Journal: Southern Baptist Journal of Theology
Volume: SBJT 29:1 (Spring 2025)
Article: Editorial: Remembering The 1700th Anniversary Of The Nicene Creed
Author: Stephen J. Wellum

Editorial: Remembering The 1700th Anniversary Of The Nicene Creed

Stephen J. Wellum

Stephen J. Wellum is Professor of Christian Theology at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and editor of Southern Baptist Journal of Theology. He received his PhD from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, and he is the author of numerous essays and articles and the co-author with Peter Gentry of Kingdom through Covenant, 2nd edition (Crossway, 2018) and God’s Kingdom through God’s Covenants: A Concise Biblical Theology (Crossway, 2015); the co-editor of Progressive Covenantalism (B&H Academic, 2016); the author of God the Son Incarnate: The Doctrine of the Person of Christ (Crossway, 2016) and Christ Alone—The Uniqueness of Jesus as Savior (Zondervan, 2017); the co-author of Christ from Beginning to End: How the Full Story of Scripture Reveals the Full Glory of Christ (Zondervan, 2018); and the author of The Person of Christ: An Introduction (Crossway, 2021), Systematic Theology: From Canon to Concept, vol. 1 (B&H Academic, 2024), and It is Finished (Union, 2025).

This year is the 1700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea. At Nicaea, the church stood for the truth of who God is, along with the glory of our Redeemer, against the heresy of Arianism. Arianism is the view taught by Arius that argued that our Lord Jesus Christ is merely a creature, albeit the first and greatest creature. In denying the deity of the eternal Son of God, Arius failed to understand who our Creator and Lord is as the triune God. In the place of the truth of the God of the Bible, he affirmed an idol— an idol who ultimately is a blank impersonal unity, who is not fully complete in himself, and one who cannot redeem us from the plight of our sin. In fact, if Arianism had won the day, Christianity would have reverted to merely another pagan religion, and the truth of Scripture and the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ would have been lost.

But thankfully, the church stood firm and upheld the truth of Scripture. In contrast to Arianism, the church believed God’s own revelation of himself,

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revealed over time, and ultimately fully disclosed in the Father’s sending of his Son and Spirit. The Son who assumed our human nature in order to dwell among us to accomplish our redemption— a redemption planned between the persons of the Godhead from eternity— and to win for us a new creation by his obedience in life and death as our new covenant head. And the Spirit who was sent by the Father and the Son to bring to completion God’s plan so that in the end, we, as God’s people, are redeemed, and the triune God is forever praised as our glorious Creator, Lord, and Redeemer. At Nicaea, the church faithfully upheld bib...