Christian and Missionary Alliance
Citylight Southwest Iowa is gladly accountable to the leadership and doctrinal commitments of the Christian and Missionary Alliance and is honored to be part of the C&MA family. The C&MA is a missionary and church-planting movement that has a rich history of planting churches in the United States and all over the world. Pastor A.B. Simpson started the C&MA in 1887. Simpson had an evangelistic heart and helped his church in New York City reach out to the poor and homeless. The C&MA originally started as a missionary agency and later became a denomination. Currently, the C&MA has 500,000 people worshiping in 2,000 churches in 37 languages across the globe.
To learn more about the C&MA and explore their doctrinal statements, please visit cmalliance.org. For our specific statement of faith, see below.
We are also a part of the Citylight Family of Churches. They are made up of autonomous churches that share the same DNA, vision, and values. Like a family, each church is governed independently and has its own unique personality that fits its neighborhood, but is connected strategically and relationally with the other Family churches. We believe that God's main mode of spreading the gospel is through the local church, and we have a vision to multiply disciples and churches across the Midwest and beyond.
What We Believe
The Alliance Statement of Faith
Our core theological beliefs as a church, rooted in historic Christian orthodoxy and the authority of Scripture.
There is one God, who is infinitely perfect, existing eternally in three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Jesus Christ is the true God and the true man. He was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary. He died upon the cross, the Just for the unjust, as a substitutionary sacrifice, and all who believe in Him are justified on the ground of His shed blood. He arose from the dead according to the Scriptures. He is now at the right hand of Majesty on high as our great High Priest. He will come again to establish His kingdom, righteousness and peace.
The Holy Spirit is a divine person, sent to indwell, guide, teach, empower the believer, and convince the world of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment.
The Old and New Testaments, inerrant as originally given, were verbally inspired by God and are a complete revelation of His will for the salvation of men. They constitute the divine and only rule of Christian faith and practice.
Man was originally created in the image and likeness of God: he fell through disobedience, incurring thereby both physical and spiritual death. All men are born with a sinful nature, are separated from the life of God, and can be saved only through the atoning work of the Lord Jesus Christ. The portion of the unrepentant and unbelieving is existence forever in conscious torment; and that of the believer, in everlasting joy and bliss.
Salvation has been provided through Jesus Christ for all men; and those who repent and believe in Him are born again of the Holy Spirit, receive the gift of eternal life, and become the children of God.
It is the will of God that each believer should be filled with the Holy Spirit and be sanctified wholly, being separated from sin and the world and fully dedicated to the will of God, thereby receiving power for holy living and effective service. This is both a crisis and a progressive experience wrought in the life of the believer subsequent to conversion.
Provision is made in the redemptive work of the Lord Jesus Christ for the healing of the mortal body. Prayer for the sick and anointing with oil are taught in the Scriptures and are privileges for the Church in this present age.
The Church consists of all those who believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, are redeemed through His blood, and are born again of the Holy Spirit. Christ is the Head of the Body, the Church, which has been commissioned by Him to go into all the world as a witness, preaching the gospel to all nations. The local church is a body of believers in Christ who are joined together for the worship of God, for edification through the Word of God, for prayer, fellowship, the proclamation of the gospel, and observance of the ordinances of Baptism and the Lord's Supper.
There shall be a bodily resurrection of the just and of the unjust; for the former, a resurrection unto life; for the latter, a resurrection unto judgment.
The second coming of the Lord Jesus Christ is imminent and will be personal, visible, and premillennial. This is the believer's blessed hope and is a vital truth which is an incentive to holy living and faithful service.