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Central Beliefs

Below, you will find information concerning doctrinal core beliefs that define our worship, ministry, and church. While this list is not an exhaustive list of every theological distinctive or practical philosophy, it does provide a solid snapshot of the heartbeat of Pepeprell. We encourage you to read through these beliefs and examine them in the light of Scripture. Additionally, a link is provided to the Baptist Faith and Message, which this church aligns with under the Southern Baptist Convention. 

The Gospel

The Gospel is the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. In order to appreciate this good news, one should understand the bad news about ourselves. The bad news is that born with a sinful nature, human beings rebel against their Creator and set their lives on a course contrary to His will. Moreover, this warrants a sentence of condemnation, a sentence of death. This is the bad news of humanity: we are sinners in the hands of an angry God. The good news of Jesus is that God sent Him, the Son of God in human flesh, into the world to give His life as a ransom for many. He gives His life as a ransom by taking the place of sinners and enduring the death they deserve. That is the hope in Jesus that His sacrificial, substitutionary death has turned the anger of God toward us as sinners into affectionate delight as children. This hope is not a shot in the dark but one that breathes, defends, and lives because God resurrected Jesus after three days with new life! Now, Jesus offers this new life and the forgiveness of sin to any who come to Him in repentance of sin and trusting faith. The bad news is that we are sinners in danger of divine wrath. The good news is that Jesus endured that wrath as a substitute. The invitation is to repent and believe in Him for new life and the forgiveness of sin.  

The Trinity

There is one God. He has revealed himself to us as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, with distinct personal attributes, but without division of nature, essence, or being. 

God as Father reigns with providential care over His universe, His creatures, and the flow of the stream of human history according to the purpose of His grace.He is all-powerful, all-loving, and all-wise. God is Father in truth to those who become children of God through faith in Jesus Christ. He is fatherly in His attitude toward all men. 

Christ is the eternal Son of God. In His incarnation, Jesus Christ was conceived of the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary. Jesus perfectly revealed and did the will of God, taking upon Himself the demands and necessities of human nature and identifying Himself completely with mankind yet without sin. He honored the divine law by His personal obedience, and in His death on the cross, He made provisions for the redemption of men from sin. He was raised from the dead with a glorified body and appeared to his disciples as the person who was with them before His crucifixion. He ascended into heaven and is now exalted at the right hand of God where He is the One Mediator, partaking of the nature of God and man, and in whose Person is effected the reconciliation between God and man.He will return in power and glory to judge the world and to consummate His redemptive mission. He now dwells in all believers as the living and ever-present Lord.

The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of God. He inspired holy men of old to write the Scriptures. Through illumination, He enables men to understand truth. He exalts Christ. He convicts of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment. He calls men to the Savior and effects regeneration. He cultivates Christian character, comforts believers, and bestows the spiritual gifts by which they serve God through His church. He seals the believer unto the day of final redemption. His presence in the Christian is the assurance of God to bring the believer into the fullness of the stature of Christ. He enlightens and empowers the believer and the church in worship, evangelism, and service.

The Church

The New Testament Church is the body of Christ. The Lord Jesus is recognized as the head of the church, and the Holy Spirit as its leader. The scriptural officers of the New Testament Church are bishops or elders (called pastors) and deacons.The church expresses itself in a local congregation of baptized believers who observe in fellowship the ordinances of Christ and seek to extend that gospel to all the world. The local church is constituted of Christians who have experienced His saving grace. This does not imply that everyone who joins the church has experienced His saving grace. The local church does recognize its responsibility to minister lovingly to the total needs of everyone who is a member of the congregation.

The Scripture

The Holy Bible is God’s Word in the scriptures. The Holy Bible was written by men divinely inspired and is the record of God’s revelation of Himself to man. It is a perfect treasure of divine instruction. It has God for its author, salvation for its end, and truth, without any mixture of error, for its matter. It reveals the principles by which God judges us; and therefore is, and will remain to the end of the world, the true center of Christian union and the supreme standard by which all human conduct, creeds, and religious opinions should be tried. The criterion by which the Bible is to be interpreted is Jesus Christ. The Bible is God’s divine library. It contains sixty-six books. Thirty-nine books compose the Old Testament. Twenty-seven books compose the New Testament. The Old Testament was originally written in Hebrew and Aramaic. The New Testament was originally written in Greek. The Bible is the sourcebook of the Christian faith. The Bible had fifty-seven different authors taking some 1500 years to write.

Humanity

Man was created by the special act of God, in His own image, and is the crowning work of His creation. In the beginning, man was innocent of sin and was endowed by His Creator with freedom of choice. By his free choice man sinned against God and brought sin into the human race. Through the temptation of Satan, man transgressed the command of God and fell from his original innocence, whereby his posterity inherited a nature and an environment inclined toward sin. When man develops a personal awareness of rebellious and moral behavior, he becomes a transgressor and is under condemnation. This is recognized as the age of accountability. Only the grace of God can bring man into His holy fellowship and enable man to fulfill the creative purpose of God. The sacredness of human personality is evident in that God created man in His own image and in that Christ died for man; therefore, every human being possesses dignity and is worthy of respect and Christian love.

Salvation

Salvation involves the redemption of the whole man and is offered freely to all who accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, who by His own blood obtained eternal redemption for the believer. In its broadest sense, salvation includes regeneration, justification, sanctification, and glorification.

Regeneration, or the New Birth, is a work of God’s grace whereby believers become new creatures in Christ Jesus. It is a change of heart wrought by the Holy Spirit through conviction of sin, to which the sinner responds in repentance toward God and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Repentance and faith are inseparable experiences in grace. Repentance is a genuine turning from sin toward God. Faith is the acceptance of Jesus Christ and commitment of the entire personality to Him as Lord and Savior.

Justification is God’s gracious and full acquittal upon principles of His righteousness of all sinners who repent and believe in Christ. Justification brings the believer into a relationship of peace and favor with God. Sanctification is the experience, beginning in regeneration, by which the believer is set apart to God’s purposes, and is enabled to progress toward moral and spiritual perfection through the presence and power of the Holy Spirit dwelling in him. Growth in grace should continue throughout the regenerated person’s life. Glorification is the culmination of salvation and is the final blessed and abiding state of the redeemed.

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