By design, God chose the church encompasses
… builders and baby boomers, gen-xers and millennials, conservatives and progressives, educators and athletes, struggling doubters and committed believers, engineers and artists, introverts and extroverts, healers and addicts, CEO’s and homemakers, affluent and bankrupt, single and married, happy and hurting, lonely and connected, stressed-out and carefree, private and public schoolers, PhD’s and people with special needs, experts and students, saints and sinners.
As a church,
- we are a family united in Christ that aspires to be led by Scripture.
- Together, we will look to the Father’s perfect Word as given in the Old and New Testaments—and as interpreted by the historic ecumenical creeds and Protestant Baptist confessions—to form our spiritual life.
- We will look to Jesus, the Son of God and Savior of sinners, to forgive our sins, refresh our spirits, ignite our worship, and transform our character.
- We will prayerfully depend on the Holy Spirit, whose power raised Jesus from the dead, to also empower us to live resurrected lives, loving God with our whole selves and our neighbor as ourselves.
Because Christ’s church is called to be a family,
- we will aspire to share life with one another.
- In our beliefs and teaching, we will unite around Scripture’s essential truths, while promoting liberty around things about which Scripture is flexible or silent.
- In our worship, we will honor God, gather weekly around the Lord’s Table, and create belonging for one another and our guests.
- In our life together, we will honor one another above ourselves as we pursue the Father’s vision for welcoming, listening to, loving, confessing, forgiving, serving, comforting, sharing burdens with, caring and praying for, remaining loyal to, and spurring on the best in one another.
- We will celebrate our diversity—opening our lives and hearts and homes to sinners and saints, doubters and believers, seekers and skeptics, prodigals and Pharisees, young and old, married and unmarried, leaders and followers, famous and infamous, our own races and other races, happy and depressed, helpers and those who need help, creative and corporate, conservative and liberal, American and international, affluent and bankrupt, public and private and home schooled—and all others who enter our doors.
- We will aspire to expand our ‘us’ by carefully listening to, learning from, and being shaped by one another’s unique experiences and perspectives.
As a church rooted in Jesus Christ—who taught that it is more blessed to give than it is to receive and that greatness is found in serving—
- we will aspire to give ourselves away. Indeed, our ‘conservative’ belief that every word of Scripture is right and good and true, will compel us toward ‘liberal’ lives of generosity and love.
- We will aim to live not only for ourselves but as partakers in a movement of God’s Kingdom. God, because he loves us, sweeps us up and includes us—along with all of his children everywhere—in his mission of loving people, places, and things to life. As his beloved ambassadors, he sends us out to ‘so love the world,’ in hopes of leaving the world better than we found it.
- We hope to be part of something that adds such value to our city that if Christians disappeared, the whole city would weep.
Because Jesus called us to let our light shine before men that they may see our good deeds and glorify our Father in heaven, our faith will be a public faith.
- We will aspire to love and serve all our neighbors in the places where we live, work, and play.
- We will host and encourage civil conversations that unite believers, seekers, and nonbelievers around shared interests, in hopes that the truth, beauty, love, and justice of God will be brought to bear on the most central and pressing issues of our time.
- We will host life-giving parties for our city and our neighbors as a sign of God’s Kingdom, and of how heaven rejoices when prodigals come home and cynics lay down their defenses and join the celebration.
Although Jesus reserves membership in His church and participation in His Table for those who trust Him and seek to obey Scripture,
- we will join Jesus in befriending those who do not believe as we do.
- We will welcome all people into our worship services, parties, conversations, homes, and lives, including those who have misgivings or doubts about the beliefs, ethics, generosity, self-denial, and countercultural nature of historic Christianity.
As Christ’s ambassadors to our neighbors in need,
- we will aspire to live lives of mercy and justice.
- We will give special attention to, and generously channel our resources toward improving conditions and systems—whether spiritual, social, economic or vocational—for the poor, immigrants and refugees, ethnic and other minorities, and others who lack resources, opportunity, or privilege.
- We will embrace the idea that as conditions improve for those who have power, conditions must also improve for those who lack power, and never at their expense. For wealth, privilege and power are given to be stewarded and shared for the benefit of all, not protected and kept merely for the benefit of some.
As those who have been called into the world by Christ to serve him in our work,
- we will aspire to eliminate the false dichotomy of sacred versus secular.
- We will affirm that every good work—whether creative or restorative—is no less God’s work than the work of pastors and missionaries.
- We will commit our resources to train, equip, and resource Christians for the integration of faith and work, in hopes that people and institutions representing church, business, education, the social sector, arts and entertainment, government and media, and other channels of influence—will approach their work with tenacity, purpose, and confidence that their work contributes meaningfully to God’s mission to heal the world.
Finally, because God’s Kingdom is much greater than a single church,
- we will pray and work for the flourishing of all people and not just our people; of all churches and not just our church; of all cities and not just our city; and of all nations and not just our nation.
- We will do this chiefly by making disciples, equipping leaders, creating and sharing content, and starting new, like-minded congregations—including cross-denominational and multi-ethnic ones—throughout our city and across the globe. Because our city is a strategic hub for multiple spheres of impact, we will expect any movement of God’s Kingdom in our city to also extend beyond to the world.
- We will pursue and embrace opportunities to share our resources and capital—whether spoken, written, creative, financial, relational, professional or otherwise—toward Jesus’ vision to bless and heal the world. As we do this,
- we will celebrate wherever, whenever, and through whomever, God chooses to grow his Kingdom. And never, under any circumstances, will we concern ourselves with who gets the attention or the credit. Our task is to advance his fame and glory, and not our own. For it is from him, and to him, and through him that are all things. Amen.
Erick Chepkwony, TH.D 