Common Christian Prayers
The Nicene Creed
We believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, of all that is seen and unseen. We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, eternally begotten of the Father, God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten not made, one in being with the Father. Through him all things were made. For us men and our salvation he came down from heaven: by the power of the Holy Spirit he was born of the Virgin Mary and became man. For our sake he suffered under Pontius Pilate; he was crucified, died, and was buried. On the third day he rose again in fulfillment of the Scriptures; he ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father. He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead, and his kingdom will have no end. We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son. With the Father and the Son he is worshipped and glorified. He has spoken through the prophets. We believe in one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church. We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins. We look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come. Amen.
About The Nicene Creed
The Nicene Creed is technically a creed—a public profession of Christian faith—rather than a petitionary prayer. Yet because Christians recite it in worship, often standing together before God, it also functions devotionally. It gathers the central claims of historic Christian belief into a Trinitarian confession: one God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; the incarnation, death, resurrection, ascension, and return of Jesus Christ; the Church; baptism; resurrection; and the life of the world to come.
Its history begins with the Council of Nicaea in AD 325. The council met amid controversy over the relationship between the Son and the Father. Arius and those influenced by him used language that made the Son subordinate in being to the Father. The Nicene bishops answered with the decisive term homoousios, meaning that the Son is “of one substance” or “of one being” with the Father. The creed therefore insists that Christ is not a created intermediary: he is “God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made.”
The creed commonly recited today is more fully called the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed. Its form reflects the development associated with the Council of Constantinople in 381, especially the fuller confession concerning the Holy Spirit. That expansion helped express the Church’s Trinitarian faith with greater clarity. The creed follows a threefold structure because Christian baptism and worship are fundamentally Trinitarian, echoing the baptismal command of Matthew 28:19.
The section on Jesus is intentionally historical as well as theological. Christ “came down from heaven,” became human, suffered under Pontius Pilate, died, was buried, rose, ascended, and will come again. Naming Pontius Pilate anchors the confession in public history. Christianity is not presented merely as timeless spiritual philosophy; it makes claims about God acting within human history through Jesus of Nazareth.
One line requires special ecumenical care. Western forms commonly say that the Holy Spirit “proceeds from the Father and the Son,” translating the Latin Filioque addition. The original Greek form associated with Constantinople says that the Spirit proceeds “from the Father.” The Western addition became a major point of disagreement between Eastern and Western Christianity. Living Word Bibles can present the Western wording used on the Christian Living page while noting that Eastern Orthodox Christians normally recite the creed without the Filioque. This is an important example of describing Christian differences accurately without treating them as trivial.
The final movement of the creed turns from the triune God to the Church’s shared hope: one holy catholic and apostolic Church, one baptism, resurrection of the dead, and the life to come. Here “catholic” means universal or according to the whole, not simply Roman Catholic as a denominational label. Anglican, Lutheran, Reformed, Roman Catholic, Orthodox, and many other churches receive the Nicene faith, even where liturgical wording differs.
For Bible study, the creed is valuable because nearly every phrase invites a chain of scriptural connections. Genesis and the Psalms illuminate creation; John and Colossians illuminate the Son’s relation to the Father and creation; the Gospels narrate incarnation, cross, and resurrection; Acts and the Epistles describe the Spirit and the Church; 1 Corinthians 15 and Revelation nourish the hope of resurrection and the world to come. The creed does not replace Scripture. It is a historical summary meant to confess what the Church understood Scripture to teach about the heart of Christian faith.
Bibliography & Further Reading
- The Church of England, “The Nicene Creed.” An ecumenically useful overview of the creed’s 325 origins, later development, and widespread Christian use.
- United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, “Nicene Creed.” The contemporary Roman Catholic English liturgical text.
- J. N. D. Kelly, Early Christian Creeds, 3rd ed. (Longman, 1972). A standard scholarly history of early Christian creedal formation and development.
- Lewis Ayres, Nicaea and Its Legacy (Oxford University Press, 2004). A major modern study of fourth-century Trinitarian theology and the Nicene settlement.
- The Holy Bible, Matthew 28:19; John 1:1–18; Colossians 1:15–20; 1 Corinthians 15. Key scriptural passages connected with the creed’s Trinitarian, Christological, and resurrection affirmations.