What We Believe

Page 4

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17. BAPTISM AND THE LORD'S SUPPER

We believe that Christian baptism is the immersion of a believer in water, under the authority of the local church, to show forth in a solemn and beautiful emblem our faith in the crucified, buried and risen Savior, through Whom we died to sin and rose to a new life; that baptism is prerequisite to the privileges of church membership. We believe that the Lord's Supper is the commemoration of His death until He come, and should be preceded always by solemn self-examination. We believe that the Biblical order of the ordinances is baptism and the Lord's Supper, and that participants should be immersed believers.

(Acts 8:36, 38, 39; John 3:23; Rom. 6: 3-5; Matt. 3:16; Col. 2:12; I Cor. 11:23-28; Matt. 28:19, 20; Acts 2:41, 42)

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18. SEPARATION

We believe in obedience to the Biblical commands to separate entirely from worldliness and ecclesiastical apostasy unto God.

(2 Cor. 6:14-7:1; I Thess. 1:9, 10; I Tim. 6:3-5; Rom. 16-17; 2 John 9-11)

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19. CIVIL GOVERNMENT

We believe that civil government is of divine appointment for the interests and good order of human society; that magistrates are to be prayed for, conscientiously honored and obeyed, except in things opposed to the will of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who is the only Lord of the conscience and the coming King of kings.

(Rom. 13:1-7; 2 Sam. 23:3; Exod. 18:21, 22; Acts 23:5; Matt. 22:21; Acts 5:29; 4:19, 20; Dan, J:17,18)

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20. ISRAEL

We believe in the sovereign selection of Israel as God's eternal covenant people, that she is now dispersed because of her disobedience and rejection of Christ, and that she will be regathered in the Holy Land and, after the completion of the Church, will be saved as a nation at the second advent of Christ.

(Gen. 13:14-17; Rom. 11:1-32; Ezek. 37)

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21. THE RAPTURE AND SUBSEQUENT EVENTS

We believe in the premillennial return of Christ for His Church, and that at that moment the dead in Christ shall be raised in glorified bodies, and the living in Christ shall be given glorified bodies without tasting death, and all shall be caught up to meet the Lord in the air. (I Thess. 4:13-18; I Cor. 15:42-44, 51-54; Phil. 3:20, 21; Rev, 3:10). We believe that the Great Tribulation, will be culminated by the revelation of Christ in power and great glory to sit upon the throne of David and to establish the millennial reign.

(Dan. 9:25-27; Matt. 24:29-31; Luke 1:30-33; Isa. 9: 6, 7; 11:1-9; Acts 2:29, 30; Rev. 20:1-4,6)

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22. THE RIGHTEOUS AND THE WICKED

We believe that there is a radical and essential difference between the righteous and the wicked; that only those who are justified by faith in our Lord Jesus Christ and sanctified by the Spirit of our God are truly righteous in His esteem; while all such as continue in impenitence and unbelief are in His sight wicked and under the curse; and this distinction holds among men both in and after death, in the everlasting felicity of the saved and the everlasting conscious suffering of the lost in the lake of fire.

(Mal. 3:18; Gen. 18:23; Rom. 6:17, 18; I John 5:19; Rom. 7:6; 6:23; Prov. 14:32; Luke 16:25; Matt. 25:34-41; John 8:21; Rev. 20:14,15)

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