Thus says Article 21 of the Anglican Thirty-Nine Articles. And though Emmanuel is not an Anglican church, everyone in the congregation here – along with pretty much every other Christian I’ve met – would agree with it.
But there’s more than one way to affirm this article of the church’s teaching.
It’s possible to say “Churches and Councils have erred, and therefore we can cheerfully ignore what our forefathers in the faith have believed for the last two millennia. Tradition can go wrong, so phooey to tradition. Just as long as I’ve got my Bible, I can find the truth, and I don’t need no help from anybody.”
But there’s another way to say “Churches and counciles have erred.” We could can say it with tears in our eyes and grief in our heart. We could say it as a lament, knowing that the historic teaching of the church contains countless glittering insights into the way of Christ which we have lost in large part because we have thrown out the baby with the bathwater. We could say it in hope, as we recommit ourselves to dig deeper into the riches of ages past, to sift the wheat from the chaff and recover treasures long-lost which, if only we could find them, would give fresh life and power to an increasingly anaemic 21st-century church.
This latter path, it seems to me, comes a good deal closer to showing the appropriate respect both to the wisdom of saints long dead and to the power and grace of the God who is the Lord of history. Unfortunately, it’s a harder road, and so in our day it is fast becoming the road less travelled. Please, Lord, help us to rediscover it.
Rev Dr Steve Jeffery is Minister at Emmanuel Evangelical Church, London, England (Blog, Facebook, Twitter)
