At the core of Providence is a community of people still amazed at God’s kindness shown to us in Jesus Christ. We know we aren’t perfect and don’t pretend to be. We don’t expect our guests to be perfect either! In fact, we are very aware of our weaknesses and brokenness, which makes us even more grateful for the forgiveness and grace we discover in the gospel.
There’s really so much that could be said about us. Each member and family at Providence has a unique story to tell. But the common thread that connects every person, service, ministry, pastor and care group is our desire to celebrate and live in light of God’s generosity to us in the gospel of Jesus Christ. The powerful work of the Spirit in our church is seen in the increasing ways we love Christ, love one another and love our community. You could say “the love of Christ controls us!”
2 Corinthians 5:14-21 says,
“For the love of Christ controls us, because we have concluded this: that one has died for all, therefore all have died; 15 and he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised. 16 From now on, therefore, we regard no one according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, we regard him thus no longer. 17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. 18 All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; 19 that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. 20 Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. 21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”
What is the Gospel?
It's a Story
The Gospel is the story describing how God is at work to reconcile all things to Himself through the life, death, resurrection and future return of Jesus Christ.
But story doesn't mean fairy tale. The gospel is real, it's the supreme history of the world that ties all the other smaller stories together. The gospel is the historical narrative about the work of the triune God to unite all things together in the Son according to the eternal plan and will of the Father by the power of the Spirit.
It's a Rescue Mission
From the very beginning God was orchestrating His great gospel rescue mission to reconcile and redeem a broken creation and fallen humanity from Satan, sin and its fallout. And that rescue is centered on the life, substitutinoary death and glorious resurrection of the Son of God, Jesus Christ. The gospel is God's saving activity, his work of reclaiming a people for himself, that we would glorify God and find all-satisfying joy in Jesus.
It's Good News
The gospel is the good news that God extends grace to broken people. While all people have rebelled against God's rightful rule as their Creator, in mercy He sent Jesus to redeem rebels and transform them into worshippers. The gospel is God's great announcement that He saves all who repent and believe in Jesus.
What is Our Mission?
A Community of Disciples Treasuring, Proclaiming & Maturing in the Gospel of Jesus Christ
Providence exists to celebrate the Gospel by making disciples of Christ, for the glory of God, by the power of the Spirit, for the joy of all peoples. That's our direction and goal. To fully enegage ourselves in Christ's disciple making commission to the Church.
Our mission of treasuring, proclaiming and maturing in the gospel is our means of achieving that end.
At the heart of this mission is the belief that all we do should be built around the gospel. It's the message that brings salvation, but also the power by which the Christian life is lived. The gospel reminds us of our never ending need for Christ and his saving work. And this same gospel reminds us that while God saves us as individuals, he calls us into the community of His Church, in order that we'd be built up to maturity together. Finally, the satisfaction we find in Christ and His Church compels us outward, to share Christ and love people as His ambassadors.
In light of this, we believe that the local church is God's ordained context where the mission of disciple making is meant to happen. Biblical disciple making is a synergy of treasuring, maturing in and declaring the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Treasuring
The glorious end of God's saving work in Jesus is to make worshippers who treasure Jesus above all else. As disciples of Jesus Christ we are called to the joyful task of taking supreme pleasure and delight in Jesus. In finding satisfaction in the fountain of delights that exceeds all the other leaky pleasures the world offers outside of the Jesus. The treasure we find in salvation is satisfying because it brings us into relationship and communion with God himself, the One our hearts were made for.
Maturing
The power of the gospel that first caused us to be born again is also active in bringing us to maturity. We become like what we worship, and so disciples who treasure Jesus will inevitably begin to be conformed to His image. The grace that saved us is also the grace that sanctifies us, as we behold and are changed by the glory of Jesus Christ witnessed in God's Word. The transforming work of the Spirit empowers our pursuit of a life lived in step with the gospel. And the gift of the Body of Christ provides community encouragement, fellowship and exhortation that assists believers in their fight of faith, battle with sin and pursuit of holiness.
Proclaiming
As disciples who've been made alive by God's grace we are eager to share God's grace in the gospel. Having received the good news of the gospel believers now have the privilege of being ambassadors for Christ, proclaiming God's message of reconciliation to their communities and the world. The church gives witness to the gospel as it gathers and as it scatters, in corporate worship and personal relationships. The experience of the love of Christ engenders love for our neighbors, communities and the least of these. Our life together and in the world serves as a bridge to the message of hope we declare, creating an attractional comminty - the church - that displays the goodness of the gospel.
What Do We Believe?
The Bible is the Word of God, fully inspired and without error. It is the supreme and final authority for all matters of Christian life and belief.
There is one true and living God, who eternally exists in three persons—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—who are equal in every divine perfection and who execute distinct but harmonious offices in all the work of the Godhead.
Man was created by God in His own image, but through his sin incurred physical and spiritual death. As a result, all people are separated from God because of their sin and are lost and without hope apart from salvation in Christ.
The Gospel is the good news of God’s saving actions towards sinners through Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ, the eternal son of God, took on human nature, lived a sinless life, and died a substitutionary death for sinners.
Salvation is a free gift that comes only by God’s grace, through faith in Jesus Christ alone. Anyone who turns from their sin and trusts in Jesus Christ and His death on their behalf receives forgiveness of sins and the gift of eternal life.
The Holy Spirit works progressively to transform genuine believers more and more into the image of Christ. His work is carried on in our hearts through such appointed means as the study of Scripture, prayer, worship, and fellowship with other believers. The Holy Spirit also empowers believers for Christian witness and service and gives gifts for the building up of the body of Christ, the church.
The universal church, composed of genuine followers of Christ, exists to worship, serve, and glorify God. All members of the universal church are to be vitally committed members of a local church, where they receive pastoral care and the opportunity to employ their God-given gifts in His service.
Jesus Christ will return to the earth, personally and visibly, to establish His kingdom in the new heavens and the new earth. We believe in the bodily resurrection of both the saved and the lost—the saved to endless joy, living and reigning with Christ, and the lost to endless punishment away from the benevolent presence of God.
