The most important thing about SIBC is what we have in common with all gospel-believing churches: “the faith once for all delivered to the saints” (Jude 3). Still, even if we share the same faith, we know every local church will have its own feel.

Our Beliefs

Our Statement of Faith outlines the core beliefs of our church.

It’s biblical—its teachings are drawn directly from Scripture.

It’s historical—it broadly agrees with many other statements of faith throughout church history.

And it’s simple—it summarizes essential doctrines of the Christian faith. Being a summary, it’s of course not exhaustive. So while we hope you believe everything in this statement, we also hope this statement is not everything you believe.

  • GOD: There is one Triune God, who exists eternally in three distinct but equal persons: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. God is unchangeable in his holiness, justice, wisdom, mercy and love. He is the almighty Creator, Savior and Judge who sustains and governs all things according to his sovereign will for his own glory.

    THE BIBLE: God has revealed himself in the Bible, which consists solely of the 66 books of the Old and New Testaments. Every word was inspired by God through human authors, so that the Bible as originally given is in its entirety the Word of God, without error and fully reliable in fact and doctrine. The Bible alone speaks with final authority and is always sufficient for all matters of belief and practice.

    THE HUMAN RACE: All men and women, being created in the image of God, have inherent and equal dignity and worth. Their greatest purpose is to obey, worship, love and enjoy God. As a result of the fall of our first parents, every aspect of human nature has been corrupted and all men and women are without spiritual life, guilty sinners and hostile to God. Every person is therefore under the just condemnation of God and needs to be born again, forgiven and reconciled to God in order to know and please him.

    THE LORD JESUS CHRIST: The Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is fully God and fully man. He was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of a virgin, and lived a sinless life in obedience to the Father. His miracles attested to the authority with which he taught and all his words are true. He died on the cross in the place of sinners, bearing God’s punishment for their sin, redeeming them by his blood. He rose from the dead, and in his resurrection body, ascended into heaven where he is exalted as Lord of all. As the sole mediator between God and man he intercedes for his people in the presence of the Father.

    SALVATION: Salvation is entirely a work of God’s grace and cannot be earned or deserved. It has been accomplished by the Lord Jesus Christ and is offered to all in the gospel. God, in his love, forgives sinners whom he calls, granting them repentance and faith. All who believe in Christ are justified by faith alone, credited with the righteousness of Christ, adopted into the family of God, and receive eternal life.

    THE HOLY SPIRIT: The Holy Spirit has been sent from heaven to glorify Christ and to apply his work of salvation. He convicts sinners, imparts spiritual life and gives a true understanding of the Scriptures. He lives in all believers, brings assurance of salvation and produces increasing likeness to Christ. He incorporates believers into the Body of Christ, builds up the Church and empowers its members for worship, service and mission.

    THE CHURCH: The universal Church is the body of which Christ is the head and to which all who are saved belong. It is made visible in local churches, which are congregations of believers who are committed to each other for the worship of God, the preaching of the Word, the administering of Baptism and the Lord’s Supper, for pastoral care and discipline, and for evangelism. The unity of the body of Christ is expressed within and between churches by mutual love, care and encouragement. True fellowship between churches exists only where they are faithful to the gospel.

    BAPTISM AND THE LORD’S SUPPER: Baptism and the Lord’s Supper are ordained by Christ as visible signs of the gospel. Baptism symbolizes union with Christ and entry into his Church but does not impart spiritual life. It is our practice to baptize, by immersion in water, only those who profess repentance towards God, faith in, and obedience to, our Lord Jesus Christ.  The Lord’s Supper is a commemoration of Christ’s sacrifice offered once for all and involves no change in the bread and wine. All its blessings are received by faith.

    THE FUTURE: The Lord Jesus Christ will return in glory. He will raise the dead and judge the world in righteousness. The wicked will be sent to eternal punishment in hell and the righteous will be welcomed into a life of eternal joy in fellowship with God. God will make all things new and will be glorified forever.

Our Life Together

As a local church, we’re not just a group of random, casual consumers; we’re a family of redeemed, committed contributors!

Relationships require commitment, which in the Bible is often expressed in covenants. Many people today long for community, yet they shy away from commitment. But the Bible is clear that compelling community involves covenant commitment. Church membership isn’t like joining a club, where you’re not very committed or vitally connected. Rather, being a church member means being vitally connected to the body of Christ, like a limb (member) is vitally connected to a physical body (1 Cor. 12:12-27; Eph. 5:29-30).

Just as the covenant promises that spouses make summarize and clarify their relational commitment to one another in marriage, so the covenant promises that church members make summarize and clarify their relational commitment to one another in the church. The commitments expressed in our Members’ Covenant that we live out together at SIBC are based on the commitments that Scripture says the earliest Christians lived out together in their local churches.

  • Having, as we trust, been brought by Divine Grace to repent and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and to give up ourselves to Him, and having been baptized upon our profession of faith, in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, we do now, relying on His gracious aid, solemnly and joyfully renew our covenant with each other.

    We will work and pray for the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

    We will walk together in brotherly love, as becomes the members of a Christian Church; exercise an affectionate care and watchfulness over each other and faithfully admonish and entreat one another as occasion may require.

    We will not forsake the assembling of ourselves together, nor neglect to pray for ourselves and others.

    We will endeavor to bring up such as may at any time be under our care, in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, and by a pure and loving example to seek the salvation of our family and friends.

    We will rejoice at each other’s happiness and endeavor with tenderness and sympathy to bear each other’s burdens and sorrows.

    We will seek, by Divine aid, to live carefully in the world, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, and remembering that, as we have been voluntarily buried by baptism and raised again from the symbolic grave, so there is on us a special obligation now to lead a new and holy life.

    We will work together for the continuance of a faithful evangelical ministry in this church, as we sustain its worship, ordinances, discipline, and doctrines. We will contribute cheerfully and regularly to the support of the ministry, the expenses of the church, the relief of the poor, and the spread of the Gospel through all nations.

    We will, when we move from this place, as soon as possible unite with some other church where we can carry out the spirit of this covenant and the principles of God’s Word.

    May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with us all. Amen.

Our Priorities

  • Clear Gospel

    The apostle Paul delivered as of first importance the gospel that he received (1 Cor. 15:1-8). Because it’s of first importance, the gospel informs everything we do as a church. The good news of what God has done to save sinners through the life, death, and resurrection of His Son, Jesus Christ, isn’t just Christianity 101. God’s saving grace is never something we graduate from, but something we always grow in. So if we don’t get the gospel right, then our faith is in vain and we are of all people most to be pitied (1 Cor. 15:14-19).

  • Devoted Worship

    Our corporate worship is simple in that we do what the Bible says the earliest Christians did when they gathered for worship: sing God’s word, pray God’s word, read God’s word, hear God’s word preached, and see God’s word displayed in baptism and the Lord’s Supper. But our individual worship isn’t limited to Sundays; it extends to every other day of the week. So whether we’re at home, or on the job, or in the classroom, or at our Sunday gatherings, we want to show our devotion to King Jesus by making much of him in everything we do as individuals and as a church.

  • Deep Discipleship

    We don’t just desire to grow in number; we want to be a people after God’s heart who “grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” (2 Pet. 3:18) as we learn to obey all that he has commanded us (Matt. 28:19-20). This involves prioritizing corporate worship and deep relationships, since sanctification is a community project (Heb. 12:1). It also involves pressing into relationships even when it’s messy, since all believers are still sinners and sufferers as well as saints.

  • Dependent Prayer

    It’s astonishing that in Christ we have the ear of the King of the universe who delights to hear and answer our prayers according to his perfect will! We depend on him for everything as a church, so we want to “in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let our requests be made known to God” (Phil. 4:6). This is why we have four corporate prayers during our Sunday morning service, and we devote some time to corporate prayer most Sunday afternoons.

  • Every-Member Ministry

    It’s the job of the whole church, not just the pastors, to build up the body of Christ. So we want all our members to take initiative in discipling others, and in meeting needs both within the church and among the lost around us. The primary job of pastors is “to equip the saints for the work of ministry” (Eph. 4:12). We do that through our Sunday morning sermon, as well as our Sunday afternoon equipping class.

  • Faithful Evangelism

    As Christians, we are ambassadors of Christ, entrusted to take his message of reconciliation to a lost world (2 Cor. 5:19-20). Therefore, we want to “always be ready to answer anyone who asks for a reason for the hope within” us (1 Pet. 3:15). We also want to have a sense of urgency in our evangelism, since the harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few (Luke 10:2). At the same time, our responsibility is to faithfully share gospel content, and trust God with genuine conversions.

  • Unity in Diversity

    Since our church is in the heart of a global city, we are culturally and demographically diverse. And we love that because we worship a God of all nations and ages and backgrounds! Such diversity is a wonderful gift, as long as we’re united in the gospel and sound doctrine. It’s precisely this gospel unity in our diversity that makes us stand out in a world where unity often means uniformity and diversity often means division. We hope our church’s unity in diversity not only reflects something of the universal Church, but also our Triune God who is himself unity in diversity (one God in three Persons).

  • Generous Giving

    “God loves a cheerful giver” (2 Cor. 9:7). So as Christians we should financially support the church’s ministry and help meet pressing needs around us as we are able. But that shouldn’t be the extent of our giving. We should also generously give of our time and energy and talents, all in service to our generous God who “gives to all mankind life and breath and everything” (Acts 17:25).

  • Strategic Partnerships

    It’s our conviction that healthy churches seek to cooperate with and establish other healthy churches, just like the earliest Christians did in the New Testament. So we intentionally invest in strategic ministry partnerships with other likeminded churches in our city and beyond, with the goal of planting more healthy churches across China and East Asia.

 FAQs

  • Yes, our services are entirely in English. We believe English-speaking churches like ours are uniquely strategic in global cities like Shanghai because English is a language that many people here have in common. So we’re able to minister to many different people from many different cultures and backgrounds through our English services.

  • We sing a mix of traditional and contemporary hymns that are gospel-centered and rich in biblical truth. Our philosophy of music is that the congregation is the main instrument! While we have excellent musicians, their purpose is not to entertain but rather to accompany the congregation’s voice so we can all hear ourselves “addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs” (Eph. 5:19).

  • We do not have formal church-wide small groups, as our church is less program-driven and more relationship-driven. So our members practice biblical hospitality, and many form their own weekly small groups for prayer and Bible study and fellowship based on relationships that naturally develop within the church.