We believe that though God has revealed Himself in many ways throughout history (Heb. 1:1-4), He has made Himself and His will known accurately and adequately through the Bible. According to its own admission, the Bible is God’s own Word. God superintended the writers of Scripture in such a way that, using their own personalities and cultural surroundings, they recorded without error God’s message to man. Composed by over forty authors over a sixteen-hundred year period, with complete unity and accuracy, reflecting a single divine perspective, the Bible is God’s authoritative Word to all people (Psalm 19; Mark 4:1-11; Luke 24:27, 44; John 5:39, 10:35; Acts 1:16; 2Tim. 3:16-17; 2Peter 1:3-4; Heb. 1:1-4, 4:12-13).

We believe that there is one eternal, infinite, self-existent, unchanging, sovereign God (Deut. 6:4; Psalm 90:1-2; Dan. 4:34-35; John 5:24), who has revealed Himself as three distinct Persons: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. All three persons are fully God, yet have forever communed equally as only One God (Matt. 28:18-19; Mark 12:29; John 1:14; Acts 5:3-4; 2Cor. 13:14). God is absolutely holy, completely righteous, always loving, full of glory. He is the creator of all that has or will exist, and is the source of all life (Gen. 1:1; John 1:1-5).

We believe that Jesus Christ is both fully God and fully human (Heb. 1:3, 2:14-18; John 1:1-3). We believe He was born of a virgin, that He lived a perfect life, that He died on a cross as a payment for the sins of all people, that He actually rose from the dead and ascended into heaven (Matt. 1:16; Heb. 4:15; Acts 13:26-40). We believe that one day He will return to earth to rescue His followers, punish those who oppose Him, and reign over heaven and earth (2Thess. 1).

We believe that the Holy Spirit (whose name appropriately describes both His character and His essence) possesses the characteristics of a person rather than an impersonal force. He has intelligence (1Cor. 2:10-11), feelings (Eph. 4:30), and a will (1Cor. 12:11). As a person, He can be lied to (Acts 5:3), outraged (Heb. 10:29), or worshiped and reverenced (Ps. 51:11). Yet, the Spirit is Himself fully God, and is called such by the writers of Scripture (Acts 5:3-4; 1Cor. 6:11), and is associated with the Father and the Son (Matt. 28:19; 2Cor. 13:14). The Holy Spirit is now restraining sin and rebellion against God in the world (2Thess. 2:6-7), as well as convicting individuals of their guilt and need for Christ (John 15:5-11). We believe that all Christians are baptized and indwelled by the Holy Spirit at the moment we believe in Christ (1Cor. 12:13), and that we are empowered, guided, instructed and changed by the Spirit as we yield our lives to Him (1Cor. 6:19; Rom. 8:9; Eph. 5:18). We believe that the Spirit sovereignly gives each believer gifts for the strengthening and encouraging of the Church, and that all gifts are at His disposal to give to whomever and whenever He desires (1Cor. 12:11; 1Peter 4:10).

We believe that all people are created in the image of God (Gen. 1:26-27), but having been born alienated from God, all have done wrong and gone wrong (Isaiah 53:6; Eph. 2:1-3). We believe that all of us have earned eternal separation from God, and that not one of us is able to save ourselves from this fate through our own efforts (Eph. 2:8-9).

We believe that we can be rescued from death and given the gift of an eternal relationship with God only by putting our faith in Jesus Christ—that is, by trusting in His death for us as a full payment for all our sins, and in His resurrection as proof that He is the Lord of all (1Cor. 15:1-8; Rom. 5:8; Matt. 20:28; 1John 2:2). By Christ alone can we be reconciled to God (2Cor. 5:19-22; Rom. 5:10). We believe that eternal life is a free and irrevocable gift, graciously given only by God to whomever believes in Christ. Those who believe, God completely, instantly and forever forgives, and credits to their account the righteousness of Christ (Eph. 2:8-9; 2Tim. 2:8-10). Believers in Christ are secure in the promise of God that they will most certainly go to heaven (John 5:24,10:27-30; Rom. 8:38-39; 1John 5:11-13).

We believe that the church is Christ’s “body” in today’s world, and that it is comprised of all genuine Christians—those who have put their trust in Christ (Acts 11:21-26; 1Cor. 1:2). Jesus is the head of His body, the shepherd of His flock, who has supremacy in everything in the Church (John 10:11-15; Eph. 1:22; Col. 1:18). We recognize many local expressions of the Church, and teach that Redeemer’s is but one small part of the whole Church, consisting of all believers not only on earth but also in heaven. The Church exists to glorify and worship God, to build itself up in the faith, and to reach out with the Good News to a lost world (Eph. 1:6, 12, 14; 4:12-13; Matt. 28:19-20).

We recognize two continuing ordinances which Jesus commanded and the early church practiced: Baptism and the Lord’s Supper. We believe that Jesus instituted baptism as the means of publicly professing faith in Him, and that, although baptism has no power to save, it is the first step of obedience expected of every believer in Christ (Rom. 1:16; 1Cor. 1:17; Matt. 28:19; Acts 2:38). We believe that Jesus instituted the practice of the Lord’s Supper to help us vividly remember His death for us, and directed us to participate in this act of worship regularly (1Cor. 11:23-26).

We believe that angels are created beings, and though they were originally created holy, some have become evil opponents of God (Job 38:6-7; Mark 12:25). Good angels exist to carry out the will of God, and to serve and protect those who are heirs of salvation (Heb. 1:14). Fallen angels (or “demons”) are led by Satan, the arch-enemy of God and man (Matt. 25:41, 12:24). We believe that he is active in the world, seeking to discredit and dishonor God, to deceive all mankind, and to oppose those who seek to do God’s will (Gen. 3:1-7; John 10:10; 1Thess. 2:18, 3:5; 1Peter 5:8). We believe that Satan’s doom was sealed when Jesus died and was raised, and that our power over him rests in our submission to Christ, His Spirit and His Word (Matt. 4:1-11; Eph. 6:17; 1Peter 5:9; Rev. 12:11).

The Christian life is meant to be one full of joy, freedom, love, peace, wonder, and every other good thing in God (Gal. 5:22-23). We believe that as we delight ourselves in God, we will find our deepest fulfillment in life. As followers of Jesus, we are called to a life of Spirit-empowered obedience, and that when we disobey, we will experience God’s loving discipline (Matt. 18:15-20; Gal. 6:1; Heb. 12:4-13). We also believe that God gives every Christian spiritual gifts as He decides, through which God clearly works, and which believers are to use to strengthen the Church and display His love and power in the world (1Cor. 12:1-11; 1Peter 4:10).

We believe that God wonderfully and immutably creates each person as male or female. These two distinct, complimentary genders together reflect the image and nature of God (Gen. 1:26-27). Rejection of one’s biological sex is a rejection of the image of God within that person. We believe that the term “marriage” has only one meaning: the uniting of one man and one woman in a single, exclusive union, as delineated in Scripture (Gen. 2:18-25). We believe that God intends sexual intimacy to occur between a man and a woman who are married to each other (1Cor. 6:18; 7:2-5; Heb. 13:4). Further, no sexual activity should occur outside of a marriage. We believe that any form of sexual activity outside of marriage (including adultery, sex between consenting but unmarried partners, homosexual or bisexual behavior, bestiality, incest, and use of pornography) is sinful and offensive to God (Matthew 15:18-20; 1Cor. 6:9-10). We believe that every person must be afforded compassion, love, kindness, respect and dignity, as those made in the image and likeness of God (Mark 12:28-31; Luke 6:31). Hateful and harassing behavior or attitudes directed toward any individual are to be repudiated, and are not in accord with Scripture, nor the convictions of Redeemer’s Fellowship.

We believe that Jesus Christ will return personally and visibly, in fulfillment of prophecy, to save His own, redeem Israel, and judge the earth (Acts 1:11; 2Thess. 1:6 10; Isaiah 63; Rom. 11:25-26). Though the timing is disputed among believers, the fact of the rapture is indisputable (1Cor. 15:50-55; 1Thess. 4:13-18). We affirm that though we as believers are destined for trouble and persecution (1Thess. 3:3-4; 2Tim. 3:12), we will never experience any of God’s wrath (1Thess. 1:10, 5:9; 2Thess. 1:5-10). We believe that both heaven and hell are real, and that every person will spend forever either in joyful fellowship with God, or in agonizing separation from God, based on their response to Jesus Christ in this life (Rev. 19:20, 20:10-15, 21:1-22:5).