Project Design/Goals
Copyright © 2011
Evangelical Beliefs
Evangelical Beliefs
Our desire for others is that they might be saved from the penalty and power of their sins, and, as a result, enjoy a personal and joyful relationship with their Creator forever. This happens when a person places their trust only and completely in the one true God for the free gift of a full and legal pardon-based upon the death of Jesus on the cross as their substitute.
OUR CENTRAL MESSAGE
The What Evangelical Christians Believe project is the culmination of collaborative efforts undertaken by many of those found on the endorsements page of this site. Upon gathering and consulting our respective church and ministry statements of faith, the consistency in meanings became obvious, and a Bible-based template was created. From that template, editing took place in order to accomplish the set goals through the development guidelines (see below).
The following goals were kept in mind while designing this project:
1. During joint intra-faith evangelistic projects, to provide a brief handout that answers the questions frequently posed to Christian missionaries: Would you tell me what you believe, and what your central message is?
2. To answer the objection that we Christians of various denominations are not of a common faith, by showing that we are unified in the essentials.
3. To be a teaching tool within our community, especially for persons new to street-conversation evangelism; essentially a place to start when searching for the right words to convey your personal beliefs.
Obviously, the use of this handout is not limited to these particulars, but we narrowed our goal parameters in order for it to have a particular shape and minimum functionality.
Development Guidelines
This inclusive statement of faith for Bible-believing, Evangelical Christians needs to be:
·...a Biblically accurate expression of our most important beliefs.
·...the doctrines evangelicals universally agree on, rather than teachings specific to particular groups only.
·...an affirmative, declaratory statement (e.g.—this is what we do believe), and not apologetic in nature per se.
·...brief, concise, and relatively free from technical terminology, in order to reduce reader confusion.
·...enough content to meaningfully illustrate the most important differences with non-Christian doctrines.
·...written as if its target audience could be practically any non-Christian.
·...clearly in contrast with any faith system outside Christianity, without having to list other system's doctrines within the document.
The project's website—www.evangelicalbeliefs.com—provides scripture references to support each of the statement's topics. There are also links to churches and ministries that have endorsed the statement content, directing the visitor to their independent statements of faith, as evidence that although we might find different ways of phrasing the 10 topics, our central evangelical Christian beliefs are unified.
If you would like to add your church or ministry to this list, please contact us at info@evangelicalbeliefs.com or call 253-831-1807.
The following goals were kept in mind while designing this project:
1. During joint intra-faith evangelistic projects, to provide a brief handout that answers the questions frequently posed to Christian missionaries: Would you tell me what you believe, and what your central message is?
2. To answer the objection that we Christians of various denominations are not of a common faith, by showing that we are unified in the essentials.
3. To be a teaching tool within our community, especially for persons new to street-conversation evangelism; essentially a place to start when searching for the right words to convey your personal beliefs.
Obviously, the use of this handout is not limited to these particulars, but we narrowed our goal parameters in order for it to have a particular shape and minimum functionality.
Development Guidelines
This inclusive statement of faith for Bible-believing, Evangelical Christians needs to be:
·...a Biblically accurate expression of our most important beliefs.
·...the doctrines evangelicals universally agree on, rather than teachings specific to particular groups only.
·...an affirmative, declaratory statement (e.g.—this is what we do believe), and not apologetic in nature per se.
·...brief, concise, and relatively free from technical terminology, in order to reduce reader confusion.
·...enough content to meaningfully illustrate the most important differences with non-Christian doctrines.
·...written as if its target audience could be practically any non-Christian.
·...clearly in contrast with any faith system outside Christianity, without having to list other system's doctrines within the document.
The project's website—www.evangelicalbeliefs.com—provides scripture references to support each of the statement's topics. There are also links to churches and ministries that have endorsed the statement content, directing the visitor to their independent statements of faith, as evidence that although we might find different ways of phrasing the 10 topics, our central evangelical Christian beliefs are unified.
If you would like to add your church or ministry to this list, please contact us at info@evangelicalbeliefs.com or call 253-831-1807.
