What We Teach
Our Statement of Faith captures what we believe, creating a foundation for why we do what we do as a church. The gospel of Jesus Christ is central to who we are and is our primary passion and influence in life together.
What We Teach
Our Statement of Faith captures what we believe, creating a foundation for why we do what we do as a church. The gospel of Jesus Christ is central to who we are and is our primary passion and influence in life together.
The Word of God
We teach that God’s Word is our sufficient authority for foundational truth and real-life function. God’s Word is complete in its inspired formation and inerrant in its original manuscripts. Through careful interpretation and proper application, God’s Spirit uses God’s Word to transform every area of our lives. God’s Word is to be skillfully exposited, confidently proclaimed, and discerningly applied.
The Sovereignty of God
We teach that God is supreme over all His creation. His sovereignty is expressed through the multiplicity of His perfections, through His eternal plan for His creation, and through His particular redemption of His adopted children of faith.
The Trinity
We teach that there is ONE God who has equally, eternally, and distinctly existed as THREE persons: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. Each member of the Trinity is fully divine and indispensably involved in all aspects of a foreordained plan of redemption.
Creation
We teach that the entire universe was created by the direct act of God who fulfilled His creation work in six literal days. God’s prized creations, Adam and Eve, were intentionally created in His image as male and female. Although common mutations do enhance survivability on this young earth, the observable fact is that God’s beautiful handiwork is not evolving to become increasingly better but is slowly deteriorating to become increasingly damaged. God’s creation groans as it longs for the establishment of the New Heavens and the New Earth.
Universal Corruption
We teach that the sin of Adam brought corruption and death into all of God’s beautiful creation. Any remaining expression of beauty and consistency in this universe is a general revelation of God’s common grace through corruption. Both through Adam and through rebellious choice, all human beings are sinners deserving the just wrath of a holy God. Man’s sinful condition is not one of being spiritually sick, but of being spiritually dead.
The Gospel
We teach that the gospel—the good news of God’s eternal plan of reconciliation and redemption—is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone. This rescue from the condemning effects of sin is entirely undeserved and unearned. It is found only through Jesus Christ—His virgin-birth, His sinless life, His substitutionary death, His victorious resurrection, and His authoritative ascension. Enabling His adopted children to respond in faith, God the Father accomplishes this salvation through the gracious drawing and regenerating work of God the Holy Spirit. Every true believer has been positionally saved from the penalty of sin (justification), is being progressively saved from the power of sin (sanctification), and at the return of Christ will be permanently saved from the presence of sin (glorification). The gospel is not simply meant to transform our eternal standing before God, through the empowering work of the Holy Spirit, the gospel is also meant to transform our daily choices of submission to Jesus Christ, our new Master.
The Church
We teach that in God’s sovereign plan of redemption, He has called out New Covenant believers from every nation, tribe, people, and language. The primary command to the Church is to love God supremely while the primary mission of the church is to make disciples. Although God’s Church, the Body of Christ, is comprised universally of every true believer, it is expressed autonomously through local assemblies. Each church is to enjoy the study and preservation of truth, the promotion and participation of heart-engaged worship, and the practical application of selfless service. Along with providing necessary support and accountability for spiritual growth, each church is to be the tangible expression of Christ’s care to a broken world. Biblically, the primary ordinances of Christ’s church are communion (the Lord’s Supper) and baptism—symbolically commemorating Christ’s death and resurrection. God has designed His church to be directed by pastors/elders/overseers—a plurality of men who seek God’s glory through God’s Word as they shepherd God’s people. Practically, the primary stimulus for accountability and organization is the covenant of church membership.
The Work of the Holy Spirit
We teach that God the Holy Spirit regenerates the spiritually dead heart in order to bring about salvation’s faith. Accordingly, the Holy Spirit permanently indwells and actively empowers every true believer. As consistent with the advancement of God’s revealed plan through redemptive history (primarily the completion of the Bible and the establishment of the Church), the Holy Spirit’s present-day ministry is not consumed with supernatural expressions of miraculous signs or giftings; but is a ministry that is consumed with empowering believers with the practical understanding and application of God’s sufficient Word. Through the means of the Bible, the Holy Spirit guides true believers in continual spiritual growth as well as in consistent spiritual battle against the remaining flesh. Although choices of sin may temporarily minimize the vibrant work of the Holy Spirit in the life of a true believer, as the Guarantee of a New Covenant relationship, the Holy Spirit will never fully abandon a true believer.
The End
We teach that through the dynamic expression of His sovereignty over all His creation, Christ will return to earth at His foreordained time to eternally glorify His own, to eternally punish sinners, to eternally torment Satan and his workers of evil, and to eternally establish a New Heavens and a New Earth. The life-sustaining presence of our Triune God will be the joyful focus of the New Heavens and the New Earth. Although we acknowledge that those who hold other historic views of the timing of Christ’s return are welcome within our church family, we teach a premillennial view of Christ’s return.
Gender & Marriage
We teach that God intentionally created two genders: male and female. The special bond of sexual intimacy is to be found only in a marriage union that is covenanted between one man and one woman for life. Marriage has been designed by God not only for the practical purpose of procreation, but also for the joyful benefit of complementary function. God does not prefer one gender over another, however, both men and woman should embrace their God-designed beauty, function, and giftings as they seek to glorify Him for His intended purpose.
