Moved that Lake Avenue Church amend its Doctrinal Statement found in Article III, Character, Section 2, Doctrine, as follows:

Section 2 Statement of Faith

1. We believe in one God, Creator of all things, infinitely perfect and eternally existing in a unity of love in three equally divine Persons: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Having limitless knowledge and sovereign power, God has graciously purposed from eternity to establish a redeemed family from among all peoples and to make all things new for His own glory.
2. We believe that God has spoken in the Scriptures, both Old and New Testaments, through the words of human authors. God, His work and His ways are revealed through the Bible truly though surely not exhaustively. As the inspired Word of God, it is without error in the original writings, the complete revelation of His will for salvation, and the ultimate authority for what we believe and for how we live. Therefore, the Bible is to be believed in all that it teaches, obeyed in all that it requires, and trusted in all that it promises.
3. We believe that God created Adam and Eve in His image, but they sinned when they were tempted by Satan. The result is that all human beings are sinners by nature and by choice, alienated from God, and under His wrath. Through God's saving work in Jesus Christ can we be rescued, reconciled, and renewed.
4. We believe that Jesus Christ is God incarnate, fully God and fully man, one Person in two natures. Jesus, Israel's promised Messiah, was conceived through the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary. He lived a sinless life, was crucified under Pontius Pilate, arose bodily from the dead, ascended into heaven, and sits at the right hand of God the Father as our High Priest and Advocate.
5. We believe that Jesus Christ, as our representative and substitute, shed His blood on the cross as the perfect, all-sufficient sacrifice for our sins. His atoning death and victorious resurrection constitute the only ground for salvation.
6. We believe that the Holy Spirit, in all that He does, glorifies the Lord Jesus Christ. He convicts the world of its guilt. He makes sinful people alive to God through faith in Christ, and through the Spirit they are baptized into union with Christ and adopted as heirs into the family of God. He also indwells, illuminates, guides, equips, and empowers believers for Christ-like living and service.
7. We believe that the true Church began at Pentecost and is made up of persons from every nation, tribe, people, and language who have been made right with God by His grace through faith alone in Christ alone. These members of God the Father's eternal family are reconciled to one another and united by the Holy Spirit in the Body of Christ, of which Jesus Christ is the Head. The true Church is manifest in local churches. The Lord Jesus mandated baptism and the Lord's Supper, which visibly and tangibly express the gospel. Though they are not the means of salvation, when celebrated by the Church in genuine faith, these practices confirm and nourish the believer.
8. We believe that God's justifying grace must not be separated from His sanctifying power and purpose. God commands us to love Him supremely and others sacrificially, and to live out our faith with care for one another, compassion toward the poor, and justice for the oppressed. With God's Word, the Spirit's power, and fervent prayer in Christ's name, we are to combat the spiritual forces of evil. In obedience to Christ's commission, we are to make disciples among all peoples, always bearing witness to the gospel in word and deed.
9. We believe in the glorious and personal return of our Lord Jesus Christ. He will come in power and great glory to gather His people, to raise the dead, to judge the nations, and to bring His Kingdom to fulfillment. The coming of Christ, at a time known only to God, demands constant expectancy and motivates the believer to godly living, growing faith, sacrificial service, and energetic mission.
10. We believe that God commands everyone everywhere to believe the gospel by turning to Him in repentance and receiving the Lord Jesus Christ. We believe that God will raise the dead bodily and judge the world, assigning unbelievers to eternal separation from Him, and believers to eternal peace in His presence with restored relationships to God, renewed creation, and one another in the new heaven and the new earth, to the praise of His glorious grace.

Specifically, the words to be replaced are as follows (strike-through markings added to emphasize that these words are to be deleted):

Section 2 Doctrine. It receives the Scriptures as its authority in matters of faith and practice. Its understanding of Christian truth as contained therein is in accord with the belief of the Congregational Churches of the United States, and substantially as set forth by the unanimous vote of the National Council of 1865, or by the National Council's Commission of 1883, in the form authorized to be printed in this manual as follows:

"We confess our faith in God, the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost, and the only living and true God; in Jesus Christ, the Incarnate Word, who is exalted to be our Redeemer and King; and in the Holy Comforter, who is present in the Church to regenerate and sanctify the soul.

"With the whole Church we confess the common sinfulness and ruin of our race, and acknowledge that it is only through the work accomplished by the life and expiatory death of Christ that believers in Him are justified before God, receive the remission of sins, and through the presence and grace of the Holy Comforter are delivered free from the power of sin and perfected in holiness.

"We believe also in the organized and visible church, in the ministry of the Word, in the sacraments of baptism and the Lord's Supper, in the resurrection of the body and in the final judgment the issues of which are eternal life and everlasting punishment.

"We believe these truths on the testimony of God, given through prophets and apostles, and in the life, the miracles, the death, the resurrection of His Son, our Divine Redeemer – a testimony preserved for the Church in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, which were composed by holy men as they were moved by the Holy Spirit.

"Affirming now our belief that these who thus hold 'one faith, one Lord, one baptism,' together constitute the one catholic faith, the several households of which, though called by different names, are the one body of Christ, and that these members of His body are sacredly bound to keep 'the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace.' We declare that we will cooperate with all who hold these truths. With them we will carry the gospel into every part of this land, and with them we will go into all the world and 'present the gospel to every creature.' May He to whom 'all power is given ... in heaven and earth' fulfill the promise which is all our hope: 'Lo I am with you always, even to the end of the world. Amen.'"