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| The teaching that "everything is divine." Affirms that beyond surface appearances, all beings are one with God. |
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| GREEK meaning "bearer of God" and used as the name of Mary, the mother of Jesus. |
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| THREE FOLD OFFICE OF CHRIST |
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| A doctrine that articulates the saving work of Christ as his fulfillment of the three divinely appointed vocations or offices of prophet, priest and king. |
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| The teaching that the church "supercedes" or replaces the people of Israel as God's chosen people. |
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| THEOLOGIA CRUCIS/ THEOLOGIA GLORIAE |
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| LATIN meaning "theology of the cross/ theology of glory." Luther set the theology over against every theology of glory that looks for God elsewhere than in Christ and his cross. |
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| GREEK meaning word and reason or discourse; Jesus is the perfect expression of the logos (word and wisdom) of God. |
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| The "service" of God in the church and through the church to the world. |
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| An interpretation of the trinitarian doctrine which Father, Son and Holy Spirit are not three distinct eternal divine persons, but are simply "modes" of activity of the undifferentiated being of God. |
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| Means reliability and faithfulness and contrasts with human unfaithfulness and falsehood. Is a quality of the being and activity of God. |
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| The expression, regula fidei, refers to the brief summary of the faith recognized and confessed in all the churches. |
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| A sacred practice of the church based on a scriptural mandate made effective by the Spirit of God as "means of grace" to confirm the presence and promise of Christ to believers. |
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| The process of "being made holy" through the renewal of life in the Spirit by participation in Christ through membership in the community that is his body. |
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| LATIN meaning "always in need of being reformed. Expresses the truth that reformation is needed again and again, not just one time. |
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| LATIN meaning "at the same time justified and sinful." This doctrine emphasizes the radicality of sin and the gratuity of God's grace and opposes all self-righteousness among believers and all perfectionist doctrines of Christian life. |
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| All that contravenes the will of God as this is expressed in special revelation or known to some degree by general revelation. A distinction is made between actual and original sin. |
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| LATIN meaning "by faith alone." A teaching meaning the grace of God is freely given and gratefully and trustingly received by faith alone. |
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| LATIN meaning "grace alone." God's grace alone is entirely sufficient basis of the healing of the relationship between God and humanity broken by sin. |
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| According to 16th CE Reformers, the Scripture of the Old and New Testaments are the only necessary source and sufficient norm of Christian faith and life. |
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| According to John Wesley, perfection or full sanctification is realized in this life only in relatively few Christians, but it is something all Christians should strive for. |
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| The reception and confirmation of a person into ministry of leadership in the church. |
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| The distinctively Christian understanding of God as ineffable mystery of love, distinct in three persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit united in an eternal movement of mutual self-giving love as to an indwelling of each other. |
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| Belief in three gods, not taught by the Orthodox doctrine of the Trinity. |
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| The divine attribute of being "all powerful" or "having all power over all things." |
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| An attribute of God in classical theology meaning "knowing all things" or "possessing perfect knowledge." |
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| An interpretation of the trinitarian doctrine in which Son and Spirit are divine persons but "subordinate" or inferior to God the Father. |
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| LATIN meaning "stepping over" or "going beyond." This is an attribute of God and his mode of being "beyond" or "above" the world. |
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| A doctrine of the Eucharist stating that the "substances" of the bread and wine are changed into the "substances" of the body and blood of Christ while the "accidents" of the bread and wine remain unchanged. |
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| Can be interpreted by some theologians to mean that nature is always and everywhere already permeated by grace. |
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| The doctrine that God has eternally ordained the destiny of human beings. |
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| The doctrine that God unceasingly cares for the world, that all things are in God's hands, and that God is leading the world to its appointed goal. |
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| Adopted by the first ecumenical council of the church in 325; this creed affirmed the full divinity of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. |
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| Refers to God's gracious pardon and acceptance of sinners not on account of their virtues or good works but solely because of God's sheer grace embodied in Jesus Christ, received by faith. |
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| A phrase used to designate the real or actual presence of Christ in the Lord's supper. |
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| GREEK meaning "mutual indwelling" or "interpenetration." Can refer to the unique communion of the triune persons. |
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| The condition or state of captivity in which the whole humanity finds itself after the fall. |
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| The attempt to defend or justify the goodness, providential care, and wisdom or God in the face of horrendous evil in the world and particularly the suffering of the innocent. |
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| GREEK meaning "divinization" or "deification"; this summed up by the statement from Athanasius: "God became human that we might become divine." |
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| GREEK meaning "empytying"; concept referring to God's self-emptying and self-giving. |
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| LATIN for topics or areas; term used to designate the major subjects of doctrinal or systematic theology. |
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| Term that means teaching office and refers to designated positions of teaching authority in the church to declare what is sound and binding doctrine. |
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Modern: critical of religious traditions, emphasizes autonomous human reason, a closed universe described by Newtonian science and hope in progress of human nature.
Postmodern: views of relative truths, end of all religious and secular grand narratives. |
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| The doctrine of the saving work of Jesus Christ and the participation of believers in the new life in Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit. |
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| Based on the natural light of reason, the dictates of conscience, or purported evidences of God in the processes of nature or the events of history; independent of God's revelation. |
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| A term widely used in contemporary theology to refer to the practices that cultivate and strengthen Christian life. |
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