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Article VI—The Church
ATS holds that all believers from the Day of Pentecost until the Rapture of the Church prior to
the Tribulation of the last days are members of the Church, the Body of Christ and the Bride of
Christ. Having begun at Pentecost and not before, the Church is wholly separate from and
distinct from Israel.
ATS holds all believers of this present age, whether Jew or Gentile, are baptized by the Spirit
into the Body of Christ.
Article VII—The Ordinances
ATS holds that there are two and only two ordinances for the Church, these being water
baptism by immersion and the Lord’s Supper. Baptism serves as a sign that a person who is
already saved through the blood of Christ alone is identifying himself with the death, burial, and
resurrection of Jesus Christ and the new life which He alone can grant. The Lord’s Supper is a
memorial, looking back to the cross of Jesus Christ and the blood which He shed upon that
cross, and is anticipatory, looking forward to the return of Jesus at His coming again.
Article VIII—Last Things
ATS holds that the Rapture of the Church prior to the coming Tribulation is the next great event
in the fulfillment of biblical prophecy. This rapture will be due to the Lord Jesus Christ coming in
the air to call out all members of His Church, both living and dead, to meet Him in the air. He
will then immediately remove these saints to Heaven, where He has prepared a home for them.
They will be judged at the Bema Judgment, the Judgment Seat of Christ, for eternal rewards,
salvation already having been secured.
ATS holds that following the Rapture of the Church, the world will undergo the most severe of
judgments, fulfilling Daniel’s Seventieth Week, a time known as the Tribulation and a time of
Israel’s trouble. The Tribulation will end with the Second Coming of Christ, who will fight the
Battle of Armageddon and who will defeat the Antichrist and the False Prophet.
ATS holds that at the Second Coming of Christ, following the Battle of Armageddon and the
Judgment of Israel and the Judgment of the Nations, the Lord Jesus Christ will introduce the
Kingdom of God upon earth. This Kingdom will endure throughout the Millennium, the literal
one-thousand-year reign of Christ upon earth, and will bring about a lifting of the curse which
now rests upon all creation. Israel, having been purged and judged, will dwell safely within the
Promised Land, and the Church, having been judged, will rule with Christ over the nations of the
earth. Satan shall be bound for the thousand years, being released at the end of the period to
raise an army to resist and attack God and His holy saints. Satan and his army shall be destroyed
immediately, and the final judgment of lost souls, the Great White Throne Judgment, shall
ensue.