This is the beginning of a three-week course that is designed to give you an opportunity to learn more about who we are as a church. We’re calling it Membership Matters. By attending you are not obligated to join, but if you would like to join, completing the class is the first (1st) step we will ask you to take. Membership Matters is designed to answer the following questions:
1) Why Should I Join a church?
2) What is the Purpose of this Church?
3) What Does NRHBC & Cross Church Believe?
4) How Do I Get Involved?
5) And, How Do I Develop Relationships with Others through our Church?
6) How Do I Join North Richland Baptist Church?
The Purpose of this three-week class is to encourage you to become an informed member of North Richland Baptist Church so that you may, in turn, become an involved member of North Richland Baptist Church and Cross Church. As we get started we have placed a “Getting to Know You” form on your chairs. If you haven’t already would you take a few minutes to complete this in order for our church to have a better idea of who you are? In our church, we have a wide assortment of people ranging from “uninvolved church members” to “attenders.”
1. Why Should I Join North Richland Baptist Church?
So many times I have sat and listened to a presentation either in school or in church and wondered, “Why am I here?” “Why does this matter?” Or, “why does this matter to me?” I want to tell in the next few minutes why joining a church is relevant to your life. Or why membership matters.
By joining a church or even your interest in joining a church, you are making an unselfish move in a selfish society. So many people are only interested in themselves. They are only interested in their holy trinity: me, myself, and I. But being a part of a church is much like raising children – it is fundamentally a non-selfish commitment. And that is one of the fundamental beliefs you need to understand about our church (not that our church is perfect). So as a part of our introduction to our church, I am asking many of you to form a new mental category. A category that calls upon you to think of others first before yourself. Again, as a mother would her children. So everyone repeat after me: My Church is not about me, it’s about God. Does that mean you’ll not benefit from this church? Or that we don’t want you to benefit from being a part of this church? Absolutely not. You’ll benefit in tremendously practical ways:
1. Encouragement when you are down;
2. You’ll make new friends;
3. You’ll grow in depth of your understanding of Scripture;
4. You’ll have a new family in times of crisis.
Yet, your happiness and growth and development will only be to the proportion that you invest in God and others: “And he sat down and called the twelve. And he said to them, ‘If anyone would be first, he must be last of all and servant of all’” (Mark 9:35).
So with that in mind, I want to give you four reasons why you should join a church. And none of these is about you first and foremost but all of them benefit you tremendously. And they benefit you more than if you just spent a lifetime focusing on what can church do for me.
1.1 Join a Church for God
The church is important because of God.
1.1.1 The church was God’s idea
“And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it” (Matthew 16:18).
The church is in existence today because Jesus started it.
1.1.2 The New Testament Letters were to Churches and Not Individuals
“Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, To the saints who are in Ephesus, and are faithful in Christ Jesus…” (Ephesians 1:1).
1.1.3 Jesus Christ identifies Himself with the Church
It’s interesting if you look through the book of Acts, it is the Lord who adds people to their number and being added to the Christians number meant being identified as the church: “And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved” (Acts 2:47). “And more than ever believers were added to the Lord, multitudes of both men and women…” (Acts 5:14). And lastly, “And a great many people were added to the Lord” (Acts 11:24).
And who identifies with the church? It is fascinating that when Paul or Saul is on the road to Damascus he has the vision of the risen Christ. He appears to him and Saul falls to the ground. Do you remember what Jesus says to him? “But Saul, still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest 2 and asked him for letters to the synagogues at Damascus, so that if he found any belonging to the Way, men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem. 3 Now as he went on his way, he approached Damascus, and suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him. 4 And falling to the ground he heard a voice saying to him, ‘Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me’” (Acts 9:1-4)? He doesn’t say “Saul, Saul, why are going to persecute those Christians”. He doesn’t even say “Saul, Saul, why are you going to persecute the church.” He says, “Saul, Saul, why are you going to persecute me.” Jesus so clearly and closely identifies with the church that he refers to the congregation of Christians as Damascus as “me.” That’s why I think Paul got his image of the church as the body of Christ (1 Corinthians 12:12-31).
1.1.4 The Church had a Costly Start-Up
One of the items that business people examine before starting a new business is the cost of start-up. Paul tells the church leaders of his day to: “Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood” (Acts 20:28). It says that the church is the body of Christ and that God bought the church with His own blood. In Ephesians 5, when Paul discusses the importance of how wives and husbands relate to one another, he refers by analogy to the church’s relationship with Christ: “Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her…” (Ephesians 5:25). Again, this represents a very costly start-up.
1.1.5 Jesus Christ is Coming Again to Inspect His Church
“so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish” (Ephesians 5:27). I don’t know all the bits of your life and how you have been brought up to regard the church but in the New Testament I can tell you, the church is regarded as the body of Christ bought with God’s own blood. This is what God is about.
1.2. Join a Church for Other Christians
By throwing your lives into other people in a committed fashion, those who may be weaker in the faith will be strengthened. That is part of what God is about in the church. I want to encourage you to join a church for the sake of weaker Christians. I am sure we all know people who we think are Christians but have been badly wounded by a church or in a church. They take it upon themselves to be their own shepherd, wandering around managing their own spiritual portfolio, alone, for months or even years.
All Christians are to be part of a church. That is the normal way to be a Christian. Now, I’m not saying that you can’t be Christian on your own. I disagree with the Church Father Cyprian who said: “No one can have God as Father who does not have the Church as Mother” Cyprian (died 258). But I am saying that I’ve seen many sheep wandering outside the fold and in great danger because they have accepted a wrongly selfish idea of what it means to be a Christian.
Again, one of the reasons you should join a church is for weaker Christians. You should help dry up that market so that it is no longer socially acceptable to call yourself a Christian and not be involved in a local church. We, as Christians should try and clean up our act on this. And Texas as well as much of the south (the Bible Belt) is full of Christians trying to manage their spiritual portfolio on their own. We should tell the sheep “Into the fold, or else stop calling yourself a Christian.” Unfortunately, the current situation is one where the church is seen as an added option if you happen to like it. To many, the church just seems like a needless peripheral thing. When you meet someone who believes this, say, “Did you ever think that maybe if you link arms with other people, perhaps God has designed that you to help to speed them up? Despite the widespread hypocrisy in many churches, God has called you to join a church to combat this trend?”
1.3 Join a Church for Me
If you are not a member of this church, the staff and deacons may not know your name. We may not remember it, and we will not pray for you regularly. We don’t even know if you are a Christian. We’ve not heard your testimony. Members of this church have had Scott and other leaders hear their testimonies. Leaders have asked them questions about their understanding of the Gospel, and they have committed to pray for them regularly. Not only by the church’s leadership but many other members of this church. That’s what we understand it means to be a member of a church. Certainly, we as church leaders cannot function if everybody were just a consumer. Imagine if no one would commit and people just kept hopping and shopping around saying, “Well, I like this one over here, I like this one over there a little bit more, I like the praise music over here, I like the sermons over there.” There wouldn’t be any churches. The only reason there are churches is because people realize “No church is perfect.” You need to say to yourself, “I’m going to settle in this place and I’m going to try and prosper here spiritually. I agree with what they teach, their statement of faith, I agree with the summary on how we should live, the church covenant. These are things in good conscious I can commit to, I will do this, I will live for Christ with these people.”
1.4. Join a Church for Non-Christians
Remember that our happiness, growth, and personal development are not achieved by focusing on ourselves but on others.
“It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and of a kind that is not tolerated even among pagans, for a man has his father's wife. 2 And you are arrogant! Ought you not rather to mourn? Let him who has done this be removed from among you. 3 For though absent in body, I am present in spirit; and as if present, I have already pronounced judgment on the one who did such a thing. 4 When you are assembled in the name of the Lord Jesus and my spirit is present, with the power of our Lord Jesus, 5 you are to deliver this man to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord.
6 Your boasting is not good. Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump? 7 Cleanse out the old leaven that you may be a new lump, as you really are unleavened. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. 8 Let us therefore celebrate the festival, not with the old leaven, the leaven of malice and evil, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. 9 I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people— 10 not at all meaning the sexually immoral of this world, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters, since then you would need to go out of the world. 11 But now I am writing to you not to associate with anyone who bears the name of brother if he is guilty of sexual immorality or greed, or is an idolater, reviler, drunkard, or swindler—not even to eat with such a one. 12 For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge? 13 God judges those outside. ‘Purge the evil person from among you.’” (1 Corinthians 5:1-13)
One of the reasons that we join a church is because it is there to help you understand if you are truly living as a Christian. I’ll bet you that the man in 1 Corinthians 5 thought of himself as a Christian. I’ll bet he went to church regularly. I bet he did all the things a person would do in that community. And that is precisely the reason why Paul had to write and tell them to take action. Somehow they had to make it clear to him, for his sake, that his life’s actions were that of a non- Christian. That is a loving thing to do. One reason why you need to join a church is because the Gospel is made clear. It is defined and made visible by Christians who gather together to form congregations of believers.
One of the most important results is that non-Christians will be able to see “Oh- I’m calling myself a Christian, but I'm not really living like one. Perhaps I’m not a Christian.” Or those who are outside the church can see “Ah… this is what Christians are like. Not like this.” Church membership serves non-Christians: both non-Christians outside the church and those inside the church who are deceived into thinking they are Christians. I feel too often, church attendees fool themselves about the fellowship they claim to have with God because they have nothing to do with other Christians. I don’t think church membership is essential for salvation, but I do think that as fallen people, we can deceive ourselves: “Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to make your calling and election sure, for if you practice these qualities you will never fall. For in this way there will be richly provided for you an entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” (2 Peter 1:10-11).
The main thing in Scripture that God has set up for us to deal with self-deception, is the church. It is being in a community of people where we get to know them and we allow them to get to know us. That’s how we see whether or not we are living out this Christianity we profess with our lips. Again, a church should make the Gospel clear for non-Christians. Remember that I had said to you that it is our goal is that everyone that joins our church would know Jesus Christ in a saving relationship.
Give the invitation to come to faith in Christ.
