What We Believe

The Sacred Scriptures

Their verbal inspiration in the original language, their consequent divine inerrancy and sufficiency, and their supreme authority in all matters of doctrine, worship and conduct. The Apocrypha is rejected, because it is no part of the canonical scriptures.

The Triune God

The three Persons, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are one God, and these three Persons are the same in substance or essence, and equal in majesty, wisdom and power.

The Creation

The Triune God created the whole universe, by the exercise of His almighty power, to manifest His glory. Man was created directly by God, in His image and therefore rational, holy and happy, and was given dominion over all earthly creatures.

The Covenants

God made a covenant with Adam, whom He had constituted the head and representative of the whole human race, promising life to him and his descendants on condition of perfect obedience. Adam failed to obey, and sin, suffering and eternal separation from God ensued as penal consequences.

God in His infinite mercy made another covenant, called the Covenant of Grace, in accordance with which the Son of God having taken to Himself a perfect human nature, became the covenant-head and representative of God's elect people, for whom He died as a sin-bearer, rose and intercedes. In Christ, all His people are justified, adopted, sanctified and ultimately glorified.

God the Father

God the Father, as the sovereign of all, foreordained all which comes to pass, decreed to permit sin and sorrow to come into human lives, and to overrule them so that they contribute to the accomplishment of the ends He foreordained, especially His glory and the good of His people.

God the Father elected from all eternity His people, sent His Son to redeem them, and the Holy Spirit sovereignly to apply that redemption to them and to maintain them in faith to life eternal.

God the Son

The eternal Son of God became incarnate by uniting to His perfect divine nature a perfect and sinless human nature, and being born of the Virgin Mary. His divine nature was not humanised, nor His human nature deified. He lived a substitutionary life on earth, whereby He achieved a flawless righteousness for His people. Likewise His death was substitutionary, and was expiatory and redemptive because He bore the sins of His elect people. He bodily rose from the dead, ascended and is now exalted as the God-man, at the right hand of God the Father, where he performs His ministry of intercession; thence He will come to perfect the blessedness of His people and to punish eternally the unsaved.

The Holy Spirit

The Holy Spirit, according to the divine purpose, sovereignly regenerates the elect, giving life to them who formerly were dead spiritually, and persuading and enabling them to receive Christ Jesus as the Saviour and Lord. The Holy Spirit indwells and sanctifies them whose minds, hearts and wills were formerly corrupted by sin as a result of Adam's fall.

The Church

The true church of God is composed of all the elect and constitutes a real, essential and spiritual unity of all who have been redeemed by Christ and regenerated by the Holy Spirit. Christ Jesus is the Head of the Church, which owes loyal obedience to Him in all things. Thus it is the duty of the Church to see that its doctrines, worship, government, discipline and all its actions are in accord with the will of God as set forth in His word. The primary task of the Church is to honour God by obeying His commands which are expressive of His will.

The Lord's Day

There is one holy day known as the Sabbath (rest) day. It is a great Divine institution. The Sabbath referred to in the Ten Commandments was the weekly day of rest from the Creation. The seventh-day Sabbath was superseded by the first-day Sabbath—the Christian Sabbath—at the bringing in of the Christian dispensation, and is the Lord's Day. Christ rose from the dead on the first day of the week, and that day became the Divinely-appointed memorial of His resurrection. Hence it is of much richer significance than the pre-Christian Sabbath. The law of the Sabbath is of binding authority on all, even as it was in the pre-Christian era. Therefore the Lord's Day is to be treated as holy, and as appointed for God's glory and man's good. All so-called holy days such as Christmas and Good Friday we do not observe, because they lack the sanction of Scripture.

Worship

The worship rendered to God should be Scriptural, for there is revealed in the Bible the authoritative and therefore the acceptable way in which God is to be worshipped. As to the quality of worship, the ideal is the spirituality which characterised the Apostolic worship. As to the mode of worship, it is to be Scriptural, even as was Apostolic worship. What is not of divine appointment is excluded, on Scriptural principles. Therefore we refrain from the use of the cross as a religious symbol, and exclude the use of musical instruments and hymns of mere human composition. Because the Psalms only are Divinely appointed to be used in praising God, we employ them only in the praise portion of our worship. In this we conform to the Apostolic practice. We do not use set forms of worship or liturgies, because they lack Scriptural authority. In order that all parts of our worship may be in accord with Scripture, our postures in prayer are standing and kneeling.

The Sacraments

There are only two Divinely appointed sacraments: Baptism and the Lord's Supper. They were instituted to promoted the growth in grace of believers. They do not convey saving grace, but they signify the blessing of the new Covenant. It is not true that people are united through the sacraments to the church, and through the church to Christ. The sacraments are not conveying ordinances.

The mode of Baptism, in strict accordance with Scriptural teaching and example, should be by the sprinkling of water. The adult believer who was not baptised in infancy should be baptised, also the children of believing parents should be baptised.

The Lord's Supper is to be observed as set forth in the word of God, and its participants should be God's people. It is not a sacrifice, but a memorial—a reminder—of Christ and His atoning death as the sin-bearer. In the right observance of this sacrament, believers have fellowship with their Lord and with each other, to the glory of God. This sacrament confirms to believers their eternal interest in Christ.

The Nations

Christ's sovereignty over all nations and their rulers is declared repeatedly in the Old and New testaments. Also there is set forth the duty of rulers, legislators and people to recognise Christ's leadership, to acknowledge publicly His sovereignty and to order their legislation, administration and conduct in accordance with the will of God as set forth in the Scripture. Consequently it is the duty and privilege of nations to foster the Christian Religion. God blesses those nations who honour Him. Failure on the part of nations to recognise, or to fail to perform the duty of honouring Christ as their Supreme Sovereign does not annul this duty.