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| About Christ Covenant |
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| Pastors, Elders and Deacons |
| Mark Melton (Minister of the Word), Tim Baker (Minister of the Word); Kim Stoneking (Ruling Elder), Mike Gilbert (Ruling Elder), John Wall (Ruling Elder); Jared Black (Deacon), Bryan McCarty (Deacon), Jason Elmore (Deacon), Glenn Orr (Deacon). |
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| Our Journey to the OPC |
Christ Covenant OPC has been a particular congregation of the OPC since May 22nd, 2004. The congregation itself has been in existence since September of 1988. Between those two events (the founding of the church and our particularization), a seismic shift in thinking, theology and worship style has occurred. We moved from being broadly evangelical to being distinctively, decidedly, and emphatically Reformed.
Our journey to the Reformed faith began some ten years ago when several of our members (including our Pastor) read Chosen By God by R.C. Sproul. Shortly after that our Pastor began preaching through the book of Ephesians and our eyes were more fully opened to the glorious truths of the doctrines of grace. That, in turn, led to a desire and commitment by the Elders of the church to study theology together. The text that was decided upon was the Systematic Theology of Louis Berkhof.
Through that study and other materials we were reading, we next became cognizant of the Regulative Principle of Worship and became convicted that we needed to dramatically alter our approach to corporate worship. After studying principles of Presbyterian worship for over a year, we adopted wholesale changes to our worship "format" the first Lord’s Day in the year 2000.
The last major step in our journey occurred with the recognition that an "independent church" (which we had been up to that point) was an oxymoron. We thus began an earnest search for a Reformed denomination that reflected our journey as well as one that was theologically and ecclesiologically conservative. By God’s grace, we were led to the OPC and began a two year process that resulted in our being received into the OPC as a particular congregation of the Ohio Presbytery.
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| Our Distinctives as an OPC Congregation |
While it is a well-recognized fact that the OPC is a conservative Presbyterian denomination, Christ Covenant OPC of Sheridan, IN would clearly identify herself as being among the more conservative churches of that conservative denomination.
Our conservative approach begins with a strong emphasis upon the father being the spiritual head of his home. We believe it is incumbent upon him to catechize his children and to teach them the grand stories of Scripture. In place of the traditional Sunday School class, we, instead, have a morning catechism class in which individual families recite what they have been memorizing the preceding week. This flows out of our conviction that the church is only as spiritually vibrant and strong as the families (led by godly fathers) who comprise her.
Our conservative approach is also reflected in our approach to corporate worship on the Lord’s Day. We are not "trendy" or "contemporary," having come out of that milieu (see "Our Journey to the OPC"). Rather, we prefer the "old paths" forged for us by the magisterial reformers.
Finally, our conservative approach is reflected in our lack of “programs.” We are of the firm conviction that our God has ordained but one program—the family. The activities which we do promote are all designed to support and encourage the family; thus we do not deem it helpful to "segregate" the various members of the family into age related groupings.
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