Christ as Lord. Its scriptural officers are Pastors and Deacons. While both men and women are gifted for service in the church, the office of Pastor is limited to men as qualified by Scripture.
The New Testament speaks also of the church as the Body of Christ which includes all of the redeemed of all the ages, believers from every tribe, and tongue, and people, and nation.
VII Baptism and The Lord’s Supper
Christian baptism is the immersion of a believer in water in the name of the Father, the Son, and Holy Spirit. It is an act of obedience symbolizing the believer’s faith in a crucified, buried, and risen Saviour, the believer’s death to sin, the burial of the old life, and the resurrection to walk in newness of life in Christ Jesus. It is a testimony to his faith in the final resurrection of the dead. Being a church ordinance, it is a prerequisite to the privileges of church membership and to the Lord’s Supper.
The Lord’s Supper is a symbolic act of obedience whereby members of the church, through partaking of the bread and the fruit of the vine, memorialize the death of the Redeemer and anticipate His second coming.
The first day of the week is the Lord’s Day. It is a Christian institution for regular observance. It commemorates the resurrection of Christ from the dead and should include exercises of worship and spiritual devotion, both public and private. Activities on the Lord’s Day should be commensurate with the Christian’s conscience under the Lordship of Jesus Christ.
The Kingdom of God includes both His sovereignty over the universe and His particular kingship over men who willfully acknowledge Him King. Particularly the Kingdom is the realm of salvation into which men enter by trustful, childlike commitment to Jesus Christ. Christians ought to pray and to labor that the Kingdom may come and God’s will, be done on earth. The full consummation of the Kingdom awaits the return of Jesus Christ and the end of this age.
God, in His own time and in His own way, will bring the world to its appropriate end. According His promise, Jesus Christ will come in the air at the end of this Church age and take the Church out of this world. At this time the dead in Christ will rise first and those who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the air to be forever with the Lord. The righteous in their resurrected and glorified
