The Holy Spirit is God, the Lord and giver of life, who was active in the Old Testament and given to the church in fullness for the Apostles prior to Pentecost and to the church at the point of salvation. He empowers the saints for service and witness, cleanses man from the old nature and conforms us to the image of Christ. The Holy Spirit empowers believers for Christian witness and service. The promise of the Father is freely available to all who believe in Jesus Christ, thereby enabling them to exercise the powers of the age to come in ministry and mission. The baptism of the Holy Spirit, subsequent to conversion, releases the fullness of the Spirit and is evidenced by the manifestation of spiritual gifts. The Holy Spirit desires to continually fill each believer with power to witness and imparts His supernatural gifts for the edification of the body and the work of ministry in the world. All the gifts of the Holy Spirit at work in the church of the first century are available today and are to be earnestly desired and practiced in an orderly manner. The gifts are essential to the mission of the Church in the world today. 

We affirm that the Bible containing the Old and New Testaments is alone the only infallible, inspired, written Word of God and that its authority is ultimate and final and eternal. The Bible is the source of all doctrine, instruction, correction and reproof. It contains information for guidance in godliness and practical Christian conduct. We accept the Bible, including the 39 books of the Old Testament and the 27 books of the New Testament, as the written Word of God. The Bible is an essential and infallible record of God’s self disclosure to mankind. It leads us to salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. Being given by God, the Scriptures are both fully and verbally inspired by God. Therefore, as originally given, the Bible is free of error in all it teaches. Each book is to be interpreted according to its context and purpose and in reverent obedience to the Lord who speaks through it in living power. All believers are exhorted to study the Scriptures and diligently apply them to their lives. The Scriptures are the authoritative and normative rule and guide of all Christian life, practice and doctrine. They are totally sufficient and must not be added to, superseded or changed by later tradition or worldly wisdom. Every doctrinal formulation, whether of creed, confession or theology, must be put to the test of the full counsel of God in Holy Scripture. 

God made man – male and female – in His own image, as the crown of creation so that man might glorify Him through enjoying fellowship with Him. Tempted by Satan, man rebelled against God. Being estranged from his Maker yet responsible to Him, he became subject to divine wrath, inwardly depraved and apart from a special work of grace, utterly incapable of returning to God. This depravity is radical and pervasive. It extends to his mind, will and emotions. Unregenerate man lives under the dominion of sin and Satan. He is at enmity with God, hostile toward God and hateful of God. Fallen, sinful people, whatever their character or attainments, are lost and without hope apart from salvation in Christ alone.

Christ’s vicarious death on the cross paid the penalty for the sins of the whole world, but its benefits are only applicable to those who believe in Jesus as their personal Savior. Healing of the body, soul and spirit is provided for in the atonement, as well as, all of God’s provision for His saints, but these must be appropriated. 

The Word of God declares clearly that salvation is a free gift of God, based on the merits of the death of His Son, and is appropriated by faith. Salvation is affected by personal repentance, belief on the Lord Jesus (justification), and personal acceptance of Him into one’s life as Lord and Savior (regeneration). The new life in Christ includes the privileges of adoption and inheritance in the Kingdom of God’s beloved Son. Salvation is an act of free will in response to God’s personal love for mankind. It is predestined in the sense that God, through His omniscience, foreknew those who would choose Him. This doctrine is not in contradiction to the free will of man to appropriate salvation. It is secure in the eternal unchanging commitment of God, who does not lie and is forever the same. Salvation should produce an active lifestyle of loving obedience and service to Jesus Christ our Savior. 

Jesus Christ is the gospel. The good news is revealed in His birth, life, death, resurrection and ascension. Christ’s crucifixion is the heart of the gospel; His resurrection is the power of the gospel, and His ascension is the glory of the gospel. Christ’s death is a substitutionary and propitiatory sacrifice to God for our sins. It satisfies the demands of God’s holy justice and appeases His holy wrath. It also demonstrates His mysterious love and reveals His amazing grace. Jesus Christ is the only redeemer between God and man. There is no other name by which men must be saved. At the heart of all sound doctrine is the cross of Jesus Christ and the infinite privilege that redeemed sinners have of glorifying God because of what He has accomplished. Therefore, we want all that takes place in our hearts, churches and ministries to proceed from and be related to the gospel. 

The proper response to the gospel is faith in the person and work of Jesus Christ, a faith that is naturally accompanied by repentance from sin. Biblical repentance is characterized by a changed life, and saving faith is evidenced by kingdom service or works. While neither repentance nor works save, a person must be willing to deny himself, pick up his cross and follow Christ, or he cannot become His disciple. This response to the gospel is rooted and grounded in the free and unconditional election of God for His own pleasure and glory. This gospel of grace is to be sincerely preached to all men in all nations. 

Salvation, the free gift of God, is provided by grace alone, through faith alone, because of Christ alone, for the glory of God alone. Anyone turning from sin in repentance and looking to Christ and His substitutionary death receives the gift of eternal life and is declared righteous by God as a free gift. The righteousness of Christ is imputed to him. He is justified and fully accepted by God. Through Christ’s atonement for sin, an individual is reconciled to God as Father and becomes His child. The believer is forgiven the debt of his sin and via the miracle of regeneration, liberated from the law of sin and death into the freedom of God’s Spirit. 

We believe that the Scriptures portray the life of the saint in this world to be one of balance between what is imputed to us as Christians and what is imported to us according to our faith and maturity. Hence God’s provision for His children is total, and the promises are final and are forever. The shortcomings of the individual and of the Church are because of the still progressing sanctification of the saints. The Christian life is filled with trials, tests and warfare against a spiritual enemy. For those abiding in Christ until their death or His return, the promises of eternal blessing in the presence of God are assured. To remain faithful through all circumstances of life, it requires a dependence upon the Holy Spirit and a willingness to die to personal desires and passions. 

We believe that the term 'marriage' has only one meaning and that is marriage sanctioned by God which joins one man and one woman in a single, exclusive union, as delineated in Scripture. We believe that God intends sexual intimacy to only occur between a man and a woman who are married to each other. We believe that God has commanded that no intimate sexual activity be engaged in outside of a marriage between a man and a woman. We believe that any form of sexual immorality, such as adultery, fornication, homosexuality, bisexual conduct, bestiality, incest, pornography or any attempt to change one's sex, or disagreement with one's biological sex, is sinful and offensive to God. We believe that in order to preserve the function and integrity of the church as the local Body of Christ and to provide a biblical role model to the church members and the community, it is imperative that all persons employed by the church in any capacity, should abide by and agree to this Statement on Marriage and Sexuality and conduct themselves accordingly. We believe that God offers redemption and restoration to all who confess and forsake their sin, seeking His mercy and forgiveness through Jesus Christ. We believe that every person must be afforded compassion, love, kindness, respect, and dignity. Hateful and harassing behavior or attitudes directed toward any individual are to be repudiated and are not in accord with scripture nor the doctrines of the church.

The goal of the Church is to make disciples of all nations and to present the saints complete in Christ. The Church is governed by the fivefold ministry of Ephesians 4, the offices of Elder, as well as other offices mentioned in Scripture. It is essential to the life of the Church that scriptural patterns of discipline be practiced and that oversight for Church discipline, individual and corporate, be exercised by the leadership of the Church. God, by His Word and Spirit, creates the Church, calling sinful men out of the whole human race into the fellowship of Christ’s body. By the same Word and Spirit, He guides and preserves that new redeemed humanity. The Church is not a religious institution or denomination. Rather, the Church is made up of those who have become genuine followers of Jesus Christ and have personally appropriated the gospel. The Church exists to worship and glorify God as Father, Son and Holy Spirit. It also exists to serve Him by faithfully doing His will on earth. This involves a commitment to see the gospel preached and churches planted in the entire world for a testimony. The ultimate mission of the Church is worship, and the means by which this is accomplished is the making of disciples through the preaching and embracing of the gospel. When God transforms human nature, this becomes the chief means of society’s transformation. Upon conversion, newly redeemed men and women are added to a local church in which they devote themselves to teaching, fellowship, the Lord’s Supper and prayer. All members of the Church are to be a vital and committed part of a local church. In this context, they are called to walk out the New Covenant as the people of God and demonstrate the reality of the kingdom of God. The ascended Christ has given gift ministries to the Church (including apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers) for the equipping of Christ’s body so that it might mature and grow. Through the gift ministries, all members of the Church are to be nurtured and equipped for the work of the ministry. In the context of the local church, God’s people receive pastoral care and leadership and the opportunity to employ their God-given gifts in His service in relation to one another and to the world. 

The Word of God enjoins on the Church two perpetual ordinances of the Lord Jesus Christ. The first, baptism is the outward sign of what God has already done in the individual’s life, and is a testimony to all that the person belongs now to Jesus. Baptism allows believers to identify with Jesus and is performed in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. The Lord’s Supper is a commemoration of the death of the Lord and is done in remembrance of Him until He comes again, and is a sign of our participation in Him. Both institutions are restricted to those who are believers.