OUR VALUES
The following are the values that shape how we want to bring God glory and seek to accomplish our mission. Our values unpack the foundation of the church (the Bible), the mission of the church (disciples making disciples), and the motivation of the church (gospel heart).
God loves his people, changes his people, communes with his people, and gives His life to his people by communicating to them. We open our Bibles because God’s Word is what grows God’s people. Our foundation is the Word of God and in everything we do we want His Word, His life, his reality informing and transforming everything we do.
At The Shore Church we believe the Bible to be the inspired, inerrant, and infallible Word of God, useful for fully equipping, training, and reproving men and women of God (2 Timothy 3:16). The Bible is totally true and trustworthy and thus it is be our final guide in matters of faith and of daily life; for when it speaks God speaks. Furthermore, the Bible is a testimony to Christ, who is Himself the focus of divine revelation.
“Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth” – John 17:17.
“And every day in the temple and from house to house, they did not cease teaching and preaching that the Christ is Jesus.” – Acts 5:42
After Jesus rose from death and achieved salvation, He told the church, Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. – Matthew 28:19
A disciple is someone who follows and believes in the teachings of another. It is a follower or a learner. It refers to someone who takes up the ways of someone else. Applied to Jesus, a disciple is someone who learns from, and lives like Jesus in every area of their lives, by the power of the Holy Spirit. Making disciples is about worshipping Jesus, serving Jesus, and being a witness of Jesus. When Jesus speaks, we listen and live it out.
What does this look like?
It look like helping one another develop a Christian mind and Christlike character in the context of biblical community. It looks like equipping people for ministry inside the church, raising people up, and sending people to make Jesus known outside. It looks like being a family who is committed to seeing each other become more like Jesus, forming deep friendships where we can be challenged by another and exhort each other onto love and good deeds.
WE LOVE EVERYONE
A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” – John 13:34-35
We are fully loved and delighted in by Jesus. We have a secure place in God’s heart and in his family and it is from this love that the church is called to love God and one another (1 John 2:7-11; 3:10-18, 23; 4:7-12, 20). Our heart is to be a church where its okay to be in the process, to be in the mess, but loving you means helping you not stay there. At the heart of the Gospel is the cross where Jesus put our lives and relationships back together by his grace.
What does this look like?
We love everyone by rejoicing with one another, celebrating the good and beautiful things that are happening in our lives, as well as weeping with one another, sharing one another’s sorrows and entering into each other’s pain. We love everyone means we welcome both believers and skeptics to bring their doubts and beliefs to the table.
OUR BELIEFS
“What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us.” – A.W. Tozer
At the core of what we believe is the gospel of Jesus Christ—the glorious truth that Jesus Christ died and was raised so that sinners would be reconciled to God. The gospel is our primary passion and the driving influence in our church’s preaching, worship, Community Groups, and mission.
Below is our Statement of Faith (adapted and condensed from the Gospel Coalition and Bridgeway Church which is rooted in the Scriptures and centred on the gospel.
(2) REVELATION
(3) CREATION OF HUMANITY
(4) THE FALL
(5) THE PLAN OF GOD
(6) THE GOSPEL
(7) THE REDEMPTION OF CHRIST
(8) THE JUSTIFICATION OF SINNERS
(9) THE POWER OF THE HOLY SPIRIT
The Power of the Holy Spirit We believe that this salvation, attested in all Scripture and secured by Jesus Christ, is applied to his people by the Holy Spirit. Sent by the Father and the Son, the Holy Spirit glorifies the Lord Jesus Christ, and, as the other Paraclete, is present with and in believers. He convicts the world of sin, righteousness, and judgment, and by his powerful and mysterious work regenerates spiritually dead sinners, awakening them to repentance and faith, and in him they are baptized into union with the Lord Jesus, such that they are justified before God by grace alone through faith alone in Jesus Christ alone. By the Spirit’s agency, believers are renewed, sanctified, and adopted into God’s family; they participate in the divine nature and receive his sovereignly distributed gifts. The Holy Spirit is himself the down payment of the promised inheritance, and in this age indwells, guides, instructs, equips, revives, and empowers believers for Christ-like living and service. (John 14:12; Acts 2:14-21; 4:29-30; Romans 12:3-8; 1 Corinthians 12:7-11; 12:28-31; 14:1-33; Galatians 3:1-5).
(10) THE KINGDOM OF GOD
(11) GOD'S NEW PEOPLE
(12) BAPTISM & THE LORD'S SUPPER
(13) THE RESTORATION OF ALL THINGS
OUR ALIGNMENT
The following are organizations The Shore Church has formal partnership with or is supportive of:
The Canadian Conference of MB Churches