Man

We teach that man was directly and immediately created by God in His image and likeness. Man was created free of sin with a rational nature, intelligence, volition, self-determination, and moral responsibility to God (Genesis 2:7, 15-25; James 3:9).We teach that God’s intention in the creation of man was that man should glorify God, enjoy God’s fellowship, live his life in the will of God, and by this, accomplish God’s good and acceptable perfect will for man in the world (Isaiah 43:7; Colossians 1:16; Revelation 4:11). We teach that in Adam’s willful sin of disobedience to the revealed will and Word of God, man lost his innocence, incurred the penalty of spiritual and physical death, became subject to the wrath of God, and became inherently corrupt and utterly incapable of choosing or doing that which is acceptable to God apart from divine grace. Fallen in depravity and inability, man is hopelessly lost. Man’s salvation is thereby wholly of God’s grace through the redemptive work of our Lord Jesus Christ (Genesis 2:16-17; 3:1-19; John 3:36; Romans 3:23; 6:23; 1 Corinthians 2:14; Ephesians 2:1-3; 1 Timothy 2:13-14; 1 John 1:8). Salvation is therefore a work of God for man, and not a work of man for God (Psalm 3:8; Jonah 2:9).

We teach that, because all men were representatively and seminally in Adam, a corrupted Adamic nature of sin has been federally and seminally transmitted to all men of all ages, Jesus Christ being the only exception, by virtue of His virgin birth. All men are thus sinners by nature, by choice, and by divine declaration and imputation, and now, left to themselves, hopelessly and helplessly exist under a nature and will bound by total depravity (Psalm 14:1-3; Jeremiah 17:9; Romans 3:9-18, 23; 5:10-12). All men are therefore dead in sin and under the bondage of the will so that none are good, or capable of any means or measure of good (Romans 3:10-12; Ephesians 2:1).