Ok, this will have to do:

Brother, you hit the nail right on the head!

Voting people into church was never something that I agreed with either…

Besides, what sense is there to it?

Who would actually say, “No, we don’t want these people to become members of our church!”

It is not only a waste of time, but an insult to the Holy Spirit to decide by manner of voting who really belongs to our ‘Omniscient’ God!

Thank you for sharing your thoughts,

–Chris

However, my question now is, if voted in, can they be voted out? Cuz that might ocassionally come in handy…

I guess this is one of the problems you run into when a congregation gets a certain size. Ideally everyone would be connected relationally and the body would be encouraging one another automatically. If someone stopped coming around, friends would know and already be intervening in their lives doing what is necessary (loving compassion or sometimes loving confrontation).

However, that’s not typically how churches above 100 or so tend to work. I think this is one of the many upsides of having house churches vs. the institutional church. But, everything has its weaknesses.

Personally, I don’t think “Church membership” is the route we should take if we want people to “commit”. If people aren’t committing to following Christ, serving His Body, and bringing others into that Body I don’t see putting their name on a list making much of a difference.

It’s all about the attitude. If some kind of census is used to merely help organize ministries and things like that, I think it can be good. For example, if a Church was trying to make sure younger Christians in the Church had personal mentors and wanted to make sure people were sort of spread out, I don’t see any problem with organizing a list for that. But membership for the sake of membership tends to put alliances towards a group of people rather than to Jesus.

People need to be connected relationally, not just officially. This is one of the biggest problems in the Church today. People tend to think that if someone is going to a building every Sunday that they are “faithful”. That’s dangerous… because then we have people coming every Sunday but living like Hell the rest of the week, and also people who don’t come but are genuinely following Jesus. Anyway, this is long enough lol.

All the input has been great. Hope to keep hearing more.

Monica – Ouch. I hate stories like that. Sadly I’ve heard way to many of them.

Joe – Good point.

Steven – Thanks for stopping by the blog. I hear you on the membership thing. When asking what size your congregation is, membership is misleading.

Matthew – I hope you were being nice!

I think you make a good point about how some churches misplace the emphasis on membership. Sometimes pastors boast “I have 500+ ‘members’” when only 100 people show up on Sunday. Or others within the congregation use it as a status symbol or treat it like an exclusive club of “cool people.”

But I also think membership in a local congregation is important, as a lay person, to know what is expected of me at this church (accountability, giving, serving) and what I can expect from the church (shepherding, counseling, fellowship).

I also think that if I was a pastor I’d want to know whether the folks in my church are indeed Christians or they just like hanging out with a bunch of nice folks. If they aren’t Christians that’s great they come! But I’d want to know in order to serve them better and also how to shepherd the members in the church.

I think the idea of the whole church “voting” is so that the congregation affirms all these new folks to the church and is committed to loving them and building each other up in the Lord.

Thanks for your thoughts!

However, I think rolls are pretty useful, provided you don’t get all snotty about it. (Like the “on the roll = admittance to heaven” view you mentioned.) I find rolls to be very helpful in remembering that every sheep gets fed — because, let’s face it, sometimes we can just forget. Also, it can help us spot trends. (“I wonder why Susie stopped coming as often this year? Maybe I should talk to her and see if something’s bothering her.”)

I think it’s irresponsible for a church NOT to try whatever righteous means it has to care for the people that come, even those that only come occasionally. (And they often need the most attention.)

This is something that I just witnessed first hand with a church of christ. My friends sister-in-law moved to their town and starting attending church with my friend and her husband. She started volunteering in childrens ministry and decided to make this church her home. She arranged to meet with the elders and was immediately faced with tremendous questions and concerns about her baptism. She grew up in another “denomination” and so the elders questioned her salvation therefore questioned her ability to “be a memeber” at their church. This went on with her cooperation for weeks. She attended meetings, studies, and was basically put on trial. They did “allow her in”, but the damage was done and she now attends somewhere else.

I appreciate your point that “placing membership” has no biblical history. This story is just another example of the “human-ness” of church. Sometimes we try so hard to do all of the right things according to our “doctrine” that we forget to just love people where-ever and how-ever they are.

Loved this post and passing it on!

I think you meant to say DOESN’T!

This is a great point, though.

There’s a great contrast in John 7 that someone recently helped me untangle. Jesus says that “a prophet hath no honor…” and in the VERY NEXT SENTENCE John writes that all Galilee welcomed Jesus.

The idea that someone bonked me on the head with is that Jesus doesn’t need FANS, he needs true followers.

Thanks for this reminder!

in HIS love,
nick

Ray – Thanks for your thoughts on this. You make some very good points.

Brian – That is SO good.

you need one of these:
http://blogprophet.wordpress.com/2007/10/10/church-membership-questionnaire/

I agree that church membership is not scriptural, although I don’t think that necessarily makes it non-scriptural. I do see the value in making a conscious decision to call a church family your home and to commit yourself to service within that congregation. We methodists agree to support the local church with “our prayers, our presence, our gifts, our witness, and our service.”

I think there is a practical use for rolls, such as keeping up with people so that they are properly cared for. Particularly as a church grows it is difficult to keep track of all the people, and I know of people who dropped out of church for one reason or another, and no one checked in on them. Do they need care? Are they okay? Have they found another church home?

I think all these are important if pastors are to shepherd the flock appropriately. I imagine even thousands of years ago shepherds counted sheep frequently so they were aware when one might have wandered off into danger, or have been attacked by a predator. Keeping rolls helps manage this. Now that the church I’m at has allowed their youth to dwindle to nothing, I’m left with no good records, either, so I can’t even check on those who used to come. Yes, it’s bureaucratic, but I think there are good reasons to do it, as long as we make that secondary to being Christ followers.

Peace,
Ray

It’s about identity I guess. Many see themselves as Church members instead of Christ followers, and that can be very damaging for one’s spirituality. Thanks for the post bro.