John Stott on Church Membership
Last night I began reading through John Stott's The Living Church: Convictions of a Lifelong Pastor. A dear member of the church gave me an autographed copy after a visit to London and All Souls where Stott served for so many years.
After reading the preface and the first chapter, I'm a little saddened that I've left this book unread for so long. It's vintage Stott--relentlessly clear and biblically centered. In the opening chapter, he spelled out a couple assumptions undergirding the book, assumptions pertinent for recent discussions here on the blog.
Stott writes:
First, I am assuming that we are all committed to the church. We are not only Christian people; we are also church people. We are not only committed to Christ, we are also committed to the body of Christ. At least I hope so. I trust that none of my readers is that grotesque anomaly, an unchurched Christian. The New Testament knows nothing of such a person. For the church lies at the very centre of the eternal purpose of God. It is not a divine afterthought. It is not an accident of history. On the contrary, the church is God's new community. For his purpose, conceived in a past eternity, being worked out in history, and to be perfected in a future eternity, is not just to save isolated individuals and so perpetuate our loneliness, but rather to build his church, that is, to call out of the world a people for his own glory. ... So then, the reason we are committed to the church is that God is so committed.
A little later, Stott meditates on Acts 2:47 and the hints there of the early church's commitment to evangelism. Acts 2:47 reads, "And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved." One of the truths Stott directs us to is:
The Lord did two things together. He 'added to their number... those who were being saved.' He didn't add them to the church without saving them, and he didn't save them without adding them to the church. Salvation and church membership went together; they still do.
In our day, we unfortunately have broken apart what the early church seemed to view as a natural, necessary, and seamless chain of events: gospel preaching and evangelism, leading to conversion and baptism, leading to church membership and communion. It's difficult to imagine that Paul or Peter or John could conceive of something called a 'Christian' that was not a baptized, communing member of the church. I think Stott is absolute correct when he refers to such creatures as a "grotesque anomaly." Part of what is critical to healthy community in the church is the conceptual and temporal tightening of the events in this chain. The clearer these things are (the gospel, conversion, the practice and meaning of baptism, church membership and the privilege of communion) and the more joined together they are in practice the stronger will be the ties that bind the church. Loosen these and you unravel the church.
It seems to me that all of the New Testament shows Christ as the center of the Church. Not membership and sacraments. The sacraments are given to the Church as visual, tactile displays of the Gospel of grace.
I see God saving people into His Body, the Church, and that they commune as members of His family, but I cannot find membership (a much later human invention) mentioned anywhere in the NT.
Posted by: Caesar | Jan 27, 2009 2:57:17 AM
I agree with everything in the John Stott extract. HOWEVER, I can't help thinking you are reading far too much into the fact that he uses the phrase 'church membership'. Surely in the context he is refererring to being included 'in Christ' or being obviously recognised as part of God's visble community on Earth. You seem to be extrapolating from that to modern day practice where we include some sort of man made register of names of those who have agreed to certain things - a doctrinal basis, a set of values, a mission statement or whatever - which goes well beyond the simplicity of what the NT (and John Stott) describes. This is why trying to understand and follow apostolic practice is so important. It enables us to avoid taking words like 'membership', 'leadership', 'preaching', etc and reading into them what we want them to say.
My apologies in advance if I've misunderstood where you are coming from in your statements.
Enjoy Grace!
Posted by: Goblin | Jan 27, 2009 8:25:17 AM
It seems to me that the earlier comments might be missing the point, and might be critiquing a conception of membership widespread in American evangelicalism but not articulated by 9Marks. Nowhere on this blog have I seem "church membership" put at the center of the church. And the whole reason for insisting on church membership as articulated by 9Marks is so that the church can practice the apostolic practices prescribed by Scripture: have elders with genuine authority who are genuinely qualified, guard our doctrine, practice church discipline, offer baptism and the Lord's Supper only to believers, etc.
As a pastor who is now attempting to expose his congregation to the Nine Marks of a Healthy Church (including membership), I can testify to the damage that is done to the health of the congregation when "regular attendance," or mere confession without further examination of doctrine and life, is made the standard by which a church acknowledges members.
Posted by: Justin Keller | Jan 27, 2009 10:39:28 AM
Hi Justin
The whole discussion about church membership really comes down to the fundamental issue of the size of the church in question. I fundamentally believe that NT churches were house churches or, in larger cities, networks of house churches and they were set up like this, based on extended households, for very, very good reasons which we have largely lost sight of today in our crazy fixation with everyhting big and impressive. In NT times each household church would have had an absolute maximum of around 40 believers. Go beyond that number and it is IMPOSSIBLE to develop the church as a network of relationships and to develop the level of familiarity and intimacy with each other that allows the 'one anothering' that the NT describes as vital for the church. It also means that it is impossible for believers to minister to one another when the church gathers together as is also described in the NT.
So what happens when you lose this intimate and relational focus through larger numbers?
Things become formalised. Rather than loving, intimate, relational servent leadership where we are in relationship with everyone else in our church, we end up having to exercise 'controls' via qualifications/interviews for membership, checking who can share the Lord's supper, checking exactly what doctrines people can sign up to, etc.
It may look impressive, it may be functional - but is it REALLY church?
Posted by: Goblin | Jan 28, 2009 3:56:36 AM