About Us

WHAT WE BELIEVE

We believe in one true, perfect, loving, and just God who created us for an amazing life of wonder, work, and intimacy with him.

The first humans, Adam and Eve, sinned (missed the mark of what God intended) by distrusting God and disobeying instructions God gave them. They exchanged intimacy with God for the curse of sin and death, and passed this curse through generations along to us.

All people now sin by disobeying God in actions, words, thoughts, or motives.

Because God is eternally perfect, loving, and just, he cannot be in the presence of evil and sin, and we are separated from him without hope for all eternity. For God to be just, the only way for us to be reconciled to him is to have someone or something innocent to pay the penalty of our sin (death), or for us to pay it eternally in hell.

God loves us in spite of our sin though, and he made a way for us to once again be close to him. He sent his only son Jesus Christ to earth to live a perfect life, take on all our sin, die a bloody death, be buried, and rise from that death. His sacrifice is an undeserved gift from God to us, known as grace.

When we place our faith in Jesus as the sacrifice for our sins, we are restored to fellowship with God as he originally intended. Our sin, no matter how bad, is exchanged for his righteous life and we can walk with God our Father. Because our sin was paid once for all at the cross, Jesus' sacrifice remains valid for us as we grow, covering all our sin - past, present, and future. We can look forward to eternity with him in heaven after death. This is good news - part of what Christians call the gospel.

This new life is a growing, grand adventure where we continually discover more of God's love, mercy, and justice. That's why the Bible speaks of being "born again." Like newborn children we need to grow up to maturity in God's family. He gives us his word, the Bible, to be our guide to knowing him and following him. Likewise, he gives us symbolic ordinances we can enjoy together. Through water baptism, we can declare our commitment to him and identify with his death and resurrection. Through communion, we can remember together his broken body and his bloody death and look forward to our future with God.

Since God loves all people, he desires all people to know about his sacrifice that can restore them to intimacy with him. He gives his followers the amazing task of representing him here on earth. It's our privilege as Christians to show his nature to those around us, and tell them about his sacrifice and what he has done for us.

However, because sin still exists in the world, we will have problems here on earth. Many will reject Jesus, and much suffering and death still exists because of sin. Because of this, God sent the Holy Spirit, called the Comforter in the Bible, to live inside his believers and empower them to be his representatives in this still-dark world. One day Jesus will return to earth as the king he is to eliminate all evil and reward his people eternally in heaven.

The Bible gloriously writes of it this way - "No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him - but God has revealed it to us by his Spirit." Though we see dimly now, we will one day see God fully because of his son Jesus. To him be the praise!