Believers' Church


The believers' Church is a theological doctrine of Evangelical Christianity that teaches that one becomes a member of the Church by new birth and profession of faith. Adherence to this doctrine is a common feature of defining an Evangelical Christianity church.

History

This doctrine has its origin in the Radical Reformation within Anabaptism. The Schleitheim Confession published in 1527 by the Swiss Brethren, a group of anabaptists, of which Michael Sattler, to Schleitheim is a publication that spread this doctrine. In this confession, the believer's baptism after a profession of faith is placed as an essential theological foundation. In 1644, the 1644 Baptist Confession of Faith published by Baptists churches will do the same. In 1916, the Assemblies of God Statement of Fundamental Truths published by Pentecostal churches also as well as the churches of charismatic movement. In 1967, the Believers' Church Conference is established at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky in the United States, and will be held every two or three years in a different Evangelical bible college.
Adherence to the doctrine of the believers Church is a common feature of defining an Evangelical church in the strict sense.

Doctrine

A widely accepted definition of characteristics is that of the American historian Donald Durnbaugh, who summarizes the doctrine of the believer's church in seven points:
  1. Voluntary membership in the church. One becomes a member of the Church by new birth and profession of faith. The baptism, reserved for adolescent or adult believers, is a symbol of this commitment.
  2. The Church is a fraternal community of mutual aid and edification.
  3. Charity and service in the church are an expression of a healthy Christian life.
  4. The Holy Spirit and the bible are the only bases of authority in the Church. Some non-biblical religious traditions must be rejected.
  5. Willingness to return to the fundamentals of the Early Church.
  6. A simple structure of the Church.
  7. Faith in the Church as the body of Christ.
The doctrine of the believers’ Church should not be confused with the free church, which is a concept designating the separate churches of states. Some Christian denominations that can be identified in the free church movement do not adhere to the doctrine of the believers’ Church.