What we believe

We believe the Old and New Testament are the verbally and plenarily inspired word of God. Being fully persuaded that the Holy Scriptures are inerrant, infallible and God-breathed and are therefore the final authority for all faith and life and are the ultimate constitution for His church. The sixty-six books of the Old Testament and New Testament are the complete and divine revelation of God to man. The scriptures are interpreted literally by consistently applying the rules of grammar, literature, history, and culture in order to unlock and understand the authors meaning. This method of interpretation recognizes the fact that the authors of the scriptures were divinely inspired. We, as the ministry partners of City Soul Ministries, joyfully pursue the exaltation of Christ in the life of the church through the constitution outlined in the pages. We believe that the Bible is without error and is our ultimate authority. It is God’s spoken word to us. (2 Timothy 3:16-17; 2 Peter 1:20-21; Hebrews 4:12)

We also believe that the scripture interpreted in their natural, literal sense reveal divinely determined decrees or rules of life that define mans’ responsibilities before a Holy God and are absolute and applicable to all people, in all places, and all ages (past, present, and future.) The scripture not only reveals the way of salvation, but they are divinely ordered through which God directs man according to His purpose and are presented therewith in: The Law, the Prophets, Wisdom literature, the Gospels, Epistles, and Revelation. (Deut. 4:1-2, 44-45; Deut 30:1-20; Ezra 9:5-11; Ps 11:10, Prov 1:1-7; Prov 3:1-26; Mark 1:1; Matt 24:14; Mark 16:15; Luke 16:16; John 20:30-31, Luke 24:25-27, 1 Pet 1:10-13; 2 Pet 1:16-21; Gal 3:22-24; Eph 3:1-13; 1 Tim 3:16; Rev 22:10-21)

We believe in one triune God, eternally existing in three persons-Father, Son, and Holy spirit- each co-eternal in being, co-identical in nature, co-equal in power and glory, and having the same attributes and perfections. Each functions differently with respect to Gods dealing with man.
(Deut. 6:4; Eph 4:4-6) 

The Father – The first person of the Trinity orders and directs all things according to His own purpose, pleasure, and grace. He has decreed all things that come to pass are for His own glory. He graciously involves Himself in the affairs of men, hears and answers prayer, and saves from sin and death all who come to Him through Jesus Christ. (Matt 6:9; John 5:19-24; Eph. 1:3-6)

The Son – Jesus Christ is both the eternal Son of God and the virgin-born son of man. Fully God and fully man, He surrendered nothing of His deity during His early life. Having led a sinless life, He satisfied the father’s justice concerning sin by his death. We believe in His bodily resurrection, His physical ascension, and His visible return to this earth to establish His earthly kingdom. (1 Cor.15; Heb 2:17-18; Rom. 3:24-26: Col. 2:9; John 1:14-18: Rev. 20:11-15)

The holy spirit – The third person of the Trinity executes the will of God in the world of men. The holy spirit applies the salvation Jesus Christ secured through his death on the cross and convicts the world of sin, righteousness, and judgment. The holy spirit empowers the church to live a lifestyle that is pleasing to God, endowing it with special gifts that equip believers to accomplish distinct ministries that were planned by God the Father. ( 1 Cor. 12; Eph. 2:10, John 3:1-8; John 16:4-15; Eph. 1:13-14, 2:8-10; John 15:16; Gal. 5:16-25)

The person and work of Christ– We humbly submit to him who is the head of his body and the only lawgiver for his church that is in all things Christ might have first place and final say. (Eph. 1:22-23; Jas. 4:12, Col 1:18) We believe that the Lord Jesus Christ, the eternal son of God, became man without ceasing to be God, having been conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary, so that he might reveal God and redeem sinful man. (Isah. 7:14; Luke 1:35; John 1:1-2, 14, Cor. 5:19-21; Gal 4:4-5, Phil 2:5-8) We believe that the Lord Jesus Christ accomplished our redemption through his death on the cross as a representative, vicarious, substitutionary sacrifice and that our justification is made by his literal, physical resurrection from the dead. (Acts 2:18-36; Romans 3:24-25; Eph. 1:7; 1 Pet 1:3-5) We believe that the Lord Jesus Christ ascended to heaven and is now exalted at the right hand of God where, as our high priest, he fulfills the ministry of representative, intercessor, and advocate. (Acts 1:9-10, Romans 8:34, Heb. 9:24, 1 John 2:1-2)

The person and work of the Holy Spirit – We believe that the Holy Spirit is a person who convicts the world of sin, of righteousness, and judgment; and, that he is the supernatural agent in regeneration, baptizing all believers into the body of Christ, indwelling and sealing them unto the day of redemption. (John 11:6-8, Romans 8:9; 1 Cor. 12:12-14, 2 Cor. 3:6; Eph 1:13-14). We believe that he is the divine teacher who assists believers to understand and appropriate the Scriptures and that it is the privilege and duty of all the saved to be filled with the spirit. (Eph 1:17-18, 5:18; 1 John 2:20, 27) We believe that God is sovereign in the bestowal of spiritual gifts to every believer. God uniquely uses evangelists, pastors, and teachers to equip believers in the church to do the work of the ministry. (Romans 12:3-8; 1 Cor. 12:4-11, 28; Eph 4:7-12) We believe that the sign gifts of the holy spirit, (I.E. speaking in tongues, miraculous signs, and wonders) served to authentic the Apostles of Jesus Christ, whom he called, endowed with his power and authority, and appointed as the foundation of his church, and therefore were specific to the first century apostolic age. Ultimate deliverance of the body from sickness or death awaits the consummation of our salvation in the resurrection, although God does frequently choose to answer the prayers of believers for physical healing. (1 Cor. 1:22, 13:8, 14:21-22)

We believe that man was directly created in the image and likeness of God to enjoy His fellowship and to fulfill Gods will on this earth. Man fell into sin by a voluntary act of personal disobedience to the will of God; consequently, all men are spiritually dead, alienated from God, and subject to the certainty of both physical and spiritual death apart from Jesus Christ. The fall of man was a once for all historical fact. Its spiritually deadening effect spread to all men, each of whom is born with a sinful nature and sins habitually in thought, word and deed. (Genesis 1:26-27; Genesis 2:7; Genesis 3:3-4; Romans 1:18-32; Romans 3:10-23; Eph 2:1-3, 4:17-19)

We believe that Jesus Christ died for our sins as the only sufficient sacrifice. All who believe in Him are declared justified by the father on the grounds of Jesus’ death and resurrection. All who repent and receive the Lord Jesus Christ by grace through faith have been regenerated by and baptized in the holy spirit. They are thereby the children of God forever and members in the one true church, the body of Christ. This salvation results in righteous living and good works as the believer submits his life to the word of God and the direction of the holy spirit. (John 14:6; Titus, 3:4-7; Acts 4:12; John 1:12; Romans 3:21-26; 1 Cor. 15:1-4; Eph. 1:7, 2:2-9; Heb. 10:10-12; 1 John 5:11-13; Gal. 3:26, John 1:12, 3:16, 5:24)

We believe that all who have been regenerated by the Holy Spirit belong to the one true church and are directed by the Scriptures to associate themselves in local, visible churches. The local church is the only visible representation of Christ’s invisible church and consists of regenerated, born-again believers. The two-fold purpose of the church is to lead men to Christ and mature them in faith. (Heb. 10:24-25; Acts 2:41-47, 4:1-16; 1 Cor 12-14; Matt 16:13-28, 28:18-20; Eph 2:19-22, 24; 1 Thess. 4:15-17; John 14:1-3; Acts 2:9-11) We believe the local church is autonomous in its relationship, free of any external authority or controls. Any affiliations, societies, organizations, associations or agencies this church affiliates with to further the objective stated. We believe the local church to be autonomous in the election of its members to the biblical offices of elder, deacon, and leadership team. (1 Tim 3, 5:17-25)

We believe that believers should maintain a Godly testimony and live in such a way that their lives do not bring reproach upon their Savior. God commands his people to separate from all religious apostasy, all worldly and sinful pleasures, practices, and associations, and to refrain from all immodest and immoderate philosophies that seek to destroy or undermine the truth of Biblically Christianity. (Lev. 19:28; Rom. 12:1-2, 14:13; 1 Cor 6:19-20, 2 Cor. 6:14, 7:1; Eph 5:1-5; 2 Tim. 3:15; 1 John 2:15-17; 2 John 9-11)

We believe that baptism is an essential first step for a believer who seeks to become a disciple of Jesus Christ who commissioned His church to go into the world, make disciples, and baptize them in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. (Matt 28:19). We uphold the act of baptism as a sacred, uncompromisable induction of the scriptures. Every believer, serious about his or her faith, will follow Christ in obedience to His command to be baptized. Baptism declares a variety of scriptural truths – It proclaims Christ’s death and resurrection (1 Cor. 15:1-4). It serves public notice to the world of one’s new life in Christ (Matt 10:32) It pictures a believer’s death to sin and his resurrection to spiritual life and lifestyle through the power of the holy spirit. (Rom 6:3-7, 10-11) Our method of baptism is immersion. We feel strongly that this mode is the one presented in the New Testament for the following reasons; The Greek word for baptism means: “To submerge, plunge, drench, saturate, dip.”  Immersion followed the Jewish proselyte practice. The practice of the early church was immersion. The command of scriptures is to “be baptized.” By it, we both please the Lord and declare His reality in our lives and to the world.

We believe that the Genesis account of creation is neither allegory nor myth, but a literal, historical account of God’s creation of the universe in six literal 24-hour periods. We reject evolution, the Gap Theory, the Day-age theory, and the Theistic evolution as unscriptural theories of origin. (Gen.1-2; Ex 20:11)

We 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; Isa 14:12-17; Matt 4:2-11, 25:41; Rev 20:10)

We believe in the bodily resurrection of all men, the saved to eternal life, and the unsaved to judgment and everlasting punishment. (Matt 25:46; Jn 5:28-29, 11:25-26; Rev 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 and glorified forever with the Lord. (Luke 23:43; 2 Cor 5:8; Phil 1:23, 3:21; 1 Thess. 4:16-17; Rev 20:4-6) We believe that the souls of unbelievers remain, after death, in conscious punishment and torment until the second resurrection, when with the soul and body reunited, they shall appear at the Great White Throne of Judgment and shall be cast into the Lake of Fire, not to be annihilated, but to suffer everlasting conscious punishment and torment. (Matt 25:41-46; Mark 9:43-48; Luke 16:19-26; 2 Thess 1:7-9; Jude 6-7; Rev 20:11-15)

We believe the Lord’s supper is summed up in the command of Christ, “Do this in remembrance of me.” It is first and foremost the memorial of Christ and his redemptive death, and secondly an expression of our fellowship with one another. We believe the Lord’s supper is open to all who meet the prerequisites outlined in the Scripture, that one knows Jesus Christ as Savior and that they have a cleansed life. We corporately share the Lord’s supper accordingly to the Scriptural guidelines, “as often as you do this, do this in remembrance of Me.” (Luke 22:19; 1 Cor 11:24-25; Ps. 24:3-4; 1 Cor. 11:17-34)

We believe that God has ordained the family as the foundational institution of human society. It is composed of persons related to one another by marriage, blood, or adoption. We believe that God wonderfully and immutably creates each person as a male or female. These two distinct, complementary genders together reflect the image and nature of God. Marriage is the uniting of one man born a man and one woman born a woman in covenant commitment for a lifetime. It is God’s unique gift to reveal the union between Christ and His church and to provide for the man and the woman in marriage the framework for intimate companionship, the channel of sexual expression according to biblical standards, and the means for procreation of the human race. It is therefore not lawful for any man to have more than one wife, or for any woman to have more than one husband at the same time. It is the duty of Christians to marry in the Lord. We believe that God intends sexual intimacy to only occur between one man and one woman who are married to each other and that God has commanded that no intimate sexual activity be engaged in outside of a marriage between a man and a woman. Therefore, any form of sexual immorality, such as adultery, fornication, homosexual conduct, bisexual conduct, bestiality, incest, any use of pornography, or any attempt to alter (i.e. identifying or expressing a gender identity that does not match a person’s physical/genetic sex) or change one’s physical/genetic sex, is against the design of God and is therefore sin. We are all broken in our sin and are in great need of acceptance by God through the atoning work of Jesus Christ. We are all guilty sinners who have rebelled against a Holy God and who desperately need to respond to Christ in repentant faith. It is the awareness of our sin that reveals our need for redemption in Christ. Self-acceptance must not replace repentance and the liberating love of Christ that delivers us from bondage to our sins. Faith, sin, and repentance are Christ-directed. By God’s grace, love, and the provision of His Son’s death upon the cross, all who will, can receive salvation and forgiveness of sin.

(Gen 1:26-28; 2:15-25; 3:1-20; Exodus 20:12; Leviticus 20:10-24; Deut. 6:4-9; Josh 24:15; 1 Sam 1:26-28; Psalms 51:5; 78:1-8; 127; 128; 139:13-16; Prov 1:8; 5:15-20; 6:20-22; 12:4: 13:24; 14:1: 17:6; 18:22; 22:6, 15; 23:13-14; 24:3; 29:15, 17; 31:10-31; Eccl. 4:9-12; 9:9: Malachi 2:14-16; Matt 5:31-32; 18:2-5; 19:3-9; Mark 10:6-12; Rom. 1:18-32; 1 Cor. 6:9-11; 1 Cort. 7:1-16; Eph. 5:1-12; 5:21-33; 6:1-4; Col. 3:18-21; 1 Tim. 5:8,14; 2 Tim. 1:3-5; Titus 2:3-5; Heb 13:4; 1 Peter 3:1-7; Rev. 21:5-8.)

We believe that God is a relational God and we who are created in His image are to be relational beings, both with those inside the church community and outside the church community. (Genesis 1:26-28; Acts 2:44-46)

We believe that the body of Christ (the Church) is a living organism and all living things are to reproduce. We will be a church that is dedicated to the reproduction of other churches (Church Planting). This is the means to make disciples that make disciples. (Matthew 28:19-20; Romans 12:4-8)

We believe that excellence honors God and inspires people. We believe we are to do all we do for God’s glory and we are to finish well. (2 Timothy 4:7)

We believe that the family is one of God’s means to spread the Christian faith. We seek to create an atmosphere that strengthens families and places God and the center of our relationships. (2 Timothy 1:5)

We believe that we are to attempt to communicate the good news of Jesus Christ by relating to the culture without compromising biblical absolutes. We are to be culturally relevant while remaining biblically pure. (1 Corinthians 9:19-23)

We believe that prayer is one way we communicate with God and that we will be a people of prayer in all that we do from beginning to end. (Matthew 7:2-11; James 5:13-18)

We believe that believers in Jesus Christ are indwelled by the Spirit of God. We believe that the Spirit of God is convicting us and growing us into the likeness of Jesus Christ. (2 Corinthians 13:18)