First United Methodist Church Core Beliefs

Bible

In thinking about our faith, we put primary reliance on the Bible. It’s the unique testimony to God’s self-disclosure in the life of Israel; in the ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus the Christ; and in the Spirit’s work in the early church. It’s our sacred canon and, thus, the decisive source of our Christian witness and the authoritative measure of the truth in our beliefs.

In our theological journey we study the Bible within the believing community. Even when we study it alone, we’re guided and corrected through dialogue with other Christians. We interpret individual texts in light of their place in the Bible as a whole. We use concordances, commentaries, and other aids prepared by the scholars. With the guidance of the Holy Spirit, we try to discern both the original intention of the text and its meaning for our own faith and life.

God

We believe in one God, Creator of all, holy, sovereign, eternal, existing in three equal Persons, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

Jesus Christ

We believe in the absolute and essential deity of our Lord Jesus Christ

• In His existence since the beginning (John 1:1) with the Father
• In His work of creation, in His virgin birth, sinless life, substitutionary death and bodily resurrection
• In His triumphant ascension, mediatorial ministry and personal return

The Holy Spirit

We believe in the absolute and essential deity, and in the personality of the Holy Spirit

• Who convinces of sin, of righteousness and of judgment
• Who regenerates, indwells, seals, sanctifies, illuminates and comforts those who believe in Jesus Christ
• Who baptizes believers at conversion into the Body of Christ and bestows upon them His gifts sovereignly as He wills and fills those yielded to Him

Mankind

We believe that Adam was divinely created in the image of God

• That by the sin of disobedience he fell from that state
• That all his posterity inherited spiritual depravity and defilement
• That all men therefore are guilty before God and condemned to physical and spiritual death

Salvation

We believe that salvation is by the sovereign grace of God

• That by the Father, Christ voluntarily suffered a propitiatory death
• That justification is by faith alone in the all-sufficient sacrifice and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ
• That those whom God has effectually called shall be divinely preserved and ultimately perfected in the image of the Lord