We believe every local Baptist church is autonomous and responsible directly to the Lord Jesus Christ under Scripture. No denomination, convention, fellowship, bishop, synod, presbytery, government, school, or outside organization possesses ecclesiastical authority over the local congregation.
We recognize two scriptural offices: pastor/bishop/elder and deacon. The terms pastor, bishop, and elder describe different aspects of the same pastoral office. These offices are reserved for biblically qualified men.
The pastor shepherds, teaches, and oversees the assembly under the authority of Scripture, while the congregation remains autonomous under Christ.
We believe in the priesthood of all born-again believers and their direct access to God through the Lord Jesus Christ. We reject Baptist Briderism and Landmarkism insofar as they teach that the Bride or Body of Christ is composed only of Baptist churches, that one particular Baptist succession or association alone constitutes the true Church, or that membership in the Bride depends upon an unbroken institutional chain of Baptist churches back to the apostles. We believe the Body and Bride of Christ consist of all genuinely saved believers in the present Church Age, while also maintaining the importance of a biblical, autonomous, Baptist local church and the historical continuity of Baptist distinctives.
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