We are a community who believe in asking questions, we know that this is just as important as finding answers. Here faith is celebrated and nurtured, and doubts can be shared. We try to be a place where people feel comfortable coming as they are and as God has made them to be. we try to grow together in a way that pleases God and makes our lives and the lives of those around us better.
Sometimes folk have an unhelpful and inaccurate image of “church” as a gathering of morally self-righteous people who tut-tut at the world whilst at the same time retreating from it. That’s not us! That’s not what “church” is meant to be, and it certainly isn’t us.
Whatever we sing and share and preach and pray on a Sunday has got to help us make sense of Monday, and every other day of the week. We are serious about making powerful, exciting, insightful connections between the faith we live by and the world we live in.
We want to engage with our world because God loves it.
Who is Jesus?
(From the Church of Scotland website)
At the heart of the Church of Scotland is our love and dedication to following our Lord God through his son, Jesus Christ. But who is Jesus?
The Bible and Jesus
There are those who speak of Jesus the political revolutionary, the religious guru, the mystic, the faith healer, the hypnotist, an occultist, a magician.
The Gospels teach us that Jesus was no ordinary man, but was, in fact, God in human form.
In the Bible, each of the four Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John point toward God interacting with us. They reveal a Jesus who came to bring a new dynamic kind of life that brought with it intimacy and peace with God through having our sins forgiven and receiving a transformed heart and soul.
The Resurrection of Jesus
The death and resurrection of Jesus, when he rose to heaven from the grave, sum up the most important moments in the Gospels. It allows people to come to terms with their own sin, God’s love for them, and to seek his forgiveness, trust in him, and understand what it means to believe in and follow him. It is not an easy step to take; to admit that you have sinned, to realise that Jesus was crucified for your sin and to seek his forgiveness is possibly one of the most difficult steps you will ever take. But it is undoubtedly the most important one, which leads to a new and transformed life. Those who do take this step of faith find and sense the power of God at work in their lives and are never the same again.
One of the most dramatic stories in the New Testament is found at the end of Luke’s Gospel. It tells of two of Jesus’s first followers, who were devastated by his death.
As they walked home on Easter Sunday afternoon, Jesus walked alongside them, but they did not recognise him. In the course of their conversation, Jesus explained who he was and introduced them to the Old Testament stories which pointed towards the significance of his own life. At the end of the story, when they finally realise who he is and recognise him, they sum up their own experience by saying: “did not our hearts burn within us, when he talked to us.”
Relevance Today
Today, 21 centuries after his death, there is never a single moment in which fewer than several million people are reading what Jesus said and did and trying to apply the significance of his words and actions to their lives. Jesus said: “I have come to bring you life and life to the full” and the Gospels teach that a relationship with God is the most exciting kind of life that can ever be experienced. To know the purposeful hand of God in your life, to know His touch and forgiveness leads not only to purpose and meaning in life but peace with God and fulfilment in Him. For these reasons, the story of Jesus is still relevant for today.
Find Out More
Through reading the Bible and attending church services you can discover that Jesus transforms the lives of individual people from within, and they come to the point of trusting him with their lives and recognising that they need his transforming love and forgiveness for their sins and then be willing to follow him the rest of their days.
Church of Scotland
We are a parish of the Church of Scotland. Central to the Church of Scotland is our love and worship of God through following the teachings and examples of Jesus Christ. We express our love for God by our love and practical care for each other and for those we live with and encounter in our daily lives.
Although the Church traces its roots back to the beginnings of Christianity in Scotland, its identity was principally formed by John Knox in the Reformation of 1560. At that time, the Church split from the Roman Catholic Church and instead adopted the reformed tradition. The Church of Scotland is Calvinist Presbyterian; we recognise no head of faith other than the Lord God, and no one person or group within the Church has more influence than any other.
Statement of Faith
This statement offers a basic idea of what we believe. It is used alongside the Apostles’ Creed and the Nicene Creed, ancient creeds of the church:
We believe in one God:
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. God is love.
We praise God the Father:
Who created the universe and keeps it in being. He has made us his sons and daughters to share his joy, living together in justice and peace, caring for his world and for each other.
We proclaim Jesus Christ, God the Son:
Born of Mary, by the power of the Holy Spirit, He became one of us, sharing our life and our death. He made known God’s compassion and mercy giving hope and declaring forgiveness of sin, offering healing and wholeness to all. By his death on the cross and by his resurrection He has triumphed over evil. Jesus is Lord of life and of all creation.
We trust God the Holy Spirit:
Who unites us to Christ and gives life to the Church; who brings us to repentance and assures us of forgiveness. The Spirit guide us in our; understanding of the bible, renews us in the sacraments and calls us to serve God in the world.
We rejoice in the gift of eternal life:
We have sure and certain hope of resurrection through Christ, and we look for his coming again to judge the world. Then all things will be made new. And creation will rejoice in worshiping the Father, through the Son, in the power of the Spirit, one God, blessed for ever.
Amen.