The Forgotten Lord in “Lordship Salvation”

The Nicene Creed confesses:

We believe in one Lord Jesus Christ…
And we believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord and Giver of life…

Reformation Christians gladly confess that both the Son and the Spirit are Lord. The Creed’s language is not casual—it is theological precision. “Lord” (Kyrios) names the divine identity revealed in Scripture. When the Creed calls the Spirit the Lord and Giver of life, it attributes to Him full deity, co-equality, and co-sovereignty with the Father and the Son.

That is why the Reformers spoke of the one saving Lordship of the triune God, not of a separate “lordship” appended as a condition to faith. The Spirit’s Lordship does not compete with Christ’s—it is through the Spirit that Christ reigns in the believer’s heart, uniting us to Himself and producing obedience as fruit, not as a requirement for salvation.

Ironically, “Lordship Salvation” rarely (if ever) acknowledges that the Creed calls the Spirit Lord. It turns the apostolic and Nicene confession “Jesus is Lord”—a declaration of Christ’s divine identity—into a moral condition of discipleship, thereby confusing the gospel’s indicative with the law’s imperative.

To confess “Jesus is Lord” in the biblical and Nicene sense is to acknowledge the full deity of both the Son and the Spirit—the triune Lord who saves by grace alone (sola grātia), through faith alone (sola fīde), in Christ alone (sōlus Chrīstus).

The Reformers confessed one Lord in three Persons. By contrast, Lordship Salvation redefines that confession, shifting it from a proclamation of Christ’s deity and saving office to an ethical qualification for salvation, thus obscuring the gospel’s free promise under the law’s demand.

Confessional witness:
The Heidelberg Catechism (Q/A 21) defines true faith as “not only a sure knowledge… but also a hearty trust” that rests entirely on Christ’s finished work. The Belgic Confession (Art. 26) declares that we have “no access to God but through the only Mediator and Advocate, Jesus Christ the righteous.”

Likewise, the Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion stand with this witness. Article II, Of the Word or Son of God, which was made very Man, affirms the full deity and saving office of the Son who “truly suffered, was crucified, dead, and buried, to reconcile his Father to us.” Article V, Of the Holy Ghost, confesses that the Holy Spirit “proceedeth from the Father and the Son… of one substance, majesty, and glory, with the Father and the Son, very and eternal God.” And Article XI, Of the Justification of Man, safeguards the gospel against every moralizing distortion: “We are accounted righteous before God, only for the merit of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ by faith, and not for our own works or deservings.”

Together, the Nicene Creed, the Heidelberg Catechism, the Belgic Confession, and the Thirty-Nine Articles proclaim one triune Lord—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—whose saving lordship is declared, not achieved; received by faith, not performed by obedience.

The Reformation confesses one triune Lord—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—who saves by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone. His lordship is confessed in the gospel, not earned by obedience.