OUR VISION is to make known the saving and transforming Grace of God through Jesus Christ in Slippery Rock and beyond.

 

OUR FOUR CORE VALUES: worship

  • Proclamation: We focus on the redeeming work of the crucified and risen Christ, and boldly, without compromise, proclaim the unconditional Gospel of God’s Grace through Word and Sacrament.
  • Worship: We participate in vertical, unifying, Christ-Centered Worship, using both ancient and modern music and traditional liturgy from the historic Book of Common Prayer.
  • Growth: In response to God’s Grace, we desire to grow in our knowledge and love of the Lord and one another through Worship, Prayer, Study, Hospitality, and Service.
  • Mission: As a parish and as individuals, we seek to be missional rather than attractional, being actively involved in our local communities and reaching out to local residents and students with the Grace of Jesus.

 

GRACE.  Foundational to our Vision and our Core Values is the concept of Grace. Grace is simply “one-way love”; that is, love without strings, conditions, or exceptions. Sadly, the message of Grace is easily buried in life—even in the Church! But at Grace Anglican Church (GAC), we believe that the Gospel (which is God’s one-way love to sinners through his Son, Jesus Christ) is the central message of the Christian faith and shouldn’t be replaced by anything else.

Because we focus on God’s Grace in Jesus, we don’t talk about “How to have a Great Marriage in Five Steps,” “Eight Ways to Raise Positive Kids in a Negative World,” or “31 Ways to be a ‘Proverbs 31′ Woman.”  Such subjects, while perhaps true in what they command, are “Law” rather than Grace.  We at GAC believe that the Law—those things which are commanded for our good—is right and true (Rom. 7:12), but it doesn’t have the power to create or engender the things it requires.  (This is why, for example, people don’t change just because you tell them to!) The Law is like a mirror that shows us the messed up parts of our lives, but it cannot do the actual transforming. Only Grace can change a person.

Some people teach that God’s Grace is for non-Christians in order to make them into Christians, but once a person is “in” they then require the Law to create holiness or morality.  We think that this view is mistaken.  Christians struggle with sin like everyone else, and Christians need the Grace of God just as much as anyone else.  The only message that can change people is the Gospel, and so this is what we proclaim: to Christians and non-Christians alike.  We’re not saying that virtue, goodness, and morality are unimportant, but we know that moral change is the fruit of the Grace. Put simply, the very thing which makes a Christian—namely, the Gospel of God’s Grace—is very thing that grows and transforms a Christian.

In short, we at Grace Anglican really trust in the power of the Gospel of Grace, the entire sufficiency of the Cross, and the transforming work of the Holy Spirit.  Why do we believe this?  Because the Gospel always works!