The Nicene Creed. As I mentioned above, the texts that say that Christ was God’s “only begotten Son” were understood by early church leaders to refer to an eternal relationship between the Father and the Son. But the many texts affirming Christ’s deity were so strong that the early church concluded that whatever “only begotten” meant, it did not mean “created.” Therefore, the Nicene Creed in AD 325 affirmed that Christ was “begotten, not made”:
