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What is a Lutheran?
Confession of Faith
of the
Evangelical Lutheran Church
in America
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The following is the official text as it appears
in the Constitution of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.
- This church confesses the Triune
God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
- This church confesses Jesus
Christ as Lord and Savior and the Gospel as the power of God for
the salvation of all who believe. Jesus Christ is the Word of
God incarnate, through whom everything was made and through whose
life, death, and resurrection God fashions a new creation. The
proclamation of God's message to us as both Law and Gospel is
the Word of God, revealing judgment and mercy through word and
deed, beginning with the Word in creation, continuing in the history
of Israel, and centering in all its fullness in the person and
work of Jesus Christ. The canonical Scriptures of the Old and
New Testaments are the written Word of God. Inspired by God's
Spirit speaking through their authors, they record and announce
God's revelation centering in Jesus Christ. Through them God's
Spirit speaks to us to create and sustain Christian faith and
fellowship for service in the world.
- This church accepts the canonical
Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments as the inspired Word
of God and the authoritative source and norm of its proclamation,
faith, and life.
- This church accepts the Apostles',
Nicene, and Athanasian Creeds as true declarations of the faith
of this church.
- This church accepts the Unaltered
Augsburg Confession as a true witness to the Gospel, acknowledging
as one with it in faith and doctrine all churches that likewise
accept the teachings of the Unaltered Augsburg Confession.
- This church accepts the other
confessional writings in the Book of Concord, namely, the Apology
of the Augsburg Confession, the Smalcald Articles and the Treatise,
the Small Catechism, the Large Catechism, and the Formula of Concord,
as further valid interpretations of the faith of the Church.
- This church confesses the Gospel,
recorded in the Holy Scriptures and confessed in the ecumenical
creeds and Lutheran confessional writings, as the power of God
to create and sustain the Church for God's mission in the world.
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