jesus affirms

that he rules from heaven as head of the church and Lord of the

world and that he continues to be present and active in the world

in the power of the Holy Spirit. An important aspect of this

doctrine is that the presence of Jesus cannot be directly

identified with either the structures and practices of the church or

the events and movements of history. The doctrine thus calls in

question every ecclesiastical or secular triumphalism.

ATONEMENT

Atonement or “at-one-ment” refers to the reconciling act of God

in Jesus Christ, especially though not exclusively through his

passion and death, that mends the broken relationship between

God and humanity caused by sin. While the New Testament is

unanimous in declaring that Christ lived and died “for us” (“Christ

died for our sins,” 1 Cor. 15:3), there are many images and

metaphors of atonement in Scripture, and there is no single

official church dogma defining the work of Christ as there is of his

person. Nevertheless, several “theories of the atonement” have

been especially influential.

THEORIES OF ATONEMENT

This theory finds its roots in the Early Church, particularly in

Origen from the 3rd century. This theory essentially teaches that

Jesus Christ died as a ransom sacrifice, paid either to Satan (the

most dominant view) or to God the Father. Jesus’ death then acts

as a payment to satisfy the debt on the souls of the human race,

the same debt we inherited from Adam’s original sin. Redemption

in this theory means to buy back, and purchase the human race

from the clutches of the Devil.

THE RANSOM THEORY

THEORIES OF ATONEMENT

This theory focuses on not just the death of Jesus Christ, but on

His entire life and sees the saving work of Jesus not only in the

event of the crucifixion, but also in all the words he has spoken,

and the example he has set. In this theory, the cross is merely a

ramification of the moral life of Jesus. He is crucified as a martyr

due to the radical nature of His moral example. The death of

Christ is understood as a catalyst to reform society, inspiring men

and women to follow His example and live good moral lives of

love.  Augustine, from the 4th century, emphasized this theory

alongside the Ransom theory.

MORAL INFLUENCE THEORY

THEORIES OF ATONEMENT

In this theory, Jesus Christ dies in order to defeat the powers of

evil (such as sin, death, and the devil) in order to free mankind

from their bondage. This is related to the Ransom view with the

difference being that there is no payment to the devil or to God.

Within the Christus Victor framework, the cross did not pay off

anyone but defeated evil thereby setting the human race free.

Gustaf Aulen argued this is the most consistently held theory in

the early church up until the 12th century before Anslem’s

satisfaction theory came along. He writes that “the work of Christ

is first and foremost a victory over the powers which hold

mankind in bondage: sin, death, and the devil.”

CHRISTUS VICTOR

THEORIES OF ATONEMENT

In the 12th century, Anselm of Canterbury proposed a satisfaction

theory for the Atonement. In this theory, Jesus Christ’s death is

understood as a death to satisfy the justice of God. Satisfaction

here means restitution, the mending of what was broken, and the

paying back of a debt to God. In this theory, Anselm emphasizes

the justice of God and claims that sin is an injustice that must be

balanced. Anselm’s satisfaction theory says essentially that Jesus

Christ died in order to pay back the injustice of human sin and to

satisfy the justice of God.

THE SATISFACTION THEORY

THEORIES OF ATONEMENT

Developed during the Reformation, the Reformers, specifically

Calvin and Luther, took Anselm’s Satisfaction theory and modified

it slightly. They added a more legal (or forensic) framework into

this notion of the cross as satisfaction saying that Jesus Christ

dies to satisfy God’s wrath against human sin. Jesus is punished

(penal) in the place of sinners (substitution) in order to satisfy the

justice of God and the legal demand of God to punish sin. In the

light of Jesus’ death, God can now forgive the sinner because

Jesus Christ has been punished in the place of the sinner, in this

way meeting the retributive requirements of God’s justice. God is

satisfied with punishing Jesus in the place of mankind.

PENAL SUBSTITUTIONARY THEORY

THEORIES OF ATONEMENT

This is a slight variation upon the Penal Substitutionary theory.

Jesus suffers the punishment of our sin and propitiates God’s

wrath, but Jesus does not take the exact punishment we deserve,

he takes a punishment. Jesus dies on the cross to demonstrate

the displeasure of God towards sin. He died to display God’s

wrath against sin and the high price which must be paid, but not to

specifically satisfy that particular wrath. Jesus died only for the

church, and if you by faith are part of the church, you can take

part in God’s salvation. The church then acts as the sort of hiding

place from God’s punishment.

THE GOVERNMENTAL THEORY

THEORIES OF ATONEMENT

Human nature, in pursuit of power, tends to play the victim or

create victims. When we feel sorry for ourselves, we often seek

someone else to blame, accuse, or attack—often without

consequences. This behavior provides a temporary relief from

shame, guilt, and anxiety. Throughout history, the pattern remains

consistent. Hating, fearing, or diminishing others somehow binds

us together. Scapegoating, or creating necessary victims, seems

ingrained in our nature. Philosopher René Girard labeled this

phenomenon the “scapegoat mechanism”, a central pattern in the

formation and maintenance of cultures worldwide.

THE SCAPEGOAT THEORY

Page 1

THEORIES OF ATONEMENT

The death of Christ was an act of opposition to seeing violence as

a way of solving social crises. Violence and suffering do not bring

real peace or salvation. Brutality is not a way to solve problems.

Jesus does not quietly accept his abuse in hopes of changing the

hearts of his abusers. Rather, he publicly denounces the violence

and calls out this violent method of problem solving. In exposing

the futility of the scapegoating mechanism, the death of Christ

condemns suffering as a redemptive or reconciling act. God

breaks the grip of the scapegoating by stepping into the place of

a victim, becoming a victim who can’t be hidden or mythologized.

THE SCAPEGOAT THEORY

Page 2

CANON

The Greek term literally means “rule” or “measuring rod.” By

speaking of Scripture as “canon” and of its writings as

“canonical,” the church acknowledges that Scripture is the basic

standard or criterion of Christian faith, life, and theology. In the

Protestant churches, the canon of Scripture is composed of

thirty-nine books of the Old Testament and twenty-seven books

of the New. In the Roman Catholic Church several other writings

found in the Greek Septuagint but not contained in the Hebrew

Scriptures (e.g., the Wisdom of Solomon) are also included within

the Old Testament canon.

THE CHURCH

This area of Christian belief is traditionally designated

“ecclesiology” (from the Greek word for “church,” ekklēsia, which

originally meant “gathering” or “assembly”). The church is not a

building.  The church is the gathered people of God. The

particular congregations of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)

wherever they are, taken collectively, constitute one church,

called the church.

COVENANT

A promissory relationship established by God with God’s chosen

people. Based on God’s grace and faithfulness and calling for

obedience and service, covenant in the biblical sense must be

distinguished from a legal “contract” agreed upon by equal

partners. God’s covenant with Israel is summarized in the

promise, “I will be your God and you shall be my people” (Lev.

26:12; Jer. 7:23; 11:4; 30:22). Scripture describes various

covenants of God with Noah, Abraham, Moses, and David. The

prophet Jeremiah speaks of a new covenant that will be written

not on tablets of stone but on human hearts (31:31ff.). Jesus

describes his sacrificial death as “the new covenant in my blood”

(1 Cor. 11:25).

CREATION

God is the creator.  “In the beginning God created the heavens

and the earth” (Gen. 1:1). God called them into being and formed

them in order with an existence that depended on God’s will yet

was distinct from God’s own.

DEMYTHOLOGIZATION

An approach to New Testament interpretation, associated

especially with Rudolf Bultmann, that seeks to replace

“mythological” aspects of the biblical message by uncovering

their existential meaning for people today.

ELECTION

God chooses God’s own (see Romans 9:15-16).  God’s election of

people for salvation and service.  Election means, very simply,

that those who have come to a saving faith in Christ, have done so

because God has claimed them as God’s own, and has firmly

grasped them in the palm of God’s hand. The biblical doctrine of

election is that before Creation God selected out of the human

race, foreseen as fallen, those whom God would redeem, bring to

faith, justify, and glorify in and through Jesus Christ. This divine

choice is an expression of free and sovereign grace, for it is

unconstrained and unconditional, not merited by anything in those

who are its subjects.

ESCHATOLOGY

The doctrine of the “last things” or the completion of God’s

works of creation and redemption. Traditionally, eschatology has

dealt with the topics of the second coming of Christ, the

resurrection of the dead, the final judgment, and heaven and hell.

Because of the importance of the coming reign of God in the

message of Jesus, this theme had special prominence in

twentieth-century interpretations of eschatology. The reign of

God is not something built by humans but comes as a gift of God.

Moreover, it concerns not simply the completion of the life of

individuals but also the consummation of God’s purposes for the

whole creation.

FAITH & BELIEF

It is helpful to make a distinction between “faith” (which is

generally understood relationally) and “belief” (which is generally

understood cognitively or conceptually). Faith primarily describes

a personal act of trust, a relationship with God that is

characterized by trust, commitment, and love. For Christians, to

have faith in God is to place one’s trust in God, believing him to

be worthy of such trust. Beliefs represent an attempt to put into

words the substance of that faith.  The eleventh-century

theologian Anselm of Canterbury made the point that words are

often not up to the task of describing the things of faith through

the Latin phrase 

fides quaerens intellectum

 (“faith seeking

understanding”).

THE FIVE SOLAS

Protestant Reformer Martin Luther discovered that the Bible

taught a salvation that was by grace alone, through faith alone, in

Christ alone, to the glory of God alone. The Five Solas are based

upon five Latin words with the Latin equivalent of the English word

“alone” placed before them. These are meant to be five quick

reference points to the theological difference between the

Roman Catholic Church and the Reformers.

 1. SOLA SCRIPTURA

According to the sixteenth-century Reformers, the Scriptures of

the Old and New Testaments are the only necessary source and

sufficient norm of Christian faith and life. The Reformers defended

the principle of “Scripture alone” against the then current

teaching of the Roman Catholic Church that the tradition of the

church is an additional and independent source of revelation and

that the magisterium of the church is the ultimate interpreter of

Scripture and church tradition.

2. SOLA GRATIA

The phrase “grace alone” refers to the free and unmerited mercy

and forgiveness of God extended to sinners. God’s grace alone is

the entirely sufficient basis of the healing of the relationship

between God and humanity broken by sin. Grace is not a kind of

substance but God’s free personal self-gift of renewed

relationship with us. It includes both God’s pardon of our sin

(justification) and the power of God’s reconciling grace that opens

new life in communion with God and others (sanctification).

3. SOLA FIDE

“By faith alone” is one of the watchwords of the Reformation. As

the apostle Paul teaches in Galatians, Romans 3:21ff., and

elsewhere, sinners are justified before God not by their good

works, but by God’s grace alone received “by faith alone.” This

teaching does not mean that our faith rather than our works is the

way we achieve our salvation. Rather, the grace of God is freely

given and is gratefully and trustingly received by faith alone.

4. SOLUS CHRISTUS

Christ Alone (Solus Christus) – Jesus Christ is the only mediator

through whose work we are redeemed. There is no one else who

is qualified to mediate between us and God. This exclusion

includes Mary the mother of Jesus, all “saints,” or anyone else

other than Jesus Christ.

5. SOLI DEO GLORIA

To God Alone Be Glory (Soli Deo Gloria) – Salvation is of God and

has been accomplished by God; therefore, to God alone belongs

the glory. Since humanity is dead in sin, and deserves nothing but

the wrath of God for rebelling against God, any mercy bestowed

upon sinners in salvation should result in giving the glory to God,

and God alone.

FORGIVENESS

God’s free and gracious acceptance of sinners decisively

declared in Jesus’ teaching, in his ministry to sinners and outcasts,

and in his death for the salvation of the world. Forgiveness is

God’s reception of sinners into new communion in advance of and

apart from reparations for offenses committed. An act of divine

grace, forgiveness is free, scandalous, and costly. Christians are

called by Christ to practice forgiveness in their relationships with

others.

FREE WILL

The view that human beings always have the power of choice and

that no decisions are necessitated. The debate about the

freedom of the will is closely connected with understandings of

the doctrines of sin and grace. Defenders of free will argue that if

sin wholly eradicated human freedom, human beings could not be

held responsible for their decisions and actions. Critics of free will

argue that although human beings make “free choices,” under the

conditions of sin their choices are determined by desires,

motives, and social influences that are inevitably marked by sin.

Hence sinners may be said to have a kind of “free will” (

liberum

arbitrium

), but apart from God’s grace they do not have true

human “freedom” (

libertas

) to live in accordance with God’s will.

FREEDOM

God is free.  God is not bound to act the way we want.  God is not

bound by scripture.  God is not bound by what we call nature.

God is free to be who God is regardless of what we desire.  This

does not mean that God is capricious.  Why?  Because God has

revealed God’s self to us as one who loves.  To believe in God’s

sovereignty is to believe that ultimately, in every aspect of history,

God’s love will remain steadfast.

GOSPEL

The “good news” of salvation through the free and unmerited

grace of God in Jesus Christ. Luther sharply opposed gospel and

law as the basis of right relationship to God. Although the law is

the good gift of God, it is intended to lead sinners to Christ and

not to be a way of establishing one’s righteousness before God.

For Luther, the distinction between gospel and law contained “the

sum of all Christian doctrine,” and the person who can rightly

distinguish the two is a “right good theologian.”

GRACE

Translates the Greek word 

charis 

that is used in the New

Testament to describe the free and unmerited love of God for us.

Salvation “by grace alone” (sola gratia) received “by faith alone”

(sola fide) were watchwords of the sixteenth-century Protestant

Reformation.

HOLY SPIRIT

God’s presence with us.  Before Jesus’ passion, he promised that

the Father and he would send his disciples “another Counselor”

(John 14:16, 26; 15:26; 16:7). The Counselor or Paraclete, from the

Greek word parakletos (meaning one who gives support), is a

helper, adviser, strengthener, encourager, ally, and advocate.

Though the Old Testament said much about the Spirit’s activity in

Creation (e.g., Gen. 1:2; Ps. 33:6), revelation (e.g., Isa. 61:1–6; Mic.

3:8), enabling for service (e.g., Exod. 31:2–6; Judg. 6:34; 15:14–15;

Isa. 11:2), and inward renewal (e.g., Ps. 51:10–12; Ezek. 36:25–27), it

did not make clear that the Spirit is a distinct divine Person. In the

New Testament, however, it becomes clear that the Spirit is as

truly a Person distinct from the Father as the Son is.

HOPE

Christianity is a religion of hope, which focuses on the

resurrection of Jesus as the ground for believing and trusting in a

God who is able to triumph over death and to give hope to all

those who suffer and die. The Christian hope is about the

restoration or re-creation of God’s creation at the end of time

when God will make all things right.  The Christian believer is thus

caught up in this tension between the “now” and the “not yet.” In

one sense, eternal life and the Kingdom of God have not yet

happened; in another, their impact upon life already makes

Christians to be at one and the same time excited at the

prospects and rendered dejected by knowing that they are not

yet fully here.

IDOLATRY

The sin of idolatry.  The chief sin with which the reformed tradition

is concerned is the sin of idolatry.  Calvin: “[Human] nature . . . is a

perpetual factory of idols.”  Bluntly, if we don’t worship the one,

true God who is revealed to us in Christ, we will worship

something else, an idea, a power, a person, even ourselves.  All

sinful behavior grows out of the sin of idolatry.

IMAGO DEI

This Latin phrase translated “image of God” is part of the doctrine

of being human and derives from Genesis 1:27: “So God created

human beings in God’s image; in the image of God he created

them.” Various answers have been given to the question of what

constitutes the image of God in humanity. Among the proposals

are self-consciousness, the capacity to reason, freedom of

choice, and the unique abilities that enable humanity to have

dominion over the other creatures. Some twentieth-century

theologians (e.g., Bonhoeffer, Barth) have argued that life in right

relationship with God and others constitutes the image of God.

For Christian faith and theology, Jesus Christ is the perfect

realization of the image of God (Col. 1:15).

IMMANENCE

From the Latin immanere, “remaining within” or “indwelling.”

God’s immanence is God’s nearness to and presence with all

created beings (Ps. 139). Although often understood to be in

opposition to the transcendence of God, God’s immanence is

properly understood as God’s intimacy and closeness to all

creatures yet without ceasing to be the free and sovereign Lord

of all. The various mystical traditions characteristically emphasize

the immanence of God over against views of God’s otherness as

alienated transcendence — mere opposition to and separation

from creatures.

INCARNATION

The incarnation of the eternal Word of God in Jesus Christ. Jesus

was the Son of God in whom the fullness of God was pleased to

dwell.  Jesus was fully God and fully human in some mysterious

way that we humans may never understand, but can only accept

by faith.  Having said that, we also affirm that not only was Jesus

fully human, but also Jesus was fully a man of his time.  For him to

have been otherwise would be to suggest that he was beyond

fully human and would deny the mystery of the incarnation.

INFALLIBILITY

The property of being “incapable of error” ascribed to Scripture

by some Protestant churches and to the pope by the Roman

Catholic Church. The term “infallible” is used in different ways. For

some, the infallibility of Scripture includes every aspect of its

teaching, including its historical data, scientific assumptions and

statements, and theological and moral teachings. Others employ

the term more strictly with reference to Scripture’s function in the

church as the “infallible rule of faith and life.” Still others prefer to

speak of the unique and authoritative witness of Scripture to the

character, acts, and will of God without using problematic terms

like “infallibility” or “inerrancy.”

INSPIRATION

That Scripture is “inspired” or composed under the special

guidance of the Holy Spirit is a common teaching in Christian

theology. “All Scripture is inspired by God” (2 Tim. 3:16). How to

understand the work of the Spirit in inspiring the biblical writers

has been a subject of much debate. At one extreme is the claim

that the words of Scripture were dictated by God, making

Scripture inerrant in every respect. At the opposite extreme,

inspiration is equated with religious genius and creative

imagination. Between these extremes is the affirmation that the

Holy Spirit works in and through the human writers of Scripture to

convey God’s Word, respecting their human limitations and

conditioning by their historical, social, and cultural contexts.

JUSTIFICATION

A term drawn from the legal sphere, justification refers to God’s

gracious pardon and acceptance of sinners not on account of

their own virtues or good works but solely because of God’s

sheer grace embodied in Jesus Christ and received by faith.

Believers are accounted just, not in themselves, but in Christ. As

God’s free act of forgiveness of sin, justification is the basis of

sanctification or the new life in Christ. Luther called the doctrine

of justification “the article on which the church stands or falls,”

and Calvin called it “the hinge on which religion turns.”

KENOSIS

A Greek word translated “emptying.” In Philippians 2:7 Christ is

said to have “emptied” himself and taken the form of a servant for

our salvation. Nineteenth-century “kenotic” theologians

developed a distinctive interpretation of the Incarnation. Wanting

to take the full humanity of Jesus more seriously than traditional

Christology, they taught that the incarnate Lord emptied himself

of the “metaphysical” attributes of divinity like omnipotence and

omniscience while retaining the “moral” attributes of divinity like

love and holiness. While the concept of kenosis in the sense of

self-emptying and self-giving is employed by many theologians

today, most would agree that God’s act of self-giving does not

mean that God ceases in any way to be fully God.

KINGDOM OF GOD

The Kingdom of God is not just about heaven.  It’s not entirely

about the future and neither is it a place.  Throughout the

Gospels, there is a central confession that the kingdom of God

has arrived with the advent of Jessu even if its complete

fulfillment still awaits us in the future.  It is present but not fully.  It

is already, but also not yet.  We trust that God is reorienting the

world around the reign of God and we are stirred by the Spirit to

make that world a reality in collaboration with God.  God’s

kingdom is when God alone rules and when God’s hopes for the

world are fully present.  God’s kingdom is present when people

and communities are healed of their physical ailments but also

those communal fractures that tear us apart.

KERYGMA

The Greek word for “message” or “proclamation.” It is used in the

New Testament to refer to the central Christian proclamation of

salvation through the crucified and risen Christ.

NATURE OF GOD

God is not a great heavenly Tyrant who threatens and terrifies us

with arbitrary unpredictable divine power that may be for or

against us. Nor is God a great heavenly Granddaddy (or

Grandmother) who does everything for us and makes our lives

smooth, painless, and easy, without expecting or demanding

anything of us.  On the one hand, the Bible indicates God is

infinite, almighty, omnipresent, omniscient, beyond the greatest

and highest we can imagine. On the other hand, it indicates God is

also a God who draws near to us in an intimate way as a loving

parent to a child or as one who wants to be our friend and

companion. God is in fact far above us yet with us, distant yet

near, mysterious yet familiar, powerful yet loving, loving yet

powerful—both at the same time.

OBEDIENCE

Seeking justice and living in obedience to the Word of God.  The

first word we hear from God is I love you.  The second is go and

do justice.  We must obey God before we obey any lesser

authority.  And we are bound to work for the transformation of

society, by Christ’s incarnation.

THREEFOLD OFFICE OF CHRIST

Christ, it is argued, brought to fulfillment the three great “offices”

or “roles” of the Old Testament – the prophet, the priest, and the

king. These three categories were seen as a convenient summary

of all that Jesus of Nazareth had achieved in order to redeem his

people. Jesus is a prophet (Matthew 21:11; Luke 7:16), a priest

(Hebrews 2:17; 3:1) and a king (Matthew 21:5; 27:11), bringing

together in his one person the three great offices of the Old

Testament. Jesus is the prophet who, like Moses, will see God

face to face (Deuteronomy 17:15); he is the king who, like David,

will establish a new people of God and reign over it in justice and

compassion (2 Samuel 7:12–16); he is the priest who will cleanse

his people of their sins.

PERFECTION

According to John Wesley, the goal of God’s work of

sanctification is the perfecting of the saints. Since Jesus calls us

to perfect love of God and neighbor (Matt. 5:48), we should direct

our lives to this goal and trust in God’s power to realize it. Wesley

believed that perfection or full sanctification was realized in this

life only in relatively few Christians, but that all Christians should

at least want to be made perfect in love.

PREDESTINATION

The doctrine that God has eternally ordained the destiny of

human beings. With deep roots in Scripture, this doctrine has

been taught in some form by many theologians, including

Augustine, Aquinas, Luther, Calvin, Schleiermacher, and Barth. In

scholastic Calvinism the doctrine was interpreted to mean God’s

election of some people to salvation and God’s rejection or

reprobation of others to damnation. Barth offered a major

reinterpretation of the doctrine, centering it on Jesus Christ as

both electing God and elected and rejected human being. For

Barth election is first and foremost God’s self-determination to be

God for the world in Jesus Christ. In him all humanity is elect and

by him the divine judgment on sin has been borne for all.

PROVIDENCE

The doctrine that God unceasingly cares for the world, that all

things are in God’s hands, and that God is leading the world to its

appointed goal. Abraham’s assurance to Isaac that “God will

provide” (Gen. 32:8), the psalmist’s confidence that we need not

fear even though kingdoms totter (Ps. 48), and Jesus’ teaching

that not a single sparrow falls without the knowledge of God the

Father (Matt. 10:29) are examples of the strong faith in God’s

providence characteristic of the mainstream of the biblical

witness. The doctrine of providence opposes the idea that all

things happen by chance. At the same time, divine providence

must be distinguished from fatalism or determinism, according to

which God directly causes everything that happens.

RECONCILIATION

The restoration of a broken relationship. Paul speaks of God

having “reconciled us to himself through Christ,” and he declares

that “in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself” (2

Corinthians 5:18–19). Paul uses the same word elsewhere in his

writings to refer to the restoration of a fractured human

relationship, asking husbands to be reconciled to their alienated

wives.

REDEMPTION

This term primarily bears the sense of “securing someone’s

release through a payment.” In the ancient world, which acted as

the backdrop to Paul’s thought, ”redemption” could be used to

refer to the liberation of prisoners of war or to securing liberty for

those who had sold themselves into slavery, often to pay off a

family debt. Paul’s basic idea appears to be that the death of

Christ secures for believers freedom from slavery to the law or to

death, in order that they might become slaves of God instead (1

Corinthians 6:20; 7:23).

REGENERATION

Regeneration is a New Testament concept that grew, it seems,

out of a parabolic picture-phrase that Jesus used to show

Nicodemus the inwardness and depth of the change that even

religious Jews must undergo if they were ever to see and enter

the kingdom of God, and so have eternal life (John 3:3–15). Jesus

pictured the change as being “born again” or “born from above.”

The concept is of God renovating the heart, the core of a

person’s being, by implanting a new principle of desire, purpose,

and action, a dispositional dynamic that finds expression in

positive response to the gospel and its Christ.  Regeneration is

monergistic: that is, entirely the work of God the Holy Spirit. It

raises the elect among the spiritually dead to new life in Christ.

REPENTANCE

A Christian changes radically (see Acts 26:20).  The New

Testament word for repentance means changing one’s mind so

that one’s views, values, goals, and ways are changed and one’s

whole life is lived differently. The change is radical, both inwardly

and outwardly; mind and judgment, will and affections, behavior

and lifestyle, motives and purposes, are all involved. Repenting

means starting to live a new life.

RESURRECTION

Based on the New Testament witness to the resurrection of the

crucified Christ, Christians affirm belief in “the resurrection of the

dead” (Nicene Creed) and “the resurrection of the body”

(Apostles’ Creed). Faith and hope in bodily resurrection stand in

contrast to the idea of the immortality of the soul. The latter holds

immortality to be intrinsic to some aspect of the human creature,

whereas resurrection faith presupposes that death is total and the

hope for life beyond death rests on the sheer gift of God who

brought creation out of nothing and raised the crucified Jesus

from the dead. Moreover, resurrection faith affirms the

significance of embodied existence in God’s sight and by

extension the value of the entire material cosmos.

REVELATION

This word translates the Greek 

apocalypsis

, the “unveiling” or

disclosure of the divine character, purpose, and will. As an event

of personal self-disclosure, the revelation of God is God’s own

free act and must therefore be distinguished from insight or truth

discovered independently by human beings. For Christian faith

and theology, God’s decisive self-revelation is the person and

work of Christ as attested in Scripture. When a distinction is made

between special and general revelation, special revelation refers

to God’s self-disclosure in the covenant history with Israel and

supremely in Christ, and general revelation refers to what can be

known of God through observation of nature and by the dictates

of universal human conscience.

SACRAMENT

The word derives from the Latin sacramentum, which in turn

translates the Greek mysterion, “mystery.” Sacraments are

sacred practices of the church based on a scriptural mandate and

made effective by the Spirit of God as “means of grace” to

confirm the presence and promise of Christ to believers.

Augustine defined a sacrament as a “visible sign of an invisible

grace,” Calvin as a “sign and seal” of God’s promise of salvation.

In Protestant churches, only baptism and the Lord’s Supper are

recognized as sacraments, because they alone rest on a direct

command of Christ.

SALVATION

The Greek term 

soteria 

is translated “salvation” and means

rescue from mortal peril, deliverance from sin and death, and the

gift of fulfilled life in communion with God. According to scripture,

salvation comes from God’s mighty acts and above all from the

work of Jesus Christ the Savior. It is significant that the New

Testament speaks of salvation in past, present, and future tenses:

we “have been saved” (Eph. 2:8); we “are being saved” (1 Cor.

15:2); and we “shall be saved” (Rom. 5:10). In classical

Protestantism, salvation is forgiveness of sins and rescue from

the condemnation of the law.  In the modern period, the ultimate

threat, according to Tillich, is meaninglessness and nihilism, and

salvation is the gift of meaning, purpose, and wholeness of life.

SANCTIFICATION

The process of “being made holy,” sanctification is the renewal of

life in the power of the Spirit by participation in Christ through

membership in the community that is his body. While a deeply

personal process, sanctification is cultivated in and for community

and involves all the formative practices of Christian life, including

worship, prayer, service to one another, and mission of word and

deed in the world. Its basis is justification or forgiveness of sins by

God, and its goal is fullness of life in communion with God and

others. Calvin spoke of justification and sanctification as the

twofold grace (duplex gratia) of Christ.

SEMPER REFORMANDA

A Latin phrase meaning “always in need of being reformed.” The

full motto from which this phrase comes is ecclesia reformata

semper reformanda secundum verbum Dei, “the church reformed,

always in need of being reformed according to the Word of God.”

This motto expresses the truth that reformation is not a one-time

event in the life of the church but is needed again and again. The

quest for better understanding and more faithful practice requires

continual vigilance and self-criticism in the light of the Word of

God.

SIMUL IUSTUS ET PECCATOR

A Latin phrase translated “at the same time justified and sinful.”

This phrase is related to the Reformers’ doctrine of justification by

grace through faith alone. While sin continues to be at work in the

life of believers, they are graciously forgiven by God for Christ’s

sake. This doctrine emphasizes the radicality of sin and the

gratuity of God’s grace and opposes all self-righteousness

among believers as well as all perfectionist doctrines of Christian

life.

SIN

All that contravenes the will of God as this is expressed in special

revelation (the ten commandments; the life, teaching, death, and

resurrection of Jesus Christ) or known to some degree by general

revelation (conscience, the sense of moral responsibility). An

important distinction is made in theology between actual sins

(particular transgressions of God’s will) and original sin (the

radical and universal sinful human condition). Sin is not only

manifested in personal life; it is also embedded in social

structures. The roots of sin are distrust of God, denial of grace,

rejection of life in solidarity with others, and the idolatry of wealth,

power, pleasure, or nation.

SOTERIOLOGY

The doctrine of the saving (reconciling, liberating, renewing) work

of Jesus Christ and the participation of believers in the new life in

Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit. Soteriology thus deals with

both the work of Christ “for us” and the transforming work of the

Holy Spirit “in us.”

SOVEREIGNTY

God’s sovereign power is exercised in history, God’s sovereign

grace is experienced in redemption, and God’s sovereign will is

revealed in Scripture.  Sovereignty includes: God’s freedom,

God’s providence, God as Creator.

STEWARDSHIP

A faithful stewardship of God’s creation shuns ostentation and

seeks proper use of the gifts of God’s creation.  Stewardship is

not simply the giving of money, it is a way of life that has its roots

in faith.  God has placed us here as God’s stewards, caretakers of

our planet and our resources.  We do not have the right to use the

earth and that which is in it for our own purposes.  The earth is the

Lord’s; it does not belong to us.  We must care for the earth as

we would care for the possession of another who has entrusted it

to us for safekeeping.  All of life belongs to God.  There is no

aspect of life that does not properly come under God’s rule.

THEOLOGY OF THE CROSS

The phrase “theology of the cross” is associated especially with

Martin Luther, who, on the basis of the Pauline proclamation of the

cross of Christ, emphasized God’s shocking self-revelation and

gracious act of redemption through the death of Christ for us.

Luther set the “theology of the cross” over against every

“theology of glory” that looks for God elsewhere than in Christ

and his cross, and that thinks of salvation as other than the free,

unmerited gift of God.

THREE-FOLD OFFICE OF CHRIST

This doctrine articulates the saving work of Christ as his

fulfillment of the three divinely appointed vocations or offices of

prophet (who proclaims God’s Word), priest (who offers

redeeming sacrifice to God), and king (who rules in God’s name

and to God’s honor). This way of presenting the work of Christ has

the advantage not only of comprehensiveness but also of relating

it closely to the Old Testament in which prophet, priest, and king

are offices established by God. Calvin was one of the first

theologians to develop extensively the doctrine of the threefold

office (munus triplex) of Christ.

TRANSCENDANCE

Transcendence, from the Latin transcendere, means “stepping

over” or “going beyond.” As an attribute of God, transcendence is

God’s mode of being “beyond” or “above” the world. God’s being

and power surpass the world and are never identical with,

confined to, or exhausted in the world God has freely created and

to which God freely relates. The early Barth reclaimed the

importance of the transcendence of God by speaking of God as

radically free and “wholly other,” while the later Barth spoke more

often of God’s transcendence as God’s freedom to be “God for

us.”

TRINITY

We believe in One God who is mysteriously revealed to us in

three different persons: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The three are

differentiated only by their relations to each other as Begetter,

Begotten, and Breathed Forth, or, in Augustine’s analogy, as

Lover, Beloved, and Love. The doctrine of the Trinity is not found

in the bible, but it does speak of the one God who is present and

at work in three ways.  Following scripture, Trinitarian theology

“assigns” or “attributes” different works to the Father, Son, and

Holy Spirit (such as Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer).  However,

all of God is involved in everything God does. God is creator and

ruler, reconciler and savior, renewer and transformer of our lives.

USES OF THE LAW

Luther spoke of two proper uses of the law: the theological (to

unmask human sinfulness and drive sinners to Christ), and the civil

(the power of the state to keep order, by force if necessary, and

thus restrain evildoers who would otherwise cause chaos). Calvin

added a “third use of the law”: the use in the life of believers who

freely and gladly obey the commandments of God rather than

seeing them as a heavy obligation or as a means of salvation.

VISIBLE/INVISIBLE CHURCH

This distinction is used in two ways. For some theologians,

“visible” church refers to the church on earth here and now (the

“church militant”), while “invisible” church refers to all the saints

who have died and now live with God in heaven (the “church

triumphant”). For other theologians, “visible” church refers to the

empirical church in which there are both elect and non-elect, and

“invisible” church refers to all the elect, living and dead, who are

known only to God. Critics of this understanding of the

visible/invisible distinction argue that it is misleading and devalues

the actual church in favor of an ideal church.

WORD OF GOD

Refers to the self-expression or self-communication of God. In the

Old Testament the Word of God is spoken through prophets. In

the New Testament the Word of God refers at times to what is

written in Scripture and proclaimed in the gospel, but primarily it

refers to the Word of God that was with God in the beginning

(John 1:1) and has been embodied in the person and reconciling

work of Jesus Christ (John 1:14). Barth developed a highly

influential doctrine of the Word of God as event that takes a

threefold form: Word of God revealed (incarnate in Jesus Christ),

Word of God written (witness of Scripture centered in God’s self-

revelation in Christ), and Word of God proclaimed (Christian

witness today in word and deed, based on the scriptural witness).