Why be a church member? Why not just be able to go and participate?
I think the answer is that you should be a church member. But that's not even a clear word�what does "member" mean?
What I mean by "member" is somebody who, whether by a signature or a word of commitment or promise, says, "I'm committed to a people, a people who hear the word of God preached, a people who perform the ordinances that Jesus gave to his church (baptism and the Lord's Supper), and a people who commit to the 'one another' commandments (love each other, exhort each other, admonish each other, hold each other accountable)."
Those commitments are what membership is. And I think something is wrong if you resist putting your name on the line for that.
If you want to say, "OK, I believe the New Testament says, 'Be a part of a community, give yourself to ministering there and receiving ministry there, and advancing the cause of the gospel there, and upholding the name of Jesus there, and doing mission there,' and I'm a part of that," then to resist putting your name on the line for that is probably not a biblical conviction. It's probably an American, independent, give-me-elbow-room, don't-get-in-my-face-too-often conviction, which I don't think is biblical.
The reason for even using the word "member" is because of 1 Corinthians 12-14, where Paul uses the word "member" in a body analogy.
The local church�not just the global church, but the local church�is a body. The reason we know it's local and not just global is because, while in Ephesians 1 and Colossians he talks about Christ as the head of the body, in 1 Corinthians 12 he's talking about a head with eyes and ears that are members of the body.
So the body analogy has one global meaning, and it has one local meaning. There's global membership in the body universal, and there's local membership in the body where I'm a finger or an eye or an ear or a foot. And everybody is a member.
So the word "member" in 1 Corinthians 12-14 means you're part of a local organism, and the finger belongs. It should care about what happens to the eye, and the eye what happens to the finger. And it should function in a way that has some organic coherence to it.
It's very hard to do what the Bible calls a church to do unless it knows who are the members and who aren't. Who are the people that want to be treated as members here?
A very simple example of this is the biblical concept of church discipline.
In 1 Corinthians 5, for example, Paul says that the man who is sleeping with his mother-in-law (or stepmother) should be put out of the church because he is so proud and arrogant about his sin, and unrepentant and resistant to any kind of exhortation. But how can you put him out? He could just say, "I just go here! They can't put me out of anything. I'm not in anything!"
And I think a lot of people don't want to be in anything because they don't even like the idea of being able to be put out of something.
So for all those reasons, even though there's no sentence in the Bible that says, "There is such a thing as church membership, and thou shalt be a church member," I think it's implied in the nature of the church and of Christian discipleship that everybody should, by a covenant commitment of some kind, put their name on the line saying, "I'm here. While I'm in this place, and until God leads me otherwise, these are my people and I'm committed here."
The apostle John makes it perfectly clear in Revelation that God has His own membership book, I suppose you can have one of your own, but I don't see how your going to take it with you? Hmmm... maybe God has a fax machine!
In God's membership book Jesus writes the names, in His blood.
Well, Mr.Twosparrows.....you leave me no choice but to post a Quote on church membership by someone we both admire.......
C.S.Lewis on Church membership:
"My own experience is that when I first became a Christian, about fourteen years ago, I thought that I could do it on my own, by retiring to my rooms and reading theology, and I wouldn't go to the churches and Gospel Halls; and then later I found that it was the only way of flying your flag; and, of course, I found that this meant being a target. It is extraordinary how inconvenient to your family it becomes for you to get up early to go to Church. It doesn't matter so much if you get up early for anything else, but if you get up early to go to Church it's very selfish of you and you upset the house. If there is anything in the teaching of the New Testament which is in the nature of a command, it is that you are obliged to take the Sacrament, and you can't do it without going to Church. I disliked very much their hymns, which I considered to be fifth-rate poems set to sixth-rate music. But as I went on I saw the great merit of it. I came up against different people of quite different outlooks and different education, and then gradually my conceit just began peeling off. I realized that the hymns (which were just sixth-rate music) were, nevertheless, being sung with devotion and benefit by an old saint in elastic-side boots in the opposite pew, and then you realize that you aren't fit to clean those boots. It gets you out of your solitary conceit." God in the Dock, pp. 61-62.
Plain and simple, being a member of a church congregation, identifies you with the body of Christ. Otherwise we would not have the Church of Rome, the Cortinthina Church, The church at Ephesus, the church of Colosse, the church of Philippi, the Church Thessalonica, the church at Antioch, the church at Jerusalem... The local church body of Christ is an assemble of believers gathering together on one accord to worship God in unity in fellowship. Paul writies about the local church assembling together thorughout his writings.
The church body and the church building are two diffenert things, and the church building set aside for as a holy place to worship and prasie God, and you can find thsi all in the word fo God, the apostle and disciples gathered in the temples, the synagoguages on Solomom Porch to worship and presie God and to hear the gospel of Jesus Christ, even in the Old Testement, buildings were built for the worshipping and praising of God and for the reading of the Law.
The church building is biblical, throughout God's word, so what I'm trying to figue out is, why is there so much fuss about people assembling together with other believers to worship God in a building set aside as being a holy place dedicated to God as the House of God, the House of Prayer as Jesus called the church building for formal services, if its all in the Bible?
One more thing, if a person does not beleieve in a church building as a place to gather for believers, and that God should have a house called after his name to dwell among His members people who are called by His name, why then do we have houses to live in that are set aside for our dwelling places and for our families to live? Isn't and should God be more respected that we are and our familes needing a place to live? I would think so.
Jesus said He didn't have a place to lay his head or a pillow to sleep on, so then if God doesn't need a Hosue for His family to come worship him, why do we need houses to live in? Why are we memebers known as a family living at a certain resident?
Why be a member people? Then their will be a written record that says i am a member here because I am not ashamed to believe. then the anti christ you read the membership book during the tribulation and shop off your head.
Because it is where the Lord Jesus has placed & planted " me "...for his purposes not my own...a born again Christian is a member of the body of Christ Jesus*...no matter where the Lord leads...the Church and Fellowship will Follow and Abide in him...xo
If we are to know fellowship and friendship, there has to be a commitment to the fellowship as a whole, and there has to be a readiness to identify individually with people for our good and for theirs. For your good and mine, we need friendships. We need fellowships and relationships.
In the OT, God intended his people to worship in tents, not the temple.
Simply applied today, if you can't find the tent at the church, put up your own tent with others.
New Post coming on the tent!
I am a church member at a small church but a growing one. I enjoy the fellowship, the worship and the praise. God shows up right on time at my church and I get a fresh annointing each week.:applause:
Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brothers to dwell together in unity. [Psalms 133:1]
Matthew 18:20 ESV
For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them.�
Acts 2:42 ESV
And they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.
1 John 1:3 ESV
That which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ.
