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What We Believe

We desire to respond in faith to the call of the Holy Spirit through the Gospel and to unite together to preach the Word, administer the Sacraments, and carry out God’s mission.

The Triune God

We confess the Triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

There is one God: eternal, incorporeal, indivisible, of infinite power, wisdom, and goodness, the Creator and Preserver of all things, visible and invisible. Yet there are three Persons, co-eternal and of the same essence and power: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.

The Scriptures and Creeds

We confess the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments as the inspired Word of God and the authoritative source and norm of its proclamation, faith, and life.

 

We confess the Apostles’, Nicene, and Athanasian Creeds as true declarations of the faith of this congregation.

We confess the Gospel, recorded in the Holy Scriptures and confessed in the ecumenical creeds and Lutheran confessional writings, as the power of God to create and sustain the Church for God’s mission in the world.

Justification

We confess that we cannot obtain forgiveness of sin and righteousness before God by our own strength, merits, or works, but that we receive forgiveness of sin and become righteous before God on account of Christ through faith when we believe that we are received into His grace and that our sins are forgiven on account of Christ, who by his death made satisfaction for our sins. God will regard and reckon this faith as righteousness in His sight.

The Sacrament of Holy Baptism

We confess that baptism is necessary to salvation, and that the grace of God is offered through baptism, and that children should be baptized. The baptism of children is not ineffective, but is necessary and efficacious for salvation. They are received into the grace of God when they are offered to God through baptism.

 

Baptism is not simply plain water. Instead it is water enclosed in God’s command and connected with God’s Word. It brings about forgiveness of sins, redeems from death and the devil, and gives eternal salvation to all who believe it.

 

Clearly the water does not do these great things, but the Word of God, which is in and with the water, and faith, which trusts this Word of God in the water. For without the Word of God the water is plain water and not a baptism, but with the Word of God it is a baptism, that is, a grace-filled water of life and a washing of regeneration in the Holy Spirit.

Jesus Christ

We confess that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, assumed human nature in the womb of the blessed Virgin Mary, so that there are two natures, the divine and the human, inseparably united in one Person, one Christ, truly God and truly human.

 

He truly was born, suffered, was crucified, died, and was buried, that He might reconcile the Father to us, and be a sacrifice, not only for original guilt, but also for all actual sins of human beings. He descended into hell and rose again the third day.

 

He ascended into heaven in order to sit at the right hand of the Father, and he will forever reign and have dominion over all creatures. He will sanctify those who believe in him by sending into their hearts the Holy Spirit, who will rule, console, and make them alive and defend them against the devil and the power of sin.  The same Christ will publicly return to judge the living and the dead.

The Lutheran Confessions

We affirm the Unaltered Augsburg Confession as a true witness to the Gospel, acknowledging as one with it in faith and doctrine all churches that likewise accept the teachings of the Unaltered Augsburg Confession.
 

We affirm the other confessional writings in the Book of Concord, namely, the Apology of the Augsburg Confession, the Smalcald Articles and the Treatise, the Small Catechism, the Large Catechism, and the Formula of Concord, as further valid interpretations of the faith of the Church.

The Sacrament of the Altar

We confess that the body and blood of Christ are truly and substantially present in the Lord’s Supper, and are truly distributed to all who receive the sacrament.

The sacrament of the altar is the true body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, under the bread and wine, instituted by Christ Himself for us Christians to eat and to drink.

The words "given for you" and "shed for you for the forgiveness of sins" show us that the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation are given to us in the sacrament through these words, because where there is forgiveness of sin, there is also life and salvation.

It is not the eating and drinking that does these things, but rather the words that are recorded: "given for you" and "shed for you for the forgiveness of sins." These words, when accompanied by the physical eating and drinking, are the essential thing in the sacrament, and whoever believes these very words has what they declare and state, namely, "forgiveness of sins."

The Word of God

"God is Love" stained glass window

Jesus Christ

Jesus Christ is the Word of God incarnate, through whom everything was made and through whose life, death, and resurrection God fashions a new creation. 

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