about us

Who Are We?

The Shelby Church of Christ is an independent congregation of Christians serving Christ in truth and love. We are a growing church striving to serve God in all we do. As members of the Lord's church, we strive to put into practice Jesus' command to demonstrate His love through our love for one another (John 13:35) and through our service to those around us (Mat 25:40).

What We Believe?

In a world filled with religious confusion, we seek to go back to the Bible and practice simple New Testament Christianity. The Bible is our only guide for all that we teach and practice (2 Tim 3:16-17).Jesus said, "I will build My church" and it is that church to which we belong (Matthew 16:18). The Church of Christ does not claim to be any denomination. We are not governed by a central headquarters or any other centralized organization. The church is autonomous (self-governing) under the authority of only one head which is Christ. We have no creed or declaration of faith besides the Bible.We believe that Jesus is the Son of God, and that he must be obeyed. We learn of His will for our lives through the Bible, God's inspired, written word. We are saved by grace through faith (Ephesians 5:8), and that salvation is available to us because of the shed blood of our Savior Jesus Christ.One becomes a christian by believing that Jesus Christ is the Son of God (Acts 2:37; 8:12; 8:37), repenting of past sins (Acts 2:38; 11:18), confessing faith in Christ (Acts 2:38; 8:37; 9:5), and being baptized into Christ (Acts 2:38,41; 8:12; 16:33; 22:16). Through this experience of being ''born again'', God adds us to His church (Acts 2:47). It begins the life-long journey of ''walking in the light'' of fellowship with Christ and our brothers and sisters in Christ (1 John 1:7).

What is Our Historical Heritage?

One of the earliest advocates of the return to New Testament Christianity, as a means of achieving unity of all believers in Christ, was James O'Kelly of the Methodist Episcopal Church. In 1793 he withdrew from the Baltimore conference of his church and called upon others to join him in taking the Bible as the only creed. His influence was largely felt in Virginia and North Carolina where history records that some seven thousand communicants followed his leadership toward a return to primitive New Testament Christianity.

In 1802 a similar movement among the Baptists in New England was led by Abner Jones and Elias Smith. They were concerned about "denominational names and creeds" and decided to wear only the name Christian, taking Bible as their only guide. In 1804, in the western frontier state of Kentucky, Barton W. Stone and several other Presbyterian preachers took similar action declaring that they would take the Bible as the "only sure guide to heaven." Thomas Campbell, and his illustrious son, Alexander Campbell, took similar steps in the year 1809 in what is now the state of West Virginia. They contended that nothing should be bound upon Christians as a matter of doctrine which is not as old as the New Testament. Although these four movements were completely independent in their beginnings eventually they became one strong restoration movement because of their common purpose and plea. These men did not advocate the starting of a new church, but rather a return to Christ's church as described in the Bible.

Members of the church of Christ do not conceive of themselves as a new church started near the beginning of the 19th century. Rather, the whole movement is designed to reproduce in contemporary times the church originally established on Pentecost, A.D. 30. The strength of the appeal lies in the restoration of Christ's original church.