About Us

"For we are created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them." (Ephesians 2:10)

Who Are We?

Who Are We?

We all feel the pressure to secure a sense of significance, approval, validation, love, etc... and we conclude that if we’re going to experience these things, we have to make it happen. Most of us are exhausted because we’re trying to justify ourselves by what we do, who we can become, and what others think about us. 

If any of this describes you, Grace Community is for you! We are a group of imperfect people learning what it means to rest in God’s perfect love for us. We are a pack of 21st-century missionaries of grace called to go into the hard regions of human need and struggle with the good news of God’s unconditional love. 

Jesus invited weary and burdened out people to come to him to find rest (Matthew 11:28). So, at Grace Community you won’t hear, “Just do it.” Instead, you will hear over and over again the words of Jesus from the cross, “It is finished.” Why? Becuase Jesus alone saves!

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We're a movement for ALL people to discover and deepen a relationship with Jesus Christ!

Our Mission

Connecting exhausted people to God’s inexhaustible grace by demonstrating and declaring the gospel message of Jesus Christ!

Our Vision

Meet Pastor Andrew

If you’re looking for a reason not to attend Grace Community, allow Pastor Andrew to offer the most obvious one — him!

He is a self described one-trick pony. His stubborn, repetitive fixation on God's unconditional grace makes him painfully predictable. Sermon after sermon, it’s the same dangerous message: mercy for people who don’t deserve it and relief for those who keep failing. One would think he’d eventually move on to something more useful — like instructions for being more holy, more disciplined, more faithful. But no. Pastor Andrew insists that broken people don’t need better advice, they need better news! Worse, he refuses to lead as an aspirational figure. Instead he uses himself less as an example to follow and more as a warning to heed; and is relentlessly pointing everyone to a Savior that meets people while they’re still falling apart.

But if you want to know him some more, and you aren't already turned off… here’s a quick snapshot. He is a northern New Jersey native. In his downtime he most enjoys spending quality time with his family, cheering on his beloved New York Yankees, fishing and playing golf, as well as reading books authored by his intellectual mentors and theological soulmates. He is eager to see people set free by the power of the gospel, and is fueled by hearing people's testimonies of God's saving grace. He and his wife Jenna have three children — Talan, Keatyn, & Kollyn.

Email — afoss@gracecomm.church

ALLIANCE OF REFORMED CHURCHES (the ARC)

We belong to a community of congregations who join together as friends and partners in Christ, seeking first the Kingdom of God with the presence and power of the Holy Spirit. We pursue unrelentingly innovative ways to engage a changing world with the good news of Jesus, all the while embracing the diversity of the human experience under obedience to Christ our King.

To find out more about the Alliance of Reformed Churches click the link below.

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OUR BELIEFS

Believe it or not, Christianity is not about good people getting better. If anything, it's good news for bad people coping with their failure to be good. The heart of the Christian faith is good news, not good advice, good technique, or good behavior...  it's not complicated, so we keep it simple! Below is a summary of what we believe, teach and confess here at Grace Community.

We believe… the Bible, including both Old and New Testaments as originally given, is the verbally and plenarily inspired Word of God and is free from error in the whole and in the part, and is therefore the final authoritative guide for faith and conduct.

We believe… there is one God eternally existent in three distinct persons in one divine essence, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

We believe… God the Father has revealed Himself as the Creator and preserver of the universe, to Whom the entire creation and all creatures are subject.

We believe… God created Adam and Eve in His image to live in fellowship with Him. They fell into sin through the temptation of Satan and thereby lost fellowship with God. Through their disobedience the entire human race became totally depraved, that is, self-centered sinners who oppose God, and who by nature are unable to trust, fear or love Him. They are subject to the devil, and are condemned to death under the eternal wrath of God.

We believe… Jesus Christ, the Eternal Son, is the image of the invisible God. To accomplish our redemption, He became fully human, being conceived of the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary. Jesus Christ, who is true God and true man, by His perfect obedience and substitutionary death on the cross, has purchased our redemption. He arose from the dead for our justification in the body in which He was crucified. He ascended into heaven, where He is now seated at the right hand of God, the Father, as our interceding High Priest. He will come a second time personally, bodily, and visibly to gather the believers unto Himself. He will judge the living and the dead and make an eternal separation between believers and unbelievers. His kingdom shall have no end.

We believe… the Holy Spirit is a divine person eternally one with the Father and with the Son. Through the Word of God He convicts people of sin, graciously leads them to confess their sinfulness to God, and then calls them to faith through the Gospel. He regenerates, sanctifies, and preserves believers in the one true faith. He comforts, guides, equips, directs, and empowers the church to fulfill the Great Commission.

We believe… the knowledge and benefit of Christ’s redemption from sin is brought to the human race through means of grace, namely the Word and the Sacraments.
  • Through the Word of the Law God brings sinners to know their lost condition and to repent. Through the Word of the Gospel He brings sinners to believe in Jesus Christ, to be justified, to enter the process of sanctification, and to have eternal life. This occurs as the Holy Spirit awakens them to see their sin, convicts them of their guilt of sin, and calls them to repent and believe, inviting and enabling them to accept God’s grace in Christ. Each person who believes is instantly forgiven and credited with Christ’s righteousness. The Word then teaches and guides the believer to lead a godly life.
  • In the Sacrament of Baptism, God offers the benefits of Christ’s redemption to all people and graciously bestows the washing of regeneration and newness of life to all who believe. God calls the baptized person to live in daily repentance, that is, in sorrow for sin, in turning from sin, and in personal faith in the forgiveness of sin obtained by Christ. By grace we are daily given the power to overcome sinful desires and live a new life in Christ. Those who do not continue to live in God’s grace need to be brought again to repentance and faith through the Law and Gospel. Because the sinfulness of human nature passes on from generation to generation and the promise of God’s grace includes little children, we baptize infants, who become members of Christ’s believing church through baptism. These children need to come to know that they are sinners with a sinful nature that opposes God. Through the work of the Holy Spirit, they need to confess their sinfulness and yield to God; and possess for themselves forgiveness of their sin through Jesus Christ, as they are led from the faith received in infant baptism into a clear conscious personal faith in Christ as their Lord and Savior and being assured of salvation, rely solely on the finished work of Christ, and the power of the Gospel to live as children of God.
  • In the Sacrament of Holy Communion, Christ graciously gives to the communicants all the benefits of His substitutionary body and blood. When communing at the Lord’s table and partaking the bread and fruit of the vine (juice or wine) Jesus declares the forgiveness of sin to all believers and strengthens their faith.
We believe… eternal salvation is available to every living human being on earth by God’s grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. This salvation consists of an instantaneous aspect and an ongoing, continual aspect.
  • Justification is God’s gracious act by which He, for Christ’s sake, instantaneously acquits repentant and believing sinners and credits them with Christ’s righteousness. At that moment, God gives each one who believes a new and godly nature and the Holy Spirit begins the process of sanctification. There is no place for human effort in justification.
  • Sanctification is God’s gracious, continual work of spiritual renewal and growth in the life of every justified person. Through the means of grace, the Holy Spirit works to reproduce the character of Christ within the lives of all believers, instructing and urging them to live out their new nature. The Holy Spirit enables believers more and more to resist the devil, to overcome the world, and to count themselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. The Holy Spirit produces spiritual fruit in and bestows spiritual gifts upon all believers. He calls, empowers and equips them to serve God in the home, in the community, and as part of the Church Universal. The process of sanctification will be complete only when the believer reaches glory. 

    Any version of Christianity that makes the focus of the Christian faith the life of the Christian is what the Reformers called a “theology of glory” — not God’s glory, but ours. A theology of glory is all about us and what we do. It’s about us and our performance, our obedience, our faithfulness, our potential, our strength, our improvement, and so on. Its main message is our need to do more, try harder, get better, and climb higher. A theology of glory has no room for Christian failure and weakness. It views Christianity primarily in terms of us being the main characters that morally ascend to God, rather than God being the main character who lovingly descends to us. It may give lip service to Jesus hanging on a cross for us, but its emphasis is us climbing a ladder for Jesus.

    Here at Grace Community we embrace a “theology of the cross”  because we readily acknowledge that we are weak and weary, bad, and broken. We admit that while our love for Jesus will continue to fall short, Jesus' love for us will never will. We are deeply grateful that because of what Jesus has accomplished for us, there is nothing we can do — or fail to do — that will ever tempt God to leave us or forsake us. Because of Jesus, God’s love for us, approval of us, and commitment to us does not ride on our resolve for Jesus... but rather on Jesus’ resolve for us. It is, after all, His faithfulness that is great, not ours.

    The good news of the gospel rings true when we finally and openly confess that we are weak and we need help, that we fail, that we’re not as put-together as we want people to think we are. That’s when the rushing wind of God’s amazing grace blows through and reminds us…
    • Because Jesus was strong for us, we’re free to be weak!
    • Because Jesus was extraordinary, we’re free to be ordinary!
    • Because Jesus succeeded for us, we’re free to fail!
    • Because Jesus won for us, we’re free to lose!

    And that's good news! Amen?!?!

    We believe… the Church is a chosen people of God throughout redemptive history, united in true faith, and sent out with the message of the Gospel; and is the heart of God’s mission to the world. 

    We believe… the Church Universal consists of all those who truly believe on Jesus Christ as Savior. The local congregation is an assembly of believers in a certain locality among whom the Gospel is purely taught and the sacraments are rightly administered. The confessing membership here at Grace Community shall include only those who have been baptized into “the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” and confess personal faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

    We believe… in a congregational form of church government and the autonomy of local congregations. The offices of pastor, elder, and deacon can be filled by both men and women who are confessing members of Grace Community Church. The synodical administration (Alliance of Reformed Churches — the ARC) has only an advisory function as it relates to our congregation, but also an administrative function as it relates to the cooperative efforts of all ARC congregations collectively.

    We believe… the mission of multiplication should be at the core of every church and we will prioritize our resources to continue growing our congregation’s reach, as well as planting new churches in the future if the Lord blesses our ministry and chooses to expand our reach.

    We believe… in the total sovereignty of God in all things, and that we are forever and completely forgiven of our sins by God’s grace alone, through the gift of faith alone, in Christ’s atoning sacrifice alone, as revealed in the Bible alone, all for the glory of God alone. 

    We believe… the Apostles, Athanasian, and Nicene Creeds unite all Christians as the Church Universal.

    We believe… in the Heidelberg Catechism, Belgic Confession, and the Canons of Dort as historic Reformed expressions of the Christian faith, because their interpretations align with our understanding of God’s Word and these creeds and confessions come from the authority, clarity, and sufficiency of the eternal Word alone. These doctrinal standards, which are taken from Scripture, help us to understand the Bible and unite us in the way we practice our faith and distinguish us as Reformed within the Church Universal.

    We believe… in the Belhar Confession as an addendum to the Belgic Confession, to give its call to unity a more biblical context.

    We believe… in the Great Lakes Catechism on Marriage and Sexuality as an addendum to the Heidelberg Catechism to give its teaching on human sexuality a more biblical context.  

    1. The Bible is central in our church. The Word of God is the focus of our worship services, the textbook for our teaching ministries, and the foundation of our daily lives. Whether we are preaching, teaching, singing or just talking, we want to be people of the Word.
    2. We revere God’s Law. The Law of God cannot save us, but it is necessary for our salvation. We need to see our sin and be driven to the cross of Christ for forgiveness. We need to be reminded that we cannot earn God’s love or merit His blessings. We need the ethical guidance that God’s Law gives. We dare not make up our own morality.
    3. Therefore, the Gospel is our true treasure and lasting joy. We want the good news of God’s grace to us in Jesus Christ to be the centerpiece of our mission. All people need the Gospel. God’s children need to hear it again and again. The good news is God’s power, which saves us, draws us together and motivates us for service.
    4. The Word and the Sacraments are God’s precious means of grace. The Word teaches us, Baptism washes us, and the Lord’s Supper nourishes us. In our sacramental life together we are brought again and again to the crucified and risen Jesus Christ, who alone is the source of our salvation.
    5. We cherish the love and fellowship of God’s people. We need each other. We need the spiritual gifts, which the Holy Spirit imparts to His people. We experience God’s peace as we worship and work together, forgive one another, and bear one another’s burdens.
    6. We long for people to trust in Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord, and to come to know Him in a personal way. We are called by the love of Christ to share His Gospel. Our mission is as local as our neighborhood and as universal as the whole world.
    7. We seek to be people of prayer. Whether in public worship, small groups or in our personal lives, we want prayer to be foundational. Prayer supports and propels us in our mission. We desire that prayer be as essential in our ministries as breathing is to our physical life.