You may have come from another church tradition before you found your way to the Covenant Church, or perhaps you were born onto the pulpit of your local Covenant Church and never left. Regardless, one of the first things that will immediately set the Covenant Church apart from many other churches is that we do not have a statement of beliefs. Despite what it might look like however, the Covenant Church does in fact have a guiding theological outlook. Although not a doctrinal statement that determines what people must believe in order to be apart of the Covenant context, we have a document that guides our theology. The document in question is what is commonly referred to as "The Affirmations." The Affirmations, are six principles that we as the Covenant Church use to express our theological outlook, they are the orienting things in the life of our context that make us distinctly Covenant.
We affirm the centrality of the word of God.
We affirm the necessity of the new birth.
We affirm a commitment to the whole mission of the church.
We affirm the church as a fellowship of believers.
We affirm a conscious dependence on the Holy Spirit.
We affirm the reality of freedom in Christ.
In the next few weeks, we will begin our first topical endeavour by discussing these affirmations, their significance, and roots in our Covenant circumstance as well as their applicability for our Canadian context. If you know absolutely nothing about the Evangelical Covenant Church of Canada, but are interested in our theology, this is the place to begin. Also, if you have been apart of a Covenant Church all your life and think you know what's what, then this might enlighten you as to what you may not know.
