The following is an exercise in succinctness. This creed, in 22 articles, summarizes the beliefs held by Tetelestai Church in a very abbreviated form. A creed or statement of beliefs is not an explanation or an expansion of what is believed. That is left to the pastor and teacher, the theologian, the dogmatician, and all Christian witnesses of Jesus Christ. The Biblical references are but a tiny sample of Scriptural warrants for those beliefs. If one is interested, the explanation and expansion of this creed may be found in the hundreds of Biblical messages available on tetelestai.org.
Article 1) We believe in God the all-powerful Father, who is Love, whose Name is to be held as sacred, the Eternal Father of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Creator of Heaven and Earth, the Giver of every good and perfect gift.
Biblical references: Genesis 1:1; Matthew 6:9; Luke 10:21; John 3:16; 10:29-30; 1 Corinthians 8:6; 2 Corinthians 13:11; Ephesians 1:3; 5:20; James 1:17; 1 Peter 1:3; 5:10; 1 John 4:8, 16
Article 2) We believe in Jesus Christ the Messiah of Israel and Savior of the world, God's only eternally-begotten Son as to His Divine Nature, the Son of God's love, our Lord, the Lord of the living and the dead.
Biblical references: Matthew 16:16; John 1:18; 3:16, 18; 4:42; 1 John 4:9; Romans 14:9; Ephesians 1:5-6; Colossians 1:13; Revelation 1:17-18
Article 3) We believe that, as to His human nature, our Lord Jesus Christ was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary.
Biblical references: Isaiah 7:14; Matthew 1:20-23; Luke 1:27-31
Article 4) We believe in the Eternal Holy Spirit, "the Lord the Spirit", that He Himself is God, that His works are those that can only be attributed to Divinity, and that He is worthy of worshipful adoration by all of creation.
Biblical references:Genesis 1:2; Judges 14:6; 2 Samuel 23:2; Job 33:4; Psalm 139:7; 150:6; Isaiah 61:1; 63:11; Ezekiel 11:24; Mark 13:11; John 4:24; 20:22; Romans 1:4; 5 15:13; 1 Corinthians 2:10-14; 3:16; 2 Corinthians 3:16-18; 1 Thessalonians 4:8; Hebrews 9:14
Article 5) We believe that Jesus, once crowned with a crown of thorns, now "crowned with glory and honor", experienced Death, the wages of Sin, for everyone, that He the Sinless One loved us and became sin for us, was crucified, died, was buried, and rose again on the third day according to the Scriptures.
Biblical references:Psalm 22; Isaiah 53; Hosea 6:2; Zechariah 12:10; Matthew 28:7; John 19:2, 5, 17-18; 30-35; Romans 6:23; 1 Corinthians 15:3-4; 2 Corinthians 5:21; Galatians 2:20; Hebrews 2:9; Hebrews 13:20
Article 6) We believe that Jesus ascended to Heaven and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God where as our Great Archpriest He intercedes for us in order to save us completely.
Biblical references:Luke 24:51; Acts 1:9; Romans 8:34; Ephesians 1:19-21; 4:8-10; Hebrews 1:3; 7:25; 8:1; 10:12; 12:2
Article 7) We believe that Jesus Christ has universally saving significance, that His death on the Cross and His resurrection has a universally saving impact, and that He will return from Heaven to effect the restoration of all things according to that which God spoke through the mouth of His holy prophets from time immemorial.
Biblical references:John 3:17; 4:42; Acts 3:20-21; Romans 4:25; 5:18-19; 8:30-32; 1 Corinthians 15:22; 2 Corinthians 5:14, 19; Ephesians 1:9-11; Hebrews 9:26, 28; 1 Timothy 2:3-6; 4:9-10; Titus 2:11, 13; 3:4-7; 1 John 2:1-2; 3:1-2
Article 8) We believe in the resurrection of the body, that all human beings of all times and places will be changed, receiving a body of immortality and incorruptibility.
Biblical references: 1 Corinthians 15:12-16; 21-22; 44; 51-53; Philippians 3:20-21; 1 Thessalonians 4:13-17
Article 9) We believe that the last judgment of the living and the dead is to be transformative and restorative not condemning or retributive, that it will be conducted by the same Jesus Christ who exposed Himself to judgment for us all by tasting death, the wages of Sin, for everyone.
Biblical references:John 5:22, 27; Romans 5:20; 6:23; 11:32; Galatians 3:13; 2 Corinthians 5:14, 21; Hebrews 2:9-10; 13:8; 2 Timothy 4:1; 1 John 2:2; Revelation 21:5
Article 10) We believe that the New Covenant Community, also called the Church, is the Body of Christ who is its Head who is also Head of all things, and that "the Assembly of the Firstborn", as it is also called, is a preview of a reconciled community consisting of all people of all places and times, when God will be all in all.
Biblical references:1 Corinthians 12:12-13; 25-27; 15:20-28; 2 Corinthians 5:19; Ephesians 1:10; 22-23; 4:9-10; Colossians 1:15-20; Hebrews 12:23
Article 11) We believe that salvation is entirely a work of God accomplished in His omnipotent mercy, love, and grace, that the justification of all of humanity is by grace and through the faithfulness of Jesus Christ, His obedience to God the Father's universally saving will to the extent of THE Death of THE Cross, that the Holy Spirit evokes and stokes the faith of individuals and regenerates them by His power, and that eventually all of humanity will come to the unity of the faith and be conformed to the Image of God's Son.
Biblical references: Psalm 3:8; 68:20; Isaiah 45:23; 46:10; Jonah 2:9; Romans 3:23-24; 5:15-19; 6:23; 8:29-32; 11:32, 36; 2 Corinthians 4:13; Galatians 2:20; 3:22; Ephesians 1:9-11; 2:4-9; 4:13; Philippians 2:6-11; 1 Timothy 2:3-4; 4:9-10; Titus 3:5-7
Article 12) We believe that the Bible in its 66 canonical documents (39 in the Old Testament and 27 in the New Testament) from which we have taken references throughout this creed, is a single master narrative and as such that it exists as the Divinely revealed and authorized, God-breathed testimony of Jesus Christ who is the Reality of God, of True Humanity, and of salvation, and that all Scripture is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, correction, and for practical instruction in righteousness.
Biblical references: Luke 24:26-27, 44; John 5:39-40; Colossians 1:19; 2:9; 1 Timothy 2:5-6; 2 Timothy 3:15-16; Revelation 19:10
Article 13) We believe that the Christian life is a supernatural operation of grace involving faith, love, and hope, that it is the effect of God both willing and working in the individual believer to produce the fruit of the Spirit and the manifestation of the life of Jesus in one's mortal body, and that this is never perfectly attained in this life.
Biblical references: Romans 5:5; 8:24; 15:13; 1 Corinthians 13:13; 2 Corinthians 4:10- 11; Galatians 5:5, 14, 16, 22-24; Ephesians 4:22-24; 5:1-2; Philippians 1:9; 20-21; 2:13; 3:11-14; 1 Thessalonians 3:12; 1 John 1:9-2:1
Article 14) We believe that at the moment of death the Christian is at once absent from the body and at home with the Lord. We believe that since the risen Lord Jesus is the Lord of the living and of the dead and the Great Shepherd of the sheep that all those who have not believed in Him in the course of their life on earth nevertheless enter into His merciful and compassionate care at the moment of their death.
Biblical references:Romans 14:8-9; 2 Corinthians 5:1, 8, 14-21; Philippians 1:23; Hebrews 2:17; 13:20; 1 Timothy 4:10; 1 Peter 4:6
Article 15) We believe that the two ordinances of water-baptism and the Lord's Supper have been bequeathed to the Church until the Lord comes, but that water baptism is not the means of regeneration and that the Lord's Supper is not the conveyance of eternal life, the non-ritual vital issue with baptism being baptism into Christ's death and by the Spirit into Christ, and the purpose of the Lord's Supper being an inner recollection of the Lord's death and expectation of His coming.
Biblical references:Romans 6:4; 1 Corinthians 1:14-17; 11:20, 23-26; 12:12-13; Galatians 3:27; Ephesians 4:4-5
Article 16) We believe in the providence of God, that He works out everything in agreement with His great and gracious saving intention, that His Son through whom He created the universe upholds all things by His powerful decree and that by Him everything is held together and is being directed to a universally redemptive goal.
Biblical references:Romans 8:28; Ephesians 1:11; Colossians 1:16-17, 20; Hebrews 1:3
Article 17) We believe that Jesus Christ is the King of the ages and of all kings and the Lord of history, that He is in ultimate control of the course of history in its periods of progress and of decline and that He will ultimately redeem history and all of time along with all the universe and all creatures.
Biblical references:Psalm 2:7-8; 31:15; 110:1; Isaiah 49:6; Jonah 4:11; 1 Corinthians 15:25-28; Ephesians 1:9-11; 5:16; 1 Timothy 1:17; 6:15; Revelation 17:14; 19:16
Article 18) We believe that what a person or nation society or civilization sows it will also reap, that catastrophic temporal and historical judgments are allowed by God who will not be mocked when there has been an unrelenting and protracted sowing to the Flesh, that there is also a harvest in connection with everlasting Life in this and the next life to those who sow to the Spirit.
Biblical references:Hosea 8:7; Galatians 6:7-8
Article 19) We believe in accordance with and in addition to Articles 6-9 above that we will all appear before the judgment seat of Christ and receive rewards or suffer loss depending on what we did and produced in our time in mortal bodies, that the quality of our works will be made apparent through fire on that Day, but that the foundation of salvation Jesus Christ Himself remains for all people, even though some may be saved as through fire.
Biblical references:Romans 14:10-12; 1 Corinthians 3:10-15; 2 Corinthians 5:10; 2 Timothy 2:19; Hebrews 12:28-29
Article 20) Though we believe that God is the Savior of all people of all places and times, we also believe that He is especially the Savior of those who believe, for though believing is not the means of a person's justification in God's eyes, it is nevertheless the instrumentality of experiencing the Life of the Age to come, an experience of love (righteousness) joy, and peace, a modicum at least of the experience of the coming kingdom of God and of the salvation of the soul in time.
Biblical references:John 3:15-16; 20:31; Romans 14:17; 15:13; Galatians 5:22-23; Philippians 2:12; 1 Timothy 2:3-4; 4:9-10; James 1:21.
Article 21) We believe that all of Israel will be saved in the context of the salvation of the nations (Gentiles) and of the restoration of all things and the liberation of all of creation from its slavery to corruption.
Biblical references:Acts 3:19-21; Romans 8:19-23; 11:1-32, 11:26 especially
Article 22) Finally, we believe that we are not to be known merely by our beliefs but by the fruits of our lives, that we should and will be known as Christ-followers not solely by our creed but by the love of God being poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit given to us by the Father and the Son.
Biblical references:Deuteronomy 6:4-5; Matthew 7:16; 22:37-40; John 13:34-35; 14:16-17; 15:9-10; Romans 5:5; Galatians 5:22-23; Philippians 1:9; 2:13; 1 Thessalonians 3:12; 4:9
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