Values
All about Jesus
Congregational
Missional
Vision
‘To be a dynamic fellowship of evangelical churches, with each Church effectively reaching its local community with the Gospel and collectively, impacting our nation and the world for Christ.’
Statement Of Faith
GOD
God is Almighty, Eternal and Unchanging. He is just and holy, gracious and merciful. He is the Creator and Ruler of all things, exercising sovereign power in Creation, Providence and Redemption, and is deserving of all glory and praise forever.
TRINITY
God is One, existing through all eternity in three Persons: Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
WORD
God’s greatness and holiness are such, that without His aid, humankind can neither understand God nor find the way to a right relationship with Him. In His mercy, however, God has made Himself known. He has done this partially through Creation but more fully and clearly to the people of Israel and explicitly and finally in Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God and the Word of God incarnate. The Scriptures of the Old and New Testament as originally given and divinely preserved, record, interpret and complete God’s special revelation to us. We therefore accept the Bible as not merely containing but being the divinely inspired and infallible Word of God written and the final and sufficient authority in all matters of Christian faith and life.
SATAN
Satan is a person, a malignant Spirit, the enemy of Jesus Christ and of the saints, deceiving humankind; and he has been condemned to eternal damnation.
SIN
God created humankind perfect, but after being tempted by Satan, by our own free choice, we disobeyed God and became sinful. Humankind’s whole nature is now corrupted by sin and our fellowship with God is broken.
SAVIOUR
God alone can deal with humankind’s sin and bring about a reconciliation with Himself. In God’s great plan of Redemption, God the Son became man through the Incarnation. Jesus Christ was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary. He lived a sinless human life and taught with divine authority. He suffered and died in the place of sinners, bearing their sin and its guilt and punishment. He thus sets free all believers from the domination of Satan and the corruption of their own sinful nature, and removes from them forever sin’s lasting consequences.
FORGIVEN
God, by His Grace, forgives and reconciles to Himself all who turn to Him in true repentance, turning from sin and trusting in Christ’s atoning death. God imputes to them the righteousness of Christ Himself and adopts them as His children.
RISEN
The Lord Jesus Christ was shown to be the Son of God by His teaching, by His miracles and by His bodily resurrection from the dead. He has ascended in power and glory to the presence of God where He now pleads on behalf of those who call upon Him in truth.
SPIRIT
God, in the Person of the Holy Spirit, must work in a person before he can enter Salvation. He leads the sinner into an awareness of his sinfulness and brings him to repentance and trust in Christ. He brings to birth in him a new and eternal life and, by His continuing work, develops in this new life the fruits of love and holiness.
LIVING
God, in the Person of the Holy Spirit, must work in a person before they can enter Salvation. He leads the sinner into an awareness of their sinfulness and brings them to repentance and trust in Christ. He brings to birth a new and eternal life within the person and, by His continuing work, develops in this new life the fruits of love and holiness.
JUSTIFIED
The Scriptures affirm that the sinner is justified by faith alone in the finished work of Christ, that is, by His substitutionary death upon the Cross and His resurrection from the dead. The works of humankind and the traditions of the visible Church are of no avail in Salvation and Justification.
RETURN
God is bringing all human history to a climax which will be marked by the personal bodily return to the earth of the Lord Jesus Christ in power and glory.
JUDGE
God has appointed Jesus as Judge and there will be a final judgement. Those who are saved will be raised in a glorified body and enjoy eternally and to the full the presence of their Lord in heaven. Those who have rejected Christ will also be raised and banished from God forever in hell.
ONE
All who have been personally redeemed with the precious Blood of Christ and upon whom God has bestowed His righteousness as a free gift, belong to Christ. They alone may rightly be called Christians. They alone are members of the one universal and eternal Church which is the Body of Christ.
GATHERED
Each local church is a fellowship of believers gathered by Christ and under His sole, sufficient and supreme authority. Through Him, as Head of the Church, it has direct access to God and enjoys fellowship with other Congregations of His people in a unity which transcends all barriers.
GIFTS
The Holy Spirit gives many different gifts to equip all God’s people for ministry, in order to build up the Body of Christ, and He determines what is given to each believer. A gift is to be valued in the Church according to its contribution to the common good.
LIFE
Every Christian is called to love the Lord his God with all of their heart, soul, mind and strength; and to love their neighbour as themselves. Therefore, all are to live godly lives, doing all things to the glory of God. The indwelling Holy Spirit makes this new life a reality as they yield themselves to Him.
MARRIAGE
We affirm God's creation ordinance of marriage to be between a man and a woman for life to the exclusion of all others.
SACRAMENT
Baptism is a sacrament ordained by Jesus Christ as a sign and seal of the Covenant of Grace. Where one who confesses faith in Christ is baptised, the sacrament is seen as an outward and visible sign of newness of life through faith in Christ on the part of the candidate.
Or
Where an infant of confessing parents is baptised, the sacrament is seen as an outward and visible sign of the Grace of God that works in the life prior to the response of faith, calling the one baptised to grow up into Christ and put on Christ.
The Lord’s Supper is a sacrament ordained by Jesus Christ and is to be observed in the churches for a perpetual remembrance and showing forth of the sacrifice of Christ, the spiritual nourishment of believers and a sign of their communion with one another.
COMMISSIONED
We affirm the obligation to fulfil the Commission given to the Church by our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ, to proclaim the Gospel and make disciples of all nations.
ENGLAND
The tradition of Congregationalism stretches back to the Reformation in England in the 16th Century. As British theologians and pastors studied the bible, they came under the conviction that our only guide concerning spiritual matters was Scripture alone. As such, they insisted that the church and the state should be separate entities and that the local church has the authority to govern it’s own affairs.
This group, also often known as Independents, Separatists or Non-Conformists, would make up the first Congregationalists.
Early Congregationalists were defined by a strident belief in the authority of God’s Word and the autonomy of the local church. Due to the influence of the established Church in Britain, however, these convictions led to considerable social and political pressure. This often resulted in social and religious exclusion, imprisonment and even death.
The treatment went on to provoke an exodus of many Congregationalists from England to North America, most especially to the North-Eastern states of Massachusetts, Maine, New Hampshire and New York. The gradual expansion of the British Empire would also eventually see Congregationalists settle in Australia.
Throughout their history, Congregationalists have included John Bunyan, who wrote the classic ‘Pilgrims Progress,’ and English theologian John Owen. Owen helped pen what would eventually become known as The Savoy Declaration, the theological bedrock of Congregational polity and church structure. Other Congregationalists of note are Jonathon Edwards, a preacher and theologian instrumental in the Great Awakening in North America, hymn writer Isaac Watts, Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones and Lionel B. Fletcher. More recently, American theologian Dr. David Wells has also stood within our tradition.
Elements of Congregational polity can also be seen in modern church planting movements, such as Acts29, Soma and City to City.
Our Story
AUSTRALIA
The first Congregational Church in Australia wasn’t formally established until 1822. Layman Henry Hopkins was distressed at the spiritual state of the church and the plight of poorer classes and former convicts in his home state of Tasmania. In response, he financed and planted an independent Congregational church, the Brisbane Street Chapel, in central Hobart. It wasn’t until ten years later that the church called its first paid pastor, Rev. Frederick Miller. Soon after this, other Congregational churches were planted in Sydney and Melbourne. Other states soon followed, with Congregational churches being established in every state in Australia except the Northern Territory.
As Congregationalism in Australia grew, however, so too did its tendency towards theological liberalism. As a result, many churches went into decline. As early as the 1930s, talks regarding the possibility of a union between Congregational, Methodist and Presbyterian churches began.
UNION
It wasn’t until 1977 that these discussions became a reality. Later that year, the Uniting Church came into being. Only twenty seven Congregational churches throughout Australia chose not to join the Uniting Church. Those that ‘stayed out’ generally did so on the basis of theological or ecclesiological grounds.
Most of those Congregational Churches who did not go into Union formed the Fellowship of Congregational Churches. This was further solidified when, by act of Parliament, the Fellowship of Congregational Churches was declared to be the legal successor to the Congregational Union of NSW. The resultant Fellowship exists to this day, proclaiming the gospel and seeking to reach those in our contexts with the good news of Jesus.