What We Believe

What We Believe

There's a God. 

There’s a God. Only one God, in fact, and He is the creator of everything. We're made in His image, which means we're like him in many ways, except that he's God and we're not. He's loving and just and desires a relationship with us. As individuals with free will, we have the freedom to respond to the relationship God has initiated with us, or not.

Sin separates us from God. 

We're free to choose to live outside the realm of the life God has for us as it's explained in the Bible. Put another way, many choices we make either move us closer to God or further away from him. Making even seemingly small decisions that separate us from God is called sin. We all do it, and we'll continue to do so. And, even then, God will love us and passionately pursue us.

Jesus restores our relationship with God. 

God loves us so much, in fact, that he sent his only son, Jesus, to die so the rest of us could live. The cost of sin was separation from God -- spiritual death --- until Jesus came and his death paid everyone's debt. That's serious love. Because of that serious, perfect love, this gift from God is waiting for anyone who wants to receive it. This is called Grace. God gives grace freely and abundantly.

As for us, we need only to decide whether or not to believe and receive this. If we decide to believe it, we have available to us a new, full life that can start now and never stop. And it's OK to have a lot of questions along the way. Although God reveals things to us (including what he's revealed about himself in the Bible), he remains mysterious and wonderful.

Our Statement of Faith

"In the essentials we must have unity; in the non-essentials we must have liberty, in all things we must have love."

Essential beliefs are the foundational principles that supply the framework of life and meaning for the Christian faith. They are truths that the church has recognized, stood for and passed on since its earliest times. These truths are not to be tampered with, altered, removed, or compromised. They are the non-negotiables of our faith.

Non-essential beliefs, instead, are beliefs that are not foundational to the Christian faith or to the status of one’s relationship with God. These beliefs are often open to interpretation and may be regarded differently by specific movements, churches or people.

In keeping with this understanding, we hold the following to be essential beliefs:

God

There is one God, who is infinitely perfect, existing eternally in three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Jesus

We believe in the full deity and perfect humanity of our Lord, His representative and substitutionary sacrifice, His bodily resurrection, His ascension to the Father’s right hand, His present high priestly ministry, and His personal return in power and glory.  His death justifies us before God when we receive the free gift of God’s grace through personal faith in Him.

The Holy Spirit

The Holy Spirit is a divine person who convicts the world of sin, righteousness and judgment, who indwells all believers, and conforms them into the image of Jesus Christ.

The Bible

The Holy Spirit inspired human authors to write the books of the Bible. We believe that it accurately reflects God’s loving heart for all people and is our perfect authority for all of life, practice, and doctrine. It is the truth and is totally trustworthy in all it says.

Salvation

Every member of the human race was originally created in the image and likeness of God.  Through disobedience, humankind became separated from God.  We can only be saved through faith in the atoning work of the Lord Jesus Christ on the cross.

The Church

The Church consists of all those who believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, are redeemed through His blood, and are born again of the Holy Spirit.  Christ is the Head of the Body, the Church, which has been commissioned by Him to go into all the world as a witness, preaching the good news (gospel) to all nations. The local church is a body of believers in Christ who are joined together for the worship of God, for edification through the Word of God, for prayer, fellowship, the proclamation of the gospel, and observance of the practices of Believer’s Baptism and the Lord’s Supper.

Eternity

There will be a bodily resurrection for all at the judgment seat of Christ. Those who believe in Christ will spend eternity with God.  Those who refuse to believe in Jesus will spend eternity in hell separated from God.