Photo: Katharine Sherwin
Who We Are
A Jesus-centered community of people learning together to:
Discern and live the invitations of Christ through the witness of scripture, guidance of the spirit, and our relationships with one another.
Embrace our belovedness as children of God.
Participate in our personal and collective spiritual formation.
Cultivate a sense of belonging that values our differences.
Explore our questions with honesty, curiosity and grace.
Grow in love for our neighbors and join in the restorative work of God happening within and around us.
What We Believe
We believe the gospel of Jesus Christ is God’s good news for all of humanity. We are grounded in the truth of scripture, the presence of the Triune God–Father, Son and Spirit–and the belief that God is perpetually making all things new.
We believe that all of life is formation and we want to position our lives in such a way that we are being formed into the likeness of Jesus Christ. We believe that the more we can be with Jesus, the more we will grow to be like Jesus.
We believe that God’s transforming work happens in us and through us when we are connected to God and to one another as we actively participate in God’s restorative work.
We recognize that we are all pilgrims on the journey and we invite you to join us wherever you are.
Our Denomination
New Community Church is affiliated with the Evergreen Association region of American Baptist Churches USA (ABCUSA).
With more than one million members and 5,000 congregations, ABCUSA is known for being the most racially diverse Christian denomination and the denomination of Martin Luther King, Jr.
Throughout their history American Baptists have been led by the Gospel mandates to be directly active in the institutions of society to promote holistic and healing change.
ABCUSA’s congregationalist polity means that each local church is a distinct and autonomous congregation, responsible for articulating its own doctrine, style of worship and mission.
Photo: Elton Sherwin
Spiritual Formation
Spiritual formation is how our heart and our spirit are formed and how we begin to reflect Jesus’ heart and spirit in the process. We each have an inner life which has been shaped by our experiences, relationships, and practices, which then drives our outputs, our character, community, and compassion. No matter where we are on our spiritual journey, we are each transformed by the Spirit day by day when we are open to the Holy Spirit’s work in our lives.
At New Community Church, we believe that spiritual formation is the heart of the discipleship journey as Christ followers. We must play an active role in our own lifelong spiritual formation so that our formation moves us toward true Christ-likeness. Our transformation is helped through learning and knowledge, scripture, prayer and contemplation, wisdom from our community, and disciplines and practices. We invite you to intentionally participate in your spiritual formation and want to offer you resources and guidance along the way.
Baptism
We offer baptism to adults and teens who wish to take this important step in their faith journey. Baptism is a spiritual milestone and also part of the journey to becoming a steward (member) of New Community Church.
The immersion of a person into water symbolizes the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. It is an act of obedience (Matthew 28:18-20), but not a prerequisite for salvation (beginning a new life with Jesus that exists into eternity—Ephesians 2:8-9). Baptism is a voluntary act of identifying with Jesus and publicly declaring a decision to follow him. It should be done in a community of believers—the local church—to identify with that community both as a place of growth and as a place of service in the ministry of the church.
Because the symbolism of baptism requires a certain level of cognitive and developmental readiness, conversations with children about their own baptism at NCC generally begin as they approach middle school.
For younger children, NCC encourages parents to consider presenting their children for the ceremony of dedication, whereby God’s blessing is formally invoked upon the children, the parents publicly commit themselves to raise the children in accordance with the teachings of Scripture, and the community agrees to support the parents and the children in this decision.
Photo: Judy Adams
Photo: J Studios
Membership at New Community:
A Community of Stewards
A STEP OF COMMITMENT IN FAITH
Throughout scripture, we discover a holy calling for God’s people to become stewards of God’s active work in the world. Moses was a steward of the people, Solomon a steward of the temple, and the disciples stewards of the Good News.
“Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God’s grace in its various forms. If anyone speaks, they should do so as one who speaks the very words of God. If anyone serves, they should do so with the strength God provides, so that in all things God may be praised through Jesus Christ. To him be the glory and the power for ever and ever. Amen.”