Meaningful Membership
Building Meaningful Church Membership: Faithful, Available, and Teachable Members for a Healthy Local Church
This guest post was written by Armando Yzaguirre Jr., who is the member care pastor at Fellowship Church in Immokalee, FL. Armando is a graduate of the Baptist University of Florida and writes regularly at Blood Bought Theology. If you appreciate thoughtful, deeply biblical writing, I highly recommend subscribing to his Substack
Several years ago, under the leadership of my senior pastor, Timothy Pigg, our pastoral staff determined we needed to refocus on meaningful membership. As we examined the landscape of the church in America, we noticed that many had a lack of understanding of what church membership indicates. This inevitably leads to apathy in the duties that each member has to the local church.
The word duties may sound foreign to you as you think about the local church. However, we believed that each member had entered into a covenant with the local church when he or she became a member. So we decided to take each of our current members through a membership class called Discover Fellowship. In it, we discussed our church’s mission, vision, ministries, covenant, and more.
Then, as a staff, we decided to emphasize and shepherd our congregation to be FAT (I do not know if my senior pastor found this acronym somewhere else or if he was the originator). While that may sound silly, we believed that for a member’s membership to be more than inclusion in an exclusive club, a member at Fellowship Church should be Faithful to attend, Available to serve, and Teachable.
One is Faithful when they attend church services regularly. In Hebrews, the author wrote, “do not neglect the assembly of the saints.” Members who neglect the assembly of the saints care little for their souls and others in the church. Church attendance is vital because we hear the Word of God preached, sing songs that reflect truth from the Word of God that bring Him praise, and fellowship with the saints to be exhorted. A church cannot have meaningful membership when being faithful to attend the assembly is not emphasized.
A member must also be available to serve. We use the term Available because certain instances may prevent someone from serving for a period of time. However, we see in Paul’s epistles, specifically 1 Corinthians 12, that the church is described as a body with many gifts. Each member of the body is vital to the health of the church. Each member has been uniquely gifted to build up the church in love and service. When a member neglects serving the church, he or she is actually harming the church. God has designed the church to, by the power of His Holy Spirit, be built up from the gifts He has allotted to each. There is no meaningful membership when members are not available to serve in the ministries of the church.
Lastly, each member must be teachable. An essential aspect of a healthy church is the need for members to be transformed by the Word of God and to have unity among its members. Unity does not mean that we will all be exactly the same, though we should aim to be of one mind, one heart, and the same love (Philippians 2:1-5). Yet, we must be able to be corrected by our brothers and sisters in love. This correction comes in both positive and negative aspects. Each time we hear a sermon or small group lesson we have the opportunity to be trained in righteousness (2 Timothy 3:16). Every time we have a conversation about the Bible or theology with a brother or sister in the church we have the opportunity to be equipped for every good work (2 Tim. 3:17). Every member of the local body must be willing to be taught by others. They must also be willing to be corrected by others in love. In the aforementioned passage, Paul wrote that Scripture is profitable for reproof and correction. We all act wrongly and think wrongly in some areas. We need our pastors, teachers, brothers, and sisters to come to us with an open Bible and correct those blind spots we have. Without this, we will not grow as we ought. There can be know meaningful membership when members refuse to be corrected in love.
These three areas became the main barometer by which we tested if the sheep in our flock were healthy. By God’s grace, we have seen many brothers and sisters grow in this area. This includes some who were already strong in those areas. We also have had to have tough conversations and conduct church discipline with those who refuse to grow in these areas. We did this because we cannot treat membership lightly. When we enter into a covenant as a church with a new member, the body is affirming that it believes this person is a follower of Christ. We are saying this person not only represents Christ to the community and the world, but also represents this local assembly of believers. Membership can only be meaningful when we feel the weight of that truth. When we do, Christ will strengthen us by His Spirit to build up the local body to maturity. By God’s grace, I believe and know our church is not alone. There are many churches here in America and all over the world growing into Christian maturity. What a glorious day it will be when we will all be together with our Lord.
 | A guest post by
|