Beliefs – Faith in Practice
Your questions and uncertainty, your longing for community, your hope for what could be—we believe in making room for it all. At Refuge, we often say we practice our faith, even when we don’t believe it and sometimes before we believe it.
The mission of Refuge is, “To share the peace and community of God’s abundant table.”
Jesus was constantly sharing food with people. At the table, Jesus practiced what he preached, showing the disciples the kind of upsidedown world he was ushering into reality. We believe that all people—regardless of race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender identity, immigration status, where you’re from or where you’re going, what you’ve done or left undone—are welcome at God’s table. We believe in abundance over scarcity, in the giving and receiving of hospitality, and in Christ’s body that crosses boundaries, broken and poured out for the life of the world.
While we are all welcome at God’s table, we know there are systems and structures that keep us separate from each other. In our city, these systems and structures include racism, wealth inequality, incarceration, lack of access to affordable housing and food, and the exploitation of Creation. The Spirit compels us to join the work of peace and justice that God is already doing.
Our pastors are ordained Nazarene elders
Our ecclesial affiliation is with the Church of the Nazarene, rooted in the Wesleyan-Holiness theological tradition. The Church of the Nazarene has a beautiful historical foundation, including the ordination of women since our founding (1908), solidarity with the poor and marginalized, a commitment to simplicity, and working for justice alongside the neglected. You can listen to Pastor Megan’s call back to these roots in a sermon she preached to other Nazarene clergy in 2017.
Anti-racism Statement
We believe God, through the work of the Holy Spirit, overcomes oppressive power structures through the person and work of Jesus Christ. Specifically, Jesus announces liberation to those who live under the oppressive power of racism and each way it is manifest in our society.
As a predominantly white congregation, Refuge seeks to follow Jesus into faithful ways of living that reflect Christ’s own commitment to liberation. Most in our community benefit from white supremacy, a sinful system of unjust privilege, and we confess our captivity to sin. However, our lamentation should not end in despair and a continuation of the status quo. Refuge believes Jesus invites us to listen, to see, to take an honest look at ourselves and the world around us, and disrupt these dehumanizing systems of oppression; faithfulness to Christ requires us to do this work as we confess our ignorance and complicity.
We see the multitude of ways that mass incarceration targets African Americans. We try to be faithful to Christ and join God’s liberating work by partnering with Jubilee Home, worshiping quarterly at Butner Federal Prison, and offering friendship to formerly incarcerated individuals through a Faith Team sponsored by the Religious Coalition for a Non-Violent Durham. Systemic racism is oppression and Jesus is for freedom. Refuge seeks to be for freedom by standing against racism.
Refuge stands in solidarity with and receives guidance from the Church of the Nazarene’s Black Strategic Readiness Team. This statement guides our efforts toward becoming a church committed to anti-racism.
Refuge Common Prayer
Each Sunday, when we gather for worship, we pray our common prayer, which shapes and forms us in our life together: