Our Story
Ablaze Church started in 2007 as a mission church of Our Savior Lutheran Church (LCMS). Meeting in schools and rented spaces for almost a decade, in August of 2017 Ablaze moved into its current facility at 51st and Lynn Lane. At the same time Ablaze Christian Academy opened its doors to the Broken Arrow community to offer a Christian learning center for children under the age of 5. Together, Ablaze Church and Ablaze Christian Academy strive to shine a light in the community in which they’ve been planted to radiate the hope and love that we have from the assurance of our salvation through Jesus Christ.
Our Beliefs
As we are affiliated with the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, we believe in the 3 core fundamentals of Grace Alone, Faith Alone, Scripture Alone.
Grace Alone
A person is not saved by human effort, but by God’s grace (undeserved favor or love) as a gift. This grace was demonstrated in the perfect life, the sacrificial death, and the triumphant resurrection of Jesus Christ.
For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.
Ephesians 2:8-9 (ESV)
For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.
Romans 3:22b-25 (ESV)
Faith Alone
A person is saved by God’s grace through faith. Faith is simply like the hand which receives and embraces the offered gift. Faith accesses the promised gifts and blessings of God. Faith is made possible in the human heart by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ
Romans 5:1 (ESV)
And they said, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household.”
Acts 16:31 (ESV)
“Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life”
John 5:24 (ESV)
Scripture Alone
The Bible is the authority given to us by God to guide us in our daily living and to establish doctrine. Careful reading and scholarship can help us understand God’s intended meaning of the Bible, but only the Holy Spirit, working through the Word, can bring us to truly know God and accept his plan of eternal life for us. The entire Bible is inspired by the Holy Spirit and is completely truthful and reliable.
Every word of God proves true; he is a shield to those who take refuge in him.
Proverbs 30:5 (ESV)
…but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.
John 20:31 (ESV)
…and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.
2 Timothy 3:15-17 (ESV)
These core beliefs are related to all other truths of Scripture. We also believe:
GOD
There is only one true God. He is the triune God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. We agree with the ancient creeds of the Christian Church, which profess the Trinity.
CREATION
God is the creator of all that exists. He not only made all things, He owns all, and continues to sustain and provide for all living creatures.
HUMANKIND
Humanity is the crown of God’s creation. God made humans to have a capacity to know and fellowship with Him. Originally people were pure, innocent, holy and righteous, living according to the perfect will of God and intimately, knowing Him.
SIN
But Adam and Eve turned against God and brought sin into the world. Since then, all people are born sinners and cannot save themselves. Sin is an attitude of selfish disobedience against God and manifests itself in individual thoughts, words and deeds of wrong.
Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me.
Psalm 51:5 (ESV)
If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities, O Lord, who could stand? But with you there is forgiveness, that you may be feared.
Psalm 130:3-4 (ESV)
For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God
Romans 3:23 (ESV)
For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Romans 6:23 (ESV)
JESUS CHRIST
The presence of sin did not change God’s love for humanity. To save humanity from the guilt, the power and the punishment of sin, God sent His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ into the world. Jesus is true God as well as true man. He lived a life of perfect obedience to the Father, and then died on the cross. Jesus died to suffer the punishment of all the sins of all people.
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.”
John 3:16-17 (ESV)
THE RESURRECTION AND EVERLASTING LIFE
Jesus bodily arose from the dead in complete victory over the power of sin and evil so that we might have eternal life. He ascended into heaven and now sits at the right hand of the Father. He will come again at the end of time to judge the living and the dead. He will take believers with him to heaven and the unbelievers will be separated forever from him.
Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.
John 14:6 (ESV)
Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?”
John 11:25-26 (ESV)
THE HOLY SPIRIT
The Holy Spirit is truly God. He reveals and brings to us everything that Jesus accomplished in his life, death and resurrection. He makes it possible for us to believe, obey and love. He fills us with joy and the fruit of his ongoing presence within. The Holy Spirit fills the believer with the presence, the power and the gifts of God.
And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.
2 Corinthians 3:18 (ESV)
THE CHURCH
The Holy Spirit not only calls people into a faith relationship with the Triune God, He gathers them together into the supernatural community called the Church. The true Christian church is made up of all true believers in Christ in every place and time. The church seeks to obey and follow Christ and diligently search out and teach only the truth of the Scriptures.
SACRAMENTS
The church has also been given the means of grace, the Word and the Sacraments of Holy Baptism and Holy Communion. We believe that the sacraments are more than symbols and reminders of God’s love, but that they offer and deliver spiritual blessings to those who partake of them in faith. We accept all modes of baptism as correct, when water is applied in the name of the Triune God. Even little children and infants can receive the benefits God has placed into baptism.
Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit
Matthew 28:19 (ESV)
And Peter said to them, “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
Acts 2:37 (ESV)
For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, “This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes. Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and blood of the Lord.
1 Corinthians 11:23-27 (ESV)
