What We Believe

The following are the core beliefs of Fair View United Methodist Church based on the foundational truths  revealed in Scripture, illumined by tradition, vivified in personal experience, and confirmed by reason.   All of our teaching and ministry is rooted in and flows out of these biblical doctrines

We believe in the one true, holy and living God, Eternal Spirit, who is Creator, Sovereign and Preserver of all things visible and invisible. He is infinite in power, wisdom, justice, goodness and love, and rules with gracious regard for the well-being and salvation of men, to the glory of His name. We believe the one God reveals Himself as the Trinity: Father, Son and Holy Spirit, distinct but inseparable, eternally one in essence and power.

We believe in Jesus Christ, truly God and truly man, in whom the divine and human natures are perfectly and inseparably united. He is the eternal Word made flesh, the only begotten Son of the Father, born of the Virgin Mary by the power of the Holy Spirit. As ministering Servant he lived, suffered and died on the cross. He was buried, rose from the dead and ascended into heaven to be with the Father, from whence He shall return. He is eternal Savior and Mediator, who intercedes for us, and by Him all humanity will be judged.

We believe in the Holy Spirit who proceeds from and is one in being with the Father and the Son. He convinces the world of sin, of righteousness and of judgment. He leads men through faithful response to the gospel into the fellowship of the Church. He comforts, sustains and empowers the faithful and guides them into all truth.

We believe the Holy Bible - the Old Testament and New Testament - reveals the Word of God as necessary for our salvation. The Word of God is to be received through the Holy Spirit as the true rule and guide for faith and practice. Whatever is not revealed in or established by the Holy Scriptures is not to be made an article of faith nor is it to be taught as essential to salvation.

We believe the Christian Church is the community of all true believers under the Lordship of Christ. We believe it is one, holy, apostolic and catholic. It is the redemptive fellowship in which the Word of God is preached by men and women divinely called, and the sacraments are duly administered according to Christ's own appointment. Under the discipline of the Holy Spirit the Church exists for the maintenance of worship, the edification of believers and the redemption of the world.

We believe the Sacraments, ordained by Christ, are symbols and pledges of the Christian's profession and of God's love for us. The Sacraments are means of grace by which God works invisibly in us, quickening, strengthening and confirming our faith in Him. Two Sacraments are ordained by Christ our Lord, namely Baptism and the Lord's Supper.
Baptism
We believe Baptism signifies entrance into the household of faith, and is a symbol of repentance and inner cleansing from sin, a representation of the new birth in Christ Jesus and a mark of Christian discipleship.
We believe children are under the atonement of Christ and as heirs of the Kingdom of God are acceptable subjects for Christian Baptism. Children of believing parents through Baptism become the special responsibility of the Church. Children should be nurtured and led to personal acceptance of Christ, and by profession of faith confirm their Baptism.
Lord's Supper
We believe the Lord's Supper is a representation of our redemption, a memorial of the sufferings and death of Christ, and a token of love and union which Christians have with Christ and with one another. Those who rightly, worthily and in faith eat the broken bread and drink the blessed cup partake of the body and blood of Christ in a spiritual manner until He comes.

We believe humanity is fallen from righteousness and, apart from the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, is destitute of holiness and inclined to evil. Except a person be born again, he/she cannot see the Kingdom of God. An individual, without divine grace, cannot do good works pleasing and acceptable to God. We believe, however, humanity influenced and empowered by the Holy Spirit is responsible in freedom to exercise personal will for good.

We believe God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself. The offering Christ freely made on the cross is the perfect and sufficient sacrifice for the sins of the whole world, redeeming humanity from all sin, so no other satisfaction is required.

We believe we are never accounted righteous before God through our works or merit, but that penitent sinners are justified or accounted righteous before God only by faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.
We believe regeneration is the renewal of humanity in righteousness through Jesus Christ, by the power of the Holy Spirit, whereby we are made partakers of the divine nature and experience newness of life. By this new birth the believer becomes reconciled to God and is enabled to serve Him with the will and the affections.
We believe, although believers have experienced regeneration, it is possible to depart from grace and fall into sin; and we may even then, by the grace of God, be renewed in righteousness.

We believe good works are the necessary fruits of faith and follow regeneration but do not have the virtue to remove our sins or to avert divine judgment. We believe good works, pleasing and acceptable to God in Christ, spring from a true and living faith thus making faith evident.

We believe sanctification is the work of God's grace through the Word and the Spirit, by which individuals who have been born again are cleansed from sin in thoughts, words and acts, and are enabled to live in accordance with God's will, and to strive for holiness without which no one will see the Lord.
Entire sanctification is a state of perfect love, righteousness and true holiness which every regenerate believer may obtain by being delivered from the power of sin, by loving God with all the heart, soul, mind and strength, and by loving one's neighbor as one's self. Through faith in Jesus Christ this gracious gift may be received in this life both gradually and instantaneously, and should be sought earnestly by every child of God.
We believe Sanctification does not deliver believers from the infirmities, ignorance, and mistakes common to humanity, nor from the possibilities of further sin. The Christian must continue, on guard against spiritual pride, and seek to gain victory over every temptation to sin. Christians must respond wholly to the will of God so that sin will lose its power over them; and the world, the flesh, and the devil are put under their feet. Thus, Christians rule over these enemies with watchfulness through the power of the Holy Spirit.