What Are The First Principles?

13. Comparison of the Apostolic Statement with the BASF

Apostolic	Birmingham Amended
Statement of Faith	Statement of Faith
(ASF)	(BASF)
1. The Bible	The Foundation clause, Doctrine to be Rejected 1
2. God	Clause I, Doc. Rej. 2
3. The Holy Spirit	Clause I, DR 6, 25
4. Jesus, the Son of God	II, DR 3, 28
5. Jesus, the Man	VI, VIII, IX, X, DR 4, 5 (The condition of the human race - of whom Jesus was part is defined in IV and V.)
6. Sin and Death	IV, V, DR 27
7. The “Soul”	IV, DR 7, 8
8. “Hell”	DR 8, 9
9. The Sacrifice of Christ	VIII, IX, X, XII
10. The Resurrection of Christ	XIII
11. The Mediatorship of Christ	XIII, XIV
12. The Second Coming	XIX, XX
13. Resurrection	XXIV, DR 16, 17
14. Judgment	XXV, DR 15
15. The Promises to Abraham	XXI, XXIII, DR 10
16. The Promises to David	XXII
17. The Kingdom of God	XXVI through XXX, DR 12, 14, 18, 29
18. The “Devil”	DR 11
19. “Satan” and “Demons”	*....No equivalent....*
20. Justification by Faith	XI, XII, XVI, DR 22, 23, 26
21. Baptism	XVI, DR 21, 30, 31
22. The One Body	*....No equivalent....*
23. The Breaking of Bread	*....No equivalent....*
24. The Jews	XXI, XXII, DR 33
25. Christ’s Commandments	XVI, DR 24
*.No equivalent....*	DR 13, 19, 20, 32, 34, 35

The BASF has no real counterpart for the doctrine of the One Body: involving fellowship and the breaking of bread. This is, in my opinion, a major shortcoming. This lack of emphasis, historically, on the positive doctrine of fellowship may account for an unwarranted Christadelphian preoccupation with the negative aspects of “fellowship” (i.e., the exclusive aspects) and an unwarranted Christadelphian neglect of the positive (i.e., the inclusive aspects). In short, Christadelphians seem to have always been more concerned to sever fellowship ties with those who might be in error than to seek fellowship ties with those who also constitute part of the One Body.

The BASF is much more extensive in the area of the Kingdom of God (specifically with clauses XXVI, XXVII, XXVIII, XXIX, and XXX: how long the Kingdom will last, its precise form at different times, the effects of the Kingdom, and the events at the end of the thousand years). This suggests that those who rely only upon the BASF may become overly dogmatic and technical in applying fellowship standards to questions about the order, the details, and/or the times of future events.