Every church is viewed in different ways based on their practices. We hope that our identity is viewed as an evangelical, reformed, baptist, Bible-preaching church seeking to promote love for God, one another, and the world in all that we do.
We are evangelical because we believe the gospel is what defines who we are and what we must do. The gospel defines who we are in Christ in that we only have the hope of salvation in his death, burial, resurrection, and return. The gospel defines what we do because we can only proclaim Christ and what he has accomplished for us.
We are reformed because we believe that God, in his good grace, is sovereign and we are not. Generally speaking, we must begin with the “solas” of the Protestant Reformation, but we do not stop there with our confession. We believe that we are totally depraved and God must sovereignly show his grace to us in order for us to know him as the Savior. We believe that the Christian religion is about exalting and glorifying God alone, not ourselves or our work.
We preach the Bible because it is the only source of God’s wisdom, truth, and message of salvation. We preach through books of the Bible (usually alternating between OT and NT) and each sermon is expositional in nature, meaning it’s focus is the focus of the inspired passage.
We are family friendly and committed to being a family of God as adopted sons and daughters in Christ. This is lived out in our fellowship, discipleship, and gospel care for one another. We are also committed to encouraging families to fulfill their callings so that men are trained to be heads of households, women godly helpmates, and children honoring and obedient to their parents. Adoption is a primary conviction of the church so that its theological and practical applications are emphasized among the body.
We are baptist because we believe that the church is the body of Christ that is made up of converted confessors of Christ. We therefore only baptize professing believers and have a high view of church membership.
While we do not pretend to be a church that has it all together, we hope to be a church that is unified around the gospel in Christ and fulfilling his work. We pray that the vision describes who we are and who we are striving to become.
The vision was originally adopted on October 30, 2010.
Below is a summary of who we strive to be as a committed body of believers in Christ Jesus. These are high callings that we pray the Spirit is always renewing us and strengthening us to become.
This is the most important vision statement for the church. The gospel is what defines us as believers and unites us together. Praise God we have been blessed with a diversity of members from all walks of life, ages, and vocations. The gospel of Jesus Christ is what unites the diverse persons and makes us a unified body under one head or a temple of individual stones with the same foundation.
The gospel must remain central to the life of the church. This means it is central to the worship service and discipleship. We are to hear the gospel proclaimed regularly and hear how it should affect our lives. The gospel is proclaimed in prayers, songs, Scripture reading and must be proclaimed with clarity in the sermon.
We must counsel one another with the gospel as well. This means we confront one another in our sins, not with the purpose of condemning, but for the purpose of correcting one another so that our lives reflect the gospel. If the gospel is not central in our relationships within the church, then we are merely exercising moralism or gathering to further encourage our self-righteousness. The goal is to be a church that is transparent in our sins and weaknesses so that the gory and power of the gospel of Jesus is magnified.
An example of how the gospel confronts and changes us: A friend in a previous church once made a joke about me that I found offensive. It was said before Sunday School among some other friends of ours. I let the comment fester into bitterness and as I prepared to confront him I realized that I was taking myself too seriously. I realized that I was more concerned with my reputation than that of Christ. My sins against Christ and how he loved me in the midst of my rebellion demanded that I love this brother and forgive him for his comments. The big problem I had to realize was that I had made myself too big in my mind and the gospel too small.
Jesus said that it was to his disciples’ advantage that he leave them because when he would then send the Spirit to convict the world (John 16). The Spirit must accompany the Word in order for it to accomplish its proper end and purpose. The Spirit illuminates our hearts so we can see our depraved state and the truth of the gospel that forgives. The ministry of the church must be dependent upon the work of the Spirit and the mercy of God.
We intentionally encourage prayer in the church in numerous ways. First, in the morning service we incorporate a number of different kinds of prayers. We typically have someone from the congregation pray a prayer of praise, thanksgiving, or confession. This prayer follows a Scripture reading and the kind of prayer correlates with the meaning of the passage. There is also a pastoral prayer most Sundays where the pastor or another leader makes prayer of supplication. This prayer lifts up members of the church, asks for God to bless other churches and ministries throughout the world.
Second, the church joins in prayer on Sunday and Wednesday night. Both nights provide a time for the church to pray for one another. These are typically focused on the ministry and the needs within the church. Third, we encourage prayer by dedicating a Sunday School to prayer.
God calls the church to worship him. Our hope is that are hearts will be illumined by the Spirit to see the glory and love of God so that we will worship him with joy and reverences. Worship is an act of love in response to the great love that God has given to us. We worship corporately by praying, singing, practicing the ordinances, and hearing God’s Word together. We follow the regulative principle in worship, which states that the church worships God according to how God has prescribed the church to worship in Scripture. In short, this is simply saying that we do not create ways to worship God, but only approach God according to how he has instructed. There are clear prescriptions in Scripture and the church has freedom to exercise these.
Christians do not just worship in the services of the church. Every aspect of life is an arena for worship. Every relationship, family function, employment, activity is an opportunity for worship because the Christian is called to love God with his entire life.
JPBC is committed to proclaiming God’s Word faithfully and boldly. We believe that that Scripture is sufficient for all beliefs and practices. We are not supposed to be creative in our teaching or practice. Instead we are supposed to be faithful to declaring God’s truth. The diet of teaching begins with the Sunday morning sermon as the primary piece (10:45am). You can go here to see the pastor’s vision for a sermon. In short, we preach expositionally and make the gospel the center of the proclamation. We gather again on Sunday evening (6pm) where other men from the church give brief devotionals that correspond with the morning sermon. Other aspects of our teaching diet include Our Life Together and Sunday School. At Our Life Together, our Wednesday night meeting (5:15-7pm), the pastor teaches through a topic or a book of the Bible. Sunday School provides a more personal setting that facilitates a more focused Bible study on Sunday morning (9:30 am).
Christians are called to be watchful for one another’s lives and love one another. This is what we call discipleship. We do not believe every Christian naturally builds relationships that fulfill these commands. JPBC has adopted a model of discipleship that facilitates, models, and teaches members to love one another. We facilitate discipleship through our deacons who take responsibility for the wellbeing of each member. Discipleship is also facilitated by giving members questions from the sermon to ask themselves, one another, and within their families. These are meant to apply the message we have all heard together in the sermon. The pastor models discipleship by meeting with a number of men in discipleship groups regularly. The purpose is to model transparency of sin and how to overcome sin with the gospel. Discipleship is taught with the proclamation of the Word in the sermon, Sunday School, and Our Life Together.
We believe that the church is made up of the adopted sons and daughters of God. We are called to love and serve one another as the family of God. Christians find fellowship with one another when they experience Christ in each other. Christian fellowship is set apart from socializing or casual conversations because it builds the believer up in the faith. This happens in our conversations, prayers, meals together, and hearing God’s Word together.
Many of our members are not only brothers and sisters to the body, but are also husbands/father and wives/mothers. These members have the responsibility to be a Christian sibling to others in the church and to care for their family in a godly way. Our goal is to encourage and edify the men to be the head of their household and to facilitate them in their worship. We encourage families to worship together in the service and have provided a training room for families with children who are not ready to sit through the entire service.
The mission of the church is to proclaim Christ. We believe that every Christian is called to participate personally in gospel proclamation. We hope that every family would be faithful in proclaiming the gospel to their neighbors, friends and co-workers. We also try to facilitate evangelism for members who want more evangelism opportunities. Many of these opportunities will take place on the campus of UVA, which is located a couple miles from the church.
Our goal as a church is to not only to proclaim the gospel in our own community, but to send missionaries into regions where there is no gospel proclamation. It is our responsibility to be good stewards of our resources to use what God has given to us to help others who have sacrificed their lives for the sake of the gospel. We send missionaries in two ways.
First, we give a percentage of our budget to the Southern Baptist Conservatives of Virginia. This is our denominational organization who then supply the IMB with a portion of their budget. The International Missions Board is Southern Baptist institution that sends out missionaries from Southern Baptist Churches. We also take up special offerings during the year to go straight to the Mission’s Board such as the Lottie Moon Offering.
Second, we give a percentage of our budget to specific missionaries who we then partner with in the proclamation of the gospel. We hope to be in close communication with these missionaries in their ministry work. This, we pray, is a blessing to the missionaries and a way for us to be more mindful and prayerful for the work of God overseas. We pray, also, for opportunities to do short missions trips to work alongside of these missionaries. You can apply to be a missions partner by downloading a Missions Application in the Resource section of the website.
We believe the Bible is the only source for doctrine, but we do not believe we are called to reinvent the wheel of doctrine and belief in each generation. There is a rich tradition of great theology from who we seek to learn. There are principles the tradition has provided that help us think through all the teachings of Scripture. Below are the traditional marks of the church as presented in the Apostles Creed and interpreted in accord with the Protestant Reformation of the Church.
The members of JPBC seek to be unified in the gospel of Jesus Christ (John 17:20-22; I Cor 12:12-13). We unite together for the purpose of watching over each other’s lives in brotherly love and proclaiming the gospel (Eph 5:15-21). We seek to accomplish these things as one because we are united together as brothers and sisters in Christ and his gospel. We worship, fellowship, and pray together with the hope that we find mutual discipleship in the body and partnership in evangelism to the world (I Pet 2:4-5).
As God’s elect, we are set apart as his treasured possession (Deuteronomy 7:6). This means we have been called out of our previous life that Paul calls the domain of darkness (Colossians 1:13). We are called out of that life and the destruction we were destined for so that we could be place in the Kingdom of Light and receive a new identity in Christ (Ephesians 2:8-10). We receive a new identity as children of God in Christ instead of being children because of our sin (Galatians 3:23-29). We are, therefore, called to live according to Christ’s law and godly wisdom (Ephesians 2:1-10; I Peter 2:9-10).
We do not believe that the universal church is united under any head other that the risen savior, Jesus Christ (I Corinthians 3:10-11). The universal church is united in what Jesus has accomplished for us and the Spirit applying his work to us when he indwells us (I Corinthians 12:12-13). We are untied to all true churches in all places. We unite with other churches as opportunities arise in order to testify to the universal nature of the church. We do so by praying for a local church each Sunday morning and working with other churches for the purpose of evangelism in Charlottesville.
We are tied to the apostles by following their teaching (Jude 3). John proclaims throughout his writings that he is writing about the things that he has seen referring to Jesus’ ministry. We follow the Apostles as they follow Christ. We believe that the Spirit used many of these Apostles or men connected to them to provide written works for the church to follow in belief and practice. The Spirit carried these men along to produce the thoughts of God in the writings so that the words we have are breathed out by God himself in human language for us to understand (II Peter 1:21; II Timothy 3:16). By following the Apostles teaching (Acts 2:42) we relate to all churches at all times and are tied to those men whom Christ gave over the keys of the Kingdom (Matthew 18).
The saints of God are not united under human wisdom or personalities. We are united under Christ and his truth. The cleverness of man cannot save sinners. Only the gospel presented faithfully and boldly can save sinners and preserve the saints. The church must hear the gospel in each sermon. They should hear it to find hope in the promises the gospel provides as well as how the gospel calls them to repent of their sin and live a new life according to the Spirit.
The ordinances of baptism and the Lord’s Supper must be observed according to Scripture. As Baptists, we believe that only confessing believers are proper candidates for baptism. We believe baptism is the sign of the new covenant that is made up of believers. We practice immersion baptism because we believe it best represents the new birth as the believer is buried and raised with Christ.
The Lord’s Supper is practiced on the first Sunday of each month. We welcome visiting believers who are members of evangelical churches in good standing to participate in the Lord’s Supper with us. We believe Christ instituted the symbol of the bread and fruit of the vine as a reminder to the church of what he has accomplished for us in his death and that he will return to bring us home. The Lord’s Supper is intentionally just a taste of what the real wedding feast will be like when we are gathered as God’s children. After the Lord’s Supper we enjoy a fellowship meal as a church (visitors are welcome to attend).
The Bible does not have a command, “join the church.” However, we believe that it is implied by many other commands in Scripture. First, the first church was numbered so that they at least knew who was in and who was out. This is the beginning of the church and merely shows that there was clarity for who belonged. Second, Scripture commands the church to cast some of their members out who are clearly not believers either by their confession or behavior (Jude, I Corinthians, I John, Galatians). The clearest teaching on this matter is I Corinthians 6 where Paul says to cast those who profess Christ whose life does not align with the gospel out of the fellowship. Third, practically speaking, the commands in Scripture for Christians to exercise toward one another necessitate a local church membership. Christians are called to love one another just like Christ loved the church, to be watchful over one another, to correct and counsel one another, to meet together regularly.
Practically, Christians are able to fulfill these commands when they set intentionally covenant with other believers for the purpose of serving them and pursuing Christ.
The church’s confession is in full agreement with the 2000 Baptist Faith and Message. A few distinctives we wish to highlight are:
The Holy Bible was written by men divinely inspired and is God’s revelation of Himself to man. It is a perfect treasure of divine instruction. It has God for its author, salvation for its end, and truth, without any mixture of error, for its matter. Therefore, all Scripture is totally true and trustworthy. It reveals the principles by which God judges us, and therefore is, and will remain to the end of the world, the true center of Christian union, and the supreme standard by which all human conduct, creeds, and religious opinions should be tried. All Scripture is a testimony to Christ, who is Himself the focus of divine revelation.
Exodus 24:4; Deuteronomy 4:1-2; 17:19; Joshua 8:34; Psalms 19:7-10; 119:11,89,105,140; Isaiah 34:16; 40:8; Jeremiah 15:16; 36:1-32; Matthew 5:17-18; 22:29; Luke 21:33; 24:44-46; John 5:39; 16:13-15; 17:17; Acts 2:16ff.; 17:11; Romans 15:4; 16:25-26; 2 Timothy 3:15-17; Hebrews 1:1-2; 4:12; 1 Peter 1:25; 2 Peter 1:19-21.
There is one and only one living and true God. He is an intelligent, spiritual, and personal Being, the Creator, Redeemer, Preserver, and Ruler of the universe. God is infinite in holiness and all other perfections. God is all powerful and all knowing; and His perfect knowledge extends to all things, past, present, and future, including the future decisions of His free creatures. To Him we owe the highest love, reverence, and obedience. The eternal triune God reveals Himself to us as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, with distinct personal attributes, but without division of nature, essence, or being.
A. God the Father
God as Father reigns with providential care over His universe, His creatures, and the flow of the stream of human history according to the purposes of His grace. He is all powerful, all knowing, all loving, and all wise. God is Father in truth to those who become children of God through faith in Jesus Christ. He is fatherly in His attitude toward all men.
Genesis 1:1; 2:7; Exodus 3:14; 6:2-3; 15:11ff.; 20:1ff.; Leviticus 22:2; Deuteronomy 6:4; 32:6; 1 Chronicles 29:10; Psalm 19:1-3; Isaiah 43:3,15; 64:8; Jeremiah 10:10; 17:13; Matthew 6:9ff.; 7:11; 23:9; 28:19; Mark 1:9-11; John 4:24; 5:26; 14:6-13; 17:1-8; Acts 1:7; Romans 8:14-15; 1 Corinthians 8:6; Galatians 4:6; Ephesians 4:6; Colossians 1:15; 1 Timothy 1:17; Hebrews 11:6; 12:9; 1 Peter 1:17; 1 John 5:7.
B. God the Son
Christ is the eternal Son of God. In His incarnation as Jesus Christ He was conceived of the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary. Jesus perfectly revealed and did the will of God, taking upon Himself human nature with its demands and necessities and identifying Himself completely with mankind yet without sin. He honored the divine law by His personal obedience, and in His substitutionary death on the cross He made provision for the redemption of men from sin. He was raised from the dead with a glorified body and appeared to His disciples as the person who was with them before His crucifixion. He ascended into heaven and is now exalted at the right hand of God where He is the One Mediator, fully God, fully man, in whose Person is effected the reconciliation between God and man. He will return in power and glory to judge the world and to consummate His redemptive mission. He now dwells in all believers as the living and ever present Lord.
Genesis 18:1ff.; Psalms 2:7ff.; 110:1ff.; Isaiah 7:14; 53; Matthew 1:18-23; 3:17; 8:29; 11:27; 14:33; 16:16,27; 17:5; 27; 28:1-6,19; Mark 1:1; 3:11; Luke 1:35; 4:41; 22:70; 24:46; John 1:1-18,29; 10:30,38; 11:25-27; 12:44-50; 14:7-11; 16:15-16,28; 17:1-5, 21-22; 20:1-20,28; Acts 1:9; 2:22-24; 7:55-56; 9:4-5,20; Romans 1:3-4; 3:23-26; 5:6-21; 8:1-3,34; 10:4; 1 Corinthians 1:30; 2:2; 8:6; 15:1-8,24-28; 2 Corinthians 5:19-21; 8:9; Galatians 4:4-5; Ephesians 1:20; 3:11; 4:7-10; Philippians 2:5-11; Colossians 1:13-22; 2:9; 1 Thessalonians 4:14-18; 1 Timothy 2:5-6; 3:16; Titus 2:13-14; Hebrews 1:1-3; 4:14-15; 7:14-28; 9:12-15,24-28; 12:2; 13:8; 1 Peter 2:21-25; 3:22; 1 John 1:7-9; 3:2; 4:14-15; 5:9; 2 John 7-9; Revelation 1:13-16; 5:9-14; 12:10-11; 13:8; 19:16.
God the Holy Spirit
The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of God, fully divine. He inspired holy men of old to write the Scriptures. Through illumination He enables men to understand truth. He exalts Christ. He convicts men of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment. He calls men to the Saviour, and effects regeneration. At the moment of regeneration He baptizes every believer into the Body of Christ. He cultivates Christian character, comforts believers, and bestows the spiritual gifts by which they serve God through His church. He seals the believer unto the day of final redemption. His presence in the Christian is the guarantee that God will bring the believer into the fullness of the stature of Christ. He enlightens and empowers the believer and the church in worship, evangelism, and service.
Genesis 1:2; Judges 14:6; Job 26:13; Psalms 51:11; 139:7ff.; Isaiah 61:1-3; Joel 2:28-32; Matthew 1:18; 3:16; 4:1; 12:28-32; 28:19; Mark 1:10,12; Luke 1:35; 4:1,18-19; 11:13; 12:12; 24:49; John 4:24; 14:16-17,26; 15:26; 16:7-14; Acts 1:8; 2:1-4,38; 4:31; 5:3; 6:3; 7:55; 8:17,39; 10:44; 13:2; 15:28; 16:6; 19:1-6; Romans 8:9-11,14-16,26-27; 1 Corinthians 2:10-14; 3:16; 12:3-11,13; Galatians 4:6; Ephesians 1:13-14; 4:30; 5:18; 1 Thessalonians 5:19; 1 Timothy 3:16; 4:1; 2 Timothy 1:14; 3:16; Hebrews 9:8,14; 2 Peter 1:21; 1 John 4:13; 5:6-7; Revelation 1:10; 22:17.
Man is the special creation of God, made in His own image. He created them male and female as the crowning work of His creation. The gift of gender is thus part of the goodness of God’s creation. In the beginning man was innocent of sin and was endowed by his Creator with freedom of choice. By his free choice man sinned against God and brought sin into the human race. Through the temptation of Satan man transgressed the command of God, and fell from his original innocence whereby his posterity inherit a nature and an environment inclined toward sin. Therefore, as soon as they are capable of moral action, they become transgressors and are under condemnation. Only the grace of God can bring man into His holy fellowship and enable man to fulfill the creative purpose of God. The sacredness of human personality is evident in that God created man in His own image, and in that Christ died for man; therefore, every person of every race possesses full dignity and is worthy of respect and Christian love.
Genesis 1:26-30; 2:5,7,18-22; 3; 9:6; Psalms 1; 8:3-6; 32:1-5; 51:5; Isaiah 6:5; Jeremiah 17:5; Matthew 16:26; Acts 17:26-31; Romans 1:19-32; 3:10-18,23; 5:6,12,19; 6:6; 7:14-25; 8:14-18,29; 1 Corinthians 1:21-31; 15:19,21-22; Ephesians 2:1-22; Colossians 1:21-22; 3:9-11.
Salvation involves the redemption of the whole man, and is offered freely to all who accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour, who by His own blood obtained eternal redemption for the believer. In its broadest sense salvation includes regeneration, justification, sanctification, and glorification. There is no salvation apart from personal faith in Jesus Christ as Lord.
Genesis 3:15; Exodus 3:14-17; 6:2-8; Matthew 1:21; 4:17; 16:21-26; 27:22-28:6; Luke 1:68-69; 2:28-32; John 1:11-14,29; 3:3-21,36; 5:24; 10:9,28-29; 15:1-16; 17:17; Acts 2:21; 4:12; 15:11; 16:30-31; 17:30-31; 20:32; Romans 1:16-18; 2:4; 3:23-25; 4:3ff.; 5:8-10; 6:1-23; 8:1-18,29-39; 10:9-10,13; 13:11-14; 1 Corinthians 1:18,30; 6:19-20; 15:10; 2 Corinthians 5:17-20; Galatians 2:20; 3:13; 5:22-25; 6:15; Ephesians 1:7; 2:8-22; 4:11-16; Philippians 2:12-13; Colossians 1:9-22; 3:1ff.; 1 Thessalonians 5:23-24; 2 Timothy 1:12; Titus 2:11-14; Hebrews 2:1-3; 5:8-9; 9:24-28; 11:1-12:8,14; James 2:14-26; 1 Peter 1:2-23; 1 John 1:6-2:11; Revelation 3:20; 21:1-22:5.
Christian baptism is the immersion of a believer in water in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. It is an act of obedience symbolizing the believer’s faith in a crucified, buried, and risen Saviour, the believer’s death to sin, the burial of the old life, and the resurrection to walk in newness of life in Christ Jesus. It is a testimony to his faith in the final resurrection of the dead. Being a church ordinance, it is prerequisite to the privileges of church membership and to the Lord’s Supper.
The Lord’s Supper is a symbolic act of obedience whereby members of the church, through partaking of the bread and the fruit of the vine, memorialize the death of the Redeemer and anticipate His second coming.
Matthew 3:13-17; 26:26-30; 28:19-20; Mark 1:9-11; 14:22-26; Luke 3:21-22; 22:19-20; John 3:23; Acts 2:41-42; 8:35-39; 16:30-33; 20:7; Romans 6:3-5; 1 Corinthians 10:16,21; 11:23-29; Colossians 2:12.
It is the duty and privilege of every follower of Christ and of every church of the Lord Jesus Christ to endeavor to make disciples of all nations. The new birth of man’s spirit by God’s Holy Spirit means the birth of love for others. Missionary effort on the part of all rests thus upon a spiritual necessity of the regenerate life, and is expressly and repeatedly commanded in the teachings of Christ. The Lord Jesus Christ has commanded the preaching of the gospel to all nations. It is the duty of every child of God to seek constantly to win the lost to Christ by verbal witness undergirded by a Christian lifestyle, and by other methods in harmony with the gospel of Christ.
Genesis 12:1-3; Exodus 19:5-6; Isaiah 6:1-8; Matthew 9:37-38; 10:5-15; 13:18-30, 37-43; 16:19; 22:9-10; 24:14; 28:18-20; Luke 10:1-18; 24:46-53; John 14:11-12; 15:7-8,16; 17:15; 20:21; Acts 1:8; 2; 8:26-40; 10:42-48; 13:2-3; Romans 10:13-15; Ephesians 3:1-11; 1 Thessalonians 1:8; 2 Timothy 4:5; Hebrews 2:1-3; 11:39-12:2; 1 Peter 2:4-10; Revelation 22:17.
For a more extensive look at the beliefs we hold, you are encouraged to view the full 2000 Baptist Faith and Message or ask one of the church’s deacons or pastor.
Our church covenant is a statement of promise that we make to one another upon membership. The statements made in the covenant are ways we hold each other accountable the Christian walk in pursuing God in his holiness and grace. The covenant reads as:
We have been bought with the blood of Jesus Christ, and we now live for His purposes. We therefore dedicate ourselves to do God’s will in humility and purity, to walk in the Spirit, to live together in Christian love, to strive for the advancement of ourselves and others in faith, in knowledge, in wisdom, in holiness, and in service, and to support the work of the church in our worship, prayer, discipleship, teaching, giving, doctrine, and ordinances.
We will worship God together regularly.
We will prayerfully and regularly study the Holy Bible both privately and together to discern the will of God for ourselves and for His church and to learn the eternal principles, which undergird our life on Earth.
We will pray to God both privately and together, giving Him thanks for all His gifts, seeking His forgiveness and guidance, and bringing to Him our concerns and requests.
We will live as disciples of Jesus Christ—redeemed sinners in a sinful world. We will be loving, just, and truthful at home, at work, at school, and wherever we go. We will not conform to this world’s self-seeking, self-deceiving ways, but we will instead seek the straight and difficult path spoken of by our Lord, bearing faithful witness to God’s unfailing love.
We will be good stewards of our bodies, because they are temples of the Holy Spirit; we will not abuse ourselves through addiction or excess.
As members of the family of God, we will watch over each other in brotherly love. We will pray for each other, because we are all in need. We will aid each other in times of trouble, bearing each others’ burdens. We will humbly warn a brother who is in danger of falling into disobedience or error. We will speak the truth in love, be slow to take offense, and be eager to seek swift and lasting reconciliation.
We will pray for the salvation of our unsaved relatives, friends, and acquaintances, and of all who are lost.
We will raise our children so that they will know how to live righteously and will be able to recognize God when He makes Himself known to them personally.
We know that we do not stand alone and that cooperation and mutual effort are necessary among Christians. We will therefore support the church of Jesus Christ throughout the world in whatever ways God leads us.
If we leave this church, we will immediately seek to join another with similar purposes and covenants.