MEN, WOMEN, MARRIAGE & MINISTRY

We believe men and women are equal before God, bearing an unqualified and unchangeable dignity as those created in God’s image. We are equally in need of God’s grace as sinners who deserve God’s judgement. Through faith in Jesus Christ, we enjoy the shared status and privilege of being God’s children. We believe Christian men and women alike are empowered by the Spirit to serve in the Church and the world through word and deed. We also believe men and women have complementary roles within marriage and within the Church.

In marriage, we believe women are to submit to their husbands as a model of the Church’s submission to Jesus Christ. We believe men are to take responsibility to serve, and to lay down their lives for their wives as a model of Christ’s love for the Church. This reflects Christ’s headship of the Church. In the Church, we believe all Christians are to be involved in teaching and encouraging one another. We believe men and women have a wide range of formal and informal leadership roles in the Church which includes being deacons. We are committed to encouraging and equipping all men and women to use their gifts to serve our church, and in regards to teaching in ways consistent with the Bible’s teaching. We believe the particular responsibility of overseeing and teaching the doctrine of our church belongs to elders and is therefore only for men who meet the biblical qualification. This reflects Christ’s headship of the Church.