First and foremost, we believe it to be God’s intent to have an intimate relationship with His creation – mankind. This relationship involves obedience, which was broken by the sin of Adam and Eve and caused death to be passed upon all man (Rom 5:12). Man’s need for redemption and to be reconciled back to God could only be provided through a sinless sacrifice (the Lamb of God). The blood of this sacrifice would provide redemption (i.e. pay the price) for man’s sin – and position him for new birth.
The Gospel – Death, Burial, Resurrection
Paul declares the gospel he preached – to be the death, burial and resurrection of Christ (1 Cor 15:1-4).
Peter gave us the application of the gospel when we believe it, to be through repentance, water baptism in the name of Jesus, and the infilling of the Holy Ghost (Acts 2:38). The book of Romans teaches us that we are “buried with him” in baptism.
Romans 6:4 (KJV)
4 Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.
When a person is drawn by the spirit of God, they will turn towards the Lord, which will also cause them to turn away from their old ways and previous will. This is referred to as repentance and a type of death — our own personal cross experience. We are then instructed by scripture to be baptized by immersion in water, calling on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Waiting on God, we are then filled with the baptism of the Holy Ghost.
We understand this to be the new birth experience that Jesus spoke to Nicodemus about in John 3. This brings man back into right relationship with God through the process of redemption – the application of the blood of Christ, the lamb of God.