Our Beliefs
We are a Bible-believing Methodist church that stands on the fundamentals of the Christian faith. Without apology, the foundation of our ministry stands on the Word of God, and we believe it to be God’s inspired Word, inerrant, infallible, authoritative, and eternally sure. That Word proclaims Jesus Christ as the world’s only hope for salvation. All of the teaching and preaching at Hope Church is centered upon the person and work of Jesus Christ: crucified, risen, and soon coming again! We emphasize the importance of a personal relationship with Jesus Christ in all of our ministries. We worship in a manner that exalts Christ as pre-eminent, for He alone is the way sinners may come to God.
We furthermore stand for the principles and doctrines of the Evangelical Methodist Church of America, and we are also affiliated with the American Council of Christian Churches. We are NOT affiliated in any way with the United Methodist Church, nor the National Council of Christian Churches.
The Bible
Hope Evangelical Methodist Church stands without compromise or apology for the Bible as the verbally inspired, infallible, inerrant, and all-sufficient Word of God, which God has magnified above His own name (Psalm 138:2).
Evangelical Methodists accept God’s Word as God’s only written revelation to this world and is our final authority for faith and practice. We believe that God gave His Word to the human race by divine inspiration (2 Timothy 3:16), and that He has preserved His Word from that time to all generations (Psalm 12:7).
We urge the preaching and teaching of God’s Word in church, home, school, local community, and around the world. We believe that obedience to the Holy Scriptures will do more to point the world out of its present distress than all the efforts of men.
We use the King James Version of the Scripture in our pulpit.
God
The God of the Bible is the infinite and perfect Spirit in whom all things have their founding, support, and completion (Romans 11:36; 1 Corinthians 8:6; Colossians 1:16-17). God has revealed himself to mankind (Exodus 3:14; Isaiah 43:13; 1 Thessalonians 1:9) and He is known by His attributes.
The Bible tells us that God is holy, majestic above all of His creation, separate from all that is unclean. He is self existent; infinite, omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, eternal, immutable, and incomprehensible. God is perfect, all-wise, the only true God, righteous, faithful, loving, merciful, and gracious. The one true God exists wholly and indivisable, simultaneously and eternally, in three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. He is three persons in one essence. Each person is forever and equally God, yet each have their unique functions.
The Sovereign God is the Creator of all. He freely and wisely directs all things and events in accordance to His perfect will for His glory alone. He spoke all of creation into existence out of nothing (Hebrews 11:3) in six literal, twenty-four hour days.
Jesus Christ
We believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God (John 5:17-18, 10:36). He is the second-member of the Godhead. As God the Son He is co-equal (John 10:30) and co-eternal (John 8:58) with the Father. The eternal Son took man’s nature upon himself in the womb of the virgin (Matthew 1:23; Isaiah 7:14), and He was conceived of the Holy Spirit, so that He was, and still is, sinless (Hebrews 4:15, 13:8; Matthew 1:20).
In the person of Jesus Christ, God and man have been forever joined together into one person (Philippians 2:5-8) having two whole and perfect natures, never to be divided, who is One Christ. Jesus was crucified, dead, and buried, to reconcile to His Father a people whom He redeemed through the shedding of His precious blood. Jesus kept the divine law perfectly on their behalf by His personal obedience. His death on the cross was a once-for-all time substitutionary sacrifice that fully satisfied God’s wrath toward repentant sinners.
Believers are made partakers of the redemption purchased on their behalf by Jesus Christ by the working of the Holy Spirit who unites them to Christ by belief and through an effectual calling. That calling is the work of God’s Spirit, who convinces sinners of their sin, and enlightens their minds to the knowledge of Jesus Christ as He is revealed in the Word of God. The Spirit renews the will, persuades, and enables the individual to embrace Jesus Christ as his Lord and Saviour. That work is freely offered in the message of the gospel.
Jesus rose again bodily on the third day, and forty days later, He visibly ascended into heaven where He is presently interceding for His redeemed people, who eagerly await His return.
Man, Sin, and Eternity
Sin is the failing to conform to God’s holy character, and is the transgression of his holy law (Romans 3:23; 1 John 3:4). Adam, the first man created by God, fell from his original righteousness and from fellowship with God by his disobedience and has brought sin, guilt, and condemnation upon not just himself, but upon all of his descendants. All human beings have inherited from him a totally corrupted sin nature.
Being sold to sin by our first father, every person is sinful not only in their thoughts, nature, and actions, but also in their omissions. All men are totally depraved and spiritually dead, and are alienated from God and from the life that is found in Him. The mind, will, and emotions of man are throughly corrupt and enslaved to sin. The unsaved, left to themselves, are entirely unwilling, and unable, to submit to spiritual truth and salvation. Sin’s consequence is death (Romans 6:23), and this death is two-fold: spiritual death is eternal separation from God (Ephesians 2:1); physical death, is the separation of the body from the soul (James 2:26). For the unsaved, death brings eternal damnation in hell and in the lake of fire (Revelation 20:14-15). Man is thus hopelessly lost apart from the salvation that Jesus Christ alone offers.
Those who are saved have had their eyes opened to their rebellion against a holy God. They truly see their hopeless and lost condition before God’s bar of justice, and they have experienced the drawing that God alone can do. Through God’s work the saved have been made able to repent and to turn from their sinful, wicked ways, and to trust in Christ alone for salvation as is freely offered in the message of the gospel. In that salvation the believer has been forever united with Jesus Christ. He has been justified, declared righteous, in the sight of God by the imputation of Christ’s perfect righteousness. Believers’ have had their sins forgiven, and have been brought into the family of God. God has separated them from the power of sin unto Himself, and they must grow in holiness in this life through the sanctifying work of the indwelling Spirit of God, through their obedience to the Word of God, and through the ministry of the local church. God has preserved them secure in Christ, and He has enabled the believer to persevere in Christ and never fall away, thus assuring them of eternal life, until they are brought to be forever with Him.
Hope Church teaches the gospel, which must be proclaimed, heard, and believed for anyone to be saved (Acts 11:14; Romans 10:13-17; 2 Timothy 2:10). That gospel teaches that the salvation of a sinner is owed entirely to God’s grace, and that the damnation of every sinner is due entirely to their sin and unbelief (John 3:18; Acts 13:46).
The Holy Spirit
We believe in the eternal deity and personality of the Holy Spirit as the third member of the Trinity (2 Samuel 23:2-3; Matthew 28:19; 1 Corinthians 3:16; Hebrews 9:14). Through God’s Word, the Spirit convicts men of sin (John 16:8-11; 2 Thessalonians 2:13-14), imparts spiritual life in the new birth (John 3:3, 5; Titus 3:5), and is the earnest of salvation to the believer (Ephesians 1:13-14). As that earnest, the Holy Spirit permanently indwells the believer (Romans 8:9; 1 Corinthians 6:19), controls them through their obedience to the Word (Ephesians 5:18; Colossians 1:9-11), and assures them of salvation (Romans 8:14, 16). He illumines their minds to willingly accept, apply, and obey the Scripture (1 Corinthians 2:14-16), and He intercedes for them (Romans 8:26).
The Holy Spirit incorporates every believer into the body of Christ (Acts 2:1-4; 11:15; 1 Corinthians 12:13). The believer evidences the Spirit’s control and indwelling with spiritual fruit (Galatians 5:22-23). Furthermore, the Spirit distributes spiritual gifts to all who are under His control (Romans 12:6), God-given abilities for ministering to others in the church (1 Corinthians 12:7) for the use of service and edification of other believers. Certain of these gifts (e.g., tongues, prophecies, miracles, healing) were by their very nature miraculous, and they served as signs or confirmations of the apostles and their message until the canon of Scripture was closed. With this established gift, these miraculous gifts are no longer given, for they are no longer needed (1 Corinthians 13:8-10).
Committed to the Main Truths of the Protestant Reformation
We live in days of great apostasy and spiritual declension, and such apostasy and spiritual declension has produced an ignorance of, and indeed a repudiation of, the great themes of the Protestant Reformation. We celebrate the great achievements of the Protestant Reformation and glory in the five main truths which it sought to set forth. These five truths are:
SOLA SCRIPTURA: the truth that the Bible alone is the only authority for the church’s belief, worship, and practice.
SOLA FIDE: the penitent sinner is justified by faith alone in the finished work of Christ, and so we repudiate all forms of works religion.
SOLA GRATIA: Salvation is by grace alone, so that no human merit enters into our salvation, but we are saved by the merits of the Lord Jesus Christ alone, namely his blood and righteousness. That blood that cleanses us from all sin, and Christ’s perfect righteousness is imputed to us by faith alone.
SOLUS CHRISTUS: We rejoice in believing that Christ alone is the saviour of sinners, and not the church, and certainly not the Roman Catholic institution, that is more state than church. Christ alone is the way to the church; not the church the way to Christ. Christ alone is the only mediator between God and men, and there is no other name given among men whereby we must be saved.
SOLI DEO GLORIA: To the triune God belongs all the glory on earth and in heaven, in this world and that which is to come. God forbid that we should glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ by which we are crucified to the world, and the world to us. We glory in the Father, in the Son, and in the Holy Spirit, recognizing that Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created (Revelation 4:11). Salvation belongs to the Lord and we humbly bow before Him and seek to labor and glorify the Triune God in every way that we can through the exposiiton of the Word of God and through the power of the Holy Spirit. Amen and Amen.
The Doctrine of Separation
The doctrine of Separation rests on the clear teaching of the Word of God that warns, “Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness? and what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? and what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? for ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you, and will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty” (1 Corinthians 6:14-18).
The apparent “success” of modern evangelicalism has encouraged even greater departures from the Scriptures of Truth. It has also fostered the pretense that it is possible and even desirable for believers in Christ to have fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, when the Scriptures absolutely forbid such fellowship (Ephesians 5:11; 2 John 10-11). The Word of God calls Christ’s people to strengthen their resolve to be faithful to the Gospel and to take their stand against that which dilutes or denies it, and to practice such separation in their individual lives, as the Scriptures command, “as He which hath called you is holy, so be ye holy in all manner of conversation” (1 Peter 1:15). We must “earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered to the saints” (Jude 3).
Therefore we resolve to maintain the practice of biblical separation, both personally and ecclesiastically, and to remain faithful to the biblical demand to separate from those who teach “another gospel”, and from all who deny the doctrines of the Scripture, from all who pervert the Scripture to unbiblical uses and teachings, and from all those who refuse to separate themselves from those who are disobdedient to God’s commands.
Committed to Fundamental Christianity
Hope Evangelical Methodist Church takes its stand firmly with historic Fundamental Christianity which was the position of early Methodism. We believe the Bible for what it claims to be-God’s perfect revelation to man. God’s Word in the language of men. We believe all that the Bible says about Jesus Christ and all that Jesus Christ says about the Bible. Evangelical Methodist’s believe that the Bible teaches that God has revealed himself in three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; that Jesus Christ is truly God in the flesh; that his substitutionary death pays for sin; that he arose bodily from the dead; and that He will personally and physically return to rule on this earth. We believe in exposing and separating from all that is contrary to the Bible. We earnestly contend for the faith that was once for all time delivered to man in a completed Bible. We reject all additions to, and subtractions from, the Holy Scripture. We call upon God’s people to separate from churches, or other religious groups that advocate modernism, ecumenism, new evangelicalism, the modern charismatic movement, Roman Catholicism, cultism, or other theological theories which question, add to, subtract from, or twist the Word of God. We believe that there is only one true and living God of the Scriptures, and therefore reject all other religious persuasions.
The Name "Methodist"
The name “Methodist” was given to John Wesley and his fellow-seekers by scorners who ridiculed their earnest efforts to achieve holiness. But, history has vindicated those who were scorned, for the eighteenth century spiritual enlightenment is attributable to their instrumentality in God’s hands. Wesley’s name is synonymous with one of history’s greatest revivals. By this revival England was spared the bloody revolution suffered in France. In North America it helped to shape a culture of God-consciousness by which civilization has advanced beyond an earlier development.
Nineteenth century Methodists continued to suffer scorn from formal religionists and from openly wicked persons who shared their gospel-hardness, who were unconcerned with holiness, or Scripture. But it was a scorn of which only the Godly are worthy. A scorn is a badge of honor to all who live Godly in Christ Jesus. Their gospel and humanitarian outreach has brought inestimable relief to the entire world, further vindicating their convictions and their name.
Twentieth century Methodism suffered a different scorn. These claimed a name earned by their predecessors’ spiritual faithfulness but of which they were unworthy, having spurned the very doctrines that fueled the zeal, passion, sacrifice, and effectiveness of the original, authentic Methodists. They claimed its honorable name and heritage but denied the truths and the spirit which were its history. Consequently, the name “Methodist” has come to mean something different.
Those who love the truths and holiness of early Methodism see present Methodism as a contradiction of those principles. The name is defiled beyond recognition by worldly infidels whose lives are a denial of its standard. Today, the name “Methodist” has come to be scorned by the truly Godly for its continued use by an apostate ministry that has corrupted, distorted, and confused its original meaning.
We reaffirm the principles and spirit of authentic, historic Methodism by: Unwavering confidence in the divine inspiration, inerrancy, infallibility, authority, and sufficiency of the sixty-six books of the Bible; Passionately preaching the whole counsel of God revealed therein; Earnestly endeavoring with God’s help to obey his will and commandments by holy, Christ-honoring living; and zealously endeavoring to “preach the gospel to every creature” through local and worldwide evangelistic outreach.
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