Theological Declaration of Barmen

1 Corinthians 1:26-31; Ephesians 4:1-6
by Interim Pastor Doug Marshall

Thought for Meditation:
“I am the way, the truth, and the life.”  Without the way, there is no going; without the truth, there is no knowing; without the life, there is no living.  I am the way, which thou ought to follow; the truth, which thou ought to trust; the life, which thou ought to hope for.   Thomas A Kempis, “The Imitation of Christ,”

Theological Declaration of Barmen

Dr. Graham Scroggie preached at the Keswick Convention in England.  His theme was the Lordship of Christ.  After the sermon he saw a young woman sitting all by herself.  He went up to her and asked if he could help.  “Oh, Dr. Scroggie,” she blurted out, “your message was so compelling, but I am afraid to truly make Christ Lord, afraid of what he will ask of me!”  Dr. Scroggie opened his Bible to the book of Acts, the story of Peter at Joppa.  This is the story in which God told Peter that the good news of Jesus was for all people, including Gentiles.  Peter was on the roof praying and had a vision of a sheet coming out of heaven with unclean animals on it.  A voice told Peter to take one of the animals and eat it.   Peter objected, “No, Lord.  It’s unclean.  I can’t eat that.”  God responded by saying “If I have called something clean you shouldn’t call it unclean.”

Dr. Scroggie said to this young girl, “You know, it is possible to say ‘No,’ and it is possible to say ‘Lord.’ But it is not possible to say ‘No, Lord.’  I’m going to leave my Bible here and I want you to cross out either the word ‘No,’ or the word ‘Lord.’”  He left his Bible with her and went into another room to pray.  After a while came back and saw that the word ‘No’ was crossed out.  With tears streaming down her cheeks she said, “Jesus is my Lord.”                                   
 
That is the main message of the Theological Declaration of Barmen.  Jesus alone is Lord.  Barmen was a city in western Germany and The Barmen Declaration was written in May, 1934, which might give you an idea of what it is about.  Let me remind you what was happening in Germany at this time. 

Before WWI, the church in Germany was closely connected to the government.  It was that way in most of Europe.  Whatever the religion of the King was, that was the religion of the country and the king would appoint the leaders of the church.  People were beginning to recognize the problems with that and moving toward  separation of church and state.  In 1931 a group of the different churches formed the German Christian Church.  They wanted to go back to the old ways of church and state working together.  Most of them were Nazi supporters and  anti-Semitic.  In 1933 Hitler became the chancellor of Germany and continued getting power over Germany, including over the church. 

In response to Hitler and the German Christian Church another group of pastors formed the Confessing Church.  They were from several denominations, including Lutheran and Reformed.  They were primarily opposed to the government trying to control the church.  As Hitler gained more power and life degenerated in Germany the Confessing Church grew in its opposition to the immorality and antisemitism of the government and the German Church.  In May, 1934, the Confessing Church met in Barmen and wrote the Declaration.  It rejected the government control of the church and claimed that Jesus alone is the Lord of the Church. 

The Theological Declaration of Barmen is different from the other confessions that we have looked at.  The first two, the Nicene Creed and the Apostles’ Creed, are short and give the basics  of the Christian faith – the Trinity and the Incarnation.  The next four were written during the reformation era – The Scots Confession, The Heidelberg Catechism, The Second Helvetic Confession and The Westminster Confession of Faith.  They are much longer and comprehensive in describing what we believe.  They lay out doctrines that Reformed, Presbyterian, Christians believe – the sovereignty of God, election, and the authority of Scripture, salvation by grace alone through faith alone.

The Barmen Declaration is shorter.  It’s only four pages long, and part of that is the historical background.   It doesn’t try to describe everything Christians believe.  It focuses on one issue – who is Lord of  the Church and of the people of God?  Listen to one of the lines from the introduction:

We are bound together by the confession of the one Lord of the one, holy, catholic, and  apostolic Church (Book of Confessions, 8.06).

Here is the first statement from the actual declaration:

Jesus Christ, as he is attested for us in Holy Scripture, is the one Word of God which we have to hear and which we have to trust and obey in life and in death (Book of Confessions, 8.11).
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In other words, the church is called to give its primary allegiance to Jesus, and obey him before all other authorities.

One other thing is unique about the Barmen Declaration.  It makes six statements about the situation that was happening in Germany, six statements about the Church.  I just read the first one.  After each of these six positive statements about who we are and what we believe, the Declaration adds a negative statement, rejecting six false doctrines of the German Church.  After the first, positive statement, it adds this:
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We reject the false doctrine, as though the Church could and would have to acknowledge as a source of its proclamation, apart from and besides this one Word of God, still other events and powers, figures and truths, as God’s revelation.

In other words, Jesus is our only Lord.  We will not follow other authorities.  Jesus alone is the authority for our lives and the One we must listen to above all others.                                  
 
The first Christians proclaimed their faith in Jesus by calling him “Lord.”  That was the earliest confession of faith, “Jesus is Lord.”  William Barclay says that in the Bible there are at least six different meanings to the word “Lord.”  Lord means owner.  The Lord of a vineyard is the owner of the vineyard.  Lord means master.  The one who owns a slave is the lord of the slave.  Lord is a title of respect.  In English we might say “Sir.”  Lord is the title of the Roman Emperor, the one who rules over everyone else.  Lord is the word that was used as a prefix to the names of gods.  “My Lord Zeus.”  Finally, Lord is the word that is used to translate the name of the Hebrew God, Yahweh.  To call Jesus our Lord is to acknowledge all of those ideas.  We are to give to Jesus our ultimate allegiance.

The German Church was so closely connected with the government that as the government started to propose ideas and actions that were contrary to the gospel, the church went right along with them.  That should be a warning to all of us.  We are in the midst of an election that is incredibly divisive.  The majority of Americans don’t like either of the two main presidential candidates.  It seems to me that there are Christians on both sides of the issues who seem to blindly support their candidates, suggesting that voting for the other side is voting against God. 

Let me remind us that our ultimate allegiance must not  be to a political party or to a candidate, or to an issue.  It is okay to be involved with these issues and candidates, but if they ever call us to do something that is contrary to the gospel of Jesus Christ then we must reject them.  As Christians, Jesus alone is our Lord.
 
The banner for the Theological Declaration of Barmen is probably the easiest to identify.  If you know what a swastika is and know that Barmen was written as a rejection of Hitler and the Nazi beliefs, it’s easy to pick out this banner.  The swastika actually used to be a positive symbol.  It has been around for at least 5000 years and was an Indian symbol of peace.  The word swastika comes from a Sanskrit word that means fortunate, or good luck.  Then it became the symbol of Nazi Germany and lost all of its positive meaning.  Notice that on the banner the swastika is crossed out.  This is a blatant rejection of Hitler’s ideology.  Our ultimate allegiance is not to Hitler, or to any other issue, or person.  Jesus is our Lord.

At the bottom of the banner there is a cross that is rising out of the fire.  That is what the jagged edges with the red behind it is supposed to symbolize.  The fire is a symbol of the suffering and death which often comes with following Jesus.  Certainly it did for some of those who wrote the Barmen Declaration.  Some of them were killed during the Holocaust.  But the cross survives, rising out of the flames.  Death is never the final answer, because Jesus overcame death.  Therefore Jesus is our Lord.     


​Confession of Faith:                            The Theological Declaration of Barmen
 
Jesus Christ, as he is attested for us in Holy Scripture, is the one Word of God which we have to hear and which we have to trust and obey in life and in death.

We reject the false doctrine, as though the Church could and would have to acknowledge as a source of its proclamation, apart from and besides this one Word of God, still other events and powers, figures and truths, as God’s revelation.

As Jesus Christ is God’s assurance of the forgiveness of all our sins, so in the same way and with the same seriousness he is also God’s mighty claim upon our whole life.  Through him befalls us a joyful deliverance from the godless fetters of this world for a free, grateful service to his creatures. 

We reject the false doctrine, as though there were areas of our life in which we would not belong to Jesus Christ, but to other lords – areas in which we would not need justification and sanctification through him.