Justin Effler’s Reviews > The Story of Creeds and Confessions: Tracing the Development of the Christian Faith > Status Update

It might be expected that denominations in the New World simply carried over their confessions when they emigrated. However, in almost every denomination, there were additions to older confessions that addressed new situations or changes in belief, and in some instances, new confessions were written at the formation of new denominations.

Prominent in the Formula of Concord was a fine-tuning of the Lutheran teaching on original sin and free will. Both issues had been central to Luther’s theology, since original sin was the reason why Luther had denied free will.

The language of “faith working itself out in love” is biblical (Gal. 5:6) and was acceptable to Protestants, and it even appeared in the Tetrapolitan Confession.32 But Trent situated the concept of “working in love” differently than did any Protestant church, by viewing it through the lens of the penitential system of the Catholic Church.

In the East, Jeremiah II was not only aware of the Reformation but was also asked to give his verdict on the Augsburg Confession (1530). Although his response was judiciously warm and charitable, Jeremiah still made clear that he was troubled by Protestant teachings.

The Reformed confessions say nothing about the covenant or the Sabbath,and only little about predestination.Lutheran confessions speak of grace and justification,but do not give voice to the controversies on the Third Use of the Law or the ubiquity of Christ. Anabaptist confessions sketch only a very simple summary of their unique community life.And in the Anglican communion there was only the scant FortyTwo Articles

So, in June 1553, a royal mandate was issued that commanded use of the Forty-Two Articles in England. They were the work of Cranmer, and their message is overwhelmingly Protestant, although they take no noticeable side in the Lutheran or Reformed debate on the sacraments.