I. The Holy Scriptures
I believe in the verbal, plenary inspiration of the Bible. I believe in the Masoretic Text and Textus Receptus manuscripts from which came the King James Bible. The Scriptures reveal God, the fall of man, the way of salvation, and God’s plan and purpose in all ages. The Scriptures are the only authority in all manners of faith and practice.
(2 Timothy 3:16-17; 2 Peter 1:20-21; Isaiah 59:21; Psalms 12:6-7; 119:89)
II. The Godhead
I believe in one Triune God, eternally existing in three persons—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—each co-eternal in being, co-equal in power and glory. I believe God created the universe in six literal, 24-hour periods. I reject evolution, the Gap Theory, the Day-Age Theory, and Theistic Evolution as unscriptural theories of origin. God is personal, spirit, omniscient, sovereign, perfect, immutable, eternal in His being, holiness, love, wisdom and power. I believe that God is absolutely separate and above the world as its Creator, yet everywhere present in the world as the sustainer of all things. God is self-existent and self-revealing in His relationship with His creation.
(Genesis 1:1; Deuteronomy 4:35; 6:4; Matthew 28:19; John 1:1–3, 14; 14:10, 26; Romans 1:2–4; 1 Corinthians 8:6; 2 Corinthians 13:14; Ephesians 4:3–6)
a. The Person and work of the Father
I believe that God the Father is eternal without beginning or end. He is self-existent and before anything came into being God was, and is, and always will be. God is omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, and immutable. He sent his Son, Jesus Christ, to be our Savior, and the Holy Spirit to be our Comforter. (Genesis 1:1; John 1:1-3; Hebrews 1:10; Revelation 19: 6; Job 37:16; Jeremiah 23:24; Hebrews 6:17- 9; John 3:16; John 14:26)
b. The Person and work of Christ
I believe the Lord Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God, is the second person of the Godhead, God in the flesh, virgin born as no other man has ever been born nor ever will be born. He lived an absolutely sinless life and became the sinner’s voluntary substitute on the Cross of Calvary through His vicarious death for man’s sin. Jesus Christ rose from the dead on the third day, giving eternal assurance of redemption’s full payment and the satisfaction of God’s righteous indignation toward sin. He ascended bodily into Heaven and He will come to rapture His saints to be with Himself. His coming for His saints is imminent and will be personal, pretribulational, and premillennial.
(Isaiah 7:14; 1 Thessalonians 4:16; Matthew 1:18; Luke 1:35; John 1:1; 14:3; 2 Corinthians 5:19–21; 1 Peter 2:22; 3:18)
c. The Person and work of the Holy Spirit
I believe that the Holy Spirit is a person, and convicts the world of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment; He is the divine Teacher who aids believers to understand the Scriptures and it is the believers responsibility to be filled with the Holy Spirit. I believe that the sign gifts of the Holy Spirit, such as speaking in tongues and the gift of healing, were temporary.
(John 16:8-11; Ephesians 1:17-18, 5:18; 1 John 2:27; 1 Corinthians 1:22; 13:8; 14:21-22)
III. The Personality of Satan
I believe that Satan is a person, the author of sin and the cause of the Fall of Man, that he is the open and declared enemy of God and man, and that he shall be eternally punished in the Lake of Fire.
(Job 1:6–7; Isaiah 14:12–17; Matthew 4:2–11; 25:41; Revelation 12:7–12; 20:10)
IV. Total depravity of man
I believe that man was created in the image and likeness of God; but that in Adam’s sin the human race fell, inherited a sinful nature, and became alienated from God. Therefore, all men are universally sinful both by nature and choice and devoid of the righteousness required by the law. Man is totally depraved and, of himself, utterly unable to remedy his lost condition.
(Genesis 1:26-27; Romans 3:22-23; 5:12; 6:23; Ephesians 2:1-3; 4:17-19)
V. Salvation
I believe in the salvation of man by grace through faith in the finished work of Christ on the Cross. I believe that salvation is the free gift of God, neither merited nor secured in art nor in whole by any virtue or work of man, but received only by personal faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, in Whom all true believers have as a present possession the gift of eternal life, a perfectly righteous standing, and sonship in the family of God by a new birth. I believe that the Cross of Christ is redemptive, substitutionary, and propitiatory and the only basis of reconciliation for all of mankind who believe and that there is no possible salvation outside of Jesus Christ and His shed blood.
(Matthew 12:31-32; John 1:12; 3:3–6, 16; 10:28, 29; Acts 16:31; Ephesians 1:7; 2:8-10; 1
Peter 1:18-23; 1 Timothy 2: 5, 6)
VI. The Freeness of Salvation
I believe that salvation was accomplished on the Cross by Jesus Christ and is extended to all men as a gift to be received by faith. The basis of this salvation is totally the grace that provided the Cross. Although all men are responsible to receive the gift of salvation in Christ, only those who do respond to the ministry of the Spirit of God in the presentation of the Gospel will be saved. Salvation is the free and completed gift of God to all who will believe.
(John 1:12; 3:16; 5:24; 12:46; Acts 16:31; Romans 10:11–13)
VII. Eternal Security
I believe that all the redeemed, once saved, are kept by God’s power and are thus secure in Christ forever.
(John 6:37-40; 10:27-30; Romans 8:1, 38-39; 1 Corinthians 1:4-8; 1 Pet. 1:4-5)
VIII. The Church
I believe that the local church is a called-out assembly of born again baptized believers that are living in a local region, who assemble together regularly to worship the Lord, to pray, to observe the two ordinances of baptism and the Lord supper, and to reproduce disciples of Christ. I believe in the autonomy of the local church free of any external authority or control and that it is to be self-propagating through local and world evangelism. The local church is to be led by the pastor and assisted by the deacons and supported by the members.
(2 Timothy 2:2; Matthew 28:18-20; Hebrews 10:25; 1 Corinthians 3:9, 16; 5:4-7, 13; 16:3; Acts 13:1-4; 15:19-31; 20:28; Romans 16:1, 4; 1 Peter 5:1-5; 1 Timothy 3)
IX. Separation
I believe that all the saved should live in such a manner as not to bring reproach upon their Savior and Lord. God commands His people to separate from all religious apostasy (including all types of witchcraft and the occult), all worldly and sinful pleasures, practices, and associations, and to refrain from all immodest and immoderate appearances, piercings, and bodily markings.
(Romans 12:1-2; 14:13; 2 Corinthians 6:14-7:1; 2 Timothy 3:1-5; 1 John 2:15-17; 2 John 9-11; Leviticus 19:28; 1 Corinthians 6:19-20)
X. The Second Advent of Christ
I believe in that blessed hope, the personal, imminent return of Christ Who will rapture His church prior to the seven-year tribulation period. At the end of the Tribulation, Christ will personally and visibly return with His saints, to establish His earthly Messianic Kingdom which was promised to the nation of Israel.
(Psalm 89:3-4; Daniel 2:31-45; Zechariah 14:4-11; I Thessalonians 1:10; 4:13-18; Titus 2:13; Revelation 3:10; 19:11-16; 20:1-6)
XI. The Eternal State
-I believe in the bodily resurrection of all men, the saved to eternal life, and the unsaved to judgment and everlasting punishment.
(Matthew 25:46; John 5:28, 29; 11:25-26; Revelation 20:5-6, 12-13)
-I believe that the souls of the redeemed are, at death, absent from the body and present with the Lord, where in conscious bliss they await the first resurrection, when spirit, soul, and body are reunited to be glorified forever with the Lord.
(Luke 23:43; 2 Corinthians 5:8; Philippians 1:23; 3:21; I Thessalonians 4:16-17; Revelation 20:4-6)
-I believe that the souls of unbelievers remain, after death, in conscious punishment and torment until the second resurrection, when with soul and body reunited, they shall appear at the Great White Throne Judgment, and shall be cast into the Lake of Fire, not to be an-nihilated, but to suffer everlasting conscious punishment and torment.
(Matthew 25:41-46; Mark 9:43-48; Luke 16:19-26; 2 Thessalonians 1:7-9; Jude 6-7; Revelation 20:11-15)
XII. Civil Government
I believe that God has ordained and created all authority consisting of three basic institutions: 1) the home, 2) the church, and 3) the state. Every person is subject to these authorities, but all (including the authorities themselves) are answerable to God and governed by His Word. God has given each institution specific Biblical responsibilities and balanced those responsibilities with the understanding that no institution has the right to infringe upon the other. The home, the church, and the state are equal and sovereign in their respective Biblically assigned spheres of responsibility under God.
(Romans 13:1-7; Eph. 5:22-24; Hebrews 13:17; 1 Peter 2:13-14)
XIII. Human Sexuality
I believe that God has commanded that no intimate sexual activity be engaged in outside of a marriage between a man and a woman. I believe that any form of homosexuality, lesbianism, bisexuality, bestiality, incest, fornication, adultery, and pornography are sinful perversions of God’s gift of sex. I believe that God disapproves of and forbids any attempt to alter one’s gender by surgery or appearance.
(Genesis 2:24; 19:5, 13; 26:8-9; Leviticus 18:1-30; Romans 1: 26-29; 1 Corinthians 5:1; 6:9; 1 Thessalonians 4:1-8; Hebrews 13:4)
I believe that the only legitimate marriage is the joining of one man and one woman.
(Genesis 2:24; Romans 7:2; 1 Corinthians 7:10; Ephesians 5:22–23)
XIV. Love
I believe that we should demonstrate love for others, not only toward fellow believers but also toward both those who are not believers and those who oppose us. We are to deal with those who oppose us graciously, gently, patiently, and humbly. God forbids the stirring up of strife, the taking of revenge, or the threat or the use of violence as a means of resolving personal conflict or obtaining personal justice. Although God commands us to abhor sinful actions, we are to love and pray for any person who engages in such
sinful actions.
(Leviticus 19:18; Matthew 5:44–48; Luke 6:31; John 13:34–35; Romans 12:9–10, 17–21; 13:8–10; Philippians 2:2–4; 2 Timothy 2:24–26; Titus 3:2; 1 John 3:17–18)
Reaching Portland 