Beliefs - Walnut Fork Baptist Church

We are Baptist and we uphold some beliefs that guide our ministries. WFBC supports the mission and ministry of the Southern Baptist Convention primarily. We also support other missions and ministries as decided upon by our church family.

Who We Are

To know Baptists means to understand that the center of who and what we are in the Person and Work of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Baptists are people who have been redeemed through Christ from sin—the spiritual brokenness that causes us to resist God’s ways and fall short of His glory. Baptists hold high the Gospel of Jesus Christ as the unifying center around which everything else is built and from which all ministry flows.

We use the phrase regenerate church membership to emphasize that the starting point for everything related to a Baptist church is each individual’s personal faith in Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord of their lives.

Baptists believe that each human being is a sinner by birth and by choice, that all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23). We believe that Jesus, “in His substitutionary death on the cross,” made “provision for the redemption of men from sin” and “effected the reconciliation between God and man.” And we believe that “There is no salvation apart from personal faith in Jesus Christ as Lord.”

While the Bible does not teach that the waters of baptism have any saving power (salvation is by grace alone through faith alone, Ephesians 2:8), in keeping with the biblical emphasis reflected in our heritage and name, and as “a people of the Book” (the Bible),

Baptists believe that all true believers will long to be identified fully with their Lord and Savior through the act of believer’s baptism. We believe that Christian baptism is the immersion of a believer in water in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit (see Matthew 28:19).

It is an act of obedience symbolizing (1) the believer’s faith in a crucified, buried, and risen Savior; (2) the believer’s death to sin, the burial of the old life, and resurrection to walk in newness of life in Christ Jesus; and (3) the believer’s trust that his or her mortal flesh shall be clothed with immortality in the final resurrection of the dead. It is by the Gospel, because of the Gospel, and for the Gospel that the Southern Baptist Convention exists; so it only makes sense that everything about Southern Baptists is tied directly to the Gospel.

What We Believe

Baptists believe that the Bible is God’s revelation of Himself to mankind, with His ultimate revelation being the Gospel message of redemption through Jesus Christ. For that reason, Baptists have summarized their biblical convictions in a confession of faith called The Baptist Faith and Message. Baptists are not a creedal people, requiring churches or individuals to embrace a standardized set of beliefs; but we are a confessional people. The BF&M represents the confessional consensus of “certain definite doctrines that Baptists believe, cherish, and with which they have been and are now closely identified.” The first five articles of The Baptist Faith and Message affirm historical, orthodox, evangelical beliefs concerning The Scriptures, the Person and Works of God, the nature and fall of Man, God’s gracious provision of Salvation through faith in Jesus Christ alone, and God’s Purpose of Grace—that God is the One who initiates and completes the work of salvation. The next six articles affirm historical, biblical Baptist positions on the Church, Baptism and the Lord’s Supper, the Lord’s Day, the Kingdom, the doctrine of Last Things, and Evangelism and Missions. The final seven articles summarize a number of distinctively Baptist commitments to Christian Higher Education, Stewardship, Cooperation, The Christian and the Social Order, Peace and War, Religious Liberty, and The Family.

Why We Do What We Do

The answer to why we do what we do is simple— Baptists proclaim and minister the Gospel because the love of Christ compels us to do so (2 Corinthians 5:14). God loved us enough to send His one and only Son to pay the penalty for our sins. Whoever believes in Him has eternal life (John 3:16). In response to the love He has lavished on us, we are called to love one another (John 13:34–35; 15:12–17). Jesus summarized this truth in what is called the Great Commandment—Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and most important command. The second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself (Matthew 22:37–39). Baptists know the Way to have our sins forgiven and to have a right relationship with God; the Way to be redeemed from our sin and delivered from its consequences; the Way to have eternal life—not just forever in heaven, but the fullest life possible—the life of knowing Him (John 17:3) and knowing Him (Philippians 3:10). That Way is Jesus (John 14:6). Love compels us to share the Good News of His love and extend the offer of His forgiveness with as many as possible.