WHAT WE BELIEVE
THE HOLY SCRIPTURES
We believe in the Holy Bible, accepting fully the writings of the sixty-six books of the Old and New Testaments as the very Word of God. The original writings were verbally and plenarily inspired and were the product of Spirit-controlled men. The copies of these verbally inspired writings retain all of the value, power and inspirational quality of the original writings as promised by God in the Bible concerning their preservation. The Authorised Version of the Bible, known colloquially as the King James Version (KJV), carries on through perfect equivalence in translation, the very word of God for the English speaking people, we do not believe God has lost a single word through translation, trusting him as the author of language. The Bible therefore is inerrant and infallible and is the final authority in which all human conduct, creeds and opinions are to be judged.
2 Peter 1:19-21 Psalm 12:6-7 Matthew 24:35 Mark 13:31 Luke 21:33 2 Timothy 3:16
THE ONE TRUE GOD
We believe that there is one living and true God. He is the infinite, intelligent, personal and loving Spirit, the Maker and Supreme Ruler of heaven and earth. He is inexpressibly glorious in holiness, and worthy of all honour and praise. The unity of God co-exists in three persons – the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, equal in every divine perfection, and executing distinct, but harmonious, offices in the Universe.
Psalm 2:7 Deuteronomy 4:35, Deuteronomy 6:4 Exodus 20:2-3 Genesis 1:1 1 Corinthians 8:6 John 5:36-40 John 1:1-3
OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST
We believe that the Lord Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God, without any essential change in his divine person became man by the miracle of the virgin birth, thus to continue forever as both true God and true Man. As man he was tempted just as we are, but without sin. As the perfect Lamb of God he gave himself to the death of the cross, bearing the sin of the world, and suffering its full penalty of divine wrath in our place. He rose again from the dead and was glorified in the same body in which he suffered and died. As our great High Priest he ascended into heaven, there to appear before the Heavenly Father as our advocate and intercessor.
Colossians 2:9 Matthew 20:28 Matthew 1:23 Isaiah 53:5-6 John 1:29 John 1:14 Luke 24:36 John 8:46 Hebrews 4:14-15 Galatians 3:13 John 20:25-28 1 John 2:1 Hebrews 13:8 Hebrews 9:24 Revelation 22:6 Philippians 2:5-8
THE HOLY SPIRIT
We believe that the Holy Spirit is a divine Person; equal with God the Father and God the Son and of the same nature and that he was active in creation. He convicts of sin, of righteousness, and of judgement and bears witness to and exalts the Person of Christ. He is the agent in the New birth through which the believer is spiritually baptised when he believes. The Holy Spirit seals, empowers, guides, teaches, and sanctifies the believer. We believe that the Holy Spirit enables every believer to serve God through the ministry of spiritual gifts. However, we believe that the miraculous sign gifts such as tongues and healings, as recorded in the New Testament, were Apostolic in nature and have ceased to exist as distinct ministries of individuals. We believe that God can intervene in human history in a miraculous way should he choose to do so, but we believe that the occurrence of such interventions today are distinct from the phenomena of the miraculous sign gifts evident in Apostolic times.
Mark 16:20 Matthew 28:19 Genesis 1:1-3 Luke 1:35 John 14:16-17 John 3:5-6 John 1:33 John 14:26 Romans 8:14,16,26-27 1 Corinthians 13:8 John 16:8-11 Hebrews 9:14 1 Corinthians 14:21-22 Ephesians 1:13-14 Hebrews 2:4
THE DEVIL OR SATAN
We believe that Satan was created by God as an angel but through pride and rebellion became the enemy of his creator, drawing with him many angels. Satan is now the unholy prince of this age and the ruler of all the powers of darkness but is destined, however, to final defeat at the hands of Jesus Christ. He will suffer the judgement of an eternal justice in The Lake of Fire, a place prepared for him and his angels.
John 8:44 Matthew 25:41 Ezekiel 28:13-17 John 12:31-32 John 16:11 2 Corinthians 4:4 Ephesians 2:2 Ephesians 6:12-18 Revelation 12:3-4 Revelation 12:9-10 Hebrews 2:14
CREATION & THE FALL OF MAN
We believe in the Genesis account of Creation, and that it is to be accepted literally, not allegorically. Man was created directly in God’s image and after His likeness, and that man’s creation was not a matter of evolution from lower life forms. We believe that man was created in innocence under the law of his Maker but by voluntary transgression fell from his sinless state, and in consequence of which, all mankind are now sinners by nature and choice and, therefore, are under just condemnation without defence or excuse.
John 8:42-44 Matthew 19:4 Genesis 1-3 Romans 1:18 Romans 5:12 Romans 3:19 Romans 3:23 1 Thessalonians 5:23 Romans 7:18 Ephesians 4:18
SALVATION
The Atonement
We believe that the salvation of sinners is wholly of grace; through the only mediator Jesus Christ, the son of God, who by the appointment of the Father, freely took upon himself our nature yet without sin. By the shedding of his blood in his death on the cross he made a full and vicarious atonement for our sins. His atonement consisted not in setting us an example by his death as a martyr, but was the voluntary substitution of himself in the sinner’s place, the just dying for the unjust, bearing our sins in his own body. God demonstrated his acceptance of the atonement by raising Jesus from the dead and seating him at his own right hand. He is in every way qualified to be a suitable, compassionate, and all-sufficient Saviour.
The New Birth
We believe that in order to be saved, the sinner must be born again. This new birth is a new creation in Jesus Christ, in which the one formerly dead in trespasses and sins, is made partaker of the divine nature and receives eternal life, the free gift of God. The new creation is brought about in a manner above our comprehension, not by culture, not by character, nor by the will of man, but wholly by the power of the Holy Spirit in connection with divine truth. We hold that at the time of the new birth the believer is baptised by that Holy Spirit of promise, it is this one true baptism and all it entails that is portrayed by the physical ordinance of baptism to be observed by every believer.
Justification
We believe anyone who has exercised personal faith in the Lord Jesus Christ is justified. Justification is that judicial act of God whereby the believer in Christ is declared righteous. This declaration incorporates the pardon of sin and the imputation of divine righteousness for ever, not because of any works of righteousness on the believer’s part, but solely through God’s mercy and grace. Being thus fully justified he can come no more under the condemnation of death for sin, the Lord’s wrath being propitiated through the sacrifice of his Son, our Lord Jesus Christ.
Acts 15:11 John 3:16 John 3:3 Romans 3:24-25 Ephesians 2:8-9 2 Corinthians 5:17 Romans 6:23 Romans 5:1 2 Peter 1:4 Hebrews 2:14-17 Philippians 2:7-8 Galatians 2:16 1 John 5:1 1 John 4:10
SANCTIFICATION & SEPARATION
We believe that sanctification is the divine setting apart of the believer unto God accomplished in a threefold manner. There is first, an eternal act of God, based upon redemption in Christ, establishing the believer in a position of holiness at the moment he trusts the Saviour. Second, there is a continuing process as the Holy Spirit convicts and the Christian applies the Word of God to ones life. Third, this process is finally accomplished at the Lord’s return.
We believe the Scriptures teach that every believer should be separated unto God. Aided by the Holy Spirit, the believer should walk in Christian love and holiness, exhibiting qualities of honesty, purity, integrity, loving kindness, all undertaken in the spirit of humility. We also believe that every believer is admonished not to love the world or the things of the world, but rather to flee evil desires, doing all things to the glory of God.
We believe that the Scriptures teach that we should avoid the unrepentant believer and the one who promotes discord in order to see them restored. We are further instructed to avoid fellowship or involvement with religious apostasy.
1 Corinthians 5:11 1 Corinthians 1:30 John 17:17 2 Corinthians 3:18 Ephesians 5:26-27 Galatians 1:8-9 2 Corinthians 6:14 1 Thessalonians 4:3-4 2 Timothy 2:16-18 1 John 3:2 2 Thessalonians 3:14-15 1 Thessalonians 5:23-24 Jude 24-25 Hebrews 10:1-14 2 John 9-11 Revelation 22:11
THE CHURCH
We believe that a local church is a congregation of baptised believers under the discipline of the Word of God and the lordship of Jesus Christ, organised to carry out the commission to evangelise, to teach, and to administer the ordinances of Believer’s Baptism and the Lord’s Supper. We believe that the local church has the right of self- government free from interference of any hierarchy of individuals or organisations, and that the one and only Superintendent is Christ. It is Scriptural for local assemblies to cooperate with each other in contending for the faith and for the furtherance of the Gospel, but each church is the judge of the measure and method of its cooperation.
While the local church is the only place in which the command of Scripture can properly be followed, where they speak of the church, we see and also believe that all New Testament believers are baptised into one body at the moment of their salvation; This is the church which is the body of Christ (every member of which will be found in heaven).
1 Corinthians 11:2 Acts 15:13-18 1 Corinthians 12:12-13 Ephesians 1:22-23, 3:1-6, 4:11, 5:23 Colossians 1:18
BAPTISM & THE LORD’S SUPPER
We believe that Christ gave only two ordinances to his disciples – Baptism and the Lord’s Supper. We believe both are symbolic in nature and neither confer any saving merit upon the recipient, but are to be undertaken after salvation. We believe that Christian baptism is the immersion of a born again believer into water, in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. This is to show a solemn and beautiful emblem of our identification with the crucified, buried and risen Saviour, through whom we died to sin and rose to a new life. We believe that the Lord’s Supper is a commemoration of his death until he comes, and is to be observed regularly by believers only, and should be preceded by solemn self-examination.
John 3:23 Matthew 3:16, 28:18-20 Acts 2:41-42 1 Corinthians 11:23-28 Romans 6:3-5
CIVIL GOVERNMENT
We believe that civil government is of divine appointment, for the interests and good order of human society. Rulers are to be prayed for, conscientiously honoured and obeyed, except only in those things opposed to the will of our Lord Jesus Christ as found in Scripture. For he alone is to be obeyed above all as the only Lord, and the coming Prince of the kings of the earth. His word being that Law through which all men and civil government shall ultimately be judged.
Romans 13:1-7 Acts 23:5 Matthew 22:21 1 Peter 2:13-16 1 Timothy 2:1-4
FUTURE THINGS
We believe in the imminent return of Jesus Christ for His Church. The dead in Christ will rise first, and those who are alive will be caught up together to meet the Lord in the air (pre-tribulational rapture). This will be followed at some time by seven-years of God’s outpouring of his wrath on the Earth. This is climaxed by the return of Jesus Christ to the earth with the saints (pre-millennial) to usher in a literal one thousand-year kingdom with the Saviour reigning during which time Satan is bound. This will then be followed by the judgement of unbelievers before they are cast for eternal punishment into the Lake of Fire. After that all believers will enjoy God forever in a new heaven and new earth.
Matthew 24:29-31. Daniel 9:25-27. Isaiah 9:6-7. Luke 1:30-33. Acts 2:29-30 John 14:2. John 5:28-29. 1 Corinthians 15:42-44. 1 Corinthians 15:51-54 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18. Philippians 3:20-21. Revelation 20:1-6. Revelation 21:4. Revelation 3:10. Revelation 20:14-15