We Are a Christian People
We are united with all believers
in proclaiming
the Lordship of Jesus Christ.
We believe
that in divine love, God offers
to all people
forgiveness of sins and restored
relationship.
In being reconciled to God, we
believe that
we are also to be reconciled
to one another
loving each other as we have
been loved by
God, forgiving each other as
we have been
foigiven by God. We believe that
our life
together is to exemplify the
character of
Christ. We stand with Christians
everywhere
in affirming the historic Trinitarian
creeds
and beliefs of the Christian
faith and deeply
value our heritage in the Wesleyan-Holiness
tradition. We look to Scripture
as the primary
source of spiritual truth confirmed
by reason,
tradition, and experience.
With all the people of God we
confess and
praise Jesus Christ the Lord.
Jesus Christ is the Lord of the
Church, which,
as the Apostles' Creed tells
us, is one,
holy, universal, and apostolic.
In Jesus
Christ and through the Holy Spirit,
God the
Father offers forgiveness of
sin and reconciliation
to all the world. Those who respond
to God's
offer in faith become the people
of God.
Having been forgiven and reconciled
in Christ,
we forgive and are reconciled
to one another.
In this way, we are Christ's
Church and Body
and reveal the unity of that
Body. As the
one Body of Christ, we have "one
Lord,
one faith, one baptism."
We affirm the
unity of Christ's Church and
strive in all
things to preserve it (Ephesians
4:5, 3).
Jesus Christ is the holy Lord.
For this reason,
Christ's Church is not only one
but also
holy. It is to be holy in its
parts and in
its totality holy in its members
as it is
in its Head. The Church is both
holy and
called to be holy. It is holy
because it
is the Body of Christ, who has
become for
us righteousness and holiness.
It is called
to become holy by God, who chose
us before
the foundation of the world that
we should
be holy and blameless. As Christ's
one Body,
our life together as a church
should embody
the holy character of Christ,
who emptied
himself and took on the form
of a slave.
We affirm the holiness of Christ's
Church,
both as a gift and as a calling.
Jesus Christ is the Lord of the
Church. For
this reason, the Church is not
only one and
holy but also universal, including
all who
affirm the essential beliefs
of the Christian
faith. We affirm the apostolic
faith that
has been held by all Christians,
everywhere
and at all times. We embrace
John Wesley's
concept of the universal spirit,
by which
we have fellowship with all those
who affirm
the vital center of Scripture,
and we extend
toleration to those who disagree
with us
on matters not essential to salvation.
Jesus Christ is the Lord of the
Scriptures.
For this reason, the Church is
not only one,
holy, and universal but also
apostolic. It
is built on the foundation of
the apostles
and prophets and continually
devotes itself
to the apostles' teaching. The
Church especially
looks to the Scriptures, which
are the Church's
only norm of faith and life.
The Lordship
of Jesus over the Scriptures
means that we
are to understand the Scriptures
through
the witness of the Holy Spirit
as they testify
to Jesus. To confirm and correct
our understanding
of the Scriptures, we honor and
heed the
ancient creeds and other voices
of the Christian
tradition that faithfully explain
the Scriptures.
We also allow our understanding
of the Scriptures
to be guided by the voice of
the Holy Spirit
speaking to us in repentance,
faith, and
assurance. Finally we test our
understanding
of the Scriptures by seeking
the reasonableness
and coherence of their witness
to Jesus Christ.
We are especially called to witness
to the
holiness of Christ's Church as
embraced in
the Wesleyan-Holiness tradition.
We affirm
the principles of salvation by
grace alone
through faith in Jesus Christ
our Savior.
In doing so, we continue to affirm
that Christ's
Church is one, universal, and
apostolic.
But our special calling is to
hold before
the eyes of the world and the
Church the
centrality of holiness and to
encourage the
people of God to live in the
fullness of
the Father's holy love. For this
reason we
affirm the Wesleyan-Holiness
understanding
of the Christian faith and seek
to remain
faithful to its principal teachings:
God's
prevenient grace and the means
of grace,
repentance, faith, the new birth,
justification,
assurance, the Christian community
and its
disciplines, and the perfection
of love.
We Are a Holiness People
We are called by Scripture and
drawn by grace
to worship God and to love Him
with our whole
heart, soul, mind, and strength,
and our
neighbors as ourselves. To this
end we commit
ourselves fully and completely
to God, believing
that we can be "sanctified
wholly,"
as a second crisis experience.
We believe
that the Holy Spirit convicts,
cleanses,
fills and empowers us as the
grace of God
transforms us day by day into
a people of
love and spiritual discipline,
ethical and
moral purity, and compassion
and justice.
It is the work of the Holy Spirit
that restores
us in the image of God and produces
in us
the character of Christ. Holiness
in the
life of be-lievers is most clearly
understood
as Christlikeness.
We believe in God the Father,
the Creator,
who calls into being what does
not exist.
We once were not, but God called
us into
being, made us for himself, and
fashioned
us in His own image. We have
been commissioned
to bear the image of God: "I
am the
LORD your God; consecrate yourselves
and
be holy because I am holy"
(Leviticus
11:44).
Our hunger to be a Holiness people
is rooted
in the holi-ness of God himself.
The holiness
of God refers to His Deity His
utter singularity
of being. There is none like
Him in majesty
and glory The appropriate human
response
in the presence of such a glorious
being
is worship of God as God. God's
holiness
is expressed in His gracious
redemptive acts.
Encounter with the God who reveals
and gives
himself makes worship possible,
and worship
becomes the primary way of knowing
Him. We
worship the holy redeeming God
by loving
what He loves.
Our worship of the great and
gracious God
takes many forms. Often it is
praise and
prayer with the faith community.
It also
expresses itself in acts of private
devotion,
thanksgiving and praise, and
obedience. Evangelistic
sharing of the faith, compassion
toward our
neighbor, working for justice,
and moral
uprightness are all acts of worship
before
our God of blazing holiness.
Even the ordinary
tasks of life become acts of
worship and
take on a sacramental significance
as worship
of a holy God becomes our way
of life.
Jesus Christ revealed the one
holy God to
us and modeled worshipful holy
living for
us. Jesus informs our understanding
of holiness
through His life, sacrifice,
and teachings
as found in the Gospels, particularly
the
Sermon on the Mount. As a Holiness
people
we seek to be like Jesus in every
atti-tude
and action. By His grace God
enables believers
who worship Him with their whole
hearts to
live Christlike lives. This we
understand
to be the essence of holiness.
God has also given us the gift
and responsibility
of choice. Because we were born
with a tendency
to sin, we are inclined to choose
our own
way rather than God's (Isaiah
53:6). Having
corrupted God's creation with
our sin, we
are dead in trespasses and sins
(Ephesians
2:1). If we are to live again
spiritually
God, who calls into being what
does not exist,
must graciously create us anew
through the
redemp-tive acts of His own Son.
We believe that God uniquely
entered our
world through the incarnation
of His only
Son, Jesus of Nazareth, the his-torical
God-man.
Jesus came to renew the image
of God in us,
enabling us to become holy people.
We believe
that holiness in the life of
the believer
is the result of both a crisis
ex-perience
and a lifelong process. Following
regeneration,
the Spirit of our Lord draws
us by grace
to the full consecration of our
lives to
Him. Then, in the divine act
of entire sanctification,
also called the baptism with
the Holy Spirit,
He cleanses us from original
sin and indwells
us with His holy presence. He
perfects us
in love, enables us to live in
moral uprightness,
and empowers us to serve! The
Spirit of Jesus
works within us to reproduce
in us His own
character of holy love. He enables
us to
"put on the new self, created
to be
like God in true righteousness
and holiness"
(Ephesians 4:24). To be like
God is to be
like Je-sus. Having had the divine
image
restored in us in God's act of
entire sanctification,
we acknowledge that we have not
yet arrived
spiritually; our lifelong goal
is Christlikeness
in every word, thought, and deed.
By continued
yieldedness, obedience, and faith,
we believe
that we are "being transformed
in his
[Christ's] likeness with ever-increasing
glory" (2 Corinthians 3:18).
We participate
further in this process as we
live a life
of worship expressed in many
ways, including
embracing the spiritual disciplines
and the
fellowship and accountability
of the local
church. As a Body of Believers
in a specific
congregation, we endeavor to
be a Christlike
community, worshiping God with
our whole
hearts and re-ceiving His gifts
of love,
purity power, and compassion.
As a Holiness people we do not
exist in a
historical and ecclesiastical
vacuum. We
identify with the New Testament
and the Early
Church. Our articles of faith
clearly place
us in the tradition of classical
Christianity
We identify with the Arminian
tradition of
free grace (Jesus died for all)
and human
freedom--the God-given capacity
of all to
choose God and salvation. We
also trace our
ecclesiastical heritage to the
Wesleyan Revival
of the 18th century and to the
Holiness Movement
of the 19th and 20th centuries.
Through the centuries the Holiness
people
have had a "magnificent
obsession"
with Jesus. We worship Jesus!
We love Jesus!
We think Jesus! We talk Jesus!
We live Jesus!
This is the essence and overflow
of holiness
for us. This is what characterizes
Holiness
people.
We Are a Missional People
3a Our Mission of Worship
The mission of the church in
the world begins
in worship. It is as we are gathered
together
before God in worship-singing,
hearing the
public reading of the Bible,
giving our tithes
and offerings, praying, hearing
the preached
Word, baptizing, and sharing
the Lords Supper--that
we know most clearly what it
means to be
the people of God. Our belief
that the work
of God in the world is accomplished
primarily
through worshiping congregations
leads us
to understand that our mission
includes the
receiving of new members into
the fellowship
of the church and the organizing
of new worshiping
congregations.
Worship is the highest expression
of our
love for God. It is God-centered
adoration
honoring the One who in grace
and mercy redeems
us. The primary context for worship
is the
local church where God's people
gather, not
in self-cen-tered experience
or for self-glorification,
but in self-surrender and self-offering.
Worship is the church in loving,
obedient
service to God.
Worship is the first privilege
and responsibility
of God's people. It is the gathering
of the
covenant community before God
in proclamation
and celebrative response of who
He is, what
He has done, and what He promises
to do.
The local church in worship is
at the core
of our identity The Church of
the Nazarene
is essentially local worshiping
congregations,
and it is in and through the
local congregation
that our mission is fulfilled.
The mission
of the church finds its meaning
and orientation
in worship. It is in the preaching
of the
Word, the celebration of the
sacraments,
the public reading of the Scripture,
the
singing of hymns and choruses,
corporate
prayer, and the presenting of
our tithes
and offerings that we know most
clearly what
it means to be the people of
God. It is in
worship that we understand most
clearly what
it means to participate with
God in the work
of redemption.
It is with a spirit of hope and
optimism
that we engage our God-given
mission in the
world. It is more than an expression
of human
concern or human effort. Our
mission is a
response to God's call. It is
our participation
with God in the Kingdom mission
of reconciliation.
It is the church's faithful witness
to and
expression of the love of God
in the world-in
evangelism, compassion, and justice.
It is
our faith in the ability of God's
grace to
transform the lives of people
broken by sin
and to restore them in His own
image.
3c. Our Mission of Discipleship
We are committed to being-and
inviting others
to become-disciples of Jesus.
With this in
mind, we are committed to providing
the means
(Sunday School, Bible studies,
small accountability
groups, etc.) through which believers
are
en-couraged to grow in their
understanding
of the Christian faith and in
their relationship
with each other and with God.
We understand
discipleship to include submitting
ourselves
to obeying God and to the disciplines
of
the faith. We believe we are
to help each
other live the holy life through
mutual support,
Christian fellowship, and loving
accountability
Wesley said, "God has given
us to each
other to strengthen each other's
hands."
Christian discipleship is a way
of life.
It is the process of learning
how God would
have us live in the world. As
we learn to
live in obedience to the Word
of God, in
submission to the disciplines
of the faith,
and in accountability to one
another, we
begin to understand the true
joy of the disciplined
life and the Christian meaning
of freedom.
Discipleship is not merely human
effort,
submitting to rules and regulations.
It is
the means through which the Holy
Spirit gradually
brings us to maturity in Christ.
It is through
discipleship that we become people
of Christian
character. The ultimate goal
of discipleship
is to be transformed into the
likeness of
Jesus Christ (2 Corinthians 3:18).
By studying and meditating on
the Scriptures,
Christians discover fountains
of refreshment
in every thirsty valley on their
discipleship
journey Invigorated by the washing
of the
Word, refined by immersion in
the Word, drinking
deeply the truths of the Word,
the disciples
discover to their happy surprise
that they
are being "transformed by
the renewing
of [their] mind" (Romans
12:2). The
Christian way opens before them
like a high
and open road. Nerved by God,
they proceed
on a way of life that eclipses
mere human
and cul-tural values. Refreshed
by the fountain
of the Word, disciples give their
life away
in self-transcending service.
We affirm the life-giving value
of the classic
spiritual disciplines in the
training of
women and men as disciples of
Christ. The
disciplines of prayer and fasting,
worship,
study solitude, service, and
simplicity are
at the same time natural expressions
and
intentional commitments in the
life of the
believer. Discipleship requires
mutual support
and loving accountability. On
our own, few
of us will develop the spiritual
disciplines
that lead to Christian maturity.
We believe
that we are to encourage the
mutual support
provided through such means as
Sunday School
classes, discipleship groups,
Bible study
groups, prayer meetings, accountability
groups,
and Christian mentoring as necessary
to our
spiritual formation and maturity.
Recognizing
the role of accountability in
the Wesleyan
class meetings encourages us
to support its
place within the contemporary
Christian congregation.
3d. Our Mission of Christian Higher Education
We are committed to Christian
education,
through which men and women are
equipped
for lives of Christian service.
In our seminaries,
Bible colleges, colleges, and
universities,
we are committed to the pursuit
of knowledge,
the development of Christian
character, and
the equipping of leaders to accomplish
our
God-given calling of serving
in the church
and in the world.
Christian higher education is
a central part
of the mission of the Church
of the Nazarene.
In the early years of the Church
of the Nazarene,
institutions of Christian higher
education
were organized for the purpose
of preparing
men and women of God for leadership
and Christian
service in the global spread
of the Wesleyan-Holiness
revival. Our continued commitment
to Christian
higher education through the
years has produced
a worldwide network of seminaries,
Bible
schools, colleges, and universities.
Our
mission of Christian higher education
comes
directly out of what it means
to be God's
people. We are to love God with
our whole
"heart, soul, and mind."
We are
therefore, to be good stewards
in the development
of our minds, our academic resources,
and
in the application of our knowledge.
In this
light, we are committed to the
open and honest
pursuit of knowledge and truth
coupled with
the integrity of our Christian
faith. Christian
higher education is an essential
arena for
the development of the stewardship
of our
minds. It is intended to be an
arena characterized
by the discussion and discovery
of truth
and knowledge about God and all
of God's
creation.
In Christian higher education
faith is not
compartmentalized, but wonderfully
integrated
with knowledge as faith and learning
are
developed together. The whole
person is cultivated
with every area of thought and
life understood
in relationship to the desire
and design
of God. Christian char-acter
and the equipping
of Christian leaders for service
in the church
and the world are forged in the
context of
learning about God, humanity
and the world.
This commitment of Christian
higher education
to the formation of the whole
person is critical
for the development of Christian
men and
women for missional leadership
in the church
and the world.
As a redeemed people called to
Christlikeness
and sent as agents of God's love
in the world,
we participate with God in the
work of redeeming
humanity Christian higher education
contributes
significantly to our being such
a missional
people-offering the broad range
of knowledge-and
it is necessary for effective
service to
God in our various vocations.
Our faithful
participation in God's redemptive
work requires
that we raise up men and women
of God who
can take their place as Christian
servant
leaders in the church and in
the world.
The world in which we are called
to serve
is becoming more closely connected
and more
profoundly complicated each day.
As God's
work of redemption advances in
present and
future generations, our faithful
witness
to the Lordship of Christ and
effective participation
with God in the building of the
church will
continue to require a vital commitment
to
Christian higher education.
CONCLUSION
At the turn of the 20th century, the Church
of the Nazarene was born! P.F.
Bresee and
others were deeply convicted
that God had
raised them up for the express
purpose of
proclaiming to the church and
world the gospel
of Jesus Christ in the Wesleyan-Holiness
tradition. There are unmistakable
marks of
providence on this denomination.
From a fledgling
movement, the Church of the Nazarene
now
exceeds 1.3 million in membership
and is
ministering in 135 countries
of the world.
At the turn of the 21st century,
the future
of this denomination has never
been brighter!
Many believe that we were raised
up, not
for the 20th century, but for
the 21st century.
We are positioned to make a major
contribution
to our post-modern world. This
affirmation
is grounded in our Wesleyan-Holiness
heritage
with its radical optimism of
grace. We believe
that human nature, and ultimately
society
can be radically and permanently
changed
by the grace of God. We have
an irrepressible
confidence in this message of
hope, which
flows from the heart of our holy
God.
P.F. Bresee was fond of saying,
'The sun
never sets in the morning."
It is still
morning in the Church of the
Nazarene, and
the sun never sets on our denomination
around
the world. We are radically optimistic
about
impacting our 21st-century world
with the
Holiness message! With clarity
of vision,
total commitment, and firm faith,
we view
this new century as our day of
greatest opportunity
for making Christlike disciples
of all nations.
All Scripture quotations are taken from the
Holy Bible, New Interna-tional
Versions (NIV).
Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984
by International
Bible Society. Used by permission
of Zondervan
Publishing House. All rights
reserved.
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