What We Believe:
The following comprise the Scriptural beliefs of Calvary Baptist Church and its members.
The Scriptures
We believe that the Bible, both Old and New Testaments, is the verbally inspired Word of God in the original autographs, and is the absolute and only rule and authority for faith and practice. It is the special revelation of God to man and the only basis for true Christian unity. The Word of God is supernaturally preserved in translation and the translators of the King James Version were used of God to give us the Word of God in the English language. We exclusively use this in all teaching and preaching.
II Timothy 3:16, 17; II Peter 1:19-21; Matthew 5:18; Hebrews 4:12; Acts 1:16; John 10:35; 16:12, 13; 17:17; Mark 12:36
The Godhead
We believe the only true and living God is a triune God, eternally existing in three persons; the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. He is absolute in His attributes and glorious in His perfection. God is personal, spirit, omniscient, sovereign, perfect, immutable, eternal in being, holiness, love, wisdom, and power. We 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; John 1:1-3; Matthew 28:19; Romans 1:2-4; Deuteronomy 4:35; 6:4; Ephesians 4:3-6; I Corinthians 8:6
The Person and Work of Christ
We believe the eternal Son became flesh in the virgin birth and that He was Deity and lived a sinless life. His death was vicarious and after He was buried He arose bodily from the dead and ascended into Heaven. He now sits at the right hand of God as our Great High Priest, “ever living to make intercession for us.”
Isaiah 7:14; I Thessalonians 4:16; Matthew 1:18; Luke 1:35; John 1:1; 14:3; I Peter 2:22; 3:18
The Person and Work of the Holy Spirit
We believe that the Holy Spirit is the person whose task is to glorify God by convicting men of sin, drawing them unto Christ, and regenerating those who believe on Him. The Holy Spirit also empowers believers for the work of the ministry. He comforts and guides them in their Christian walk. We believe the Bible repudiates the emphasis upon speaking in tongues and general practices as any ministry of the Holy Spirit. We also believe that His testimony isn’t of Himself but of Jesus Christ and the redemptive truths centered in Christ.
John 14:16, 17; 16:8; Ephesians 1:13, 14; I Corinthians 3:16; Romans 8:9; Acts 5:3-4; I Corinthians 12:13; I Corinthians 14
The Way of Salvation
We believe that salvation is wholly of grace and that Jesus Christ is the only way of salvation. Salvation is through the finished work of Christ on the cross and that it is the free gift of God which is neither merited, nor secured through the works of man. It is received only by personal faith in Christ and His shed blood on the cross. We believe that all who will repent of sin, trusting Christ alone are saved, made perfectly righteous before God, and given the standing of sonship by the new birth into God’s family. We believe that there is no possible salvation outside of Christ and His shed blood.
John 3:3-6, 16; 10:28-29 Acts 16:31; Ephesians 2:8-10; I Timothy 2:5-6; I Peter 1:18-23; Hebrews 9:22
The Security of the Believer
We believe that once a person is saved, he is eternally saved. We believe that the blood of Christ cleanses from all sin by the substitutionary atonement of Christ. It is complete and final and the believer can never perish after trusting Christ. This gives the believer freedom to serve Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit within him. He is secure because God has taken the responsibility for his eternal destiny.
John 10:27-30; I John 2:1-2; Romans 8:31-39; I Corinthians 6:19; Hebrews 2:10; Philippians 1:6
The Church
We believe that the New Testament church is a local assembly of baptized believers who have voluntarily joined themselves together to carry out the Great Commission. The Lord is doing His work in this world through local churches. The establishment and continuance of local churches is clearly taught and defined in the New Testament Scriptures.
Acts 14:27; 20:17, 28-32; I Timothy 3:1-13; Titus 1:5-11
We believe in the autonomy of the local church free of any external authority or control. Christ is the only head of the church.
Acts 13:1-4, 15:19-31, 20:28; Romans 16:1, 4; I Corinthians 3:9,16; 5:4-7,13; I Peter 5:1-4
The Ordinances of the Church
We recognize the ordinances of baptism by immersion in water and the Lord’s Supper as a Scriptural means of testimony for local churches in this age.
Matthew. 28:19-20; Acts 2:41-42, 18:18; I Corinthians 11:23-26
Biblical Separation
We believe that all the saved should live in such a manner as not to bring reproach upon their Saviour and Lord; and, that separation from all religious apostasy, all worldly and sinful pleasures, practices and associations is commanded of God.
II Timothy 3:1-5; Romans 12:1, 2, 14:13; I John 2:15-17; II John 9-11; II Corinthians 6:14-7:1
The Doctrine of Heaven and Hell
We believe in the eternal blessedness of the saved in a literal place called Heaven and the eternal punishment of the unsaved in a literal place called the Lake of Fire. The saved go immediately to Heaven when they die and will be judged in relationship of rewards following the rapture of the church. This will take place at the BEMA. At death, the unsaved are held in Hell until the time of the Great White Throne judgement when they will be raised in bodily form and cast into the Lake of Fire, which is their place of final and everlasting punishment.
John 5:28, 29; 14:2; Luke 16:19-31; Revelation 20:14,15; 21:4; Matthew 25:46; I Corinthians 3:12-15
Our Eternal State
We 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
We 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; Revelation 20:4-6; II Corinthians 5:8; Philippians 1:23, 3:21; I Thessalonians 4:16-17
We believe that the souls of unbelievers remain, after death, in conscious misery 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 annihilated, but to suffer everlasting, conscious punishment.
Luke 16:19-26; Matthew 25:41-46; II Thessalonians 1:7-9; Jude 6-7; Mark 9:43-48; Revelation 20:11-15
The Return of Christ
We believe the “Blessed Hope” of our Lord’s return is literal, personal, visible, and imminent. We believe in a premillennial, pre-tribulation rapture of the church. The next event on God’s prophetic calendar will be the rapture of the church. This will be followed by the “seventieth week of Daniel” which is called the Tribulation. At the end of this period of seven years, the Lord Jesus will return bodily to the earth; this is called the Second Coming of Christ. He will establish a theocratic kingdom on the earth for 1000 years. Satan is bound during this time but will be released at the end of the 1000 year reign to be cast into the Lake of Fire.
I Thessalonians 4:13-18; Titus 2:13; I Thessalonians 1:10; Revelation 3:10; Zechariah 14:4-11; Revelation 19:11-16, 20:1-6; Psalm 89:3-4; Daniel 9:25-27