God created and claims us and gives us our identity as Christians through the sacrament of baptism as ordained by Christ.  In baptism we recognize we belong to God, and are called into community, the Body of Christ, where we are nurtured in our Christian faith.  Church membership is our commitment to belong to a specific family of Christian believers, an outward expression of our covenant with Christ and our commitment to further God’s work in the world.
 

To covenant is to receive God’s promise and to make a lasting agreement with God and others to live faithfully and intentionally in dynamic personal relationship with Jesus Christ.  We promise to be responsible for our faith formation through Christian spiritual practices of prayer, study, worship, giving, serving, and inviting.

To pray is to be in relationship with God, the foundation of Christ-centered faith.  Because we are each unique in personality, gift, and experience, our communication with God differs in ways of expressing and listening.  When we recognize Christ as our constant companion, we are transformed into persons who know that all of our living is prayer.

We recognize the Bible as the story of God and the text for our life-guidance.  As community of Christ-centered faith, we place church-wide priority on learning of our faith through formational Bible study so as to bring daily Christian interpretation to our being.  As responsible, committed Christians, we engage in the faith-forming spiritual practices of daily reading, reflection, life application, and conversation … continually listening for the intersections of God’s story and our own and others.

To worship is to know God … and to respond to God’s constant presence in our lives.  It is the personal and communal encounter with God that continually transforms our perception and understanding of the world and our relationship and responsibility to it.  Congregational worship is our gathering to encounter God together, learning from the scriptures and experiencing traditions brought forth from our Christian heritage that encourage us to grow in Christ-like living, while deepening our personal relationship with and worship of God.

When we recognize that all we are and all we receive is gift of God, we grow in faith when we give the first and best of all we are and all we have ~ our presence, our prayers, our possessions, our money, our time ~ as expressions of joyful gratitude to God.

In all of His living, Christ modeled faith formation for all followers.  He prayed, listened, taught, preached, healed.  He touched the marginalized and the privileged alike.  He gathered followers into small groups for study and leadership development.  He ministered to close friends and to those he did not know.  And then Jesus gave our missional orders ~ to love God with all our heart, strength, mind, and will … to love neighbors … to make disciples.  In this commissioning, we are called to the wholeness of Christian service – to serve out of our skills and passions as joyful response to God’s gracious gift of life with Christ as our guide.  Serving is the work of the church within our walls, our homes, and world-wide.

To invite is the ‘called’ ministry of all Christians as persons of the priesthood of all believers.  Involving obedience and trust in God, inviting others to know Christ is the church’s plan to implement Christ’s Great Commandment and Commission … to growingly love God with all that we are through a life-long, dynamic faith trans-formational relationship with Christ, to love our neighbor by sharing the good news of the Gospel, and by guiding others to continue the flow of Christian faith formation through sharing with all persons encountered in daily living. Christ’s model of hospitality … inviting, sharing, relating, equipping, serving …occurs in the heart, the home, the church, the world.