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Our relationship with God, each other, and creation is broken because of this disobedience, and we need redemption. Through their sin and the ongoing rebellion of all human beings, we are unable to please God and are alienated from him. The enemy, our adversary, tempted the first human beings to disobey God, bringing evil and sin into the world. We believe that man is created in God’s image, through sin has become unable to please God, and is condemned to suffer eternal punishment apart from accepting God’s gift of eternal life through Jesus Christ. To that end, the Holy Spirit gives each child of God a gift, a Spirit-empowered ability, and He convicts, teaches, and comforts us as we use it in service. Every person who responds to the grace of God in Christ Jesus is called to serve both the Church and the wider culture by participating in God’s mission to restore and bless this broken world. The Holy Spirit indwells those who believe in Jesus Christ, assures us that we are children of God, and includes us in his universal Church. He dwells in the believer, glorifies Christ, and equips us for service. We believe that the Holy Spirit is God and is the third Person of the Trinity. We therefore expectantly and hopefully proclaim the good news of salvation in Jesus Christ and call all people everywhere to repentance and faith in Him.
#CORNERSTONE CHURCH FULL#
While we cannot grasp the full nature and extent of God’s grace in offering the gift of salvation, we are warned that everlasting separation and anguish ultimately await those who turn away from God. The only proper response to this gift is repentance and joyous faith. Through the incarnation, suffering, death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, God graciously provides forgiveness for sin, freedom from sin’s control, and a loving relationship with God the Father. He came to proclaim the kingdom of God, to preach good news to the poor, to bind up the brokenhearted, and set captives free. He was born of the Virgin Mary, lived a perfect, sinless life on earth, and fully embodied the mission of God. The incarnation is the belief that Jesus Christ is both God in human flesh and the Messiah promised in the Hebrew Bible. We await His visible and glorious return to the earth to claim His own and to judge. He offers us eternal life, forgiveness of sins, and peace through faith in Him. He rose bodily from the grave and now is reigning in power with the Father. His death on the cross paid the penalty for our sins and is the only basis for the salvation of those who trust in Him.
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He lived a perfect, sinless life on earth. Having always existed, He took on human flesh and was born of the Virgin Mary. We believe that Jesus Christ is God the Son, is the second Person of the Trinity, and is fully God and fully man. God, in community with Himself, created human beings to be His image bearers, to serve and cultivate His good creation, to live in harmonious relationship with God and each other. He was and always will be in perfect relationship with Himself-Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. In the beginning, God created all things very good. God has revealed Himself in the person of his Son, Jesus Christ, in the Scriptures, and in the material creation. He is perfectly and infinitely loving, just, and holy. There is one God, who exists in three Persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We believe God is the only fitting object of our worship. Properly understood and received by the community of faith and with the aid of the Holy Spirit, the Scriptures are the Church’s true, trustworthy, and faithful guide, “useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness” (2 Timothy 3:16), never failing or erring in its purposes, and never returning void when they are faithfully lived and proclaimed. We believe God has given us the Scriptures, composed of 66 books in the Old and New Testaments, to be the final authority for faith and practice of the Church. Every word is inspired by God and is without error in the original writings.
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