Our Beliefs and Values

City Church of East Nashville is committed to the basic beliefs of historic Christianity as summarized in the Apostles’ Creed and Nicene Creed. These creeds focus on who God is (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) and what he has done for humanity (saved us from our sin through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ).

We are also a confessional Presbyterian church, which means that we believe the Westminster Confession of Faith is a faithful summary and explanation of what God’s Word teaches. While the above creeds address the basics of the Christian faith, the Westminster Confession is a longer, fuller explanation of who God is, what he has done, how he has saved us in Jesus, how Christians are called to live now, and what Jesus will do when he returns.

We are also a congregation of the Presbyterian Church in America, which means that we don’t exist on our own as a church but are formally connected and bound to other confessional Presbyterian churches in our region and in North America.

City Church of East Nashville is a body of believers seeking to live out the gospel as a community defined by five core values:

At City Church, we believe that the stories we choose to live our lives by shape and form our understanding of reality. They tell us who we are. They tell us where we come from and where we are going. Our stories are what define us and set us apart as individuals. But they are also what connect us together and bind us to each other in community. They allow us to truly know and be known, amidst love and loss, success and failure, and provide us with the context for finding meaning and purpose in this world. In this, we believe that the great story revealed to us in the Old and New Testaments of the Bible is not just one more story among the endless options in our world. It is the one, true story of all reality and human history. It is God’s great story. Moreover, we believe that our story is founded in God's story. Therefore, at City Church we are committed to living out and embodying this story in every aspect of our lives and ministry together.

The church’s mission and ministry are centered on the finished work of Jesus Christ as the climax and fulfillment of all human history. At the heart of our vision is the conviction that the gospel of Jesus Christ changes everything. It is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes, that every malady and grief is addressed and substantially healed in this gospel.  We long to see a transformation of the city by the outgrowth of the lives of the congregants as they are transformed by this gospel.  We are convinced that the good news of the love of God expressed in the death and resurrection of Jesus towards real sinners with real problems will change everything as it courses through our communities.

The term “gospel” was originally used to describe a proclamation—a piece of good news— announced by a royal messenger. For this reason, biblical writers adopted the term “gospel” to describe the historical reality and teaching associated with the life, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus Christ. The gospel declares the news that God reconciles broken people and our broken world to himself through the life, death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus!

God has intervened in our world to restore all things to their rightful order through the power of the gospel. The righting of the relationships between God and humanity, humanity and humanity, and humanity and creation comes from God through Jesus Christ.

It has been said, “The gospel means that I am more flawed and sinful than I ever dared believe, but at the same time, I am even more loved and accepted than I ever dared hope because Jesus Christ lived and died in my place.” Therefore, the person and work of Jesus Christ fuels all our relationships and ministries.

The motivation for our lives as Christians comes from the amazing grace of God. We are saved by His grace through faith alone, not by anything we could ever do or merit. Moreover, we are driven and motivated to live the Christian life by His grace through faith. We are not saved by grace to become a merit-based people. The power for our lives of faith must come from the Holy Spirit as He drives us to continually feed upon and cling to the wonderful grace of God in the finished work of Jesus Christ.

The gospel creates a new community and culture of transformed lives connected by geographic and relational proximity. God values and loves uniting diversity within his family more than we ever will. We believe we are in East Nashville to promote the beauty, prosperity, justice, and overall well-being of our neighborhood and, through that, the city of Nashville as a whole. We are committed to giving sacrificially of ourselves and our resources for the sake of our neighborhood and our city.

The gospel secures our access to God so we can enjoy communion with Him. Prayer is that communion and is our first and continual resort— rather than our last! God’s Spirit leads us into praise, repentance, thanksgiving, and requests. We pray for God's kingdom to come and for his will to be done in our lives, our neighborhood, and in the city of Nashville. We are committed to and dependent upon bold, specific, concerted and continual prayer.