Church membership

Occasionally I have conversations with church planters and revitalisers about whether or not they should have church membership. There are actually quite a lot of Christians who don’t agree with the idea of membership and say they would refuse to join a church.

How do churches do membership?

Every church has some form of membership. They may not use the word and they may be more or less formal about how they go about it but they still have some form of membership.

When we hear the term, we tend to immediately think about Baptist and Congregational churches as these tend to be most overt about having membership.  Members may sometimes be asked to sign their agreement with the church’s constitution and willingness to keep its rules. These churches are often “congregational” in government meaning that the members meet regularly to make decisions often by voting.

Whilst you may not think of the Church of England as having membership, the reality is that you become a member through baptism and confirmation.  This admits you to the Church as a whole.  There is less emphasis on autonomous local churches.  A communicant of the church, if they have been baptised and confirmed is able to receive communion.  Additionally, churches are obliged to keep an electoral roll which   you can have your name added to if you are in the parish.  The problem is that neither your baptism as a baby nor signing onto the electoral roll tell us anything about the state of your faith.  In effect, the leaders will have an informal list of who the true members are for when it comes to asking people to serve in the church. This list will exist in their heads.

The Brethren often talked about people being in fellowship.  A lot of small and micro-churches will follow a similar approach. There isn’t a formal process of membership list as such but everyone knows each other in the church.

The alternatives to membership are as follows

1. Only the leaders can be truly recognised as part of the church and involved in using their gifts to serve and discern.
2. People come and go as they please and do what they please. This means that there is nothing in place to ensure that it is believers who are in good standing that use their gifts to ensure the church is built up.
3. The church functions more like a gang than a family.  It depends upon who is in favour with the leader(s) at any given time. You can fall in and out of favour.

Is church membership Biblical?

One of the criticisms of church membership is that it isn’t Biblical.  So, it is worth checking back on what the Bible says.  The word “member” is specifically used, unlike with other concepts like “The Trinity” where we accept that the concept is taught even if the word isn’t used.  When used in 1 Corinthians 12, it describes being members of the body so that it might be seen as describing belonging to the whole church, everywhere, throughout history.  However, the passage is teaching about gifts and the need for diversity within the church which does suggest that the local church is also in view. The body imagery is helpful because a body part or member that becomes detached dies. 

Secondly, when Paul writes letters, he writes to specific churches and these are responsible together for applying his teaching and obeying his instructions. Similarly, Jesus addresses the seven churches through John at the start of Revelation as distinct, corporate entities. When he writes to Titus and Timothy, they are told to ensure that elders are appointed in local churches.  In 1 Corinthians 5 local church is told to decide together to remove someone who is in public and unrepentant sin.  Then in 2 Corinthians, they are given responsibility for deciding to restore the sinful member to being included as part of the body again.  That you can be removed from a church suggests that you joined in the first place. Responsibility clearly lies with the whole church and not just with the leaders.

Whilst the Bible doesn’t provide membership processes, so that you are not told that you must have a members’ list, the fact that the responsibility for discernment and discipline lies with the whole church suggests that there should be a way of knowing who belongs and who doesn’t.  Furthermore, individual lists for distinct groupings such as the widows existed. 

We can conclude that whether or not we refer to it as “church membership”, “being in fellowship”, “church partnership” or simply “belonging” that the concept itself is present and crucial.  I personally am happy to drop a word if it brings up unhelpful connotations about forms, processes, bureaucracy or if its associated with other unhelpful ideas.

Why is membership helpful

The benefits include, first of all, very simply that we know who is with us and why.  In any given week, there will be people turning up at our church meetings who are just visiting because they are in the area, having a longer break from their home church (e.g. sabbatical), enjoying “bonus” time with other Christians whilst being part of a church that meets at a different time, attending because they are interested in Christianity and believers who are considering joining with us.

A member, or someone who belongs to this specific church is someone who has committed to be teachable and accountable within this church.  This means that elders along with other leaders an pastoral care givers know that it is worth investing time in people because there is a mutual agreement that teaching and advice will be taken seriously.  We also know that we aren’t doubling up and even potentially conflicting with the advice/support given by the pastors/elders of another church.

We also know that they are professing believers who have committed to be around and so it helps us to know who we can ask to serve in ministry.  As well as helping us make sure that the right people are speaking, leading, discipling (believers in Jesus), it also helps us to have a feel for what the church has vision and capacity for in terms of big ventures and projects.

This leads to another point.  In congregational and baptistic churches, members make decisions, often by meeting together and then voting.  Not every church would agree with this approach.  I personally would shy away from voting, church is not a democracy and we want to hear what God is telling us to do, not what seems most popular.  However, there may be times when you want to specifically get together the members, including to protect confidentiality about a key decision or issue.  You will want to hear the wisdom and discernment of the church body and so it is a good idea to consult  those who belong, proactively.  Whilst we don’t want to discount any words/prophecies/insights/wisdom, after all, God even spoke through a donkey , we probably do well to give higher priority/value to those who are relationally invested in this specific church.

Membership of some form therefore benefits both the church itself and the individual members. 

How do you go about putting in membership?

It may be challenging to introduce something when a church hasn’t had anything like this before.  I’d start as I mean to go on.  Some churches have had “opt out” processes where those attending are assumed to be members but that just postpones headaches as later on you may find yourself having to work through the list asking “is this person a Christian and are they a member?” 

It’s best to start with a list of who you think are the believing, baptised people who belong to the church. You cannot just assume they are members though.  Elders and leaders should give time to visit each person and talk through with them the church’s current vision/mission/values, where they are in their faith and their relationship to the church.  It is also best not to use the language of “opting out” as you can’t really opt out of a family or a body. Also, churches that have done this have ended up with a long-term class of attendees who chose to opt out of membership whilst continuing to see that fellowship as their church.

Elders/leaders should meet with new people within a few months of them coming to the church. This should be an opportunity to hear their testimony, share the vision and values of the church and find out about the person’s gifting.  If the person has come from another church, there should be follow up with them.  This demonstrates that we are not sheep stealers and also enables “pastoral hand-over”. We want people who join us to leave their old church well.  This can also help us to build inter church relationships.

Baptism and membership should not be separated out.  Someone who becomes a Christian who is with us and gets baptised is joining the worldwide church and the local church.  Nor can you have someone who is a member but not baptised.  That is to replace God’s means for joning the church with our own.

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NB you may want to think through your approach to baptism. 

The options are

1. Strict Baptistic – you must be baptised as a believer to belong to the church because it is at the core of its DNA.
2. Baptistic  with concesssions (a). Often churches will allow paedobaptists to join if they agree on all other matters of faith and practice. They must agree not to promote paedo-baptism or undermine the church’s position on this and usually cannot serve as leaders.  However, the person will be encouraged to consider baptism.
3. Baptistic with concessions (b).  The person may join as a member in line with option 2.  However, the primary difference between the two positions is that the church recognises the person’s infant baptism as valid because there is “one church, one baptism” and so there is no expectation on them to get baptised again and in fact this is probably discouraged.
4. Dual practice.  The church doesn’t take a stance on baptism and so it is possible to be baptised as a believer or be baptised as an infant.

My leaning is probably somewhere between 2 and 3.