Mission statement

First Baptist Nixa strives to be a healthy church making healthy disciples who live transformed lives of courageous holiness and contagious love. 


We seek to accomplish this mission by holding fast to the following core convictions:


  • Scriptural Authority. We affirm the Holy Scriptures as God's inspired, inerrant, infallible revelation, our sole and sufficient authority in all matters of faith and practice.


  • Reformed Theology. We affirm the doctrine of redemption as expressed in the Protestant Reformation of the 16th century.


  • Baptist Ecclesiology. We affirm the doctrine of the church as expressed in the Baptist movement of the 17th century. We believe a true church is a congregation of baptized believers in covenant with God through Christ and with one another in Christ.


  • Expository Preaching. We affirm that the most biblical and effective method of making disciples is the regular, systematic exposition of Scripture. By preaching verse-by-verse through books of the Bible, we seek to know God and to make Him known.


  • Word-Centered Worship. We affirm that true worship finds its sanction and structure in the Word of God. Therefore, everything in our corporate worship is grounded in Scripture. We read the Word (1 Tm 4:13), we pray the Word (1 Jn 5:14), we sing the Word (Col 3:16), we preach the Word (1 Tm 4:13; 2 Tm 4:2), we receive the Word made visible in the sacraments (1 Cor 11:23-26; Rom 6:3-4), and we respond to the Word in the obedience of faith (1 Thes 2:13; Jas 1:22-25).


  • Evangelical Holiness. We affirm that true holiness proceeds from a regenerate heart, is empowered by the Holy Spirit working through faith, and results in Christlike love for God and neighbor. True holiness is neither legalistic (an attempt to establish one’s own righteousness) nor pharisaic (adherence to the traditions of men), but is Christocentric (conformity to the character of Christ).


  • Perseverance of the Saints. We affirm both the necessity and the certainty of the perseverance of the saints. Those whom God has regenerated by the Holy Spirit and justified through faith in Christ can never again become unregenerate or unjustified but shall continue in the obedience of faith unto the day of Christ Jesus.

 

  • Covenant Membership. We affirm that biblical church membership is an accountable covenant relationship among baptized believers in which they commit to gather with one another, pray for one another, exhort one another, guard one another, and assist one another to persevere in the obedience of faith.

 

  • Biblical Church Leadership. We affirm that, under Christ our Head, the final authority in the governance of the church belongs to the congregation. Under the congregation’s authority and with its consent, the church is led by a plurality of godly, gifted elders and served by a plurality of godly, gifted deacons.


  • Church-Centered Missions. We affirm that the goal of missions is the establishment of healthy indigenous churches. Therefore, we partner with missionaries and mission organizations that pursue that end.