What's In A Name?
by Rev. Barry Jones, President of WECF
This is an age old question, yet it is a worthy question for there should be no ambiguity when a company of God's people choose for themselves, or their mission a name. When the World Evangelical Congregational Fellowship (WECF) was first conceived we wanted a name that would clearly and unmistakenly tell who we are. Allow me to enlarge a little on the message our name carries in itself.
World
Is it perhaps a little presumptions for us to speak this way of ourselves? Not really, for the membership of the WECF encircles the globe. We touch every continent and so in that sense we are indeed a worldwide fellowship.
Members are found in Eastern Europe in countries such as Bulgaria and Macedonia. In Western Europe we are in England, Wales, Ireland and Portugal. In the great continent of Africa we are to be found in South Africa. In Asia you will find our members in India, Philippines, Taiwan and Hong Kong. Across the vastness of the Pacific you will find our members in Australia, New Zealand and in the islands of Micronesia. Finally in the American we are in Brazil, Canada and the United States. This international family is indebted to those Congregationalists of years ago who obeyed the great commission and sent their sons and daughters to the mission fields of the world. We ought to never forget that many of these early missionaries laid down their lives. Some were even martyred as they carried the Gospel to the far reaches of the world.
Evangelical
This defines our theological position, in that we hold to "the faith once delivered unto the saints" (Jude v. 3), a truly apostolic faith and doctrine. As evangelicals we believe in a fixed body of truth enshrined in the Holy Scriptures and enunciated in the historic creeds and reformed declarations of the father (e.g. The Savoy Declaration).
By identifying ourselves as Evangelical we join hands with believers in every place and time who uphold the saving gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. This gospel is a life transforming dynamic, which is ours through the sacrificial and subsitutionary death of Christ, and validated by His resurrection for the grave. It is a salvation that is ours by trace alone and received by faith not works.
Fundamental to the belief of evangelicals is our attitude towards the Bible. We accept and unreservedly believe that the Holy Scriptures are the Word of God, divinely inspired and therefore authoritative in matters of faith and practice.
Congregational
While Evangelical defines our theology Congregational speaks of our belief in the church and particularly the place of the local church. Congregationalism is a set of principles which are New Testament in origin and which reemerged in the Protestant Reformation. The great characteristic of congregationalism is a commitment to the principle of the Lordship of Jesus Christ manifested into the life of each gathered congregation.
Article V our our WECF Constitution declares "We believe that Jesus Christ is the head of his body, the church universal, and of each local church." Article V continues, "We believe that Jesus Christ exercises His authority in each local church by the Holy Spirit through the Holy Scriptures." This explains why we as Congregationalists believe that each local church is in itself a complete church and therefore autonomous, ultimately answerable only to Jesus Christ.
By standing on this principle we also believe in the necessity of a regenerate church membership. That is, we believe that ever church member must be a born again Christian and living under the Lordship of Christ.
Fellowship
The WECF exists as a fellowship of national associations of evangelical Congregational churches of the historic biblical persuasion. We exist to promote fellowship, encouragement and cooperative endeavors among our members. By this means we seek to deep alive the uniqueness of our heritage as Congregationalists. Furthermore by our very existence we endeavor to present to the world, a witness as to our oneness in Christ, the Lord of the church.
