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There is one God: infinite, eternal, almighty, and perfect in holiness, truth, and love.  In the unity of the Godhead there are three Persons.  God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, co-existent, co-equal, co-sternal.  The Father is not the Son, and the Son is not the Holy Spirit, yet each is truly Deity.  One God–Father, Son, and Holy Spirit–are the foundation of Christian faith and life.

God the father is the Creator of Heaven and Earth.  By His word and for His glory, He freely and supernaturally created the world. It was spoken into being.  Through the same Word He daily sustains all His creatures.  He rules over all and is the only Sovereign.  His plans and purposes cannot be thwarted.  He is faithful to every promise, works all things together for good to those who love Him, and gave His Son Jesus Christ for mankind’s redemption by His unfathomable grace. He made man for fellowship with Himself and intended that all creation should live to praise His glory.

Jesus the Christ, the only begotten Son of God. The eternal Word made flesh, supernaturally conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary.  He was perfect in nature; fully God and fully man.  He was always with God and is God. Through Him all things came into being and were created (He is the Word).  He was before all things and in Him all things hold together by the word of His power.  He is the image of the Invisible God, and in Him dwells the fullness of the Godhead bodily.  He is the only Savior for the sins of the world, having shed His blood and died a vicarious death on Calvary’s cross.  By His death in our place, He revealed the divine love and upheld divine justice, removing our guilt and reconciling us to God.  Having redeemed us from sin, on the third day He rose bodily from the grave, victorious over death and the powers of darkness, and for a period of forty days appeared to over five hundred witnesses, performing many proofs of His resurrection. He ascended into Heaven where, at God’s right hand, He intercedes for His people and rules as Lord over all.  He is the Head of His body (the church) and should be adored, loved, served, and obeyed by all.

The Holy Spirit, the Lord and Giver of Life, convicts the world of sin. He brings righteousness and judgment. Through the proclamation of the gospel, He persuades men to repent of their sins and confess Jesus as Lord.  By the same Spirit, a person is led to trust in divine mercy.  The Holy Spirit unites believers to Jesus Christ in faith, brings about the new birth, and dwells within the regenerated person. The Holy Spirit has to glorify the Son, who in turn came to glorify the Father. He will lead the church into right understanding and rich application of the truth of God’s Word. He is to be respected, honored, and worshipped as God, the Third Person of the Trinity.

God made man –male and female– in His own image, as the crown of creation, that mankind might have fellowship with Him. Tempted by Satan, man rebelled against God, being estranged from his Maker, yet responsible to Him. Man became subject to divine wrath, inwardly depraved, and, apart from a special work of grace, utterly incapable of returning to God on his own. This depravity is radically pervasive and extends to his mind, will and emotions. Unregenerated man lives under the dominion of sin and Satan.  He is at enmity with God, hostile toward God, and hateful of God.  Fallen, sinful people, whatever their character or attainments, are lost and without hope apart from salvation through Christ Jesus.

Jesus Christ is the Gospel. The good news is revealed in His birth, life, death, resurrection, and ascension.  Christ’s virgin birth and crucifixion are the heart of the gospel, His resurrection is the power of the gospel, and His ascension is the glory of the gospel.  Christ’s death is a substitutionary and propitiatory sacrifice to God for our sins. It satisfies the demand of God’s holy justice and appeases His holy wrath. It also demonstrates His mysterious love and reveals His amazing grace. Jesus Christ is the only Mediator between God and man. There is no other name by which men must be saved. At the heart of all sound doctrine is the cross of Jesus Christ and the infinite privilege that redeemed sinners have of glorifying God because of what He has accomplished.

Man’s response to the gospel is rooted and grounded in the free gift from God for His own pleasure and glory. It is also true that the message of the gospel is only effectual to those who genuinely repent of their sins and, by God’s grace, put saving faith in Christ and are born again of the Spirit.  This gospel of grace is to be sincerely preached to all men in all nations.  Biblical repentance is characterized by a changed life, and saving faith is evidenced by kingdom service or works.  While neither repentance nor works save, unless a person is willing to deny himself, pick up his cross, and follow Christ, he cannot become His disciple.

Salvation, the free gift of God, is provided by grace through faith, because of the finish work of Christ, for the glory of God. Anyone turning from sin in repentance and looking to Christ and His substitutionary death receives eternal life and is declared righteous by God as a free gift.  The righteousness of Christ is imputed to them. They are justified and fully accepted by God. Through Christ’s atonement for sin, an individual is reconciled to God as Father and becomes His child. The believer is forgiven the debt of his sin and, via the miracle of regeneration, liberated from the law of sin and death into the freedom of God’s Spirit.

The Holy Spirit is the active Agent in our sanctification and seeks to produce His fruit in us as our minds are renewed and we conform to the image of Christ. Though indwelling sin remains a reality, as we are led by the Spirit, we grow in the knowledge of the Lord, freely keeping His commandments and endeavoring to so live in the world that all people may see our good works as He works in our lives and glorify our Father who is in Heaven. All believers are exhorted to persevere in the faith, knowing they will have to give an account to God for their every thought, word and deed. Spiritual disciplines include reading the Bible and meditating on the Word of God, praise, worship, prayer and repentance, intercession and communion. These disciplines are all vital for a closer walk with the Lord. The believer’s ultimate confidence is in God and in His promises over their lives.

The Holy Spirit also empowers believers for Christian witness and service. While all genuine believers are indwelt by the Holy Spirit at conversion, the New Testament indicates the importance of an ongoing, empowered work of the Holy Spirit subsequent to conversion as well. Being indwelt by the Spirit and being filled with the Spirit are theologically distinct experiences. The Holy Spirit desires to fill each believer continually with increased power for Christian life and witness. He imparts His supernatural gifts for the edification of the body of Christ (the church) and for works and ministry all around the world. All nine gifts of the Spirit that were in operation in the early first-century church (refer to the Book of Acts) are available today! The nine gifts of the Spirit are vital for the mission of the church to bring freedom from addictions, deliverances from bondages, and healing to the sick and broken-hearted. The Holy Spirit brings a healing and purifying power that gives people an encounter with God that ultimately brings them into a relationship with God in a very intimate way. This ultimately brings forth a great harvest to the Kingdom of God.

God, by His Word and Spirit, creates the church, calling sinful men out of the whole human race into the fellowship of Christ’s body.  By the same Word and Spirit, He guides and preserves that new redeemed humanity.  The church is not a religious institution or denomination. Rather, the church universal is made up of individuals who have personally appropriated the gospel and been born again of the Spirit. The church exists to worship and glorify God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  It also exists to serve Him by faithfully doing His will in the earth. This involves a commitment to see the gospel preached and churches planted in all the world for a testimony. The ultimate mission of the church is the making of disciples through the preaching of the gospel.  When God transforms human nature, this then becomes the chief means of society’s transformation. Upon conversion, newly redeemed men and women are added to a local church in which they devote themselves to learning more, teaching what they have learned, and praying and interceding for others.  All members of the church universal are to be a vital and committed part of a local church.  In this context, they are called to walk out the New Covenant as the people of God and demonstrate the reality of the Kingdom of God.  The Lord Jesus, the ascended Christ, has given gift ministries to the church including Apostles, Prophets, Evangelists, Pastors, and Teachers for the equipping of Christ’s body, that it might mature and grow. Through the gift ministries, all members of the church are to be nurtured and equipped for the work of ministry. In the local church, God’s people receive pastoral care and leadership and the opportunity to employ their God-given gifts in His service in relation to one another and to the world.

Water baptism is only intended for the individual who has received the saving benefits of Christ’s atoning work and become His disciple.  Therefore, in obedience to Christ’s command and as a testimony to God, the believer should be immersed in water in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  Water baptism is a visual demonstration of a person’s union with Christ in the likeness of His death and resurrection.  It signifies that his former way of life has been put to death and vividly depicts a person’s release from sin. The Word of God tells us in Galatians that we are crucified with Christ; nevertheless, we live – not us but Christ lives in us, and the life which we now live in the flesh we live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved us, and gave Himself for us. Water baptism signifies that the individual has died to the flesh and comes up out of the water a new creature created in Christ Jesus. All things have passed away, and all things are made new.

The baptism of the Holy Ghost and of fire is the empowerment to do the works that Jesus did.  The Book of Acts is the great example of how the Holy Ghost will suddenly come in and change the atmosphere of the room. The more time you spend in His presence, the more in tune you are to Him, His leading and operation. Acts speaks of the Holy Ghost suddenly coming in with a sound from Heaven and a mighty rushing wind. He filled the house where they were sitting. There appeared cloven tongues as of fire upon each of them, and they were filled with the Holy Ghost and began to speak with other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance. There are nine gifts of the Spirit, and there are differences of administrations, but the same Lord. There are diversities of operations, but it is the same God that works it all in all of us. But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal. It goes on in 1 Cor. 12:8-14 to note these gifts:

“For to one is given by the Spirit the word of wisdom; to another the word of knowledge by the same Spirit; to another faith by the same Spirit; to another the gifts of healing by the same Spirit; to another the working of miracles; to another prophecy; to another discerning of spirits; to another divers kinds of tongues; to another the interpretation of tongues: But all these worketh that one and the selfsame Spirit, dividing to every man severally as He will.”

As with water baptism and the baptism of the Holy Ghost, the Lord’s supper is to be observed by those who have become genuine followers of Christ. This ordinance symbolizes the breaking of Christ body and the shedding of His blood on our behalf, and it is to be observed repeatedly throughout the Christian life as a sign of continued participation in the atoning benefits of Christ’s death. As we partake of the Lord’s Supper with an attitude of faith and self-examination, we remember and proclaim the death of Christ, receive spiritual nourishment for our souls, and signify our unity with other members of the body.

The consummation of all things includes the visible, personal, and glorious return of Jesus Christ, the resurrection of the dead and the translation of those alive in Christ, the judgment of the just and the unjust, and the fulfillment of Christ’s Kingdom in the new heavens and the new earth.  In the consummation, Satan with all his hosts and all those outside Christ are finally separated from the presence of God, enduring eternal punishment. The righteous, in glorious bodies, shall live and reign with Him forever. Married to Christ as His bride, the church will be in the presence of God forever, serving Him and giving Him unending praise and glory. Then shall the eager expectation of creation be fulfilled and the whole earth shall proclaim the glory of God who makes all things new.