Our Minister

Josh Austin

Josh was born and raised in Kayenta, AZ on the Navajo Reservation.  His parents were missionaries and schoolteachers while he was growing up.  Josh attended the University of Denver on a basketball scholarship and earned a degree in Biology.  This is also where he met his wife Divine.  She is originally from the Philippines, but grew up in Loveland, CO.  Divine earned a bachelor and master’s degree from DU in Tax Law.  Josh worked for Vector Marketing selling Cutco knives as a summer job and later as a branch and district manager before getting married.  In 2000, Josh and Divine began school at Bear Valley Bible Institute in Denver.  After graduating, they moved to Kayenta to help continue in the ministry that Josh’s parents had started nearly 30 years before.  While in Kayenta many friends were made, and many lives were changed by Christ.  Josh and Divine’s lives changed with the addition of four wonderful children.  In 2011, the family then moved back to work with Bear Valley to help start a preaching school in Cameroon, Africa.  The Lord richly blessed this mission effort, but there was a longing, a calling to go back to working with Indigenous people in Arizona.  To prepare for a new mission opportunity in the Phoenix area, Josh and the family moved to Morenci, AZ (where Josh’s parents were located) and preached there for nearly a year.  Finally, in August of 2013 a house church began with friends and past members from the Navajo reservation.  This small group of believers then started to meet on the Salt River Pima Maricopa Indian Community until they grew to have their own meeting place in N.W. Mesa.  

OUR BELIEFS

 
 

Church of Christ at Salt River is a family of believers bound together in Christian love. We are not perfect and readily admit it, but we serve and follow Jesus Christ who is perfect. In that way, we are a church where people can find acceptance and forgiveness and discover the depths of the Christian faith. Our mission is to bring people to Jesus and help them become fully devoted followers who demonstrate God's love through service. 

The Church of Christ at Salt River draws their beliefs entirely from biblical teaching. One of the famous mantras of the churches of Christ is: "Speak where the Bible speaks; be silent where the Bible is silent." Its meaning is obvious. 

Whatever the Bible clearly says and can be clearly understood is what the Church of Christ at Salt River will uphold. It also means that whatever the Bible does not speak clearly of is open to personal interpretation. This helps maintain a solid unity on indisputable core truths and a position of liberty on matters of personal understanding. The core truths upon which we all agree according to biblical teaching are as follows:

  1. We believe in the one true God existing in three persons: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

  2. We believe in the Bible as the only authoritative, infallible, and inerrant Word of God.

  3. We believe in the deity of Jesus Christ, his virgin birth, his sinless life, his teachings and miracles, his crucifixion and resurrection.

  4. We believe in the Holy Spirit as the indwelling presence of God received by all Christians upon baptism.

  5. We believe in salvation as the free gift of God's grace.

  6. We believe that becoming a Christian begins with an absolute faith in Jesus Christ as God's only Son and that such strong faith motivates one to confess his or her faith, repent of sins, and be baptized for the remission of sins. This is drawn from: John 3:16, Romans 10:9-10, Acts 3:19, Acts 2:38 and Mark 16:16. (There is no verse anywhere in the entire Bible that speaks of the sinner's prayer as a means of salvation.)

  7. We believe the church is composed of all those who have been born again according to biblical teaching.

  8. We believe in the second coming of Christ, at which time all people from all time will be judged by God.