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Statement of Faith

We believe in:

1) The Holy Scriptures consisting of the 66 books of the Old and New Testaments, which are breathed out by God such that they are his very word; in their inerrancy in all that they affirm; in their authority and sufficiency; and in the necessity of the teaching of the Holy Spirit for a true understanding of their meaning in whole and in part.

2) One true and living God, who exists eternally in the three co-equal divine persons of Father, Son and Holy Spirit, all of whom are of one and the same divine substance, and who is sovereign in creation, providence, redemption and revelation.

3) The creation of the heavens and the earth and all that is in them by God alone, including human beings whom he created as one single race, as men and women, and each person in God’s own image from the moment of their conception, and who are therefore possessed of a dignity which makes each one worthy of honour and respect as God’s image-bearer regardless of every human distinction, including those of ethnicity, class, wealth or gender.

 

4) The fall of all men and women through the sin of Adam, the representative and head of the whole human race, bringing about the brokenness of the world they inhabit as well as their own guilt, their state of spiritual death and the depravity of their nature, from all of which they are totally unable and unwilling to save themselves.

 

5) The incarnation of the eternal Son of God, the second person of the Trinity, who became true man through his virgin birth by the Holy Spirit, and lived a life of absolute moral perfection as the second Adam and, as such, the representative and head of a new people of God created in him.

 6) The totally sufficient, substitutionary, atoning death of the Lord Jesus Christ for sinners, by which he bore the guilt and shame of his people and overcame all the powers of darkness; in his bodily resurrection from the dead by which he overcame death; and in His ascension into heaven, where he is now seated at God’s right hand and there reigns over all things for the church and exercises his priestly ministry of intercession on its behalf.

 

7) The justification of sinners, meaning the forgiveness of their sins and the imputation to them of Christ’s righteousness, received solely by faith in the uniquely atoning merits of Christ’s sacrifice.

 

8) The necessity of the work of the Holy Spirit in applying the merits of the work of Christ to his people, convicting them of sin, regenerating them, bringing them to faith and repentance, baptising them into the body of Christ, sanctifying them, and enabling them to live lives of worship and obedience and to persevere to the end.

9) The church, which is the redeemed people of God consisting of all those in every time and every place for whom Christ died and who are baptised into his body by the Holy Spirit; and which is visible in local congregations, recognisable as true churches by their faithful proclamation of the gospel and administration of the sacraments, whose members are committed to one another in relationships of mutual service, love, repentance and forgiveness, and which are charged with making disciples of all nations until Christ comes again.

 

10) The baptism of believers by immersion as the outward confession of their faith commanded by the Lord Jesus Christ of all who believe, symbolising their inclusion in Christ, their death with him to sin and resurrection with him to new life, and their incorporation in his body, the church; and in the Lord’s Supper as the outward sign of the new covenant in Christ, a remembrance of and fellowship in his death, a joyous looking forward to his glorious return, and a symbolic expression of the fellowship and unity of the members of his body in him.

11) The personal, visible and physical return of the Lord Jesus Christ in glory, when he will bring into being a new heaven and a new earth, the dead in him will rise, and he will judge all human beings, bringing eternal blessedness to the righteous in the presence and enjoyment of God and eternal punishment to the unrepentant.