What we believe

We are:

A Confessional Church

We believe in confessing the faith once delivered to the saints. That means we have a written statement of our beliefs. This is known as the Westminister Confession of Faith. This summaries what we believe the bible says on important points of doctrine and worship. All our Elders subscribe to this confession as the confession of their faith. It’s important to us that we are a confessional church because that means we don’t hide what we believe and we can be held accountable for it. When you come to our services these beliefs are what you will hear being taught from the bible. It’s important to say that we don’t seek to impose these beliefs on the bible, but rather we consider them to be summaries of what the bible actually says.

Sandys Street Marriage policy

A Reformed Church

Being a Reformed Church means that we trace our heritage back to the time of the Reformation and the recovery of the biblical gospel. As a Reformed church we are part of the One, holy, catholic and apostolic church of Christ believing in the ecumenical creeds which all christians believe such as the Nicene Creed and the Chalcedon definition. We are Protestant in that we believe in the necessity of the Reformation for the purity of the church and we are Evangelical since we are people who seek to make known the gospel of God’s Grace alone in Christ alone which is received by Faith alone from Scripture alone to the glory of God alone.

A Presbyterian Church

First Newry is a Presbyterian Church. This is describing the way in which our Church is governed and its leadership. The word Presbyterian comes from the Greek word meaning elder. So Presbyterian churches are lead by a team of elders. But we are also connected to other churches through a Presbytery which is a regional gathering of representative elders from churches meeting together to make decisions. In turn the General Assembly is the greatest court of the Church which brings together elders from each congregation over the whole Island and is the highest decision making court of our denomination. Being a Presbyterian church gives us accountability and oversight as well as unity with our fellow believers. First Newry Sandys Street is part of the Presbyterian Church in Ireland.