Basics (Statment of Faith)

While I was at Ravencrest one of the of the assignments that we were given was to write up a Personal Statement of Faith. I found this to be a very engaging exercise that has been exceedingly beneficial to me as time goes on and I get further from my time at Ravencrest. Every once in a while I will pull my Statement of Faith out and look over it, maybe update, check the verses, etc. In an age where there are many people say many different things it is good to have thought about what your non-negotiables are in your faith and know why you believe them. Statements of Faith are something that are very important with churches and pastors but people tend to down play them, if they know what they are at all. It is because of that I thought that I would put my Statement of Faith up starting with the Wikipedia definition:

A statement of faith is a statement of the core beliefs of a religious group. A typical statement of faith is said to be a non-comprehensive summary of the core beliefs of a particular church or churches within a tradition (or traditions).

My Statement of Faith

My Personal Mission: To learn about God and grow into a deeper relationship with God while enabling others to do the same.

My Vision: 1^st to be in a community that wants to grow in Christ and let Him work through them. 2^nd to show the world and believers who Christ is by my actions as much as in my words. 3^rd to teach and empower people to learn who God is.

My Doctrinal Statements of Faith:

Trinity: I believe in one God who created everything. He is omnipotent (all-powerful), omnipresent (present throughout all time and space) and omniscient (all-knowing). I believe that the one God is made up of three distinct persons and and personalities (Deuteronomy 6:4, 2 Corinthians 13:14).

• God the Father: I believe that the Father is infinite, perfect in holiness, active, powerful, and loving. He sovereignly concerns himself in the affairs of humankind. He is the one who answers prayers and saves from their sins all those who come through His Son (Ephesians 1:11, Revelation 4).

• God the Son: I believe that Jesus is God's only Son and is both fully God and fully man, conceived of the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary. I believe that it is by Jesus that God put into place His redemption plan to redeem man from his sinful nature by Jesus dieing on a cross, resurrecting on the third day, and ascending into heaven ten days later (John 1:1-18, Philippians 2:5-11).

• God the Holy Spirit: I believe that the Holy Spirit convicts man of sin and points them to Jesus Christ. Once a person believes in Christ the Holy Spirit comes into their lives and empowers them to do the will of the Father through the giving of gifts and wisdom. He is active in the works of regeneration, sanctification, and preservation (Acts 5:3-4, Romans 8:1-17).

Man: I believe that man was created in the image of God, perfect in every way but man sinned against God. That action corrupted the vary nature of man towards sin, separating man from God but all of that can be over come by the work of the Holy Spirit through the redemption of Christ (Genesis 1:26-31, Colossians 3:10).

Scripture: I believe that the Scriptures (Bible) is the inspired word of God. It is infallible and the supreme and final authority in all matters to which it speaks. I believe that it is also the primary means that God uses to speak to believers today (2 Timothy 3:16, 2 Peter 1:20-21).

Salvation: I believe that salvation comes through the Grace of God and is not based on anything that man does or has done and comes through the redemption of Christ's blood for anyone who accepts and believes in Him (John 3:16, Ephesians 2:8-9).

The Church: I believe that the Church is God's primary means to show Himself to the world with Jesus Christ as the head and all the members as the body (Matthew 28:18-20, Ephesians 4:15-16).

Eternity: I believe that there is a Heaven and a Hell and that if you do not trust and believe in God that you will be condemned, at the second coming of Christ, to Hell for eternity, but if you trust in Christ you will live forever in the presence of God (Luke 16:19-31, John 5:24-29).

If you have any thoughts on this feel free to leave a comment.