William Carey International University
Statement of Faith & Belief
Introduction
WCIU is a university centered on a faith in God who exists as the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. We are followers of Jesus the Christ the Messiah, though we represent diversity in cultural background and religious heritage. This statement of faith is a declaration of our trust in God. We seek to build our lives and educational ministry around the central message of the Bible which we understand to be the good news of God’s blessing the whole world through Jesus. We experience God’s revelation as we probe, study, meditate upon and seek to obey and apply the Scriptures of both the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament, interpreted as a unified story that is focused on Jesus.
The biblical mandate to disciple (teach, educate) the nations, when applied to WCIU, involves educating students in the fullness of Scripture and in the search for truth within all aspects of God’s created order. “All nations” includes socio-cultural-religious groups and geo-political countries. We seek to discern truth in accordance with James 3:13-18 and so we seek to be open to reason, and to have a spirit of gentleness as we seek to broaden opportunities for such engagements that lead to transformative involvement in the public domain inclusive of diverse peoples, politics, religions, worldviews.
We endeavor, by God’s grace, to obey Jesus and participate with God in seeking to bless all peoples of the earth. In keeping with this, we affirm our faith as follows:
We have faith …
In the Holy Scriptures – God’s word to humanity.
In the Triune God, revealed in Exodus 34 as “compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in loyal love and faithfulness, keeping loyal love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin...
This God has existed eternally as the Father, Son and Holy Spirit and is just and pure in all His ways.
In the redeeming power of Jesus, the Christ, which He demonstrated by His life, teaching, death and resurrection whereby he took upon Himself the sins of all so that all might be saved through Him.
1. The Purposes of God
We believe God governs and is sovereign over all things according to the purpose of his will. God has been calling forth a people for himself from all the peoples of the earth and sending them to be His servants and his witnesses, for the extension and fullness of him and his kingdom, the building up of the whole body of Jesus’ followers, and the glory of his name.
See: Isa. 40:28; Matt. 28:19; Eph. 1:11; Acts 15:14; John 17:6,18; Eph. 4:12; Rom. 12:2; 1 Cor. 5:10; 2 Cor. 4:7.
2. The Person of Jesus
We believe that in and through Jesus, and Him alone, God makes available to all people reconciliation with Him and in that reconciled relationship a wholeness and peace (shalom) that passes human understanding. We believe there is one Savior Whose saving work ultimately encompasses every aspect of our humanness and all the created world, seen and unseen. The incarnation of Jesus – the Word made flesh – shapes our understanding of transformational development begins from within (a person, and a society).
See: Gal. 1:6-9; Rom. 1:18-32; 1 Tim 2:5,6; Acts 4:12; John 3:16-19; 2 Peter 3:9; 2 Thess. 1:7-9; John 4:42; Matt. 11:28; Eph. 1:20-21; Phil. 2:5-11; John 1:14.
3. God’s Spirit
We believe that the Spirit of God, fully divine and personal, has been at work in the created order since its beginning. We believe the Spirit empowers individuals in diverse ways to do God’s work. The same divine Spirit is the Spirit of wisdom, understanding and knowledge who leads Jesus’ disciples into all truth, the Spirit who brings forth the good fruit of godly character, and the Spirit of mysterious and miraculous gifts and works of power. The Holy Spirit of God who empowered particular people at particular times in the Old Covenant, is revealed in the New Covenant as the one who filled and rested upon Jesus and who came in a new way to God’s people in Pentecost. The Spirit constantly indwells followers of Jesus and unites them as the Body of Christ. The Spirit of God is involved in the full scope of God’s work of redemption as well as in sanctifying, guiding and empowering God’s people in their witness to Jesus and his kingdom and in their works of wisdom, love, justice, and transformational development.
See: Gen. 1:2; Ex. 31:3; Ex. 35:31; Isa. 11:1-3; Isa. 42:1; Matt. 3:16; Matt. 12:28; John 14:17; Acts 1:8; Acts 2:1ff; 1 Cor. 12:3-13; Gal 5:22-23; Eph. 4:3-4.
4. Humanity and the People of God (imago dei)
We believe that all humans are made in the image of God. We believe that all humans are born with a capacity to do good. At the same time, all are born into sin and equally capable of causing harm. We believe that the greatest evils experienced in history were caused by the fallenness of humanity and not the will of God.
Scripture reveals that all humanity is broken, but also reveals that in Christ, God is reconciling all things to Himself. Through Christ, all are afforded the opportunity to become the “people of God” (Romans 1:16, 10:12; Galatians 3:28). The New Testament vision for the people of God is a people who live holy lives: living in Christ and living in and among their surrounding communities.
God provides the community of faith and the work of the Spirit to help us see our blind spots and call us to repent and submit to one another (Eph 5:21) and to God's loving discipline. The New Testament vision for the people of God is a people who live holy lives: living in Christ and living in and among their surrounding communities.
5. The Place of the Bible
The message of the Old and New Testaments is addressed to all people. God’s Spirit inspired the writers of the Scriptures, and thus God speaks with a unique authority through the Bible. The Spirit illumines the minds of God's people in every culture to perceive the truths of the scriptures in fresh ways within their various contexts and thus discloses to the whole world ever more the multi-faceted wisdom of God.
See: 2 Tim. 3:16; 2 Peter 1:21; Isa. 55:10-11; Rom. 1:16; 1 Cor. 1:21; John 10:35; Matt 5:17-18; Jude 3; Eph. 1:17-18.
6. Social Responsibility
We share God’s concern for justice and reconciliation throughout human society and for the liberation of human beings from every kind of oppression. We are all made in the image of God. Every person, regardless of race, religion, color, culture, class, gender, or age, has an intrinsic dignity which should be respected and served, not exploited. The message of salvation as the fullness of God’s blessing also implies a message of judgment upon every form of alienation, oppression, and discrimination, and we denounce evil and injustice wherever they exist. When people follow Jesus, they become citizens of his kingdom and must seek not only to exhibit but also to experience and serve to further transformational development in the midst of an unrighteous world. The salvation we claim to experience should be transforming us in the totality of our personal and social responsibilities. Faith without works is dead.
See: Acts 17:26,31; Gen. 18:25; Ps. 45:7; Isa. 1:17; Gen. 1:26-27; Lev. 19:18; Luke 6:27,35; James 3:9; John 3:3,5; Matt 5:20; Matt. 6:33; 2 Cor. 3:18; James 2:14-26.
7. Spiritual Conflict
Creation is in constant spiritual struggle with the principalities and powers of evil. These powers can include spiritual beings which seek to bring devastation and destruction to frustrate human flourishing. Often these powers work through humans to use government, corporate, and/or cultural elements of society.
We encounter this struggle in many forms: a perfectly created and now broken world, sickness, broken relationships, injustice, demonic activity within people as individuals, and in some of the institutions and social structures they create, and also in false ideologies. These expressions of evil also exist among the followers of Jesus, in false representations of Jesus and his message which distort Scripture. We acknowledge that we ourselves are not immune to misunderstandings and misapplications of God’s truth in our own thoughts and actions. In response, we believe that transformational development provides a holistic approach which is required to address evil in its many forms. We recognize that every response, as followers of Jesus, needs to be rooted in the empowerment of God’s Spirit and the fruit and gifts of the Spirit.
See: Eph. 6:12; 2 Cor. 4:3-4, Eph. 6:11,13-18; 2 Cor. 10:3-5; 1 John 2:18-26; 4:1-3; Gal. 1:6-9; 2 Cor. 2:17; 4.2; John 17.15; 1 Corinthians 12; Galatians 5:22-23.
8. Culture
Transformational development calls for imaginative and innovative methods in response to ever changing situations and needs. Under God, efforts will be deeply rooted in Jesus’s life and character, and also closely related to the culture in which they are formed. The universe was made by God, who declared it to be good and filled it with blessing so that it might flourish. Human culture must always be tested and judged by scripture. This is true of every culture, including our own. Human beings are God's creatures, made in God’s image. We recognize that everyone has some knowledge of God through God’s revelation in nature, human conscience, and through the reality of humans being made in God’s image. This means that human cultures, including religious aspects of human cultures, though marred by sin, still reflect his character. Because of this, every culture is rich in beauty and goodness, while at the same time every culture is also tainted with sin and susceptible to the influences of evil spiritual forces. The gospel does not presuppose the superiority of any culture to another but evaluates all cultures according to its own criteria of truth and righteousness and insists on moral absolutes in every culture. Jesus's servants must humbly seek to empty themselves of all but their personal authenticity in order to become the servants of others, and must seek to transform and enrich culture, all for the glory of God.
See: Mark 7:8-9,13; Gen. 1:26ff, and 4:21-22; 1 Cor. 9:19-23; Phil. 2:5-7; 2 Cor. 4:5.
Conclusion
WCIU believes God’s future for this world can be summarized as “a verdant and flourishing world, ripe with wholeness and peace.”
WCIU is committed to pursuing our work as a University in allegiance to the statements above, and with excellence in the pursuit of our Mission: