What We Believe

The Holy Bible, the 39 books of the Old Testament and the 27 books of the New, is the inspired Word of God. It is our final authority in everything that concerns Christian conduct and work, and nothing is to be added to it or taken from it.

God breathed out the Scriptures through more than forty writers across many centuries, and they speak with one voice because one Spirit moved them. The Bible is how God has made Himself known, and its great subject is Jesus Christ and the redemption He won.

For the unbeliever it brings conviction of sin and points to the Saviour. For the believer it is food, light for the path, a mirror for the heart and the sword of the Spirit. It is understood best by those who come to it with a humble, willing heart, ready to obey what they learn.

There is one God, and in the Godhead are three separate, distinct and recognisable Persons, perfectly united in one: the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost. They are different Persons, not three names for one Person, equal in power and eternal together.

Scripture calls the Father God, calls the Son God, and calls the Holy Ghost God, yet it is clear there is only one God. At the baptism of Jesus all three are seen at once: the Son in the water, the Spirit descending, the Father speaking from heaven.

The three work together in creation, in the coming of Christ, in the cross, and in our salvation. We pray to the Father, through the Son, helped by the Spirit. The Trinity is a mystery beyond the natural mind, received by faith: one in being, three in Persons, never divided and never confused.

Jesus, the only begotten Son of God, was conceived by the Holy Ghost and born of the virgin Mary. He was crucified, died, was buried, and rose again from the dead in His own body.

Because He was born of a virgin, Jesus did not inherit Adam's fallen nature. He alone was without sin, the spotless Lamb of God who could die in the place of sinners. To deny the virgin birth is to deny who He is.

His death on the cross was real, and so was His rising. He showed Himself alive in a body that could be touched, and ate with His disciples. The resurrection declared Him to be the Son of God with power, and it is why He is Saviour and Judge of all, and why anyone who calls on Him can be saved.

Since the Fall of Adam and Eve, every person is born with a sinful nature, wholly corrupted by sin and guilty before God. This puts all people under God's wrath and condemnation, and no one can save themselves.

God made man in His image, upright and holy, but through disobedience man fell, and all who come from Adam inherit his fallen nature. Sin has touched every part of a person: mind, will, body and spirit. It separates us from a holy God.

Nothing we do can make up for it. But God in His love sent Jesus Christ to be our perfect substitute and sin-bearer. Through His blood the guilt and condemnation of sin can be taken away, and He calls every sinner to repent and believe.

Repentance is a complete turning away from all sin and its deceitful pleasures. God requires it of every sinner before they can truly believe in Jesus with saving faith.

Repentance is more than feeling sorry about the results of sin. It is a godly sorrow that changes the mind and the heart, so that sin is hated and forsaken and the sinner turns to God. Jesus began and ended His preaching with it, and the apostles preached it everywhere.

Repentance and faith belong together, and true repentance shows itself in a changed life, including putting right the wrongs we have done to others. God commands all people everywhere to repent, and there is joy in heaven over every sinner who does.

Restitution is making amends for wrongs we have done to others: giving back what was stolen to its rightful owner, paying debts, returning what was gained by fraud, confessing to those we have offended and apologising to those we have slandered, so that our conscience is clear before God and people.

God forgives the one who confesses and forsakes sin, but He also asks the forgiven to make right, as far as they can, the harm they did to others. Restitution does not earn forgiveness. It is the fruit of real repentance, as when Zacchaeus met Jesus and gave back what he had taken.

Time does not cancel a moral debt. Some cases are delicate, where making amends could harm others, and these call for prayer, wisdom and the counsel of a faithful pastor. When past wrongs are put right, peace and confidence before God follow.

Justification is the act of God's grace by which a repentant sinner receives forgiveness and the remission of sins and is counted righteous before God, through faith in the atoning blood of Jesus. Cleared of all guilt, the one who is born again stands before God as though they had never sinned, not because of any merit of their own but because of what Christ did by dying in our place.

No one can deal with their own sin or change their eternal destiny. Christ paid the price on the cross, and His work is received personally by faith. Church membership, ceremonies and good works cannot justify anyone.

The one who is justified is a new creation, and it shows: the works of the flesh give way to the fruit of the Spirit. James and Paul agree. We are justified before God by faith, and that faith is shown to be real before people by the life it produces.

Water baptism is essential to our obedience after we are reconciled to God. It is one immersion, not three, “in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost”, as Jesus commanded.

To baptise means to immerse. Going under the water and rising pictures the believer's death to the old life and rising with Christ to a new one. It is a public confession that we belong to Him, for those who have repented and believed, and so not for infants, who cannot yet do so.

Baptism does not save; we are saved by grace through faith in the blood of Jesus, as the thief on the cross was. But every believer should obey Christ's command and be baptised soon after being saved, as the first converts were.

Jesus Christ instituted the Lord's Supper so that all believers, all members of God's family, should share in it regularly and so “shew the Lord's death till he come”. The emblems are unleavened bread and the juice of the fruit of the vine. Whoever eats and drinks unworthily brings judgement and chastening on themselves.

Christ is our Passover, and at the last Passover He gave His followers this supper in its place. The bread and the cup represent His body broken and His blood shed; they are not His actual body and blood. We take them in remembrance of His love on the cross and in hope of His return.

Because it is holy, we come with self-examination: with a current testimony of salvation and holy living, with wrongs put right and no malice or unforgiveness in our hearts.

Entire sanctification is a definite act of God's grace, after the new birth, by which the believer's heart is purified and made holy. It is not reached gradually by works, struggle or suppression, but received by faith in the sanctifying blood of Jesus Christ. Holiness of life and purity of heart are at the centre of Christian living.

At the new birth our sins are forgiven. In sanctification the heart is cleansed from the sinful nature inherited from Adam, so that God reigns there without a rival. It is an experience given in a moment: we do not grow into sanctification, though we keep growing in it afterwards.

The one who seeks it separates from all sin, gives themselves wholly to God, and asks in faith, believing it is God's will. It is kept by abiding in Christ, watching and praying. Without holiness no one will see the Lord.

The baptism in the Holy Ghost is the enduement of power from on high upon the sanctified believer. It is “the promise of the Father”, and when one receives this gift of the Holy Ghost, it comes with the initial evidence of speaking in a language not learned before, speaking in tongues as the Spirit gives utterance. The gifts of the Spirit are for believers today.

This baptism is not the new birth, and it is not sanctification. Jesus prayed for His disciples' sanctification and then told them to wait for power. Sanctification is for purity; the baptism in the Holy Ghost is for power to witness and serve. Purity comes before power.

We do not teach anyone how to speak in tongues: the Holy Spirit gives the utterance. The Spirit is not a force but a divine Person, to be honoured and obeyed. Those who thirst, have a clean heart, and ask in faith receive, for the Father gives the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him.

Redemption from the curse of the law, healing of sickness and disease, and continued health are provided for all people through the sacrificial death of Jesus Christ.

Redemption means being bought back from slavery at a price. Christ paid that price with His own blood. He bore our sicknesses as well as our sins, and He came to destroy the works of the devil.

Healing is received through a living relationship with God: genuine conversion, obedience to His Word, holy living, peace with others, and the prayer of faith. The sick are told to call for the elders of the church to pray over them. God still heals today.

Personal evangelism is a ministry God has given to every believer. Jesus commanded it, and God requires every believer to be a compassionate and fruitful soul-winner, bringing others to Christ.

The gospel is good news: through the death, burial and resurrection of Christ there is salvation. Personal evangelism is sharing it one person at a time, as Jesus did with the woman at the well and as Andrew did with his brother. People are reached one by one.

A soul-winner needs a real experience of salvation, a holy life, prayer, compassion for the lost and skill with the Word. Kindness and friendship open doors, and every place is an opportunity: at home, at work, in the market, on the road.

Marriage is binding for life. The Bible's uniform teaching is monogamy, one man and one woman, and polygamy is contrary to God's will. A believer must not marry an unbeliever. Under the New Testament no one has the right to divorce and remarry while their first spouse is alive. Anyone who married wrongly before they were converted should put it right without delay.

Marriage is God's idea, not a product of any culture. A man leaves his parents, is joined to his wife, and the two become one flesh, for companionship, partnership and purity. God still guides His children in marriage, through His Word and His Spirit, with parents' consent and purity kept before and after the wedding.

In the home, the husband loves his wife as Christ loved the church and gave Himself for it, and the wife respects her husband, gladly and from love. Kindness, tenderness and honest communication keep a marriage strong.

The Rapture, the first stage of the second coming of Christ, is the catching away from the earth of all living saints and all who have died in the Lord. It will take place before the Great Tribulation and could happen at any time, in the twinkling of an eye, without warning: the trumpet will sound, the dead in Christ will rise first, and those who are alive will be caught up with them to meet the Lord in the air, and be with Him for ever.

At the Rapture Christ comes for His church in the air; the world will not see Him. It ends the church age. Seven years later He comes back to the earth with His saints, at His second coming. Enoch and Elijah, taken up without dying, picture it.

Because no one knows the hour, the call is to be ready: born again, living a holy life, walking in the light, serving God, watching and praying. The signs Jesus gave are being fulfilled, and His coming is near.

The Bible teaches the resurrection of the dead as clearly as the immortality of the soul. Every person who has ever lived will be raised, some to honour and glory and others to everlasting shame and contempt.

At death the soul does not sleep or cease to be. The believer goes at once to be with the Lord; the unbeliever goes to a place of conscious torment, as Jesus taught of the rich man and Lazarus. There is no purgatory and no annihilation.

The first resurrection is of the saints: Christ the firstfruits, then the church at the Rapture, then those saved during the Tribulation and the Old Testament saints when Christ returns. A thousand years later, the unsaved dead are raised to judgement. Blessed is the one who has part in the first resurrection.

The Great Tribulation will come after the Rapture and will be a time of terrible suffering on earth, also called the time of Jacob's trouble. During it the Antichrist will take hold of the world in a reign of terror. He is not a system or an organisation but a person, a supernatural and devilish being in the form of a man, who will blaspheme and proclaim himself to be God. Meanwhile the Marriage Supper of the Lamb takes place in heaven.

The Tribulation lasts seven years, the seventieth week of Daniel's prophecy, and grows worst in its second half, when the Antichrist breaks his covenant with Israel. God's judgements fall on an unbelieving world, and many who turn to God in that time will suffer for it.

God does not appoint His people to wrath. As Noah and Lot were taken out before judgement fell, so the church is caught away before the Tribulation begins. In heaven the saints receive their rewards and rejoice at the Marriage Supper of the Lamb, and they return with Christ when it ends.

The second coming of Christ will be just as literal and visible as His going away. He is coming to execute judgement on the ungodly, and He will then set up His kingdom and reign on this present earth for a thousand years.

The Rapture and the second coming are distinct. At the Rapture Christ comes for His saints, in the air, at any moment. At His second coming, after the Tribulation, He comes with His saints to the earth, and every eye will see Him. His feet will stand on the Mount of Olives.

Every prophecy of His first coming was fulfilled to the letter, and so will these be. Satan's last armies are overthrown at Armageddon. The world is called to repent, and the church to be ready, holy and busy with His work until He comes.

Christ's millennial reign is His literal reign on earth for a thousand years, begun when Jesus returns to the earth with ten thousands of His saints. He will judge the nations of the earth, the devil will be bound, and it will be a reign of peace and blessing.

In the Millennium God's purposes are seen on earth as Christ, the Son of David, rules the world from Jerusalem with justice and righteousness, fulfilling God's promise that David's throne would have no end.

War will end, the curse on the land will be lifted, and the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. Those who share in it are the church He made glorious, the humble, and those who watched and were ready.

After the Millennium comes the final judgement, the Great White Throne, when God judges all who have ever lived and have not yet been judged, the small and the great, according to their works. Believers' judgement for sin was borne by Christ on the cross. The devil and his angels are also judged then and sent to the lake of fire for ever.

At the end of the thousand years Satan is loosed for a little while and makes one last rebellion, which God ends with fire from heaven. Then the dead are raised and stand before the throne, the books are opened, and they are judged by what is written there: deeds, words and secret things.

God's judgement is righteous and has no favourites. No one whose name is in the book of life faces this judgement, but whoever is not found written there is cast into the lake of fire. That is why the gospel calls every person to be saved now.

God will make a new heaven and a new earth “wherein dwelleth righteousness”, and the redeemed will live there with God for ever. This present earth, polluted by sin, will pass away after the Great White Throne judgement. Nothing unclean will be there. We will know one another, our knowledge made perfect. There will be no more curse and no more night, for the glory of the Lord will be its light.

God's plan does not end with judgement but with a new creation, free of every trace of sin: no death, no sorrow, no pain, no tears, no separation from God. Its capital is the New Jerusalem, a real city, where Christ and His saints of every age will live.

This inheritance belongs to those who overcome. So believers hold fast, sinners are invited to repent and come, and backsliders are called home, while there is time.

Hell fire is a place of everlasting punishment where sinners, all whose names are not in the book of life, will suffer torment for ever and ever. It was prepared for the devil and his angels, but God has decreed that the wicked, and those who forget Him and reject Christ, will be cast there too because of their sin and their neglect of His salvation.

Jesus spoke of hell more than anyone, and plainly, as a place where the fire is not quenched. The punishment of the lost is eternal; neither purgatory nor the annihilation of the wicked is taught in Scripture.

Hell is not a subject anyone enjoys, but it is real, and it shows how serious sin is. God is holy, and sin must be punished, either in the sinner or in the sinner's substitute, Jesus Christ. He is not willing that any should perish, and He calls all to repent.