Salvation involves the redemption of the whole man, and is offered freely to all who
accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, who by His own blood obtained eternal
redemption for the believer. In its broadest sense salvation includes regeneration,
justification, sanctification, and glorification.
Man is the special creation of God, in His own image. He created them male and female
as the crowning work of His creation. By his free choice man sinned against God and
brought sin into the human race. The sacredness of human personality is evident in that
God created man in His own image, and in that Christ died for man; therefore every
person of every race possesses dignity and is worthy of respect and Christian love.
Election is the gracious purpose of God, according to which He regenerates, justifies,
sanctifies, and glorifies sinners. All true believers endure to the end. Those whom God
has accepted in Christ, and sanctified by His Spirit will never fall away from the state of
grace, but shall persevere to the end.
A New Testament church of the Lord Jesus Christ is an autonomous local congregation of
baptized believers, associated by covenant in the faith and fellowship of the gospel,
observing the two ordinances of Christ, governed by His laws, exercising the gifts, rights,
and privileges invested in them by His Word, and seeking to extend the gospel to the ends
of the earth. Each congregation operates under the Lordship of Christ through democratic
processes. In such a congregation each member is responsible and accountable to Christ
as Lord. Its scriptural officers are pastors and deacons. While both men and women are
gifted for service in the church, the office of pastor is limited to men as qualified by
Scripture.
Baptism & the Lord’s Supper
Christian baptism is the immersion of a believer in water. It is an act of obedience
symbolizing the believer's faith in a crucified, buried, and risen Savior, the believer's
death to sin, the burial of the old life, and the resurrection to walk in newness of life in
Christ Jesus.
The Lord's Supper is a symbolic act of obedience whereby members memorialize the
death of the Redeemer and anticipate His second coming.