“Our Mission”
Sovereign Grace is a
Christ-Centered Evangelical Family that Exists to Glorify God and Enjoy Him
Forever
Christ-Centered
We believe that Jesus’ virgin birth, perfectly obedient
life, crucifixion, resurrection, ascension, and future return, are all central
to human history and deserving of our wholehearted belief and devotion. All
things were made by Jesus, are upheld by Jesus, and are made for Jesus’ glory.
Our union with Christ by faith is what makes us “Christian”. He is our
righteousness, sanctification and glorification. We seek to worship Him as our
Prophet by trusting in His Word as truth. We come to Him as our Priest for
salvation from sin and to find strength in our daily battle against sin. We
honor Him as King by constantly seeking His kingdom here on earth as it is in
heaven.
Evangelical
The term “evangelical” comes from combining the Greek word for "gospel" or "good news” (evangelion), from eu-
"good" and angelion "message." To be “evangelical”
means that we believe in the good news of the Gospel. We believe that God
created all things good, but that Adam’s sin made the human race liable in our
enmity and strife with God. Jesus came to restore what was lost and succedded
in His mission. His righteousness was reckoned to us and our sin was accounted
to Him in His crucifixion. He conquered death and ascended to the right hand of
His father, from where He has sent the Holy Spirit to regenerate the hearts of
lost sinners. Being “born again”, we are enabled to respond to the Gospel
message through faith and repentance, thereby “justified” and reckoned as
judicially righteous in His sight through our union with Christ. We are also
“adopted” as children and enabled to cry out to Him as a Father. We also begin
the ongoing work of “sanctification” in our conversion, thus glorifying God by
bearing the fruit of the Spirit.
In a broader sense, the term “evangelical” has come to
characterize those who have a high view of the Bible. We treasure the Bible as
God's perfectly inspired Word and gladly recognize its authority in our lives.
Because we believe that the Bible is sufficient to direct us in every area of
life, Bible study and Scriptural application are vital to how we walk out our
faith and care for one another. We believe that preaching should expound upon
the text of Scripture and also point to Jesus.
In short, we submit to the authority of Scripture and
rejoice in the Gospel that it proclaims.
Family
We are not a building, though we meet in one. We are also not just a bunch of isolated
individuals who happen to gather together. The Church is the “ekklesia”, or
“called out ones”. We are a “called out” community of believers. We are all
individual members which make up a single body, meaning that each and every
single person is important to God’s plans and purposes for the Church. We seek
to be a multi-ethnic, multi-generational body of believers that represents
people from all walks of life. We reject any philosophy of Church growth that
isolates its mission to a specific type of people. As adopted children of God,
we strive to be a “household” of believers, serving one another in mutual love
and concern. We encourage both: corporate Lord’s Day worship and other smaller
gatherings for the purpose of cultivating life-long relationships characterized
by edification, prayer, and mercy.
Glorifying God and Enjoying Him Forever
This highest calling upon all of creation is to glorify God and Enjoy Him
forever. The same is true for the purpose of the Church. Pastor-Author John
Piper said, “Missions is
not the ultimate goal of the church. Worship is. Mission exists because worship
doesn’t. Worship is ultimate, not missions, because God is ultimate, not man.
When this age is over, and the countless millions of the redeemed fall on their
faces before the throne of God, missions will be no more. It is a temporary
necessity. But worship abides forever.”
We embrace the high calling of outreach and missions only
because we believe that our God is worthy to be glorified and is the source of
all joy. If we didn’t prioritize the glory of God in our worship and lives,
then all efforts of outreach and missions would actually be a pathetic
demonstration of a God who is not all-glorious and worthy of our lives. It
would be like a salesman selling something that he doesn’t personally find
worthy of his business.
We therefore strive to be a radically “doxological”
community that displays the excellencies of our great God. We are passionate in
our worship and seek to make much of God, believing that He is most glorified
in us when we are most satisfied in Him.
Worship is the fuel for outreach because we want others to experience
the glory of God in Christ Jesus and find Him to be the all-satisfying treasure
in their lives. We are therefore a missionary people who serve a missionary
God. God works through the mission of the Church in gathering worshippers from
every nation, tribe, and tongue. We gladly embrace this mission and seek to
share the Gospel, baptize new believers, and nurture glad-hearted
God-glorifying disciples.