Picture
A STATEMENT OF THE REFORMED FAITH
​An updated version of the BRIEF STATEMENT OF THE REFORMED FAITH, General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America, adopted May 22, 1902.


​GOD
  • We believe in the ever-living God, who is a Spirit and the Father of our spirits.
  • He is infinite, eternal, unchangeable.
  • He is just, holy, wise, merciful, full of love and compassion, and abundant in goodness and truth.
  • We worship God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit - one in substance, equal in power and glory.

HOW GOD IS REVEALED
  • We believe that God is revealed in nature, in history, and in the human heart.
  • But more importantly we believe that God makes Himself known definitively by men and women as they were moved by the Holy Spirit and in Jesus Christ the Word-made-flesh - the expressed image of the Living God.
  • The Bible is given to us by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and is a faithful record of God's interaction with humanity. We hold to the scriptures as the infallible rule of faith and life.

OUR ETERNAL PURPOSE
  • We believe that the eternal, wise, holy, and loving purpose of God embraces all events, so that while human freedom is not taken away, God is not the originator of sin; yet His providence makes all things work together in fulfillment of His sovereign design and for the manifestation of His glory.
  • We humbly acknowledge the mystery of this truth and trust His protecting care and set our hearts to do His will.

THE CREATION
  • We believe that God is the creator, upholder, and governor of all things.  He maintains all things by the word of His power.  He is above His works, yet is in them all.
  • God made men and women in His own image, especially suited them for fellowship with Himself, free and able to choose between good and evil, and forever responsible to their Maker and Lord.

HUMAN SIN AND BROKENNESS
  • We believe that our first parents, being tempted, chose evil, and so fell away from God and come under the power of sin, the penalty of which is eternal death.
  • We confess that, by reason of disobedience, that all are born with a sinful nature (automatically alienated from God), and that all have broken God's law (deserving of God's judgment).
  • No one can be saved but by God's grace through Jesus Christ, and Him alone.

THE GRACE OF GOD AND HUMAN RESTORATION (Salvation)
  • We believe that God out of His great love has given His one and only Son to be the Savior of sinners.
  • In the gospel God freely offers His all-sufficient salvation to the human race.
  • Whereas the wages of sin is death; the free gift of God is eternal life through our Lord Jesus Christ.
  • We believe that God, from before the creation of the world, gave to His Son a people, chosen unto holiness, service and salvation.
  • We believe that all who come to the years of accountability can receive salvation only through faith and repentance.
  • We also believe that those who die in infancy and others given by the Father to the Son who are outside the reach of the means of grace, are regenerated and saved by Christ through the Spirit, who works when and where and how He pleases.

JESUS CHRIST
  • We believe in and confess the Lord Jesus Christ, the only Mediator between God and every human being.  He is the Eternal Son of God, the expressed image of the Father in whom all the fullness of God dwells in bodily form.  
  • For us and for our salvation He became truly human, being conceived by the Holy Spirit, without sin. 
  • He has perfectly revealed the Father to us.  By His Word and Spirit He has made known the perfect will of God. 
  • By His death on the cross Jesus fulfilled all righteousness and satisfied eternal justice, taking away the sins of the world. 
  • For us Jesus rose from the dead and ascended into heaven, where He is enthroned and where He intercedes for us. 
  • In our hearts, joined to Him by faith, He abides forever as the indwelling Christ.  He rules in us and over us. 
  • To Him we render love, obedience, and adoration as our Prophet, Priest, and King forever.

FAITH AND REPENTANCE
  • We believe that God pardons our sins and accepts us as righteous solely on the grounds of the perfect obedience and sacrifice of Christ by faith alone. 
  • His saving faith is always accompanied by repentance, in which we confess and forsake our sins with the purpose and pursuit of a new obedience to God.

THE HOLY SPIRIT
  • We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord and Giver of Life, who moves everywhere upon human hearts to restrain evil and incite good. 
  • The Father is eager to give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him. 
  • We believe that He, the Holy Spirit, has spoken to holy men and women in making known God's timely and timeless truth.
  • Through our risen and ascended Savior the Holy Spirit has been sent forth to convict the world of sin, to give men and women the sure and saving knowledge of Jesus Christ, and to persuade and enable them to obey the call of the Gospel.
  • The Holy Spirit abides with the Church, dwelling in every born again believer as the Spirit of truth, holiness, and comfort.

THE NEW BIRTH AND THE NEW LIFE
  • We believe that the Holy Spirit is the only source of our new birth in Jesus.  Unless a man or woman is born again, that person cannot see the kingdom of God.  We rejoice that He has given to us the status of being a child of God. 
  • He keeps loving fellowship with us.
  • He helps us in our weaknesses and purges us from our faults. 
  • He continues His work within us until we are perfected (fully developed) in the likeness of Christ in the glory of the life to come.

THE RESURRECTION AND THE LIFE TO COME
  • We believe that in the life to come the spirits of the just, at death, are made free from sin and enjoy immediate communion with God and the vision of His glory. 
  • We confidently look for the resurrection of the dead at the last day, when the bodies of those who sleep in Christ shall be fashioned in the likeness of the glorious body of their Lord. 
  • The redeemed and raised shall rule and reign with Him forever!

THE LAW OF GOD
  • We believe that the law of God, revealed in the Ten Commandments, and more clearly in the words of Jesus, is forever established in truth, so that no human work shall abide except it be build on this foundation. 
  • We believe that God requires every person to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with God.  Only through this harmony with the will of God can there be a fulfillment of the kingdom of God in our midst.

THE SACRAMENTS OF BAPTISM AND OF THE LORD'S SUPPER (Communion)
  • We believe in the Holy Catholic (universal) Church, over which Jesus Christ is the only Head. 
  • We believe that the invisible Church consists of all those redeemed by His blood. 
  • We believe that the visible Church consists of all who make genuine confession of the Lordship of Christ.  
  • We receive into communion all who confess and obey Christ as their Savior and Lord.  We hold fellowship with all believers in Him.
  • We receive the sacraments of Baptism and the Lord's Supper, alone divinely established and committed to the Church, together with the Word, as means of grace made effective only by the Holy Spirit and used by believers with prayer and praise to God.

THE LAST JUDGMENT
  • We believe that the Lord Jesus Christ will come again in His glorious majesty to judge the world and to make a final separation between the righteous and the wicked. 
  • The wicked shall receive what is just for their sins and for their rejection of God in eternal punishment. 
  • The Lord will manifest the glory of His mercy in the salvation of His people and their entrance upon the full enjoyment of eternal life.

CHRISTIAN SERVICE AND FINAL TRIUMPH
  • We believe that it is our duty, as servants and friends of Christ, to do good unto all, to maintain the public and private worship of God, to hallow the Lord's day, to preserve the sanctity of the family, to uphold the legitimate authority of the State, and so to live in all honesty, purity, and love in lives that testify to the Lord Jesus. 
  • We joyfully receive the Word of Christ, as He sends His people to go to all nations and cultures and make disciples, declaring that God is in Christ reconciling the world to Himself and that He would all men and women be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth. 
  • We confidently trust that by His power and grace God's enemies and ours shall be finally overcome, and the kingdoms of this world be under the Lordship of Christ. 
  • It is in this faith we live.  It is in this service we labor.  It is in this hope we pray: "Come, Lord Jesus!"