The Theological Identity of New Covenant Church
The most important question you can ask regarding a church is, "What does the church believe and teach?" The fact that you are reading this article is a good indication that you, too, believe this to be an essential issue. While this article may not answer every question you have about New Covenant Church, we do want to assist guests and inquirers in learning more about us.
We are convinced that the church must not be so broadly open that it fails to make vitally important distinctions that the Bible itself makes. At the same time, however, we do not insist that every person share the same precise set of theological convictions on every matter. In other words, there are negotiables and non-negotiables when it comes to doctrinal distinctives. To be more specific, New Covenant is and will be characterized accurately with the following statements:
We seek to be centered on God's glory.
We believe that God's glory consists of the overwhelming and overflowing beauty that stems from the sum total of all his attributes (e.g., his love, wrath, mercy, justice, etc.) working together in perfect harmony.
We believe that we exist to glorify God by enjoying him forever. This belief is inevitably expressed through praise. We praise what we enjoy because our delight is incomplete until it is expressed in worship.
We are committed to doctrinal soundness.
This is primarily expressed by means of a doctrinal statement that we believe is a good and accurate summary of the Bible's teaching. We certainly recognize that our expression of biblical truth is not flawless, yet we believe it to be a carefully worded summary of the Bible's content. We believe it is important to note that every church has a doctrinal confession or statement, even though some may claim they have "no confession but Christ" or "no creed but the Bible." Every church summarizes its convictions in some form in order to distinguish its members from those who are not believers or those who do not embrace their church's distinctives.
We further recognize that knowledge alone leads invariably to pride. It is our sincere desire to affirm truth in genuine Christian love. We believe that truth properly applied will issue forth in the affections of the heart being stirred to obedience, thus yielding a life that glorifies God. Such a God-glorifying life is the very purpose for our existence.
We are evangelical.
To say that we are evangelical means that we take our stand with those who believe in what are called
“the essentials” of the Christian faith:
1. The sole basis for our belief is the Bible, which is uniquely God-inspired, without error, and the final authority on all matters on which it bears.
2. There is one God, eternally existing in three persons – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit – each possessing
all the attributes of deity.
3. God created humans to glorify and have fellowship with Him, but they defied God by sinfully going their own way. As a result, we need God’s saving grace to end our alienation from God. Salvation comes only through God’s grace – not human effort – and must be received personally by repentance and faith in and commitment to Jesus Christ.
4. Jesus Christ, the second Person of the Trinity, lived a sinless life on earth and voluntarily paid for sin by dying on the cross as our substitute. This accomplished salvation for all who receive grace by trusting in Christ. He rose from the dead and is the only mediator between us and God. At the end of time, He will return to earth to judge the righteous and the unrighteous.
5. The Holy Spirit draws sinners to Christ and equips believers for personal growth and service to God.
The Holy Spirit was sent as a comforter, to bestow spiritual gifts on the Church, to seal each believer in
God’s salvation, and to empower the Church in order that it may fulfill the Great Commission.
6. Man is by nature sinful and helpless to save himself. Before the foundation of the world, God chose to
bring salvation to individuals not because of any foreseen acts by humans, but just because of His great love. Unless God draws people to Himself through Jesus Christ, no one will be saved.
7. The Bible gives the church two ordinances, which shall be observed until the Lord returns: baptism and
the Lord’s Supper.
8. The church’s role is to glorify God and serve those in need. At the end of time, everyone will experience bodily resurrection and judgment. Only believers in Christ Jesus will enjoy eternal fellowship with God. Those who have rejected the Lord will spend eternity in hell.
9. God will bring His salvation to His people and be glorified in the events of His Church. He exists above
all creation and orchestrates history to fulfill His plan for the universe. He works through the prayers, preaching, and purposes of His people to perform His perfect will on earth. He determines who will be saved and when, so we don’t try to argue anyone into the Kingdom, although we do try to present the gospel to everyone who will listen.
These are so important that we ask each member to agree with these essentials. We cannot compromise
on these basic doctrines and beliefs of the Bible. We joyfully affirm our unity with those from every tradition and denomination that hold these essentials, including those true believers in Christ who are members of denominations or churches with which we might have certain theological or doctrinal disagreements in
other areas."
We are evangelistic.
This means we take seriously the Great Commission of Matthew 28:19-20: “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations.” Without compromising the sovereignty of God, we affirm the responsibility of each person to repent and believe on Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord. We further affirm our responsibility to extend the message of the Gospel as a call to salvation to everyone who hears its message. To this end, we call all, without distinction, to drink freely of the Water of Life and to live eternally in the presence of their Creator.
This privilege and responsibility is realized not only in our immediate context, but also in the mandate from our Lord to declare His glory to the nations. Therefore, we seek to provide opportunities for the community of believers at New Covenant Church to go on mission to other parts of the world. In recent years we have taken the message of the gospel to Scotland, Canada, downtown Detroit and Pontiac, North Carolina, and West Virginia. In addition, part of each offering we receive is given to mission projects that reach people on virtually every continent.
We are Baptist.
This is expressed in three specific ways:
1. We affirm the Southern Baptist confessional statement contained in The Baptist Faith & Message (2000);
2. We give financially to the Cooperative Program and the International Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention as well as other Baptist mission efforts;
3. Our understanding of the ordinances of the church are baptistic in nature as expressed in the following:
(a) Baptism does not save us, but evidences our union with the Lord in his death, burial and resurrection. Therefore, we practice believer’s baptism by immersion as the means by which such union is best pictured. Christian baptism, in the name of the triune God, is the visual representation with water of the believer’s identification with Christ spiritually.
(b) The Lord’s Supper is celebrated by the believing community of New Covenant Church on the first Sunday of each month. It is a time in which we recognize our bonds within the covenant community of believers who have been brought into fellowship with God and his people solely by the sacrificial work of Christ. We believe that the Lord’s Supper was instituted by Christ for commemoration of his death. In its observance, we declare Christ’s death until he comes again (cf., 1 Corinthians 11:26). We do not affirm either of these ordinances as being salvific in nature.
We are Reformed.
The word "Reformed" can be defined simply in two ways:
1. It is a reference to our historical link to the Protestant Reformation of the 16th century and describes us as heirs of the tradition that comes from Martin Luther, John Calvin, John Knox, Ulrich Zwingli, and other Reformers of the Church.
2. The word "Reformed" is used most commonly to refer to certain theological distinctives that have marked Reformation believers, particularly those who embrace what have come to be referred to as "the doctrines of grace."
These distinctives can be summarized by our glad affirmation of the responsibility of every person to repent and believe, and that it is God who, by his sovereign electing grace, draws men and women, otherwise dead in sin, to faith in his Son. By this faith alone are God's people justified.
Reformed distinctives include the sovereignty of God in his creation, providence and election of believers apart from any merit of their own; the irresistible grace of God provided for and preceding the faith of the individual; the sufficiency of God's grace apart from which every person is dead in sin and wholly defiled in all his/her faculties of soul and body; the efficacy of Christ's death for all those who believe in him by grace; the safe-guarding of all those for whom Christ died for eternal life.
We affirm biblical covenantalism.
To say we are covenantal means we believe that the unifying principle in the Scriptures is the glory of God’s grace in the one covenant of grace that God made with Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, David and finally, and most importantly, in Jesus Christ. The covenant is God's pledge to his people of a relationship of loving loyalty throughout eternity.
To speak of the unity of the covenants means that there is, and always has been, only one way to salvation
in both the Old and New Testaments—that is, by God's grace alone through faith alone. This covenantal understanding of the Bible is in distinction from any system of organizing the Scriptures that would attribute differing ways of salvation to a succession of historical biblical eras.
We are elder-led.
"This concept refers to our form of governance. We believe that the most clear biblical pattern is for churches to be governed by elders. Therefore, the spiritual oversight is provided by a council of elders, or a plurality of elders. We are currently seeking to train up elders to assist Pastor Hardy in this capacity, and our desire is for regularly-scheduled members' meetings, whereby the congregation is able to interact with and provide input to the elders regarding ministry matters pertaining to the body.
We affirm these distinctives as important in the sense of being profitable and health-producing for Christians to believe. We are further convinced that as one comes to appreciate these beliefs, he/she will grow to love and honor the Lord Jesus Christ more fully and understand more richly what it means to live by His grace.
Acceptance of all these distinctives, however, is not required for membership in New Covenant Church. One can join and be a participating member of the church without holding to any but the "essentials of the faith" mentioned under "we are evangelical". Elders and deacons, however, must hold to all these distinctives.
We believe that to be strong in truth without being gentle in manner is unbiblical. It is also our profound conviction that to be gentle in manner while not adhering to scriptural truth is also unbiblical. By God's
grace, we desire to be both as we press on in the Lord's glorious design for New Covenant Church to be
used "to glorify God through leading people to a Great Commitment to the Great Commandment and the
Great Commission!"
Doctrines of Grace
The Doctrines of Saving Grace
- The Doctrine of Total Inability
- The Doctrine of Unconditional Election
- The Doctrine of Definite Atonement (Part 1)
- The Doctrine of Definite Atonement (Part 2)
- The Doctrine of Invincible Grace
- The Doctrine of Conversion
- The Doctrine of Justification
- The Doctrine of Adoption
- The Doctrine of Sanctification
- The Doctrine of Perseverance
- The Doctrine of Glorification
What is a true Christian? What is A Christian? Are You One?
The Bible's Definition of a Christian
The Bible isn't a systematic text book. Therefore what it teaches must be gathered from its various parts.
You will find Bible passages linked at the end of most paragraphs from which the various statements have been obtained.
A Christian is a person who has come to see themselves as God sees them. That is, as a sinner, a rebel against His authority - an enemy of God; lost, hopeless, unable to deliver themselves and standing justly condemned under God's righteous law; fully deserving the just punishment of hell. Click here for Bible passages that teach this.
A Christian has embraced the "righteousness of God through faith". That is, they have accepted the only means that God offers of being in a right relationship with Him. This is through the perfect life, the sacrificial death and supernatural resurrection from the dead of Jesus Christ, God's Son. A Christian trusts what God has done in Christ as satisfying God's righteous justice for their sins and more than this, that the righteous life of Jesus Christ is accepted as theirs. Bible passages that teach this.
A Christian is one in whom God has placed His Holy Spirit, granting them a turning away from their sin and enmity towards God, faith in what God has promised and causing them to live a life in the love of God and obedience to Him. This means they have a love for God's Word, the Scriptures; an obedience to God's will as revealed in the Scriptures; a desire to see God's reign extended in their own lives and the lives of others and a love for God's people, the Church. Bible passages that teach this.
These features of a Christian will be in every believer, sometimes more, sometimes less, but always present, even if just in seed form.
Are you a Christian?
Many people say they are Christians, but does this profession measure up against what the Bible says a Christian is?
If you say you are a Christian, what is the basis for saying this? Your answer might be something like one of the following statements: "I live in a Christian country"; "I have always been a Christian"; "my parents were Christians"; "I have always been in church"; "I don't do anything to hurt other people"; "I am a moral and upright citizen"; "I do a lot of work for Charities". These, however, are not the answers that the Bible gives to this question.
The Bible deals with our status in God's eyes, the one who made us and keeps us being. It deals with the matters of our heart, our inmost self. Where we were born and the things we have done, even the best things, are not what makes us accepted in God's estimation - and that is what really counts in the end!
Click here for Bible passages that teach this.
We are told by Jesus Christ Himself that there is only one way to God, only one way to be accepted by Him. Jesus tells us that He is the way, He alone. Bible passages that teach this.
How is it that Jesus Christ is the only way to God? The Scripture teaches us that all human beings are born with a terrible problem, one they can't resolve themselves. This problem is their own internal enmity against God's rightful and absolute rule over their lives. It's not just an internal problem. It makes us think and do what we want, not what God wants. The Bible uses the word "sin" for this. It means to "miss the mark". This is what we inherited from the first man, Adam, who started the rebellion. This is my problem; this is your problem too. Bible passages that teach this.
Not only do we have this terrible problem internally towards God, but also we have another one as a consequence. This is God's just condemnation of our sin and rightful anger against us. We have all "missed the mark" and the result is that God has pronounced the "guilty" verdict against us for our sin; yours and mine. The sentence against this guilt is death, both physically and spiritually, ultimately resulting in an eternal separation from God's goodness and an eternal and awful punishment that the Bible calls Hell, a fearful yet just punishment for our willful rebellion. Bible passages that teach this.
So how is it that Jesus Christ is the only way to God in the face of this terrible situation? Jesus Christ is God's answer to our problem. Jesus Christ is the Son of God who entered this world of ours as a man, a real human being, even being born a baby. He was fully God and fully human, something very hard to understand, yet crucial to dealing with our problem of sin. Because he was God's Son, He didn't start off with an enmity against God, He loved God from the very start and with all His being, He wanted God's rule over Him. He lived out his life as a true human being without ever sinning against God His Father; not once. So He didn't deserve to die, he didn't deserve punishment; but that is exactly what he endured. But why? Click here for Bible passages that teach this.
As we said before, Jesus Christ is God's answer to our problem. Through the incredible and completely undeserved love of God He accepts the death Jesus Christ died, undeserved as it was, as the punishment for the sin of all those who trust in Him as their representative, their substitute, their advocate, their Savior. More than that, God accepts the righteous life of Jesus Christ as His peoples. The Bible puts it this way,
"God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God". Bible passages that teach this.
God calls us, God commands us to turn away from our rebellion, our sins, and our desire to go our own
way and turn to Him trusting what He has done through Jesus Christ to deal with our biggest problem.
Bible passages that teach this.
So, a Christian isn't someone who has done something to deserve God's favor, but someone who sees they can never deserve it and gratefully accepts and trusts in what God has done in His Son. That's faith. So, we can ask the question again, are you a Christian? Is your answer that same as before, does it have the right basis; the basis the Bible gives us?
If you would like to know more about God's work of salvation in Jesus Christ, please contact us.
We would be happy to help you.
