VALUES

The Bible is the inspired word of God. It is the revelation of Jesus, the Word of God—the Revealer of who God is. Because the Bible was given by the Holy Spirit, it is authoritative, full of truth, and contains what is needed to know Jesus and faithfully live for Him. We study the Bible individually and corporately to know Jesus and be conformed to His image through the work of the Spirit.

The Bible is more than a list of laws and doctrines. It is the story of God’s mission to reconcile, redeem, and restore all creation through the work of Jesus and the power of the Holy Spirit in the life of His people. This is the story we are now invited to participate in.

[Heb. 1.1-2; Jn. 5.39; Lk. 24.27; 2Ti. 3.16; Col. 3.10]

Prayer is central to our life and mission with God. It shows a posture of dependence on God in all things and is an important way of deepening our relationship with him. Through prayer, we give our thoughts and desires to God as he imparts faith in us. We desire to share with God in prayer, but also listen and allow God to speak to us. Our heart is to intercede for our neighborhoods, cities and world; to pray for Jesus to be revealed; the coming of God’s kingdom; a movement of the Spirit; physical needs; healing; freedom; courage and boldness.

[Mt. 6.9-13; Lk. 11.10-13; Eph. 1.15-23; 3.14-21; Col. 1.9-12; 4.2-4]

Every person who has received the Holy Spirit through faith in Jesus is given gifts to glorify God, serve the body of Christ, and engage in the mission of God. Each person has a contribution to share in the body of Jesus through their natural and spiritual gifts and a unique place to engage in God’s mission—to fill the earth with His glory through making disciples who make disciples. Gatherings are about every person being able to learn and teach, speak and listen, impart and receive, serve and be served.

Our lives are offerings of worship as the Holy Spirit works in us, transforming us into the image of Jesus. The Spirit works in us producing His fruits, faithfulness to Jesus and His word, and genuine worship of our Lord and King God. Worship encompasses all of life. We strive to worship God in every area of our life as we move from unbelief to belief in who God is.

Transformation can be instant but more often it takes time and is a work of the Spirit, not our own, as we move from unbelief to belief in every area of life. Receiving or entering the kingdom is the first part of being renewed and changed into the image of its King: Jesus.

[Mt. 28.19; Lk. 22.19-20; Jn. 4.23; Rm. 12.1-2; 1Cor. 10.31; 2Cor. 3.17-18; 5.17; Gal. 5.22-23; Eph. 4.22-24; Col. 3.10]

We are awaiting the unity of all things in heaven and on earth to be under Christ. We pray for God’s kingdom to come, for His will to be done on earth as it is in heaven. We believe that God’s concern with the physical world is as important as the spiritual world. As Jesus desires us to love God with all our being (Mt. 22.37; Lk. 10.27), we seek for the whole person to come under the reign of God in Jesus through the Spirit. We want people’s entire personhood to flourish to the fullness of who they are and how God has made them. This is the full meaning of God’s Peace (Shalom)—the flourishing of all one’s relationships: God, fellow humanity, non-human creation, and, even, oneself. Being ministers of reconciliation (2Cor. 5.18), may begin with being reconciled to God, but this is to flow and encompass every other aspect of the person’s being.

[Eph. 1.10; Rev. 11.15; Mt. 6.10; 22.37; Lk. 10.27; Rm. 14.17; 1Thes. 5.23]

Jesus declared that the one who wanted to be the greatest in the kingdom needed to become the servant of all. Humility is exemplified in the Trinity as each Person humbles themself to the others. We want to imitate Jesus in humility who came not to be served, but to serve; whose very incarnation and life was the exact representation of who God is and how humanity is truly made. Here, the important distinction between respect and esteem comes in. Humbling ourselves before God or others is not to degrade our worth (nature of esteem), but simply elevates others’ worth (respect). Humility always holds a person’s self-worth as high, while simply elevating God or others. Humility is also the nature of repentance and forgiveness.

[Mt. 18.1-5; 23.11; Mk. 10.42-45; Rm. 12.3; Phi. 2.1-11; Col. 3.10-13]

Unity is a mark of God. This is fully revealed in the Trinity—God as one in three and three in one. The union and relation of the Father, Son, and Spirit is the model for unity and diversity. Jesus prayed that those who believe in him would be one as He and the Father are one; so that the world would know that God sent Him. Paul affirms the unity of the body in multiple places and calls for the Church to be unified, like-minded, and at peace. Unity (as one) is not to be confused with uniformity (one-form; homogeny). Rather, unity is an embrace of united intention, purpose, and love while allowing for diversity in unique expression. When the church, as the image bearers of Christ, is unified under the headship of Jesus it can embrace the full unique expressions of God’s creativity through the diversity of peoples, cultures, and personalities.

[Gen. 1.26; Deut. 6.4; Col. 3.10-15; Gal. 3.28; Eph. 4.11-13]

God is love—revealed and enacted for all eternity within the relationship of the Trinity. Jesus said that love for each other would be the defining characteristic of his followers. This love is sacrificial, unconditional, and selfless; as revealed by God’s love for us and the world. It is through God’s love that he has adopted us into his family—the fellowship of the Trinity. As children of God, every believer is a brother or sister: we are not like family, we are family. We desire to love God, our fellow siblings in Christ, and the world (including our enemies). Love must be expressed in community, meaning, we desire to spend a lot of time together! This love is the basis for each “one another” phrase in the New Testament that we want to live by and enact together.

[Jn. 13.35; 17.20-23; Lk. 6.27; 10.27-37; 1Cr. 13; Col. 3.12-15; Gal. 3.26-28; Eph. 4.1-6; Phil. 2.1-5; 1Jn. 4.8]

The Creator God, having made everything through his word and seeing it was good, planted a garden. He formed man and placed him in the garden—offering this created person the fullness of everything He himself labored for and creatively made. We long to follow God’s heart of hospitality (philoxenia—lit. “Love of the stranger”). Just as God brought us into His family though we were sinners, we want to offer ourselves to others around us, offering all that God has gifted and graced us with, so as they can experience and receive all that God has offered them.

[Gen. 2; Rm. 12.13; 1Pt. 4.9; Heb. 13.2]

The generosity of God is hard to miss. He has showered rains upon the believer and unbeliever both. He loved the world so much that He gave His only begotten Son. We desire to be radically generous for Jesus. Sacrifice is a common posture that Jesus modeled and calls his followers to enact. This goes beyond giving money, but giving up our time, focus, and energy for God and one another. We want to give to the work in the kingdom and help those in need.

[Mt 6.1-4; 2Cor. 9.6-11; Phil. 4.14]

Jesus launched the kingdom of God at His coming and although it will not come to its fullness until his return, it is a present reality that we receive and live in. He showed us to pray for the kingdom to come on earth as it is in heaven.

Until its completion, we want the reign of God in Jesus to be revealed and received in neighborhoods and communities; in people groups and social networks; in families and individuals. We want to partner with God in the restoration of all things through Jesus by seeking justice for the marginalized and vulnerable in mercy and compassion, bringing peace to relationships with God and with others, and living joyously through the Holy Spirit. Jesus not only preached about the kingdom but embodied it. We desire to live under his loving reign, pray for it to be revealed, and share it with those around us.

[Lk. 4.16-21; 42-43; 11.20; 17.20-21; Rm. 14.17; Col. 1.13]

We affirm that the mission of the church can be summed as “disciples of Jesus making disciples of Jesus.” A disciple of Jesus is simply someone who seeks to follow the ways of Jesus by moving from unbelief to belief in every area of life. It is not reserved for a post-conversion process, but, in most cases, begins prior to “saving faith” in Jesus (Matt. 4.18-22; Rom. 10.9-10). We want to disciple to faith.

Jesus commissioned his disciples to, “Go… and disciple” and we are committed to intentionally disciple others who, in turn, will disciple. The Great Commission states, “As you are going, therefore, disciple all the people groups”. Although the word “make” is not in the passage, we see it as our heart’s posture of intentionality in discipling during the everyday life where we reveal, share, and live like Jesus.

Discipleship is not the ‘distribution of information’ through a canned program or formal class but intends to ‘cause learning’ through normal, intentional, gospel-centered relationships as disciples move from unbelief to belief in every area of life. Jesus modeled disciple-making by being close to his disciples, sharing with them, equipping them, and sending them out—we strive to follow His example.

[Mt. 4.18-22; 28.18-20; Lk. 9:57-62; 14:25-33; Jn. 20.21-22; 2Ti. 2.2]

The Great Commission does not simply say “to make disciples” but adds the “who”—all ethne (eth-nay; “people groups”). Ethne is a group of people—like our modern term “social network”. Because we live in a day where our social networks do not typically overlap, we exist within multiple social networks on a daily basis. The three major ones are where we live, work, and play. We believe that God has called the church to disciple the social networks we already exist in.

Jesus also told his disciples, “You will be my witnesses to Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth”. We fully support overseas missionaries who are planting the gospel in unreached people groups, but we also recognize that “the ends of the earth” are also present where we already exist. There are many pockets of unreached people groups within our communities and broader cities that need everyday disciples to own Jesus’ mission to make disciples in the networks they already are a part of or that Jesus is specifically sending them into.

[Mt. 28.18-20; Ac. 1.8; 8.4-8; 13.1-3; 18.24-28; Col. 4.3-4]

The Trinity is the God of movement: the Father sent the Son, the Son sent the Spirit, and the Spirit sends His people, the church. “Movement” is not grown through addition but expanded by multiplication. The New Testament describes the church as a Holy-Spirit People of God on mission: dispersed to proclaim and tangibly reveal the good news of the kingdom of God. Jesus prayed for his disciples, but also for those who will believe through his disciples. The church is a living, breathing, multiplying organism that is scattered to plant the gospel in every pocket of our communities, cities, and beyond with the love, hope, and goodness of Jesus. We desire to be a decentralized movement that raises everyday-people up to receive Jesus’ call on them and then send them out so that every area of our city can be saturated with the gospel of Jesus. We realize this cannot be done alone, but takes the full people of God—the universal church, with all of its varieties of models and ways—partnering together for God’s mission: to reconcile to Himself all things in heaven and earth in Jesus through the work of the Spirit.

Justice is rooted in the character of God and because of that we desire to live out the biblical revelation of justice. God’s character of justice is two-fold: retributive and restorative. His retributive justice falls upon those who pervert justice through the likes of oppression, inequality, racism, bondage, aggression, and elitism; and is expressed as God’s anger towards those who practice these. While his restorative justice comes to the oppressed, marginalized, bullied, and lowly; raising them to the honor and dignity they deserve as an image bearer of God, and is expressed in God’s steadfast-love (this includes the widow, orphan, and immigrant). We want to take a prophetic stance against injustice and seek to bring restoration and peace to the oppressed. We want to seek the welfare (shalom) of the city, and the person, through seeing God’s kingdom come and His perfect reign of justice, peace, and joy witnessed, experienced, and received for the flourishing of individuals and communities.

[Ex. 23:1-3; Deut. 24:17-18; 16.19-20; Prov. 28:5; 31:8-9; Isa. 58.5-12; 59:14-18; Jer. 29.5-7; Mic. 6:8; Mt. 5.6; 6.10; 6.33; 25.31-46; Lk. 4.16-21; Mk. 11.15-17; Rm. 14.17; Jam. 1.27]