Scripture is the perfect, inspired, inerrant, authoritative word of God. The Holy Spirit gave the message to human authors who communicated the message of God in their own written words (2 Samuel 23:2, 2 Peter 1:21). Scripture consists of 66 books divided into two sections: The Old Testament (39 books) and The New Testament (27 Books).  The Bible tells the entire story of God’s creation as well as his specific love and pursuit of human beings. Through God’s story of the past, the events explained reveal the nature of an unchanging God full of grace and truth. The story points to the need all people have because of their sins. This need is for a perfect king to save them and pay the price for their sin.  This Savior in the Bible is Jesus Christ who is the focal point of both the Old and New Testaments (Romans 8:3-4,15:4).  The Bible is living, active (Hebrews 4:12), cohesive (Matt 5:17-18), and is unchanging (Psalm 119:89).  The inspired Word of God provides the Christian with teaching, rebuking, training (2 Timothy 3:16-17) hope, encouragement, and delivers all the truth we need about God and this created world. (John 17:17, Psalm 19:7-11). The gospel of Jesus is the fulfillment of all the prophets and law (Matthew 5:17) and there is no other gospel than the one Jesus brought (Galatians 1:6-9).

There is one living, true, eternal (Psalm 90:2, Deuteronomy 6:4), perfect God. He is not dependent on any other (Psalm 115:3), unchanging (Malachi 3:6), unbounded by time and space (Isaiah 66:1), all-knowing (Hebrews 4:13), love (1 John 4:8), Spirit (John 4:24), and holy (Exodus 3:5).  God exists simultaneously as three coequal, coeternal persons who are united in one essence, yet have distinct roles in the Godhead. All three of the persons in the Trinity are responsible for creation, and miracles, and have equal authority over the entire creation. We worship and pray to all three persons. All exist and are working at the same time and cannot be separated. (1 Corinthians 8:6, John 1:1-3, Acts 5:3-4)

God, the Father is the infinite creator of the universe who is all-powerful and can do anything logically possible (Genesis 1:1, Genesis 18:14. Jeremiah 32:17).  The Father is also loving and personal with the willingness to do whatever it takes to pursue and redeem his people.  He demonstrates perfect true and justice and offers grace to all people through his son (John 8:26, Romans 3:23-24).  God the Father is patient with people and hopes that all humans would reach the repentance (2 Peter 3:9). The Father hears and answers prayers and saves any person who comes to him through Jesus Christ (John 3:16).

Jesus is the one and Only Begotten Son of God (John 3:16) who is coequal and coeternal with God the Father and God the Spirit (Genesis 1:1-2, John 1:12-14, Hebrews 13:8). By his statements, he is the “I am” of the Old Testament (John 8:58, Exodus 3:14) possessing all the attributes of Deity.  He is the “Word” to which the entire Bible points, and is the focal point and fulfillment of prophecy in scripture (John 1:1-3). He is the promised messiah of the Old Testament, conceived miraculously by the Holy Spirit (Luke 1:35), born of a virgin (Matthew 1:18), who is God-made flesh (John 1:14) to pay the penalty of the sins of the world.  After living the life humans should have lived and dying the death they should have died, he was resurrected from the dead and appeared to His followers (Luke 24:6-7, 1 Corinthians 15:1-8). He is the only perfect sacrifice for human sin (John 8:28-29) while being the perfect high priest at the same time (Hebrews 4:14-16). Jesus is a fully sinless human while fully God (Luke 2:52, Philippians 2:6-7) and is still living acting as an advocate for repentant humans and he sits at the right hand of God. He is the good shepherd (John 10:11) who will return in his resurrected body to be God with us fully and finally bringing the Kingdom of God to earth. Jesus’ ministry was not just for our salvation but to authoritatively teach about repentance of sins and what the kingdom of God is truly about (Matthew 7:24-29) . He is now actively present as Savior, Teacher, Lord, Healer, and Friend.

The Holy Spirit is co-equal and coeternal with God the father and Jesus Christ. He works to convict the unbeliever of their sin, thus, drawing them to repentance and faith in Jesus’ atonement for our sins. The Holy Spirit lives inside any person who repents of their sin and puts their faith in Christ (Ephesians 1:13). He works in the believer by transforming our character. The Spirit reminds us of Jesus's teaching, can come on us with power, dwells within us, helps us worship, helps us know God, helps us pray, bears witness regarding Jesus, convicts us of sin, guides us to truth, gives insights to the future, transforms our character to that of Christ, frees us from the power of sin, assures us as adopted children of God, gives Spiritual gifts, and seals us for eternity. 

Man was created in God’s image (Genesis 1:26) with moral, spiritual, and mental aspects that make us, unlike any other created thing. All created things were made by God’s word except for man who was created by the hands of God out of the dust and woman from the hands of God through man’s (Adam’s) rib. Man existed in perfect harmony with God until the fall (Genesis 3) when man was separated from God.  Since the fall, all humans live under the curse of sin.  Man is compromised of body and Spirit. By nature, man lacks Spiritual good before God (Ephesians 2:1-2). When Christ is accepted by man as Lord and Savior, he becomes the dwelling place for the Holy Spirit and man is called as an ambassador for Christ’s reconciliation (John 14:16-17, 2 Corinthians 5:20). Any man who doesn’t accept Christ will face eternal judgment while those who do will be accepted to live eternally in the holy presence of God (Revelation 20:11-15). 

Angels are created Spiritual beings (Nehemiah 9:6) that demonstrate the greatness of God’s love and plan for us (Hebrews 1:14).  They can bring messages to God’s people (Luke 1:11-19), carry out some of God’s plans (Genesis 3:24), and glorify God (Psalm 103:20). They do not contradict the message and mission of Jesus Christ (Galatians 1:6-9) and are not to be worshiped (Colossians 2:18). Satan is a fallen angel (Isaiah 14:12) and head of the demons who were angels who followed his lead (Revelation 12:7-9).  He was the originator of sin (Genesis 3:1-6) and he and his demons oppose God and his work (Matthew 4:1-11). While demon possession of a human is possible (Luke 8:27-39), demons can't possess a Christian (Romans 6:14), however, demons do try to oppress Christians by influencing or tempting Christians (2 Corinthians 12:7).

All humans are under the judgment of God because all have sinned (Romans 3:23) and sin separates us from God (Isaiah 59:2).  In God’s great love for us he offered his son Jesus Christ as the perfect sacrifice for the sins of every human (Hebrews 10:12).  When a person puts their faith in Jesus they are saved (John 3:16, Romans 10:9-13).  Through the righteousness of Christ, the Christian is accepted by God and seen as holy, blameless, and above reproach in the sight of God (Colossians 1:22).  This acceptance means that the human who puts their faith in Jesus Christ will have eternal life. Salvation is a gift from God and doesn’t require anything but us receiving Jesus who offers himself to us (Ephesians 2:8-9). Jesus is the only way to a right relationship with a holy God (John 14:6).

The church is defined as the community of all believers (Ephesians 5:25). The church is made up of many people filled with the Holy Spirit who is given gifts to serve God’s purpose in the world (1 Corinthians 12). The purpose of the church is to be ambassadors for the ministry of Christ’s reconciliation of all people (2 Corinthians 5: 20-21), and to make disciples of all nations baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (Matthew 28:19-20). The church should be outwardly focused on serving each other and the community they are influencing (Acts 2:42-47)

One day there will be a personal, visible, bodily return of Jesus Christ (John 14:3). Christians should eagerly long for the return of Jesus (Titus 2:12-13). There will be trials in this life leading up to Christ’s return and Christians are to endure them (Mark 13:12-13). We do not know and will not know the time or hour of the return of Jesus (Matt 25:13) but should always be ready for His sudden return (Matthew (25:34-46).

Marriage is not in any way required for spiritual maturity or a right relationship with God. Paul even encourages singleness in 1 Corinthians 7. However, marriage is a holy covenant that exists between a man and woman to guide mankind to express and experience intimacy while growing toward holiness (1 Corinthians 7:1-16). Marriage is to be expressed as designed by God between one man and one woman (Genesis 2:23-24). It is the only institution in which humans find the appropriate context for sexual expression (Ephesians 5:22-23). In marriage, man and woman are to submit to one another, adhere to appropriate roles, and conceive, bore, and raise children. 

All prophets (those speaking on behalf of God) must meet the requirements of one of three tests of a prophet. First, the “Test of Wait and See Test” (Deuteronomy 18:22) says that a prophet who predicts the future must predict accurately, if the person does not they are not a prophet. Second, the “Theology Test” (Deuteronomy 13:1-3) shows us that for a prophet to be true he must point you to the one true God of the Bible. If the person points you to other gods, he is not a prophet. Third, the “Sin Test” (Nehemiah 6:10-14) states that if a prophet has a prophecy that makes you sin, that person is not a prophet. In the past, God spoke through the prophets, but today God speaks to us in Jesus. No prophets who claim to be speaking on behalf of God should be followed unless they meet the three tests of prophets and are in perfect agreement with Jesus Christ's message as stated by the Apostles in the new testament. (Hebrews 1:1-3).  There is no need for a modern-day prophet although the Holy Spirit does give the gift of prophecy to believers to help build up the church and push its mission forward in Jesus. (Romans 12:6, 1 Corinthians 12:4-11, Ephesians 4:1-16)

The temple is defined as the place in which God dwells with his people.  In the Garden of Eden God perfectly dwelt with Adam and Eve. As soon as Adam and Eve sinned this was no longer possible (Genesis 1:28-31).  God made a covenant with his people, the Israelites, and pointed to a day when a temple would be built in which he could live with his people.  In the meantime, the people used the tabernacle (Exodus 25:8-9) as the place in which God dwelt. This was a mobile dwelling place of God until they made it to the promised land.  In the reign of Solomon, a temple was built for God to dwell (2 Kings 8:22-26), however, only the Levite priests could enter into the “holy of holies”  once a year (Hebrews 9:7) where God’s presence was.  They only went in to offer sacrifice.  No sacrifice was sufficient until God sent his only Son Jesus as the perfect sacrifice (Hebrews 10:14).  When Jesus died, the veil separating God from man was torn from top to bottom (Matthew 27:51) giving us free access to God and his holiness through Jesus. No temple is needed today because God has made any person who puts their faith in Jesus a temple for him (1 Corinthians 6:19-20).  The Spirit lives in the believer and executes God’s mission to seek and save the lost. Jesus is the prophesied cornerstone of the spiritual house of people that is the church. (1 Peter 2:4-9)