Distinctives

Baptistic
Our member churches are all Baptist Churches even though not all include the title ‘Baptist’ in their names. Being Baptistic means it is our conviction that only true believers should be baptized, and that baptism should only be administered by immersion. We also hold other Baptist distinctives such as:

• the authority of Scripture in all matters of faith and practice
• the autonomy of the local church
• a regenerate, baptized church membership
• liberty of conscience before God
• separation of church and state

Evangelistic
While believing that God has chosen certain individuals for salvation, we also believe that God invariably uses means to save his elect people, and therefore we believe in accordance with Christ’s command to his disciples that it is our duty and privilege to preach the gospel to everyone. We seek to do this in our public meetings and we also encourage to individuals to witness to Christ’s saving grace whenever they have opportunity. We also seek to promote missions both at home and abroad by sending out and supporting missionaries, and also by planting new churches in areas in need of a strong gospel testimony.

Sovereign Grace
We believe that salvation is by the sovereign electing grace of God. While we accept full responsibility to spread the gospel by every legitimate means, we know that no one will ever come to Christ unless God first works in their lives. We believe that those chosen by the Father for salvation were redeemed by the shed blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, are drawn to faith by the Holy Spirit and will be enabled by God’s keeping grace to persevere to the end. Although the Bible is our final authority in all things, certain historic Confessions of faith are helpful in defining what we believe. In particular we accept two Baptist Confessions known as the First London Confession of 1644 and the Second London Confession of 1689. We receive into membership churches that hold to either Confession.