Sometimes on our anniversary, my wife and I re-read our covenant vows to each other. It’s always special. When churches stand and read their church covenant together, there’s no reason it shouldn’t be just as special.
That’s the spirit behind the church covenant below. In 2015, the elders of Osterville Baptist Church adopted a church covenant that combined the biblical thoroughness of many historic covenants, but with the added warmth and eloquence of a wedding vow.
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Church Covenant
Being made by God into a holy nation, a royal priesthood, and a people for God’s own choosing,1
we joyfully affirm our covenant together:
Loved dearly by God in Christ Jesus,2
we will love Him who first loved us,
and we will walk in brotherly love,3
by working and praying toward unity,4
by regarding one another as more important than ourselves,5
by bearing with one another’s difficulties,6
by exercising spiritual gifts for one another’s good,7
by admonishing one another with the truth,8
and by putting away all forms of destructive talk.9
Brought together by God,10
we will come together regularly to worship God
and to build one another up11
by participating in song,12
in prayer,
in the
