Email Sign Up
Home Page
  • Home
  • Our Pastors
  • Our Services
  • Our Church
  • Ministries
  • Conferences
  • Contact Us
Renew Life Worship Center
  • Home
  • Our Pastors
  • Our Services
  • Our Church
  • Ministries
  • Conferences
  • Contact Us

Our Beliefs

 

 

I. The Bible

The Scriptures, both Old and New Testaments, are the inspired Word of God without error in the original writings, and are the complete revelation of His will for the salvation of men, and the divine and final authority for all Christian faith and life.


II. God
There is one and only one living and true God. He is an intelligent, spiritual, and personal Being, the Creator, Redeemer, Preserver, and Ruler of the universe. God is infinite in holiness and all other perfections. To Him we owe the highest love, reverence, and obedience. The eternal God reveals Himself to us as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, with distinct personal attributes, but without division of nature, essence, or being. (Matthew 3:16-17; Acts 5:3-4; Genesis 1:1-2)


A. God the Father
God as Father reigns with providential care over His universe, His creatures, and the flow of the stream of human history according to the purposes of His grace. He is , all loving, and all wise. God is Father in truth to those who become children of God through faith in Jesus Christ. He is fatherly in His attitude toward all men. (Psalm 102:25; Genesis 2:7)

B. God the Son
Christ is the eternal Son of God. In His incarnation as Jesus Christ He was conceived of the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary. Jesus perfectly revealed and did the will of God, taking upon Himself the demands and necessities of human nature and identifying Himself completely with mankind yet without sin. He honored the divine law by His personal obedience, and in His death on the cross He made provision for the redemption of men from sin. He was raised from the dead with a glorified body and appeared to His disciples as the person who was with them before His crucifixion. He ascended into heaven and is now exalted at the right hand of God where He is the One Mediator, partaking of the nature of God and of man, and in whose Person is effected the reconciliation between God and man. He will return in power and glory to judge the world and to consummate His redemptive mission. He now dwells in all believers as the living and ever present Lord. (Colossians 1:15-16; 2 Corinthians 12:9; Matthew 1:18-2:11; Genesis 1:26)

C. God the Holy Spirit
The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of God. He inspired holy men of old to write the Scriptures. Through illumination He enables men to understand truth. He exalts Christ. He convicts of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment. He calls men to the Savior, and effects regeneration. He cultivates Christian character, comforts believers, and bestows the spiritual gifts by which they serve God through His church. He seals the believer unto the day of final redemption. His presence in the Christian is the assurance of God to bring the believer into the fullness of the stature of Christ. He enlightens and empowers the believer and the church in worship, evangelism, and service. (Matthew 3:16-17; John 16:8; John 3:5-6; Ephesians 5:18; John 16:12-14)

III. Man
Man was created by the special act of God, in His own image, and is the crowning work of His creation. In the beginning man was innocent of sin and was endowed by his Creator with freedom of choice. By his free choice man sinned against God and brought sin into the human race. Through the temptation of Satan man transgressed the command of God, and fell from his original innocence; whereby his posterity inherit a nature and an environment inclined toward sin, and as soon as they are capable of moral action become transgressors and are under condemnation. Only the grace of God can bring man into His holy fellowship and enable man to fulfill the creative purpose of God. 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 man possesses dignity and is worthy of respect and Christian love. (Gen 2:7; 9:6; 1 Cor 11:7; Rom 8:29 James 3:9)

IV. Salvation
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, sanctification, and glorification. (Psa 111:9; 130:7; Matt 20:28; Mark 10:45; Luke 2:38; Acts 20:28; Rom 3:24-26; 1 Cor 1:30; Gal 1:4; Eph 1:7; Col 1:14, 20-22; 1 Tim 2:6; Titus 2:14; Heb 9:12, 15; 1 Peter 1:18, 19; Rev 5:9, 10)

A. The New Birth
The new birth, is a work of God's grace whereby believers become new creatures in Christ Jesus. It is a change of heart wrought by the Holy Spirit through conviction of sin, to which the sinner responds in repentance toward God and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. (John 3:3,5; Phil 1:6; Col 2:11-13; Tit 3:5-6; 1 Pet 1:23)
Repentance and faith are inseparable experiences of grace. Repentance is a genuine turning from sin toward God. Faith is the acceptance of Jesus Christ and commitment of the entire personality to Him as Lord and Savior. Justification is God's gracious and full acquittal upon principles of His righteousness of all sinners who repent and believe in Christ. Justification brings the believer into a relationship of peace and favor with God. (Mark 1:15; Gal 2:20; Eph 3:16, 17; Phil 3:8, 9)

B. Sanctification
Sanctification is the experience, beginning in regeneration, by which the believer is set apart to God's purposes, and is enabled to progress toward moral and spiritual perfection through the presence and power of the Holy Spirit dwelling in him. Growth in grace should continue throughout the regenerate person's life. (1 Cor 1:30; John 15:4, 5; Eph 4:15; 2 Cor 5:17)

C. Glorification
Glorification is the culmination of salvation and is the final blessed and abiding state of the redeemed. (1 Cor 15:22; 1 Thess 4:16, 17)

V. God's Purpose of Grace
Election is the gracious purpose of God, according to which He regenerates, sanctifies, and glorifies sinners. It is consistent with the free agency of man, and comprehends all the means in connection with the end. It is a glorious display of God's sovereign goodness, and is infinitely wise, holy, and unchangeable. It excludes boasting and promotes humility.
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. Believers may fall into sin through neglect and temptation, whereby they grieve the Spirit, impair their graces and comforts, bring reproach on the cause of Christ, and temporal judgments on themselves, yet they shall be kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation. (2 Pet 1:5-11)

VI. The Church
A New Testament churches of the Lord Jesus Christ is a local body of baptized believers who are associated by covenant in the faith and fellowship of the gospel, observing the two ordinances of Christ, committed to His teachings, exercising the gifts, rights, and privileges invested in them by His word, and seeking to extend the gospel to the ends of the earth.
This church is an autonomous body, operating through a democratic process under the Lordship of Jesus Christ. In such a congregation members are equally responsible. Its Scriptural officers are pastors and deacons.The New Testament speaks also of the church as the body of Christ, which includes all of the redeemed of all the ages. (Matt 18:17; 1 Cor 5:1-5; 2 Cor 2:4-5; Acts 10:47; Phil 1:1; 1 Tim 3:1-11)

VII. Baptism and the Lord's Supper
Christian baptism is the immersion of a believer in water in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. 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. It is a testimony to his faith in the final resurrection of the dead. Being a church ordinance, it is prerequisite to the privileges of church membership and to the Lord's Supper. (Luke 11:38; Matt 28:19; Acts 19:5; Rom 6:3-4; 1 Cor 1:13-17; 12:13; Gal 3:27; Col 2:12) The Lord's Supper is a symbolic act of obedience whereby members of the church, through partaking of the bread and the fruit of the vine, memorialize the death of the Redeemer and anticipate His second coming. (Acts 2:42; Gal 2:9; 1 Cor 1:19; 1 Cor 10:16; Phil 2:1; 3:10)

X. The Rapture
According to His promise Jesus Christ will return personally and visibly in glory to the earth. (John 14:1-3)
The dead in Christ will rise first, and then we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. After the judgments of God upon this sinful world in the Great Tribulation, Jesus our Lord will come with His saints to establish His millennial kingdom. (1 Ths 4:16; Rev 20:4-6))
Christ will judge all men in righteousness. The redeemed of Christ in their resurrected and glorified bodies will receive their rewards and will dwell in heaven forever with their Savior. The unsaved will be separated from the kingdom of God and will be consigned forever to a place of everlasting perdition. (Rev 20:11-15)

XI. Evangelism and Missions
It is the duty and privilege of every follower of Christ and of every church of the Lord Jesus Christ to endeavor to make disciples of all nations. The new birth of man's spirit by God's Holy Spirit means the birth of love for others. Missionary efforts on the part of all rests thus upon a spiritual necessity of the regenerate life, and is expressly and repeatedly commanded in the teachings of Christ. It is the duty of every child of God to seek constantly to win the lost to Christ by personal effort and by all other methods in harmony with the gospel of Christ. (Matt 28:18-20; Acts 1:8)

  • In the Resurrection of Christ - Matthew 20:17-19
  • In the baptism of the Holy Spirit with the evidence of speaking in tongues-
  • In living a holy life - Romans 12:1-2
  • That we have been saved by Grace - Ephesians 2:8
  • In Tithing - Malachi 3:10
  • Redemption through the blood of Christ - Eph 1:7, Revelation 1:7