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At the heart of every individual life, family life, and church life is the matter of what we believe. To speak of faith is to focus on what we are trusting in and what we are committed to. For true believers, this is a matter of who we are relying on and who we are committed to. Genuine Christianity is a relationship with our Creator that is ever-looking to His self-revelation in the Scriptures and ever-ready to rely on what He has said. It is a communion based on His speaking to us and our responding in love and honor and obedience. This is the creation model with Adam and Eve (Genesis 1-2), as well as the Christian model of Great Commission living (Matthew 28:18-20).
Our belief must have a Biblical basis and will continue to be shaped through our communion with the Lord. For salvation, there is the singular way of Christ’s cross-payment thus providing for sin’s forgiveness and new life through regeneration. For growth in Christlikeness, there is constant exposure to the glory of Christ through the pages of the Scriptures and ongoing adjustments in our way of thinking, choosing, and speaking.
To distill what we believe down to a few words or phrases is a challenge. To avoid an oversimplification while thinking in terms of “childlike faith” is not as simple as one might think. Essentially, it would be accurate to state that we believe in the simplicity of faith and the sufficiency of the Scriptures. We believe that all we need is granted to us in the person of Jesus Christ. He is our salvation. He is our Lord. He is our hope. He is our inheritance. He is our all in all.
Consequent to this simplicity, we are unwilling to attach ourselves to theological systems or various movements that tend to over-define and unnecessarily divide. Clarity on the gospel is essential and must be maintained. Willingness to leave the secret things to the Lord affords us the freedom to say all that the Scriptures clearly say and leave unsaid what is not clearly stated. We give our best to understand each passage of the Scriptures in the context of the whole of the Scriptures and seek to interpret and explain what is said for application to our lives. Simply stated, we chose to believe all that God has revealed, recognizing that we are finite creatures dealing with an infinite Creator who has revealed to us all we need to know for salvation, hope, and Godly living. Our limitations to understand are acknowledged, while our passion to grasp after all that God has for us is maintained and nurtured. We long to grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord without grids or systems or movements forcing our study and application of the Scriptures. We seek to be “Biblicists” in the simplest faith approach to the Word of God. We believe that the individual child of God can be taught by the Spirit of God through a copy of the Scriptures in his/her own language. We seek to nurture the daily intake of God’s Word as we gather in corporate worship and Bible study.
Possibly the most concise statement of our endeavor as a church is found in Titus 2:11-15;
For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, Teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world; Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ; Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works. These things speak, and exhort, and rebuke with all authority. Let no man despise thee.
We trust this as God’s blueprint for effective church ministry in the evangelizing of the lost and edification of the believing. This is what we believe.
Pastor