DOCTRINAL POLICY

All faculty members are required to sign bi-annually and without reservation their agreement with the Dallas Bible Theological Institute doctrinal statement.

  1. The Godhead. We believe in the oneness of God and His eternal existence in three persons – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit – and these three are one God (co-equal, co-eternal, and co-existent) – having the precise same nature, attributes, and perfections and worthy of precisely the same honor, confidence, and obedience. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, each are distinct from each other and have distinct roles.[Mt. 28:18-19; Mk. 12:29; Jn. 1:14; Acts 5:3-4; 2 Cor. 13:14; Heb. 1:1-13; Rev. 1:4-6]
  2. God the Father. We believe that God the Father is the First Person of the Trinity, who was appeased by His Son’s death and shedding of blood on the cross. The role of the Father is initiating, commanding, directing, and sending, which is the appropriate position of the Father, after whom all human fatherhood is patterned. In love and for our salvation, Jesus Christ (after the Incarnation) was exalted far above all rule, authority, power, dominion, and above every name. The Father has subjected all things to His Son and gave him head over all things of the church. [Jn. 3:16; Jn. 12:49; 14:16; Eph. 1:20-21; 3:14-15; Rom. 3:24-25; Heb. 2:17; Pet. 2:9-11; 1 Jn. 2:2]
  3. God the Son. We believe that Jesus Christ, the Second Person of the Trinity, is perfect in deity and humanity (fully God and fully Man). Jesus Christ, in concert with God the Father and God the Spirit, raised Him from the dead. He is a propitiation for our sins and the whole world. We reject universal atonement. Christ will return for His church (the Rapture), before the Tribulation and Great Tribulation period. He will return with His saints at His Second Coming, to establish the millennium kingdom on earth for 1,000 years. [Mt. 1:23; Jn. 10:17-18; Jn. 2:19; 10:28; 14:2-3; Rom. 8:11; 1 Cor. 15:3-4; Gal. 1:1-4;Eph. 1:17-20; Col. 2:9; 1 Pet. 3:18; 1 Thess. 4:16-17; Rev. 19:14; 20:2-7]
  4. God the Holy Spirit. We believe that the Holy Spirit, the Third Person of the Trinity, though omnipresent from all eternity, took up His abode in the world, in a special sense on the day of Pentecost according to the divine promise. By His baptism, He unites all to Christ in one body and indwells every believer. As the indwelling One, He is the source of all power, all acceptable worship and service, and all spiritual gifts. We believe that the foundational spiritual gifts, such as tongues, prophecy, and knowledge, as well as the role of apostleship and the function of signs, miracles, and wonders, have ceased. [Jn. 14:16-17; 16:7-15; 1 Cor. 6:19; 13:8-10, 31; Eph. 2:22; 2 Thess. 2:7]
  5. The Scripture. We believe that God inspires the Old and New Testaments. This refers to the autographs as written by the prophets and apostles. The Bible is inerrant and infallible without mistakes in the original documents. We believe Scripture reveals the mind of God to man and points to the Lord Jesus Christ and the only way of Salvation through Christ. The Scriptures are the only infallible guide for our daily thought-life and our practical, moral, and spiritual instruction. [Mk. 12:26, 36; 13:11; Lk. 24:27, 44; Jn. 5:39; Acts 1:16; 17:2-3; 18:28; 26:22-23; Rom. 15:4;1 Cor. 2:13; 10:11; 2 Tim. 3:16; 2 Pet. 1:21]
  6. Salvation. We believe that salvation is by grace through faith; it is a gift from God the Father; unmerited on our part; we are redeemed through the shed blood of Jesus Christ. Salvation is accomplished by Faith alone! We reject the tenet of salvation by works. [Jn. 1:11-17; 3:16; 6:44; Eph. 2:8-9, Titus 2:11; Rom. 3:28; 5:1-2; Heb. 9:22]
  7. Eternal Security. We believe in the eternal security of the believer. As soon as he is saved, the believer becomes complete in Christ and is in no way required by God to seek a second blessing or second work of grace. The believer is sealed until the day of redemption. [Jn. 10:27-29; Rom. 8:29-39; Jn. 10:28; 11:25-26; Phil. 1:6; 1 Pet. 1:3-5; Cor. 1:22; Heb. 7:25; Rom. 5:10-11]
  8. Body of Christ. We believe that all those who believe in the Person and Work of Christ on the Cross are born again and are members of the Church as an organism, which is the Bride of Christ, regardless of membership in any local organized church or denominations. [Ezek. 34:26; Eph. 2:8; 4:30; Jn. 5:24; 1 Pet. 1:23; Jn. 3:14; 1 Pet. 1:3; 2 Cor. 5:17; 1 Cor. 6:11; Rom. 8:2-6; 2 Cor. 5:21]
  9. Sanctification. We believe that the individual once saved through accepting Jesus Christ, retains his old sin nature which is not removed in this life, but the provision made by the Holy Spirit for daily victory over sin may be appropriated and is effective to those who do so. The work of the Holy Spirit in this dispensation of Grace is reproving, convicting, sealing, baptizing, instructing, indwelling, and filling. The believer is justified from the penalty of sin. Experiential sanctification delivers from the power of sin. Glorification delivers from the presence of sin which is the final stage in the sanctification process. [Jn. 3:3-7, 31; Jn. 7:37-39; Acts 11:15-17; Rom. 8:9-11; Eph. 4:30; 1 Cor. 12:13; 2 Cor. 1:22;Eph. 1:13-14; 1 Cor. 1:22; 6:15; Eph. 4:4-5,16; 5:18; Jn. 3:6; Rom. 5:12-14; 7:14-17; 12:22;2 Cor. 4:16; Gal. 5:16-17]
  10. Man, Created, Fallen. We believe that man was created in the image and after the likeness of God and that he fell through sin (Garden of Eden) and as a consequence of his sin, lost his spiritual life, becoming dead in trespasses and sins, and that he became subject to the power of the devil. We also believe that this spiritual death has been transmitted to the entire human race of man. [Gen. 1:26; 2:17; 6:5; Ps. 14:1-3; 51:5; Jer. 17:9; Eph. 2:1-6; Rom. 5:12-14]
  11. Angels Fallen and Unfallen. We believe in the person of Satan. He was counted perfect but fell from his eternal position in heaven due to his rebellion against God. He is the originator of sin, an enemy of God, and is now the prince and god of this world. [Col. 1:16; Ezek. 28:11-19; Isa. 14:12-17; Gen. 3:15; 2 Cor. 11:3, 13-15; Rev. 12:9; 20:2]
  12. Dispensationalism. We believe that the Bible presents the fact that God has not always dealt with mankind the same way in every age. According to Biblical terminology, these distinct periods are called "administrations" regarding the purpose of God or "stewardships" concerning the responsibility of man as originating from the New Testament usage of the Greek word, "oikonomia”. The essence of dispensationalism, then, is the distinction between Israel and the Church. This grows out of the dispensationalist consistent employment of normal, plain, or historical-grammatical interpretation, and reflects an understanding of the basic purpose of God in all His dealings with mankind as that of glorifying Himself through salvation and other purposes as well. [Eph. 1:10; 3:2,9]
  13. Blessed Hope. We believe that the next great event in the fulfillment of prophecy will be the coming of the Lord in the air. He will receive us to Himself into heaven, and both his own who are alive and remain unto His coming, and also who have fallen asleep in Jesus, and that this event is the blessed hope set before us in the Scripture, and for this, we should be constantly looking. [Jn. 14:1-3; 1 Cor. 15:51-52; 1 Thess. 4:13-18; Titus 2:11-14]
  14. Eternal State. We believe that at death, the spirits and souls of those who trusted in the Lord Jesus Christ for salvation pass immediately into His presence and there remain in conscious bliss until the resurrection of the glorified body when Christ comes for His own. Whereupon soul and body, reunited shall be associated with Him forever in glory, but the spirits and souls of the unbelieving remain after death conscious of condemnation and in misery until the final judgment of the great white throne at the close of the millennium, when soul and body reunited shall be cast into the lake of fire, not to annihilated, but to be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of His power. [Luke 16:19-26; 23:42; 2 Cor. 5:8; Phil. 1:23; 2 Thess. 1:7-9; Jude 6-7; Rev. 20:11-15]
  15. Men and Women in Ministry. We believe that in the body of Christ, men and women, stand spiritually equal and constitute the Universal Church. We believe women have God-given gifts to be used within the biblical guidelines of Scripture. Officers within the local church including elders, deacons, and pastor-teacher are reserved for men. The role of lead pastor-teacher is biblically reserved for men. [Galatians 3:26-29; 1 Tim. 2:11-15; 1 Timothy 3:1-16; Titus 2:2-5]
  16. Human Sexuality. - We believe that God created mankind in His image.[1]  In two separate acts, He created only two distinct genders:  male and female.[2]  The genders of Adam and Eve were established by God and defined by their physiological sex at creation.[3]  Subsequent to creation, God determines the gender of all other humans by their physiological sex at the time of birth.[4]  Thus, all attempts to redefine human sexuality beyond the physiological male-female distinction (whether framed biologically or culturally) and all attempts to change one's birth gender are sinful rebellions against our Creator.  As our Creator, God stipulates in His Word that the only legitimate and acceptable sexual desires and sexual acts are those between a man and a woman within the context of marriage.[5]
  17. Marriage. We believe marriage is a gift of God’s common grace to all mankind as a fundamental building block of family and society.[6] As the architect of marriage, God alone retains the right to define its constructs and guidelines, and He has done so in His Word.[7]  In accordance with Scripture, we teach that God's design for marriage is a public, formal, and official covenant between one male and one female.[8]  God designed the marriage covenant to be a life-long bond, with divorce permitted only in the case of unrepentant[9] sexual sin or of desertion by an unbeliever.[10]  Although sexual sins of thought are not justification for divorce, all sexual immorality, both thoughts, and behavior must be taken seriously as a transgression against God.[11]  God intends that the union between two believers be a loving illustration of the relationship between Christ and His church when carried out in obedience to the Bible and through the enabling power of the Holy Spirit.[12]

[1] Gen. 1:27; 5:1; 9:6; Jas. 3:9

[2] Gen. 1:27; 5:1-2; Matt. 19:4; Mk. 10:6

[3] Gen. 1:27; 2:7, 22

[4] Gen. 18:10; Lev. 12:2, 5, 7

[5] Gen. 2:24; Lev. 18:22; 20:13; Matt. 5:28; 19:4-6; Rom. 1:26-27; 1 Cor. 6:9-11; 7:1-5; Gal. 5:19-21; 1 Thess. 4:3-8; 1 Tim. 1:10; Heb. 13:4

[6] Gen. 1:28; 2:18, 24; Ps. 127:3; Prov. 18:22; 31:10-11; Heb. 13:4

[7] Gen. 2:18-24

[8] Gen. 2:24; Prov. 2:17; Ezek. 16:8-14; Mal. 2:14

[9] In keeping with the spirit of Scripture in both the Old and New Testaments, we urge reconciliation in most cases in the event of        an unfaithful spouse who demonstrates sincere biblical repentance (cf. Hos. 1-3; 11; Eph. 4:32; Col. 3:13).

[10] Mal.2:16; Matt. 5:32; 19:9; Mk. 10:11-12; 1 Cor. 7:12-16, 24

[11] Job 31:1; Matt. 5:28; 15:19; Jas. 1:14-15

[12] Eph. 5:18-33; 2 Cor. 6:14; 1 Pet. 3:7