STATEMENT OF OUR FAITH

As an Evangelical Movement

We believe the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments to be God-breathed, inerrant in the original writings, and the supreme and final authority in faith and life.

We believe in one God who eternally exists in three Persons: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

We believe that Jesus Christ was begotten by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary, and that He is true God and true man.

We believe that man was created in the image of God; that he sinned and thereby incurred not only physical death but also spiritual death, which is separation from God; and that all human beings are born with a sinful nature.

We believe that the Lord Jesus Christ died for our sins, according to the Scriptures, as a representative and substitutionary sacrifice and that all who believe in Him are justified by His shed blood.

We believe in the resurrection of the crucified body of our Lord, His ascension into heaven, and His present life there for us as High Priest and Advocate.

We believe in the “blessed hope” — the personal and victorious return of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

We believe that all who are born again of the Holy Spirit, and repent and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ, become children of God.

We believe in the bodily resurrection of the just and the unjust, the everlasting blessedness of the saved and the everlasting punishment of the lost.

As a Reformed Church

We believe the Bible is the perfectly true Word of God and the only authority for all of life.

We believe that salvation is only by the gracious choosing of the Father, the gracious sacrificing of the Son and the gracious regenerating of the Holy Spirit.

We believe that a person receives salvation only through a faith given by God, irrespective of any past or future quality of that person.

We believe that the sacrament of baptism is for believers and also for their infant children, administered by pouring or sprinkling.

We believe that the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper is for believers who are publicly repentant, professing and committed to Christ and His Church.

As a Presbyterian Church

We believe in the form of church government using elders: men qualified by God’s Word, acceptable to the congregation and accountable to Christ, the Head of the Church.

We use the Westminster Confession of Faith and the Westminster Larger and Shorter Catechisms as appropriate summaries of the major teachings of the Bible.

Presbyterian Church in America

As one communion in the worldwide church, the Presbyterian Church in America exists to glorify God by extending the kingdom of Jesus Christ over all individual lives through all areas of society and in all nations and cultures. To accomplish this end the PCA aims to fill the world with churches that are continually growing in vital worship, in theological depth, in true fellowship, in assertive evangelism and in deeds of compassion.

The distinctiveness of the PCA lies in our stress on both reformation and revival. Without an emphasis on revival, “reformation” may become either a mimicking of political ideologies. Without an emphasis on reformation, “revival” may become a shallow pietism or mysticism. Only reformation and revival together can accomplish the Great Commission of our Lord.

We are committed to the Scriptures and the historic Westminster Standards based firmly on a biblical theology that answers the questions and issues of each culture and people to which we minister.

We are committed to worship that practices the presence and power of God within the church to the transformation of the surrounding culture through biblical application in population centers around the world.

We are committed to the winning of new converts and their incorporation into the church through the ministry of the Word and to significant ministry to the needy through deeds of mercy and service.

We are committed to the freedom of every member to minister through spiritual gifts and also to the responsibility to do so under spiritual authority and loving discipline.

We are committed to dynamic, prophetic confrontation on non-Christian thought forms and behavior and also to the demonstration of the truth through the practice of holiness and love in Christian fellowship.

We are committed to guarding and strengthening the biblical family and also to a ministry to the broken family forms such as the divorced, the widowed and the unwed parent.

We are committed to teaching and discipling men and women in the whole counsel of God and also to ministering to the needs of the whole person. True to the Scriptures, the reformed faith, and obedient to the Great Commission of Jesus Christ.