What We Believe
Emmanuel is a local congregation of The Orthodox Presbyterian Church. The word "Orthodox" in our name means committed to right belief. We are unreservedly committed to the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments as the divinely inspired, inerrant Word of God. We accept them as the only infallible rule of faith and life. The Orthodox Presbyterian Church was established as a testimony to the authority of the Bible at a time when that authority was being denied by others.
The term "Reformed" defines our system of doctrine. Since we believe that the Bible is the standard of all that we are to believe and do we strive to "reform" every thought and practice by evaluating all things in the light of God’s word. The term Reformed is a historical term that goes back almost four centuries.
It refers to a period (The Great Reformation) when the church underwent a reformation in attempting to return Christianity to the authority of Scripture.
We stand in a long line of believers over the centuries that embrace the Westminster Standards as the best summary of Christian doctrine. These Standards are not the final authority in the OPC, but are subordinate to the primary standard of the Church, namely, the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments.
The Westminster Assembly (1643-48) set forth a Presbyterian form of church government as well as a Reformed theology. The term "Presbyterian" refers to our form of government. We are Presbyterian because we believe that the Bible teaches us that Christ is the King and Head of His Church.
Locally, therefore, we believe that each church is to be governed by a plurality of elders chosen and equipped by God and recognized and elected by the people. Regionally, because the Lord’s Church is more than an individual congregation, we as a congregation maintain close relationships with other congregations of like mind, providing a system of checks and balances to maintain the health of local churches.
There are two kinds of elders: (1) men who direct the affairs of the church and (2) men whose work is preaching and teaching in addition to rule. The former are called elders or ruling elders, and the latter, ministers. Together they constitute the Session (the ruling body) of the local church. As shepherds, their task is to feed, guide and guard the church that Christ purchased with his own blood.
Reformed theology is also called covenant theology because it teaches that God instituted a covenant that governs his dealings with men. In a reformed church the sacrament of baptism reflects the fact that the promise of the covenant is given not just to us, but to our children (Acts 2:39).
The one covenant of grace has existed in both the Old and the New Testament ages, and infant children of believers were clearly participants in it during the Old Testament age. Just as God commanded Abraham to put the sign of the covenant on infants who had not yet believed (Gen. 17:10),
we too place the sign and seal of the covenant on our infant children in baptism.
It is the glory of the fullness of the gospel that it extends to the generations: "For the promise is to you and to your children" (Acts 2:39). God does not alter his covenant (Ps. 89:34). The truth that God saves His covenant people in the line of continued generations is so much a part of the teaching of Scripture it belongs to the very essence of God's self-revelation: "I am the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob."
This does not mean that children of believers are automatically saved because they are born into the covenant or because they are baptized. But Scripture clearly says that covenant children are to be baptized under the covenant promises of God and that they are to grow up in faith under faithful parental and church nurture. That is our part; it is God's part to regenerate them in His perfect time.
Reformed theology also emphasizes the Cultural Mandate (Genesis 1:28), the obligation of Christians to live actively in society and work for the transformation of the world and its cultures. We don’t restrict our faith to "getting saved," going to church, and a few "don’ts." We are concerned to be faithful Christian witnesses and to influence the culture around us to be more righteous. The Reformed Christian believes that the knowledge of God must be brought into every area of thought, because Scripture addresses every area of life and man cannot exclude God from any area of life. There is no dichotomy between sacred and secular; all of life is sacred and is to be lived under the Lordship of Jesus Christ.
See more about the Reformed Faith