Our Purpose
The purpose of the Congregational Church on Mercer Island is to nurture all seekers on their paths to know and serve God.
Our Vision
We are a welcoming Christian community so full of the Spirit that love and excitement spill out and are irresistible to all who experience them.As Christian seekers it is our practice to pray every day, to study some portion of the Scriptures each day, seeking in grace and praise to discover God’s will for our own lives on a daily basis. As part of our discipleship, we also work to increase our love for one another. We move earnestly toward tithing to “our” church, that the Kingdom may increase its resources. For the same reason we try to tithe our time and our conversation. Finally, we hope that our faith and love and discipline will increase until they flow beyond our fellowship and become a blessing to others.
The flow of these blessings often manifests in the form of service to our church and the greater community. Additionally our hope is to provide a nurturing environment in which all can feel safe and encouraged to share openly of their spiritual journeys, and all are mutually supportive and respectful of the differences. We gather regularly in study groups or prayer groups to be together, learn to trust one another, and over time become people who are personally committed to one another in Christ, thus strengthening the Body of Christ.
The result is a liberal approach to mainstream Christianity, in which all can flourish as we seek individually and together.
The Covenant (Word)
The Covenant (PDF)
In the Congregational tradition, a responsibility for faith (what we believe) and practice (what we do about what we believe) rests upon each individual member. We do not depend upon a priesthood, upon any governing body of the Church, or upon creeds established and handed down from the past, though they may help and inform us. We are each responsible for the ongoing life and witness of the Christian faith.
But our tradition also reminds us that no individual can journey alone or discover very much of the path without drawing heavily and gratefully on the experiences and insights of other members of the Body of Christ - past and present. While we claim our freedom and responsibility in the United Church of Christ, our hope is that we and our fellow pilgrims will choose humility and diligence in our freedom, and that we will study, pray and act together in a manner worthy of our faith.
Therefore, we encourage each member to write his or her own covenant that is renewed or revised each year. It is specifically intended that each member assume responsibility for his or her own discipline (way of life) and support (time and money given to the Church). Because we are imperfect, our covenants will have errors large and small, and we will not keep our covenants as perfectly as we would like. But together, with the leading of the Holy Spirit, we will be built up into the Body of Christ.
