ABOUT US
Who We Are
The Reformed Baptist Church, of Madrid is formed by a group of believers in Jesus Christ to whom God in His Providence has led to know with clarity the biblical teachings that His Church must believe and practice. Many of these truths were known and loved by the primitive church and later rescued from forgetfulness during the time of the Protestant Reform. Nowadays, there are few that know these biblical truths about the Glory, Majesty and Sovereignty of God in His work of salvation. These biblical principles are vital for the due adoration to God and the faithful proclamation of His Sovereign Grace. It is not enough to say “we believe in God” to those who ask us, it is more precise to say “we believe to God” and we believe that obedience to Him is what the Bible teaches. Therefore, it is our desire to clearly identify our doctrinal convictions….
What We Believe
The Holy Spirit has been bringing the church of Jesus Christ to an understanding of the truth revealed through His written word (the Bible), which has been expounded by the creeds of the primitive church, the Reformers, and the Puritans. We understand that the fruits of this heritage are gathered in the 1689 London Baptist Confession, a time-tested summary of what the Bible teaches. This document is our confession and secondary rule of faith and practice, always in submission to the Holy Scriptures.
Some of the most important doctrines found in this Confession of Faith and that we believe and teach are the following:
1. ABOUT THE HOLY BIBLE
All of the Bible, every word of it, is inspired by God, without error and with all authority.
2. ABOUT GOD
There is only one God, existing eternally and in three persons: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. God created all things from nothing by the Word of His power in six days and continues to exercise absolute sovereign control over all creation, over all His creatures and over all the events of history.
3. ABOUT MAN
Man, through Adam’s sin, has sunk into a state of sin and guilt by disobeying God and violating His law. He is corrupted in all the faculties of his being, spiritually dead, subject to the bondage of Satan, so that he is unable to please God by his own efforts, being worthy only of God’s judgment which brings upon him eternal damnation.
4. ABOUT JESUS CHRIST
Jesus Christ, being God, took to Himself a complete humanity in the womb of the virgin Mary, lived a sinless life, suffered death as a substitute for the sin of His people to meet the just demands of God’s law, was raised bodily from the dead, evidencing that His sacrifice was accepted before God the Father to carry out the eternal Salvation of His elect, and ascended to heaven, where He lives always to intercede for His people.
5. ABOUT SALVATION
Salvation is the work of the triune God, begun in eternity by the Father’s loving election of a multitude of sinners deserving of eternal punishment. This salvation is based wholly upon the perfect work of the Son and not upon any human merit and is effectually applied by the Holy Spirit giving life to spiritually dead sinners. This work of salvation is accomplished, from beginning to end, by the grace of God alone. At the same time, God commands men to repent of their sins and believe in the gospel, the good news for the lost. Those to whom He by His sovereign will gives life, He also makes to turn away from their sins and trust in Christ as the one who has power to save them and present them clean and without blemish before God.
6. ABOUT THE BELIEVER
All true believers, having been delivered from the bondage of sin and having received by God’s undeserved grace the gift of faith, give evidence of a saving change by their obedience to Christ and by showing the fruit of the Holy Spirit in their lives. God commands and enables them to believe and persevere in faith and holiness to the end.
7. ABOUT THE CHURCH
The church consists only of repentant sinners who confess Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior with faith and submit to His government and authority as established in the Holy Scriptures. These believers, when baptized on the basis of their confession of faith, become part of the local church.
8. ABOUT THE SECOND COMING OF CHRIST
At His second coming, Christ will raise the dead from their graves and judge the whole human race. His coming will be personal, visible and glorious. At that time, unbelievers will be condemned for their sins and delivered to eternal suffering in hell and believers will be vindicated and glorified by their just Savior, who rescued them from sin and death, being Himself the Substitute appointed by the Father to fulfill all the demands that the law places on man. Christ came to rescue all that the Father gave Him, and for that purpose, at the end of time, at His second coming, He will introduce believers into the new heavens and the new earth, in which righteousness dwells. The second coming of Christ marks the end of the world.
