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We
believe in God and accept the entire Bible as
God's word, His only word, inspired, infallible
and authoritative measure of our faith and of
our behavior: "All Scripture is God-breathed
and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting
and training in righteousness, so that the man
of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good
work" (II Timothy 3:16)
The
Bible contains all the holy scriptures of the
Old and of the New Testaments. The Old Testament
was written by Moses and by the prophets before
the coming of Christ, while the New Testament
was written by the apostles and disciples of Jesus.
The
law of Moses constitutes the Pentateuch, that
is the first five books of the Bible, and can
be summarized in the ten commandments. Israel
was under the covenant of the mosaic law, in which
God showed his devotion to the degree that Israel
observed his commandments. Israel was not able
to respect this covenant, for which reason it
was replaced by another covenant founded on better
promises.
The
new covenant is based on the perfect sacrifice
of Jesus Christ; he is
the mediator and has sealed it with his own blood.
The mark of this covenant is the gift of the Holy
Spirit and the stipulations are the washing
away of our sins and the gift of eternal life
with all kinds of blessings, in response to our
faith. "For this reason Christ is the
mediator of a new covenant, that those who are
called may receive the promised eternal inheritance"
(Hebrews 9:15) The law of
Christ is therefore a law of love, of truth, of
forgiveness and of liberty.
The
New Testament includes: the four Gospels, (four
accounts of the life of Christ written by the
evangelists Matthew, Mark, Luke and John), the
Acts of the Apostles (the story of the beginning
of the church right after the death of Jesus,
written by Luke), the fourteen epistles (letters)
of the apostle Paul, the letter of James, the
three letters of John, the two letters of Peter,
the letter of Jude and Revelation by John.
The
entire New Testament can be called Gospel (good
news of salvation in Jesus) because it is the
authentic source of the teaching of our Savior
Jesus Christ.
The
Bible tells the story of how God searches for
us with his love and continues to search for us
with full provisions to free us from sin, to obtain
salvation and to live in comunion with Him "For
God so loved the world that he gave his one and
only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not
perish but have eternal life" (John
3:16)
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