WHAT WE BELIEVE

Doctrine matters. So does spiritual experience. And we're tired of the false dichotomy that says we can only have one or the other depending on what expression of the Body of Christ we’re part of. In fact, solid doctrine without deep spiritual experience is just empty words. And deep spiritual experience without solid doctrine is nothing but emotional reactions.

 

We need both. At City Church Seven Hills, we are committed to having both. We believe the Bible and we teach the Bible. We also pursue deep, profound experiences in the Spirit. We want to know God, as He is revealed in the Bible and we want to encounter Him in our mind, will, emotions, and body. 2 Timothy 3:16 says, “All Scripture is God-breathed.” The Bible is incredibly important but it is not just an ancient collection of writings to be studied. It is the words of God, breathed out on us to show us who He is. 

 

So whether you are new to our family, just checking us out, or you’ve been part of our community for years, we want to create a resource here for you to know what we believe.

 

Sunday mornings are a time when we come together to share what God has been doing in our lives. We worship and pursue that deep spiritual experience together. We also open the Word and preach the message that we believe God is speaking in that moment. For us, this is not often a place where we explore the deep theological questions. If we’re all honest, there aren’t many churches who plumb the depths of theology on a Sunday morning. It’s simply not the best place for it. There’s a wide of range of people, knowledge, and experience in any given church on any given Sunday and in order to speak to them all, we have to make certain choices about how we structure our services and choose our messages. None of this is to say that we, or any other church, waters down the gospel or ignores sound theology in order to appeal to a wide base. I’m simply acknowledging that Sunday morning worship services are not the ideal forum for teaching deep theology and walking through doctrinal statements. We touch on these things, but we don’t often dig deep.

 

A big part of the reason for this is that spoken words are far from the best way to communicate these heavy doctrinal concepts. Look at the early church. Paul wrote countless words to lay out his theology in many letters that we have collected in the New Testament and continue to study thousands of years later. No doubt, he spoke as well, but the letters he wrote were an indispensable part of his ministry and teachings. Not only because they gave those he was writing to a chance to dig deep and reflect on what he said over and over, but because they preserved his teachings through the millennia so that Paul can still influence and teach us today.

 

In the links below, we’ll be going through the doctrinal statement of City Church here on the blog. When we’re done, we’ll have a central place to answer the question, “What do we believe?” We can get in depth and we can be thorough. I pray this will be a helpful resource for you, both to give you a deeper understanding of your own faith and to help you articulate the specifics of the beliefs that define our community. Here is our full Statement of Faith along with links to the article on each point.