Hello everyone.

Well, I have decided to make a commitment for once in my life. I am not going to straddle the fence any longer. I am tired of being active in church, teaching Sunday School, and following someone else’s lead on how they think our relationship with Jesus Christ should look, feel, smell, and sound. So, I feel the Lord calling me to plant a new style of church in the St Louis Metro East area. It will be different, and I even hesitate to call it a church. Most people consider the word Church to be a verb, but I think it should be a noun. I think this concept will force me to stop calling Sunday services church and start calling it a gathering point for believers. In fact, we’ll call it The Point.

I am convinced many people have blurred the concept of going to church with their personal relationship with the Lord. It is important to fellowship with other believers, and to gather as a “Body of Christ”, but to gather as a corporate body just because we feel we should be gathering is not what I believe Christ wanted us to do when He commanded us in Mark 16:15 to, Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. We will strive to redefine the relational, personal meanings of what it means to worship the Lord, spread the gospel, feed the flock, and commune with God.

Let me set forth some basic, primary beliefs that will help embrace the concepts of The Point:

1) We believe that there is one living and true God, eternally existing in three persons: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, equal in power and glory; that this triune God created all, upholds all and governs all.

2) We believe in God the Father: an infinite, personal Spirit, perfect in holiness, wisdom, power, and love; that He concerns Himself mercifully in the affairs of mankind; that He hears and answers prayer; and that He saves from sin and death all who come to Him through Jesus Christ.

3) We believe in Jesus Christ, God's only begotten Son, conceived by the Holy Spirit. We believe in His virgin birth, sinless life, miracles, and teachings, His substitutionary atoning death, bodily resurrection, bodily ascension into heaven, perpetual intercession for His people and personal, visible return to earth.

4) We believe that all people are sinners by nature and choice and therefore under condemnation, that God regenerates by the Holy Spirit those repenting of their sins and confessing Jesus Christ as Lord; that Jesus Christ baptizes the seeking believer with the Holy Spirit and power for service. often subsequent to regeneration.

5) We are a Bible based gathering. We believe that the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments are the Word of God, fully inspired without error in the original manuscripts, and the infallible rule of faith and practice. Our teaching will come out of the Word of God. We will use supportive texts, but the primary message is God’s written Word. It is endless, timeless, unchanging, and applicable to our every day lives. 2 Timothy 3:16 says, All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness. As Christians living in a postmodern world, the Bible serves as our plumbline, or our guide for living. God’s Word is the only truth that endures forever. Isaiah 40:8 says, the grass withers, the flower fades, But the word of our God stands forever. The Word of God, through the Holy Spirit and God’s perfect timing, will provide us with insight and application in our daily lives.

6) We believe in the universal church, the living spiritual body of which Christ is the head and all regenerated persons are members. As such, our desire is to take our ability to worship to a new level. Worship is a two way process of communicating with the Lord. We worship and adore Jesus Christ for who He is, so our worship must flow out of our desire to elevate Him to His place of prominence as the Lord of Creation. At the same time worship provides us an opportunity for us to look inwardly and savor our individual personal relationship with the Lord. We are only meaningless specks on the horizon of time, but somehow the timeless Creator of the Universe believes that we are important and has chosen us to have a relationship with Him. These concepts should be the inspiration behind all that we do whether it be music, media, drama, message, and fellowship.

7) We believe in the Holy Spirit. He was sent by the Father and Son to convict the world of sin, righteousness and judgment, and to regenerate, sanctify and empower for ministry all who believe in Christ; We believe the Holy Spirit indwells every believer in Jesus Christ and He is an abiding Helper, teacher and guide. We believe in the present ministry of the Holy Spirit and in the exercise of all the Biblical gifts of the Spirit.

8) We believe that the Lord Jesus Christ committed two Ordinances to the Church: (1) baptism and (2) the Lord's Supper. We believe in baptism by immersion and communion open to all believers.

9) We believe in the personal, visible return of Christ to earth and the establishment of His Kingdom; in the resurrection of the body, the final judgment and eternal blessing of the righteous and endless suffering of the wicked.

10) The Point is a non-denominational fellowship of believers. Our desire is to know Jesus as our Lord and Savior and to be conformed into His image by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Jesus said: Learn of Me

Therefore: Our services are designed with great emphasis on the teaching of the Word of God that He might instruct us on how to live our daily lives.

Jesus said: You must worship God in Spirit and truth

Therefore: We give great place to worship in our service and desire to remain yielded to the Holy Spirit, in order that He may guide us into true worship.

Jesus said: Men ought always to pray

Therefore: We encourage everyone to fellowship daily with God through prayer that we might be filled with the fullness of His love and power.

We believe that the true basis for Christian fellowship is God's (AGAPE) love. We believe in expressing that love one to another.

Please come back for more information. I will be posting here frequently.

Take risks and live for the Lord,

Rick Marshall