About The Bible
We believe that God divinely inspired human authors to write the sixty-six books of the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures we call the Bible. God communicated through these writers to reveal his vision for the world and humanity, including the values, principles, and ideals, which honor him and are in our best interests. Because God is infallible, we believe the Bible is entirely trustworthy and serves as our guide to truth, faith, reality, and life. In it, God's Spirit increases our faith, clarifies our vision for the world and humanity, and directs our lives. We hold a high view of the Scriptures and its authoritative role in our lives. We believe that all of Scripture, both the Hebrew Scriptures (Old Testament) and Christian Scriptures (New Testament), tells us of God’s story of redemption, reconciliation, and restoration of all creation in and through Jesus the Christ, as well as our role in his redemptive work.
(2 Timothy 3:16-17; 2 Peter 1:20-21; Hebrews 4:12-13; Matthew 5:18; John 16:12-13; Psalm 19:7-11, 119:105)
About The Trinity
We believe that there is one God who is the loving Creator of all that exists, both seen and unseen. God is eternal and completely good, knowing all things, having all power and majesty. We believe God exists as an eternal community of three distinct Persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and of self-giving participation in faithful love and perfect in co-equal unity. This doctrine is called the Trinity. Although we cannot fully comprehend God's nature, we believe we can know the triune God personally. Throughout human history, God has expressed his desire to be our God and to have a personal, eternal relationship with us. We believe that God loves us and wants what is best for us.
(Genesis 1:26-27; Deuteronomy 6:4; Colossians 1:15-17; Hebrews 1:8, 2 Corinthians 13:14)
About Jesus
We believe that Jesus was born of the Virgin Mary and mysteriously and wonderfully is God in the flesh. He is the perfect reflection of God’s heart, character, beauty, and love for people; He is what God is like. Therefore, He is revealed in Scripture as fully God and fully man, Son of Man and Son of God, who inaugurated and proclaimed the full availability and tangible presence of the Kingdom of God through what He called “the Gospel” (good news). He lived a sinless life, performed many miracles, and gave direction to His followers. Jesus voluntarily offered Himself as the only perfect sacrifice for the sins of all people by dying on the cross, thereby paying the penalty for the offenses of humanity against God. His death reveals God's holy and unconditional love, unfailing mercy, and abounding grace. He died and was buried. However, as prophesied throughout the Old Testament, He rose from the dead by the power of the Holy Spirit three days later, breaking the chains of the reign of sin and death. He appeared to over 500 people during a period of 40 days before ascending to Heaven. He sits at the right hand of the Father as Lord and King, where He serves as Mediator between God and humanity. We believe that the Lord Jesus will come again to earth in power and glory to judge the world and bring an end to injustice as He brings into completion the redemption and restoration of all of creation to God’s original intent.
(Matthew 1:18-25; John 1:14, 8:40,58, 11:33; Mark 1:14-15; Luke 17:21; Acts 1:9-11; Romans 3:21-26; 5:6-21; Philippians 2:6-11; Colossians 1:13-17, 2:9; Hebrews 1:8, 4:14-16; Revelation 21-22)
About The Holy Spirit
We believe that the Holy Spirit, sent from God to live within, among, and between all who put faith in Jesus. The Spirit teaches, comforts, convicts, and empowers us, giving each person diverse gifts for serving in the church and for serving others in the world as the Spirit leads us to participate faithfully in God's life and mission. We believe that it is through the Holy Spirit that we have the power to transform and grow our grace-gifts to experience a holy and just Gospel-centered Kingdom-shaped life that loves God, loves people, and follows Jesus. We believe the Spirit enables us to make the Kingdom of God more tangible to the world.
(Genesis 1:1-3; John 16:8-11; Acts 1:8-9; 2 Corinthians 3:6, 17; I Corinthians 12:12-14; Romans 8:5-17, 14:16-17; Galatians 5:16-17, 22-24; Ephesians 3:14-21, 5:18; Hebrews 13:20-21)
About Humanity, Sin, and the Reign of Sin and Death
We believe that all people are created with dignity and great value in the image of God and that people were created to live in a thriving relationship with God. However, through our sin (missing the mark of loving God and loving neighbors, which Jesus called "the greatest commands"), our intended relationship with God is broken, and we are held captive by what the apostle Paul refers to as the reign of sin and death. The reign of sin and death is the sphere of human existence where violence and fear are justified and exemplified, and where power is most often expressed through acts of injustice and oppression. It is in the social and political structures of civilized life that self-indulgence and self-sufficiency are prioritized, and where people, individually or collectively, are free to determine what is right, wrong, good, and just. It is both internalized and habitualized by its participants and becomes institutionalized in all our social and civil systems and structures, resulting in varied oppressive forms of power.
Since sin and death have reigned from Adam, all of humanity in our natural state are born into this cosmological reality of the reign of sin and death. In that way, we “inherit” this reality and are hopelessly held captive with no way out. We are “dead in sin” due to this captivity and sin-sick in every way. The governing power of sin is that it makes us “sick” in our souls and fragments our inner lives. Perhaps this is why Jesus said, “It is not those who are well who need a doctor, but those who are sick. I didn’t come to call the righteous, but sinners.”
Sin is a distortion of our whole selves—mind, heart, body, and soul— and in how we see others, leading us away from fully living into love and away from God’s truth, goodness, and beauty. Sin’s power wounds us and condemns us.
(Genesis 1:26-3:24; Matthew 9:12; Matthew 22:37-40; Romans 3:23, 5:12-17; Ephesians 2:1-5; 6:10-12; Galatians 3:10-11; 1 John 5:19 )
About The Gospel
The word "gospel" is the Greek word "evangelion," from which we get "evangelism." It means an "announcement of good news." The Gospel in three words: Jesus is Lord. The Gospel in 33 words: Jesus is God with us, to show us God’s love, liberate us from the reign of sin and death, into God’s Kingdom of grace, to share in God’s life, both now and forever. The Gospel in story: God has come to us in the person of Jesus to disrupt the world as we know it for the sake of an alternative world in line with the realities of the coming future God has promised. Jesus, as Israel’s Messiah-King, proclaimed the coming Kingdom of God as good news and demonstrated the nature of God's reign by proclaiming the forgiveness of sins, healing the sick, casting out demons, eating with tax collectors and sinners, and welcoming all hearers to leave the realities of the old way of doing things behind to serve the coming future of God. God has come and is coming, offering us the hope of a world the principalities and powers of the age are incapable of giving us—a restored world where self-giving love, abiding peace, and unending joy flow from the fullness of God’s presence. It is a world that, through His in-breaking kingdom, has come into the present through the crucified, resurrected, and ascended Lord, yet is a world that will fully come in his return in the consummation of His kingdom.
We believe that the gospel is good news for every life and all of life. It is a gospel that addresses any beliefs or ethics that do not align with God’s Kingdom. Christianity makes a bold announcement of good news: for a world looking for order, peace, healing, and liberation due to the disorder arising from fear, violence, anxiety, and death, it is that Jesus is Lord and King of a peaceable kingdom that will never falter, fail, or be in trouble. All people from every circumstance are invited into this Kingdom to share in God's life-giving reign and presence beginning now and forever. But in this way, the Gospel becomes disruptive good news. The Gospel becomes more than information but an invitation to step into the story of God as the Coming One who disorders the world as we know it for the sake of an alternative world in line with the realities of God's future. It is the story of Jesus, as Israel's Messiah who announced the in-breaking Kingdom of God as good news and demonstrated the nature of that reign by proclaiming liberation through the forgiveness of sins, healing of the sick, casting out demons, eating with tax collectors and sinners, and inviting all hearers to leave the realities of the old way of doing things behind to serve the coming future of God. The Gospel is an announcement of a better story with a life-giving politic in a world of lesser stories and death-dealing politics.
(Isaiah 9:6-7; 1 Corinthians 15:1-6, 20-28; Mark 1:14-15; Luke 4:16-19, 11:20; Colossians 1:3-8)
About Salvation by Grace Through Faith
Since God is faithful and His love for us is great, He sent His Son, Jesus, to rescue us from those consequences and make us citizens of His Kingdom, which is the “good news” (the gospel). Our relationship with God is restored through Jesus’ death on the cross, a perfect act of redemption for each of us, and we are liberated from the captivity of the reign of sin and death. In Jesus Christ, God has begun His work of redeeming and restoring all of humanity and creation, making all things new. Jesus declared that no one comes to the Father except through Him. We receive the free gift of forgiveness by grace through faith, meaning that we cannot earn salvation or through our own works make ourselves righteous before holy God. In Jesus Christ, God has done for us what we can never do for ourselves. We believe that the bible teaches that saving faith compels us to repent (changing our mind and heart) of our sin and be buried with Christ in baptism by immersion.
Therefore, the counter to the reign of sin and death is what the apostle Paul refers to as the reign of grace, which is also a systemic description of both the human and socio-cultural condition. The reign of grace is the sphere of our human existence where violence and fear are usurped by a commitment to reconciliation and peace and where power is expressed only through humble, self-giving love. It is the place where humility gives birth to generosity and gracious hospitality and the place where faith is the light by which humanity both sees and walks. This guiding faith is not a generic faith; instead, it is a faith that rests singularly in an allegiance to the compassionate purposes of God as revealed in Jesus Christ. In the reign of grace, Jesus, as Lord and King, determines what is true, good, and beautiful because he is what God looks like. It is the place where love of God and neighbor are the law and Jesus’ sermon on the mount is the ethic. As the apostle John once said, Jesus is the Word, the divine “logic” (logos in the Greek) of God made flesh, and he—his way of being and doing life in the world, including his death and triumphant resurrection—is what God has to say to all of humanity.
Those who live under the reign of grace trust that there is no need to go back to the old ways of violence and fear because their hope, identity, and security rest in a kingdom that will never falter or fail. They have nothing to prove and can let go of the defensive postures and destructive patterns that the reign of sin and death encourages. They are also aware that they share in some responsibility for the injustices prevalent in society and, in response, are committed to living in God's presence in such a way that makes his reign tangible through truth-telling and faithful engagement, even in the midst of the reign of sin and death. Finally, because those living under the reign of grace are themselves a reconciled and forgiven community, God commands them to do what it takes to become a reconciling and forgiving community that refuses to be schooled in denial and readily admits that the reign of sin and death promotes and upholds cultural systems of injustice, violence, and fear. Each person’s capacity to love, along with their desires, is being healed from the wounds of sin and reordered by God’s grace and the liberating power of the Holy Spirit.
(Ephesians 2:8-10; John 1:12-13; 14:1-6; Ephesians 1:7; Romans 3:22-26, 5:12-21; 10:9-10; 1 Corinthians 15:1-7, 2 Corinthians 5:17, Acts 3:18-26; Acts 2:36-38; Romans 6:3-6; Galatians 3:26-27; Titus 3:4-7; 1 Peter 3:21-22)
About the Eucharist
Eucharist means ‘thanksgiving.’ As we gather around the Lord’s Table each week we bring all of who we are to God in gratitude and we receive God’s gracious gift of Christ’s presence. We are formed by the presence and reign of Christ and we extend this Kingdom hospitality out into the world. We believe in the weekly sharing of eucharist as a demonstration of our faith in Christ. As this ordinance brings us to the sacrifice of Christ's body and the shedding of His blood on our behalf, it is a sign of continued participation in the atoning benefits of Christ's death. As we partake of the Lord's Supper with an attitude of faith and self-examination, we remember and proclaim the death of Christ, receive spiritual nourishment for our souls, and signifies our unity with Christ’s universal Church. It is in this practice we acknowledge both our need and common belonging, which becomes our training for life in the world; the same kind of welcome extended to us by Christ becomes the same kind of welcome we extend to others. If we understand the Eucharist this way, our personal tables become an extension of the Lord's table; our lunch tables become extensions of the Lord's table; our cubicles become extensions of the Lord's table--because we remember that we are to be as welcoming to the person who cleans our trash as to the person who writes our checks. Eucharist is our ongoing rehearsal in the gospel story.
(Matthew 26:26-30; Luke 22:13-30; 1 Corinthians 11:17-26; Acts 20:7)
About The Mission of God
We believe that the Mission of God is the mission to glorify Himself. God does so in this world by redeeming sinful humans and, in the future, fully restoring sin-corrupted creation. God the Father is the Author of this mission. God the Son is the incarnation of this mission in the person of Jesus Christ and accomplishes redemption. God the Spirit applies redemption to the hearts of men and women. We believe that God’s mission has the Church, which becomes the instrument of His mission of Gospel redemption and restoration, finding power and guidance to engage this mission through the Spirit. Mission comes from God, through the church, and to the world where God's redemptive work results in people of every tribe, language and nation responding in lifelong worship and enjoyment of God. Ultimately the mission of God will encompass all of creation when God creates a new heaven and new earth. Therefore, we believe that the mission of God is not merely an activity or program to be arranged into our lives, but rather becomes what our lives are to be arranged by. We seek to be joined with God in His mission as everyday people who live in everyday places who demonstrate His Gospel in everyday ways, making His Kingdom tangible and His mission known. And since Scripture reveals the nature of God and His redemptive plan and purpose, we believe that a proper understanding of God’s mission is found only in what Scripture reveals.
(Genesis 12:1-4; John 1:1-5, 10-14; 17:18; 20:21; Matthew 28:18-20; 2 Corinthians 5:11-21)
About the Church
We believe that God’s mission has a Church, and the mission of God remains the Church’s organizing principle. As the sent people of God, loved, redeemed, and cared for by Him in grace, we have been entrusted with God's mission and called to participate in the world as He does. We believe that the Church does not exist for itself, but exists as a Gospel-centered community of worshippers sent as everyday people in everyday places to offer tangible expressions of love, grace, and compassion to a fallen world, as we proclaim the Gospel and make His Kingdom known in everyday ways. The Church comprises anyone, anywhere in the world, who puts their faith in Jesus. The Church is a royal priesthood, a holy nation unto itself, and a people for God's possession. The Church is one global community of people, but has smaller, local expressions, such as our church community. Each local church expression has a unique personality, and we see beauty in that diversity. For God’s people to live as ones “sent” by God, or live missionally, God's Church must be directed by God’s revealed Word in Scripture, both individually and communally.
(Matt. 28:18-20; Acts 1:3-8, 2:1-47, 4:32-35; Ephesians 1:22-23, 4:11-16; 5:25-30; 1 Corinthians 12:27; 1 Peter 2:9; Galatians 5:13-14)
About the Afterlife and End Times
We do believe that life continues after physical death and that there is heaven, where there is eternal life, and hell, where there is eternal death. We do believe that Jesus will one day physically return and bring complete justice, restoration, and judgment to all of creation. There are so many metaphors and so much ancient apocalyptic language used in the Scriptures about these mysterious topics, and we approach them with great humility and wonder.
(Matthew 24-25; 1 Corinthians 15:1-25; 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18; Revelation 20-22)
