Church Vision
Here are the core convictions of ACTS CHURCH of MARICOPA and in-depth resources (sermons videos, audios, blog articles, presentation teaching series) available to read and find out more on their biblical basis and applications to the local church context. The most important facet of any church, however, is love for God and all people, and this has to be preeminent in all things church members do for God's glory:
"If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing [...] Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away [...] So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love" (1 Corinthians 13:1-3,8,13).
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Spontaneous Free All-Member Participation in Sunday Services
“What then, brothers? When you come together, each one has a hymn, a lesson, a revelation, a tongue, or an interpretation. Let all things be done for building up” (1 Corinthians 14:26, emphasis added).
Weekly Lord's Supper as a Fellowship Meal
“And they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers” (Acts 2:42, emphasis added).
Expository Preaching
“I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: Preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching” (2 Timothy 4:1-2, emphasis added).
Family-Integrated Church
“Then children were brought to him that he might lay his hands on them and pray. The disciples rebuked the people, but Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven”” (Matthew 19:13-14, emphasis added).
Part of the Family-Integrated Churches (FIC) network, visit here.
Elder-Led Church Government
“And when they had appointed elders for them in every church, with prayer and fasting they committed them to the Lord in whom they had believed” (Acts 14:23, emphasis added).
Regulative Principle of Worship
“This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men” (Matthew 15:8-9, emphasis added).
City Evangelism, Ongoing Discipleship, and World Mission
“Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age”(Matthew 28:19-20, emphasis added).
Committed Formal Church Membership
“For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. [...] Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it” (1 Corinthians 12:12,27, emphasis added).
Excellence in New Pastor Training & Church Planting
“and what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also. Share in suffering as a good soldier of Christ Jesus”(2 Timothy 2:2-3, emphasis added).
Reformed Theology on Salvation
“You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you.”(John 15:16, emphasis added).
A non-denominational church by a bi-vocational Ordained Pastor.
Christ-exalting church life through the Gospel and all of Scripture (1 Cor. 2:2; Luke 24:44).
Church life patterned after New Testament churches (Acts 2:42; 1 & 2 Tim; 1 Cor. 10-14).
Biblical doctrine including the sufficiency and inerrancy of Holy Scripture, reformed soteriology, young-earth creationism, cessationism, complementarianism, and premillennialism.
Part of the Family-Integrated Churches (FIC) network: all children are in the church service to be in the presence of Christ (Mat. 19:14; Acts 21:5), to learn the way they should go and contribute to the service (Eph. 6:1-3; Col. 3:16).
Sunday meetings follow the regulative principle of worship (Mat. 15:8-9; 1 Cor. 4:6), which is the sufficiency of Scripture applied to church life (2 Tim.1:13).
Expository and systematic theology preaching on the whole Counsel of God with practical applications for solid Christian growth and equipping for ministry (Acts 20:26-27; 1 Cor. 14:3; 1 Tim. 4:13; 2 Tim. 4:2; Eph. 4:11-12).
Free all-member participation on Sunday including spontaneous prayer requests, prayers, testimonies, proposed songs, psalms, exhortations, and teachings (1 Cor. 14:26ff; Mat. 21:13).
Weekly Lord's Supper as a fellowship meal (Mark 14:22; Acts 2:42, 1 Cor. 10:14-31, 11:20,33).
Bi-monthly city evangelism, ongoing discipleship, and world mission (Mat. 28:19-20; Acts 20:20).
Elder-led church government (Acts 14:23; Titus 1:5).
A house church to maximize the intimacy of church members and the generosity to the poor and the Gospel-centered mission (2 Cor. 9:7-13).
Church Discipline to protect the members, provide accountability (Mat. 18:15–20; 1 Cor. 5:7-12; 2 Cor. 2:5–8), and preserve the purity of the Church for Christ and its testimony to the world.
An emphasis on family worship: every father is to lead his family before God in daily devotion (Deut. 6:4-9; Eph. 6:4; Ps. 118:15). It is the role of parents to disciple their children to know God and to be godly (Ps. 78:1-7; Mal. 2:15).