Fundamental?

Fundamental is a word with which we choose to describe ourselves at Cornerstone Baptist Church. Because the word has different meanings and connotations to different people, I think it would be good to define the word as it pertains to our particular ministry. Although some people use the words "radical", "legalistic" and "mean-spirited" as synonymns for Christian Fundamentalism, we choose to embrace a definition like the one in Dr. David Beale's book, "In Pursuit Of Purity", where Dr. Beale writes on page three, "Ideally, a Christian Fundamentalist is one who desires to reach out in love and compassion to people, believes and defends the whole Bible as the absolute, inerrant, and authoritative Word of God, and stands committed to the doctrine and practice of holiness". Later in that same paragraph he writes, "Fundamentalism is not a philosophy of Christianity, nor is it essentially an interpretation of the Scriptures. It is not even a mere literal exposition of the Bible. The essence of Fundamentalism goes much deeper than that-it is the unqualified acceptance of and obedience to the Scriptures." Now, I understand that some have given "Christian Fundamentalism" a bad name, (and I'm not talking about the Islamic extremists) but that should cause us to stand against unbiblical behavior, not the priciples of fundamentalism as described by Dr. Beale. We, at Cornerstone Baptist Church, believe the Bible to be the supreme and final authority by which all human conditions, creeds and opinions shall be measured. We strive for the purity of Bible-doctrine. We exercize ourselves unto Godliness and endeavor daily to be holy. Our desire is to glorify God, evangelize the lost, and edify fellow believers in Christ. Right now, those things are some characteristics of Christian Fundamentalists. Until someone comes up with a better term, I guess we'll stick with it.