Trondheim International Church is an independent church that does not subscribe to any confession of faith. But since it has moved doctrinally towards the Reformed/Evangelical faith, the 1689 Baptist Confession seems to be the closest confession of faith and is very close to our own beliefs.
The date of the Protestant Reformation is usually considered to be 31 October 1517 when in Wittenberg, Germany, Martin Luther, a monk and teacher, published a document called Disputation on the Power of Indulgences or 95 Theses.
The Reformation came to England in 1534, when King Henry VII broke with Rome and made himself head of the Church of England. After a turbulent beginning, including a return to Roman Catholicism by Queen Mary, the Protestant church gradually became the recognised church in England, but the Reformation did not go far enough in its Protestant reforms.
The Westminster Assembly was called by the Long Parliament in 1643 to discuss the Reform of the Church of England. It was a gathering of 120 ministers, 20 members of the House of Commons and 10 members of the House of Lords, who met in Westminster Abbey, in defiance of King Charles 1.
The General Assembly of the Church of Scotland appointed five ministers and three elders as Scottish commissioners. Although there were few Scottish brethren and they didn’t vote with the Westminster Assembly, they had a massive impact on the assembly.
The main work of the assembly resulted in producing a number of very important documents. It had originally been called to give advice about reforming the worship, doctrine and church government of the Church of England and to revise the Thirty-Nine Articles which set out what the Church of England believed. Following the signing of the Solemn League and Covenant, however, they were now requested to draw up a form of church government (describing how the church should be organised), a confession of faith (summarising what the church believed), a catechism (for teaching Bible truths) and a directory for the worship of God (setting out guidelines for worship).
In 1645, The Directory for the Public Worship of God, which replaced the hated Book of Common Prayer, had been completed and agreed by Parliament, as had The Form of Presbyterian Church Government.
These were followed by the Westminster Confession of Faith in 1646. In 1647, they completed the Larger and Shorter Catechisms.
The main work of the Assembly was completed by 1648, but the documents it produced (known as the Westminster Standards) are still used in Presbyterian churches today.
The Baptist Confession of Faith (1689) is a reformed Confession of Faith. It was written by English Baptists who subscribed to a Calvinist Soteriology (the Doctrine of Salvation) as well as a Covenantal Systematic Theology (which differed from the Westminster Confession of Faith in some points of doctrine).
The Act of Tolerance passed by Parliament in 1689 enabled religious freedom to co-exist alongside the established churches in England and Scotland.
In respect of this act of toleration, representatives of over 100 particular Baptist churches gathered in London from 3rd- 12th September, 1689 to discuss and endorse a previous (earlier) document from 1677. The 1689 Confession is very similar to the Westminster Confession of 1647, but includes new sections on baptism (believer’s Baptism, as practised in our church, Trondheim International Church) and church government. The 1689 Baptist Confession consists of 32 chapters, as well as an introduction and a list of signatories.
We have not included the whole Confession of Faith in our website, but there are numerous resources found online. One is The 1689 Baptist Confession of Faith in Modern English https://founders.org/library-book/1689-confession/.