# Second Helvetic Confession



## Jacy Hernandez (Sep 10, 2012)

personally i have not seen many hold to this confession. is there a reason why this confession isn't brought up as much as the Westminster and 3FU? thanks ahead of time for the replies. just started today in reading the Second Helvetic Confession.


----------



## yeutter (Sep 10, 2012)

Hungarian Reformed Churches adhere to the 2nd Helvetic. In the United States, the mainstream Presbyterian Church [then called the United Presbyterian Church USA] put the 2nd Helvetic into her Book of Confessions at the same time she dropped the Westminster Large Catechism and adopted the heretical Confession of 1967. Sinclair Ferguson and Joel Beeke included the 2nd Helvetic with the Westminster Standards and the Three Forms of Unity in their work Reformed Confessions Harmonized.


----------



## Semper Fidelis (Sep 10, 2012)

Just to be clear, the PCUSA has added a plethora of Confessions because, in the end, the confessions don't really serve to clearly define what the Church confesses at all. Confess everything and you confess nothing.

As to why we don't see "many" confessing the 2nd Helvetic, it should be noted that _Churches_ use Confessions as constitutional documents. Confessions were never meant to serve for people to select as personal confessions wholly apart from the Church. Modernism has instilled in us a notion that we come to beliefs independently. My aim as a Churchman is not simply to subscribe to a Confession but to strive for the unity of the faith within my Church. As the Confession is intended to serve as a standard exposition of the Word of God, then each Church is formed and re-formed according to what she confesses the Word says and it is supposed to be the basis by which reproof, instruction, rebuke, and training in the Scriptures are formed by. What kind of Church will we have if everyone confesses differently and nobody is bound in conscious according to what another believes about the Word?

Thus, it is not that the 2nd Helvetic is either good or bad but an attitude that says: "I like the 2nd Helvetic better than the 3FU and so that's my own personal confession..." goes against the purpose that a Confession is intended to serve.


----------



## Jacy Hernandez (Sep 10, 2012)

thanks for that it served me well. im pretty much bummed out since miami Fl does not have a Reformed Church. if they say they are reformed its only in sotoriology but not confessional nor credal :/. on the hunt for a church that is in line with my convictions in the Reformed tradition. thanks again for your replies.


----------



## PaulCLawton (Sep 10, 2012)

Semper Fidelis said:


> Thus, it is not that the 2nd Helvetic is either good or bad but an attitude that says: "I like the 2nd Helvetic better than the 3FU and so that's my own personal confession..." goes against the purpose that a Confession is intended to serve.



Maybe I missed something, but I don't think anyone was close to saying anything like that.

Getting at the OP's question, the book _Reformed Confessions Harmonized_ that is mentioned above indicates that it was "widely approved in Scotland, Hungary, Poland, and elsewhere". As to why there are not many churches in North America that hold to it, that would be an interesting question for some of the historians on the board.


----------



## Semper Fidelis (Sep 11, 2012)

PaulCLawton said:


> Maybe I missed something...


Yes, you did.

The point I was making. 

"Many" was undefined in the OP. If the question is: "Why don't many _churches_ subscribe to the Confession?" then that's a different question than "Why don't I run into many _people_ that list the 2nd Helvetic as their personal confession?" There are many Confessions from the time of the Reformation that are no longer well known (or are the basis for a Church's constitution.)


----------



## PaulCLawton (Sep 11, 2012)

Semper Fidelis said:


> PaulCLawton said:
> 
> 
> > Maybe I missed something...
> ...



I do thing I got the point, I just didn't think it was warranted given the original question. I think the historical question as to why the 2HC is not subscribed to widely in the USA is an interesting one and worth being responded to.


----------



## KMK (Sep 11, 2012)

Jacy Hernandez said:


> personally i have not seen many hold to this confession. is there a reason why this confession isn't brought up as much as the Westminster and 3FU? thanks ahead of time for the replies. just started today in reading the Second Helvetic Confession.



Jacy,

You need to fix your signature. Click on the words 'Signature Requirements' below my signature to see how. Thanks.


----------



## OPC'n (Sep 11, 2012)

PaulCLawton said:


> Semper Fidelis said:
> 
> 
> > PaulCLawton said:
> ...



To me, "many" in the OP means individuals not churches, and since Jacy said "thanks" to Rich's answer it seems to me that it answered his question. I guess Jacy would have to clarify though.


----------



## Jacy Hernandez (Sep 11, 2012)

before i read the replies i had an individualistic mindset concerning the confessions so thank you for clarifying. i guess my question would be why isn't the 2HC widely held to or even rarely mentioned in Reformed churches in the United States?

KMK will fix the signature, thanks.


----------



## nicnap (Sep 11, 2012)

Semper Fidelis said:


> Yes, you did.
> 
> The point I was making.


----------



## toddpedlar (Sep 11, 2012)

Jacy Hernandez said:


> before i read the replies i had an individualistic mindset concerning the confessions so thank you for clarifying. i guess my question would be why isn't the 2HC widely held to or even rarely mentioned in Reformed churches in the United States?
> 
> KMK will fix the signature, thanks.



Rich hinted at this in his response to you earlier, but perhaps it could be more clear. Confessions aren't documents that are generally adopted by individual churches by some sort of vote of the consistory or what have you as though the congregation is declaring "I like chocolate" as opposed to "I like vanilla". Churches who have that kind of ecclesiastical structure simply aren't "individuals" in that sense. They are, properly anyway in churches holding to a presbyterial form of government (as opposed to baptistic-congregationally governed churches), adopted by the federation as a whole... and generally those adoptions predate the formation of the denomination. 

The lack of advertisement/embracing of the 2nd Helvetic, isn't at all surprising, given this (and given the fact that it is an official standard of a very small part of the church in the world). All the denominations that derive from the Dutch or German Reformed branches of the European Reformed churches hold to the TFU as their confessional standard. The 2nd Helvetic, as the name implies, is a Swiss document, and there is little, if any, denominational activity that stems truly from the Swiss Reformed tradition in the US - so to me at least it's not very surprising that there aren't Reformed churches who subscribe to the 2nd Helvetic. The Hungarian Reformed Churches, as was noted, do hold to the 2nd Helvetic as one of their confessional standards together with the Heidelberg Catechism - but they have a very small presence in the US. 

The Reformed churches in the US generally do derive from either Holland or Germany - and because of their ecclesiology, individual congregations will not up and adopt some additional standard - though some will teach using the 2nd Helvetic, which is a beautiful and appropriate document to use - but it is subservient to both Scripture and the official standards of the denomination to which the congregation belongs. This is, though, fairly rare... and I would rather see - quite frankly - reformed churches promiscuously teaching from and openly embracing their official standards first .... and then, if that is in order, make more of things like the 2nd Helvetic.


----------

