Who We Are and What We Believe
Our Concern
Our greatest concern is that you know God personally. If you or your family have any special needs, you may call the church office (574-294-1131), and one of our pastors will be happy to talk with you.
Our Mission, Vision and Core Values
Our Mission
We exist to advance God’s kingdom by loving God, loving people, and making disciples of Jesus.
Matt. 28:18-20 | Matt. 22:34-40
Our Vision
By God’s grace, we seek to love and serve our community[1] and world with the transformative Gospel of Jesus.
Isa. 58:6-8 | John 13:35 | 2 Cor. 5:20 | Jam. 1:27
Core Values
Our core values are the practical distinctives that define our ministry as a church. They are not an exhaustive list of what is important to us as a church, but they are key characteristics of our practice as we seek to accomplish our mission and vision.
Our Authority: God’s Word
God’s word is our authority and foundation. We trust it, treasure it, and teach it. It is alive and active, and it will always accomplish what God wants it to. We boldly preach God’s word, believing in its transformative power. We apply the Scriptures to our lives, being doers of the word and not hearers only. We desire to be a church who submits to Scripture in all areas of life.
Psa. 119:105 | Is. 55:11 | Matt. 4:4 | Heb. 4:12 | Jam. 1:22 | 2 Tim. 3:16-17 | Luke 11:28
Our Pursuit: Transformational Growth
Disciples of Christ are marked by growth and fruit. Through the faithful application of God’s Word, we are experiencing transformational growth. We are committed to cooperating with the Holy Spirit as He sanctifies us daily. Corporately, in small groups, and in one-on-one contexts, we disciple, train, and equip each other to become more like Christ and do the work of the ministry.
John 15:8 | 1 Cor. 6:11 | Eph. 4:12 | Phil. 1:6 | 2 Peter 3:18
Our Power: Persistent Prayer
Prayer changes lives, families, and nations. We desire to be a church characterized by passionate, fervent prayer. We pray believing that whatever we ask in Jesus’ name according to God’s will, He will do it. We pray missionally, knowing that God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. We come boldly to God’s throne of grace, knowing we will find the help we need. Prayer is our power – it is one of our weapons in the spiritual battle.
John 14:13-14 | 1 Jn. 5:14-15 | Eph. 6:18-19 | Phil. 4:6-7 | Heb. 4:16 | Jam. 5:16 | 2 Pet. 3:9 | 1 Thess. 5:16-18
Our Intention: Love One Another
The Christian life is one of worshipping and glorifying God together in community. We are not meant to run our race alone. Knowing this, we walk alongside each other in the joys and the trials of life. We strive to be a multi-generational community of believers who love each other well. We want to serve each other sacrificially, understand each other deeply, and live transparently – together. We invite others into our brokenness through difficult conversations and genuine accountability, for the glory of God.
Rom. 12:1 | Gen. 2:18 | John 13:35 | Rom. 12:15 | Gal. 6:2 | Col. 3:17 | Phil. 2:3-4 | Jam. 5:16 | Heb. 10:24-25
Our Passion: Pursuing the Lost
We want our community to be glad that we are here. As Christ’s disciples, we are his hands and feet. We engage our community creatively, in ways that demonstrate God’s love. We live incarnationally[2], following Jesus’ example. Our hearts grieve at the brokenness around us – but we have the solution. The gospel is good news! We share it with our neighbors, coworkers, friends, and family. We passionately pursue the lost, loving them as Jesus does.
Matt. 9:12-13 | Acts 2:46-47 | Rom. 10:15 | Phil. 2:5-8 | Matt. 22:39 | 2 Cor. 5:20
Our Commission: World Missions
Billions are unreached with the gospel, and we desire to remedy this. The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few – we pray to the Lord to send more workers into the field. Jesus has commissioned us to make disciples of all nations. To accomplish this, we actively challenge, equip, and send our people to reach the lost globally. We generously support field workers financially, do battle on their behalf through prayer, and assist them through short-term trips. We encourage a multiplication of healthy, gospel-centered churches around the world.
Gen. 12:3 | Psa. 67:3-5 | Matt. 28:19-20 | Matt. 9:37 | Rom. 10:15 | 2 Pet. 3:9 | Acts 1:8
[1] “Community” here has a dual meaning. We mean both our internal community as a local body of believers, and also the people who make up our external local community – our neighbors, those who live near our church or in our town, etc.
[2]“Incarnationally” here means living a life patterned after Jesus’ example
in Philippians 2:5-8. Jesus took on flesh and became a man (John 1:14), entered our world of brokenness (Isaiah 53:3-4), sought us out as broken people (Matt. 9:12-13), and brought what we needed most: the good news of the gospel (Mark 1:14).
Our Location
The church is located 1 1/2 miles east of Main Street in Elkhart, Indiana, just off East Jackson Blvd., at 134 St. Clair Ave.
Our church office is located at 146 St. Clair Ave. in the white house just south of the church building.
Our Name
McCoy Memorial Baptist Church was established as the Berean Baptist Church in 1936. In 1940, the name was changed to McCoy Memorial Baptist as a tribute to the first protestant missionary in this area, the Rev. Isaac McCoy. In 1820, Isaac McCoy and his wife, Christiana, arrived in Fort Wayne, then, an Indian trading post, to establish a mission station there. Two years later, the McCoys were offered land in exchange for work with the Potawatomi Indians near Niles, Michigan. With 32 men, women, and children, Isaac led a caravan through the trackless wilderness. That journey passed over the old Indian trail, now marked by a bronze tablet on Goshen Avenue, near Jackson Boulevard. Christiana McCoy, a direct relative to our President James Polk, was the first white woman to enter what is now Indiana. Christiana Lake and Christiana Creek were named in her honor. Our church – named in memory of the first protestant missionary in this area – has always had a strong missions emphasis. At the present time, we help support twenty-three different families and five organizations who are involved in missions throughout the world.
Our Statement of Faith
- We believe that the Bible is God’s Word, fully and verbally inspired without error. It is our supreme authority in all matters of faith and practice.
- We believe in one God, the divine Trinity, Father, son and Holy Spirit- eternally existing, equal in essence and attributes; yet distinct in office and activity.
- We believe in Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God, in His pre-existence; His virgin birth; His incarnation; His sinless life; His miracles; His substitutionary, atoning death on the cross; His bodily resurrection from the grave; His high priestly work in heaven; and His personal, visible, glorious, imminent, pre-millennial return to earth to set up His kingdom.
- We believe in the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Godhead, who convinces the world of sin, righteousness and judgment and regenerates, leads, comforts, enlightens and sanctifies believers.
- We believe that man was made in the image of God, originally sinless and pure, but sinned in Adam as the natural head of the race and is now sinful by nature and by choice and in need of salvation.
- We believe in salvation by grace through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, apart from human works or ceremonies.
- We believe spiritual gifts are given by the Holy Spirit to each believer when he is saved. Those gifts are given for the unification and edification of the church, never for its fragmentation.
- We believe that the universal church of Christ is a spiritual body of which He is the head and of which all regenerated people are members.
- We believe that the local church is a company of believers in Jesus Christ, immersed on a credible profession of faith, and voluntarily associated for worship, work and fellowship.
- We believe that to these local churches were committed for perpetual observation the ordinances of baptism and the Lord’s Supper and that God laid upon these churches the task of proclaiming to a lost world that Gospel of Jesus Christ.
- We believe in two church ordinances: baptism, being the immersion of the believer in water, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, thus symbolizing the believer’s previous experience of regeneration through faith and his union in the death, burial and resurrection of Christ as set forth in Romans 6:3-11; the Lord’s supper, instituted by Christ, being a symbol of His atoning sacrifice.
- We believe that the local church is independent and autonomous and its Statement of Faith must be free from interference by any ecclesiastical or political authority and that, therefore, church and state must be kept separate as having different functions.
- We believe in the resurrection of the body, the eternal existence of all men either in heaven or hell, in divine judgment, in rewards and punishment and the certain fulfillment of all Bible prophecies.
- We believe that we “should earnestly contend for the faith once delivered unto the saints”, and that we should preach the Word, being urgent in season, out of season, reproving, rebuking, exhorting with all longsuffering and doctrine (Jude 3; II Timothy 4:2).