First of all, we believe that God IS.  It takes mental calisthenics and a seared conscience to argue Him away.  We may not be able to explain some of the mysteries about Him, but if we could, we would be His cognitive equal.  There is therefore no shame in accepting our limitations in understanding Him fully, nor justification for rejecting what can be seen plainly in Creation, understood in the conscience, and revealed in Scripture.  God IS.

God is transcendent. This is the doctrine of God’s “otherness” related to His creation--His “beyondness.”  He is distinct from His creation and independent of it.  He eclipses our boundaries of time, distance, knowledge, righteousness, love and power to such a degree that our chances of knowing Him would be nil if it were not for divine revelation and supernatural empowerment to understand it.  Miraculously, we have been given “all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue” (2 Peter 1:3).  We may boast in the knowledge of God (Jeremiah 9:24); yet there are limits.  God is beyond us; consequently there are concepts yet unrevealed, indeed unrevealable to us as we are.

God is one and Triune.  We believe in only one God, existing eternally and co-equally as Father, Son and Holy Spirit.  One Being that is God; three persons existing as that Being. Not 1+1+1=3, but 1x1x1=1. “Holy, Holy, Holy.”  We do not believe in three gods when we talk about “God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.” Because the doctrine of the Trinity is stunning and complex, many Christians live forever with confusion about it.  While we believe that Trinity must be accepted by faith as revealed in Scripture, we also think it is wrong for us to assume it is somehow logically flawed or impossible to appreciate.  The doctrine is beautiful.  Some Christians fall prey to cults who deny the Trinity based on incomprehensibility (however, the same cults believe the biblical but incomprehensible idea of eternity-past: if eternity-past has no starting point, then the present is necessarily still in the future, and we could therefore not be here yet!).  We believe that as difficult as the Trinity may be to comprehend through human logic, at the same time it solves logical problems that would be unsolved if the doctrine were absent.  For example, God is both unchangeable and love. So if He is eternally love, whom did He love before He created?  If he is eternally a communicator, to whom did He communicate? The relationships of the Trinity solve these questions. Or, if Jesus is finite, how can his death have infinite value?  A sinner can’t die vicariously for another sinner since he has his own sins to die for.  A sinless man could die vicariously for a sinful man, but just one for one. Therefore, no one should avoid this blessed doctrine; on the contrary, diving into it only confirms its truth and increases one’s pleasure in the majesty and transcendence of God.

God is involved.  A transcendent God should be untouchable, unknowable, unreachable.  So teach the many religions of the world.  However, we learn that God is involved personally with us.  He is blazing and holy but longs to draw near to us.  He is the mightiest warrior but the essence of true love.  He is spirit but became a man (in the person of Jesus Christ).  He despises sin but delights in forgiving sinners. He is the future judge but offers Himself now as Savior.  He pursues a relationship with us.  He even grieves when we rebel!

Man is a rebel.  We believe man is, by nature, at war with God, because we embrace and enjoy things God hates. We know what is right—but don’t do it.  We know what is wrong—and choose it anyway.  We covet.  And deceive.  We cheat and lust.  We live for pleasure and go in debt to get it.  We desire to control our own destiny.  We pat ourselves on the back for our achievements, overlook our failures, and convince ourselves that we are OK with God, never realizing that this lifestyle is evil and multiplying the debt of our sin.  When confronted with the Bible or preaching, we tend to justify ourselves and say, “I’m not as bad as so-and-so.”  In so-doing, we are actually fighting the very God we say we believe in.  Do not be deceived into thinking God is on your side when you are a rebel at war against Him.

Man is guilty personally.  We do not believe that our sin problem is Adam’s fault. Too many people have a chip on their shoulder about Adam and Eve’s mistake. The Bible makes it plain that we are guilty for our own sins.  Many religions deny a sin nature and say man is basically good as evidenced by “the sinlessness of children” (we don’t accept this because we have small children, not to mention Romans 5:12).  Even democracy is allegedly based on man’s inherent goodness.  But it is the best form of government only because of man’s inherent badness (power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely, so democracy is preferred).

God is a warrior with a secret weapon.  We believe that sin reveals an epic, cosmic battle between God and Satan, in which we are a part. Among other weapons, God is wielding what He calls a “sword”—the Bible.  In it, we learn God’s laws—command after command that take aim at our hearts.  For example, we learn that it is not evil just to murder or sleep around, but also to hate and gossip and fib and be proud.  God’s law tends to wound our consciences and make us feel guilty.  This is a good thing, because we are guilty!  Furthermore, we are condemned to suffering forever in Hell apart from God (we deserve this, and if we feel such a punishment is too harsh, it’s only because we don’t understand how holy God is and how evil sin is).  But then, as we feel the tip of the sword of God’s law poking onto our necks, God makes a tactical shift and fights on with a strange secret weapon: love—a wooing, healing kind you’ve never heard about until you read the Gospel of John in the Bible.  God became a man (the virgin-born Jesus Christ) and actually placed our putrid sins on His own back and died in our place!  He poured out all His blood for me and you!  Now He is inviting all men everywhere to a settlement of peace—a ceasefire!  The Bible says, “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the LORD, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.”  Believe in Jesus Christ as your only Savior and Lord and ask Him to forgive your sins.  Will He?  Here’s His answer:  “If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. For the scripture saith, Whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed. For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved” (Romans 10:9-11, 13). 

Men should surrender, believe and be baptized.  We believe it is irrational to fight with God.  Sinners must lay down their arms, surrender to His absolute authority, turn from their sins, abandon their attempts to win their own eternal life, believe on Jesus and “call upon the name of the Lord”!  Then they should be baptized in water--something we do not believe is required for justification but which is so important in Scripture that some people are led to believe that it is required for justification.  We tend to doubt the authenticity of the salvation of those who refuse baptism, based on Matthew 10:32-33 and Romans 10:11.  But we also are aware of the rare cases of secret disciples like Joseph of Arimathaea in John 19:38, who feared for his life and yet emerged courageous in the end when the other disciples were hiding.

God transforms.  We believe that once we are born again, the Holy Spirit indwells in us and leads us daily.  In our salvation, God has accepted us just as we are but simultaneously calls and empowers us to change and become like Jesus, all for His glory and our happiness.  Through His Word, He explains our new identity in Christ and reminds us that our all-consuming desire in life should be to please the Lord by faith, obeying Him from the heart.

Jesus says “Go.”  God has entrusted the message of the Gospel to the local church and has equipped it with all the gifts and resources it needs to fulfill the Great Commission.  The church is the hope of the world and it should preach the Gospel where there is no light, until Jesus returns!

What We Believe (some of it, anyway)