We are a church in The United Methodist Church, a global denomination with over 5 million members. Our connection with other United Methodists is a strength that allows us to serve people all over the world. Our beliefs are Trinitarian, meaning we believe in God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Methodism was founded by John Wesley, an Anglican priest in the 18th century.
We follow his emphasis on grace which was three-fold:
- Prevenient Grace is the belief that God seeks after us before we are aware of God.
- Justifying Grace is the belief that we are made right with God through faith in Jesus Christ.
- Sanctifying Grace is the belief that the above faith leads us to seek to become more Christ-like in our daily living.
We seek to become more Christ-like through following Wesley’s three General Rules:
- Do no harm.
- Do all the good one can.
- Continue to work on our relationship with God.
As we try to discern God’s will for our lives, we do so prayerfully, using a disciplined approach we refer to as the “Wesleyan Quadrilateral.” The Quadrilateral is a way to help us to better understand (interpret) the meaning and application of Scripture into our beliefs and daily lives, providing us a sound foundation for establishing what it is we believe void of political and social human agenda’s.
This fourfold method begins with Scripture and illuminates it with:
- Scripture - The Bible (to include Old and New Testaments) is the foundation and standard for what we believe and seek to live out as Wesleyans. We affirm that these inspired words of God give us the essential and sufficient foundation for our belief. We embrace the best interpretive practices of exegesis to arrive at sound understanding. We also recognize that there are times when we need to drill deeper into our understanding of the original intent of the text and that is when we turn to the additional steps of the quadrilateral.
- Tradition – Church traditions and writings such as the Apostles’ Creed but also recent church writings such as our United Methodist Book of Discipline or Book of Resolutions.
- Experience – Our religious experiences of what we believe God is calling us to do. As we believe that God permeates our lives, we may often broaden what we tend to think of as religious experiences.
- Reason – God has given us minds with which to use. Our reason allows us to interpret scripture or life issues utilizing other scripture, tradition and experience. We don’t believe in checking our brains at the door when we enter the sanctuary.
