We are Pentecostal
We are a Pentecostal church in our doctrine and practice. As part of the Elim family; which represents over 550 churches in the UK and 9,000 connected churches abroad, we share a set of core beliefs and values. These are outlined in the ‘Our Beliefs’ section on the website.
Pentecostal churches celebrate and encourage the ongoing work of the Holy Spirit. In practice that means allowing the Holy Spirit to empower us for ministry and evangelism. Some times during our meetings, someone might bring a prophecy or speak in tongues. We will always be sensitive to the needs of our congregation and visitors and we will always do our best to explain what is happening. Sometimes when the Holy Spirit is working people might feel emotional, this may result in them laughing or crying. Again, we will always do our best to manage those situations with care and dignity.
We believe that God wants to reveal his heart and intention through personal words of prophecy. This is mostly in the form of words of encouragement, instruction and comfort. Since we are all growing in this, we might get a few things mixed up along the way, but as long as we remember to be kind, forgive quickly and realise that we are all just learning, things work themselves out and people will feel encouraged and built up by one another. We will teach people to use this particular gift with sensitively and with humility.
We place importance on praying for the sick, for those who are physically unwell and for those who are emotionally distressed. We don’t always understand why God chooses to heal some and not others, but our commission is to just keep praying; Ours is the prayer, His is the power.
Prayer plays a large part of what we do. We enjoying praying together as a whole church, we often share prayer requests with one another. If you have any prayer requests you want us to pray about please let us know.
We are Gospel-Centred
We believe that Jesus died and rose again, so that whoever believes in him can have eternal life. Our goal is to present the message of Christianity in a clear and concise way that makes it easy to understand and makes it as easy as possible for people to become Christians.
However, we want to be as honest from the outset in saying that when you become a Christian, you are not just accepting Jesus as your saviour (so that you can get to heaven), but you are making Him Lord of your life (so that this earthly life can be so much more meaningful). That means that each one of us needs to learn to become his disciple. Being a disciple means that we have to learn to put His words into practice.
Jesus wants us to break free from a life that leads to heartache and misery and that may mean letting go of some the life choices that so far have kept us away from God. Jesus has come to give us life to the full, but we need to learn to do things His way. We believe the gospel of Jesus Christ offers eternal life and that being a disciple of Jesus is the way to help us get the best out of this life.
We are a Church Family
Being part of a family brings many benefits and many responsibilities. As a family we look after each other, have fun together, learn about and worship God together. As a family we also share responsibilities; helping and supporting each other, helping out setting up church and keeping things tidy. We use our gifts in music, children’s work and welcoming others and anything that we can do to serve. As members we all share in the financial needs of the church.
We encourage everyone to learn how to give generously. Running a church can be very costly and we believe that everyone who attends regularly should contribute financially. Of course, those who have less give less, and those who have more should consider giving more. We also believe in the spiritual importance of giving and that as God blesses us, we in turn should give back to God and bless others.
Being part of family means we are responsible for and accountable to others. We want to look after each other, and that means learning to take godly advice and correction from one another.