Our Beliefs

Bible

We believe in the verbal, plenary inspiration by God of the original manuscripts of the Old and New Testament Scriptures, and that they are inerrant and infallible in all matters.

 

Trinity

We believe the one true and living God is one in essence, existing as three eternal persons Who are revealed to us as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, equal in every divine perfection, yet executing distinct but harmonious offices.

 

Jesus Christ

We believe that Jesus Christ was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary; that He is One Person possessing two natures and thus is true God and true man; that He lived a sinless life and gave Himself as a perfect substitutionary sacrifice for the sins of all humanity; that He arose bodily from the grave, ascended into Heaven where He is seated on the right hand of God interceding for His people and will return to the earth in keeping with His promises.

 

Holy Spirit

We believe that the Holy Spirit is the third Person of the Triune Godhead; that He has been and will continue to be active throughout eternity; that, in gracious dealing with humanity, He has inspired the writing of the Scriptures; that He is in the world today convincing men of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment; that He is calling out a people for God among the Jews and Gentiles; that He regenerates those who believe, places them into the Body of Christ, indwells them and produces in them the fruit of the Spirit; and that He calls individuals to Christian service and empowers and directs them in that service.

We believe that God established the church upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Himself being the cornerstone, and that He confirmed the apostolic message with signs and wonders in that era. Having served their divine purpose, the revelatory and sign gifts of the Spirit, including tongues, prophecy, and the gift of healing, have ceased. We believe that God continues to hear and answer prayers for the sick and afflicted according to His sovereign will.

 

Creation

We accept the Genesis account of the six days of the creation week as a historical record and believe that the universe with all that is in it was created by God; and we affirm that living creatures were made according to their kinds and were not produced by some process of evolution.

 

Spirit Realm

We believe that God created an innumerable company of sinless beings known as angels; that many of these continue in their holy state and are the ministers of God; that an angelic leader now known as Satan (or the Devil) and many others rebelled against God; that these fallen angels, though defeated in the cross of Christ, still continue to oppose God and His work; that they will ultimately be judged by God and cast into the Lake of Fire to suffer everlasting punishment, which is their righteous due.

 

Humanity

We believe that human beings, male and female, were originally created in the image and after the likeness of God; that through uncoerced disobedience Adam fell from his original state, became totally depraved in nature, was separated from God and came under condemnation and the sentence of death; that because of the unity of the human race and the natural headship of Adam, all humans (Jesus Christ only excepted) are born with sin natures and have come under the same consequences of sin.

We believe that God created both male and female, and that He designed gender distinctions between men and women, including the Biblically-defined and distinctive roles of husband and wife. Since gender distinctions are rooted in divine order, changing or disguising one’s inherited sex (and correlated gender) reflective of this order transgresses God’s design. We believe in the sanctity of life of all human persons, including the unborn, ailing, and aging.

We believe that marriage was divinely ordained to be the lifelong and exclusive union of one man and one woman, and we affirm that the Scriptures command that sexual intimacy be reserved for this Biblical marital relationship alone, condemning all other forms as sexual immorality.

 

Salvation

We believe that salvation is all of grace through the substitutionary work of Jesus Christ Who paid the full redemptive price and fully satisfied God’s righteous demands by suffering the death penalty for humanity’s guilt, and that He imputes His righteousness, thus reconciling sinners to God; that salvation is made effective only upon the exercise of personal faith in Jesus Christ, which faith is not a meritorious work but possible only by the grace of God. We believe that salvation includes justification, regeneration, adoption in to the family of God, sanctification (positional, progressive, and final) and glorification; that one who is truly born again will be preserved by divine grace, being kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation.

 

Sanctification

We believe that every saved person is positionally in Christ, completely set apart for God; that in experience the saved person retains a sin nature, which is not eradicated in this life, and thus a believer’s present state is no more perfect than daily experience; that there is a progressive sanctification wherein the saved person is to grow in grace and into Christlikeness by the unhindered power of the Holy Spirit; that when Christ appears the saved person will be fully sanctified with personal state conforming to positional standing. We believe that progressive sanctification involves separation not only from ungodly living but also from ungodly teaching; that though we love all individuals and seek their salvation, there are areas in which we cannot have fellowship with unbelievers; that, in areas of ecclesiastical fellowship, it may be necessary to separate even from other believers in Christ, if they in turn maintain fellowship with unbelievers.

 

Dispensations

We believe that the dispensations are not ways of salvation, which has always been by grace through faith, but are stewardships by which God administers His purpose on earth through humanity under varying responsibilities; that changes in dispensational dealings depend upon changed situations in which humanity is found in relation to God due to human failures and God’s judgments; that, though several dispensations cover the entirety of human history, only three of these are the subject of extended revelation in Scripture; that these three (Mosaic Law, Grace, and millennial Kingdom) are distinct and are not to be intermingled or confused.

 

Church

We believe the Church which is Christ’s body is composed of all true believers (those who have been born again through a personal acceptance of Christ as Savior) from Pentecost to the rapture; that this Church was brought into being on the day of Pentecost by Spirit baptism, placing into one body all who were believers at that time; that on the day of Pentecost and since that time others have been and are being added to this church; that at the rapture this Church will be complete and will be caught up to be united with Christ as His Bride never to be separated from Him.

We believe that local churches are gatherings of professing believers in given communities, organized for the purposes of united worship, fellowship, administration of the ordinances (baptism and Lord’s Supper), edification, discipline and effective promotion of the work of Christ throughout the world; that such local churches should be limited in membership to those who are born again, desire to follow Christ in obedience and have been immersed; that Christ is the supreme Head and every member has direct access to Him and is responsible to seek His will; that the two New Testament offices recognized in such churches are to be those of pastor (also known as bishop or elder) and deacon, both referencing qualified, godly men; that government is congregational with every member responsible to vote in keeping with his or her understanding of the will of Christ; that each local church is responsible directly to Christ and not to some other local church or organization; that there is value in fellowship and cooperation with other local churches of like convictions.

 

Civil Government

We believe that civil government was instituted by God and is still His means of maintaining peace and order among humans; that believers here on earth are responsible in the area of civil government and should participate in it to promote and preserve good order in human society; that civil governments and churches (and fellowships of churches) are distinct from each other, must be organizationally separated from each other and neither must seek to control the other.

 

Future

We believe that the Scriptures foretell certain events among which are the following:

Rapture of the Church We believe that Jesus Christ will return to the atmosphere of this earth; that the dead in Christ will rise first, then believers who are still living will be caught up together with them to meet the Lord in the air and to ever be with the Lord; that the rapture is the next event on the revealed calendar and that no prophecy need be fulfilled before this occurs.

Tribulation We believe that the rapture of the Church will be followed on earth by Israel’s seventieth week; that, though there will be salvation, this will be a time of great judgments, the latter part being known as the Great Tribulation.

Second Coming We believe that following the tribulation, Christ will return to the earth with His glorified saints to establish the millennial Kingdom; that during the 1,000 years of peace and prosperity Satan will be bound and Christ will reign with a rod of iron; that at the end of the Millennium Satan will be released for a short time, deceive many and lead them in final rebellion, but be destroyed with his armies.

Eternal State We believe that the unsaved of all ages will be resurrected and together with the evil angels will be finally judged and condemned to everlasting conscious punishment in hell; that all the saved of all ages in glorified bodies will enjoy everlasting blessing in the presence of God.