Doctrinal Position
Doctrinally, Chappelow Ridge Baptist Church is an historic Baptist church in its doctrine and practices. Many Baptist churches of today have so much protestant doctrine in them that the people do not know the difference between Baptist doctrine and protestant doctrine. Baptists are not protestants. Protestants came out of the Catholic church.
A. Concerning the Scripture
We believe in the inerrant, infallible, verbal plenary inspiration of the Scriptures; that the Bible is the complete and final revelation of God to man; that the Bible is to be interpreted literally and not allegorically or figuratively unless the context clearly indicates that the language is figurative.
We believe that those inspired words have been inerrantly preserved to the English-speaking people in the Authorized Version (commonly called the King James Version).
B. Concerning the Church
We believe that the church is a local visible body of water baptized believers covenanted together by a common faith to fulfill the great commission which was given by Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ personally started his church during his earthly ministry and every church is to be autonomous and completely free from all organizations.
C. Concerning Church Ordinances
We believe that there are only two, 1. Baptism by immersion of the believer in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. This is done under the authority of the local church. 2. The Lord’s Supper is a church ordinance; therefore we practice closed or restricted communion. Open and close communion practices of the Lord’s Supper are protestant practices and should be rejected by any real Baptist church.
D. Concerning God
We believe that there is one, and only one God, creator and supreme ruler of heaven and earth; that in the unity of the Godhead there are three persons, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, equal personalities of the same essence and being. They are co-existent, and co-equal.
E. Concerning Jesus Christ
We believe in His virgin birth, His sinless perfection, His vicarious death, His bodily resurrection, His mediatorship, and His personal premillennial return.
F. Concerning Salvation
We believe in salvation by grace through faith and that not of yourselves. Real salvation comes about by the right act of God. Real salvation is not in doing something or being baptized. Real salvation starts and ends with the Trinity. The Holy Spirit convicts a person of sin, God the Father draws a person to Christ (John 6:44), and Christ saves sinners. Real salvation makes a new creature/person that is willing to follow the Lord.
G. Concerning Human Sexuality
We believe that God has commanded that no sexual activity be engaged in outside of a marriage between a man and a woman. We believe that any form of homosexuality, lesbianism, bisexuality, bestiality, incest, fornication, adultery, and pornography are sinful perversions of God’s gift of sexuality. We also believe that God disapproves of and forbids any attempt to alter one’s gender by surgery or appearance. (Gen. 2:24; 19:5, 13; 26:8-9; Lev18:1-30; Romans 1:26-29; I Cor. 5:1, 6:9; I Thess. 4:1-8; Heb. 13:4)
We believe that the only legitimate marriage is the joining of one man and one woman. (Gen. 2:24; Romans 7:2; I Cor. 7:10; Eph. 5:22-23)
H. Concerning Israel
We believe that Israel is God’s chosen national people (Gen. 28:13). In God’s sovereign will, Israel serves as a channel of His blessing to the entire world (Gen. 12:3) for His glory (Isa. 43:7), and His witness to the nations (Isa. 43:10). God’s election of Israel for this unique relationship is irrevocable (Ro. 11:28-29).
We believe Israel is distinct from the church and central to God’s plan, past, present, and future. The unfulfilled prophecies given to Israel in the Old Testament will find their literal fulfillment in Israel at a future time (Ps. 105:6-10).