OUR VISION

"Dereham Baptist Church is a community of God’s people dedicated to being and making committed disciples of Jesus Christ.”

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We believe that in our journey together towards seeing this vision fulfilled we need to embrace two principles:

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• Discipleship is a journey.

• The kingdom of God is a priority.

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DISCIPLESHIP IS A JOURNEY

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People come to faith in the context of a journey and evangelism is a process. Our role in evangelism is to give people the opportunity to make progress in that process. When we come to faith we continue in that lifelong journey of discovering who God is and what He is like, as a consequence we discover who we are and who we were created to be as we grow to be more like Jesus. This journey is never completed on earth!

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD IS A PRIORITY

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The Kingdom of God is bigger than the church and is about more than evangelism. Jesus taught, demonstrated and lived out the Kingdom. We are called to do the same.

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“But seek first His Kingdom and His righteousness”
Matthew 6:33

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In response to these two fundamental principles we will:

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a. As a church be intentional about making disciples. We will do this by developing structures, events & activities that enable us and others to journey on as disciples. But that is not the real issue. That’s easy. What we really need to do is to develop lifestyles, ways of living, which are disciple-making lifestyles. Our small groups are essential in this process.

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b. If the Kingdom of God is to be a priority we will also seek to listen to and understand the needs of local people and try to understand what a Kingdom response to these needs is. Some of these responses will happen through small informal groups of people gathering around a common purpose. Not top down

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We will also seek to maximise the opportunities afforded by the central location of our buildings in the town and area. In all of this our guiding principle will be the Kingdom of God, not merely an excuse for evangelism. We do these things because we believe they are the things God would have us do.