Membership in a local church involves more than just signing a card and occasionally showing up for a Sunday service. God’s Word gives particular duties that church members are to uphold toward their church leadership, fellow members, as well to their own respective families. But just what are these responsibilities?  In this podcast, Scott Brown and Jason Dohm, joined by special guest Trent Moody, answer the question, outlining the top ten duties of church members. 

One, work and pray for the unity of the spirit. Two, seek the salvation of the different groups of people you relate to—those in our families, communities, and workplaces. Three, submit to your church leaders as they are faithful to Christ. Four, contribute cheerfully and regularly to the church. Five, faithfully assemble with your local church. Six, maintain family and private devotions. Seven, watch over each other in brotherly love. Eight, don’t practice things which jeopardize your own faith or another’s faith. Nine, be slow to take offense. And, ten, submit to biblically-defined church discipline. 

Welcome to the Church and Family Life podcast. Today I've got my fellow elder, Trent Moody, and of course, Jason Dome, and we're gonna talk about the top 10 duties of church members. Hope you enjoy the discussion. Well, we're here, we're gonna talk about the top 10 duties of church members. And it's really a critical subject.

What we want in our churches are really high functioning church members. It's one thing to be a person who comes to church on Sunday. It's another to have a person who says, this is my church. I'm here to function fully. I'm here to be a blessing to every part of this church life.

And frankly, it really is incumbent on men to be fully functional church members. It's incumbent upon men to follow the leadership of the church. Hebrews 13, 17 makes that perfectly clear. And so what we're looking for is high performance disciples. All that means is just being biblical Christians.

So we want to identify, you know, top 10 duties of church members. And Jason, why don't you jam us through the list? Yeah. So we're working off of our church covenant between the three of us. We represent two different churches, but we have an almost identical membership covenant.

And the membership covenant makes explicit the duties that we have to each other. One of the things I love about our membership covenant is it has, I think it's a total of 60 cross references. That just means scripture passages. And so when we enter into the membership covenant, what we're actually doing is calling God to witness, the first sentence actually calls on God to witness that we're publicly agreeing to live with each other in the way the New Testament calls believers to live together. So it's really not intended to be anything beyond that.

The New Testament calls believers to live together in such a way, and we publicly commit to do that. Yeah. Number one, and we're actually just going paragraph by paragraph, our church covenant. Number one, to work and pray for the unity of the Spirit. Yeah, that's one of our great designs is that God would lead us in all of our actions within the meetings of the church and within the body of the church.

Unity is our great desire. That unity, though, is not just based on unity's sake, but unity around the truth of God's Word. That has to be our founding book. Yeah, that's the center. The unity in Jesus Christ, and that has lots of relational applications as well.

A church is full of sinners who are being sanctified. Right. And so you actually do need to work for it and pray for it. If you don't work for unity and pray for unity, you don't get unity because I'm a sinner. Right.

And I'm the church leader. And so it just goes from there. The church leaders are sinners and everyone who sits in the pews are sinners. So if we don't work and pray for this, we don't get it. But the church needs unity.

And also we should expect people to mess up with unity. It shouldn't be surprise us. It shouldn't throw us into a tether. But to keep working for it. Hey, I will do things that harm the unity.

We all will in some way, hopefully not very much and not very seriously, but I think we have to have patience with one another in that and just keep striving in that direction. So work not to break it. But then when it's broken, when some of us does something that's not good for unity, then work to mend it. Right. And that's really what the Old New Testament is about.

It's writing, teaching us how to get along with one another, how to love each other and forgive one another. Number two, seek the salvation of the different groups of people that we relate to, the people in our families, the people in our communities, the people in our workplaces. So we are great commission churches, so seeking the salvation of others is part of the things that we commit to as church members. Is the danger to be too insulated and just focused on one another. Our desire is to see the salvation not only of our communities, but really even within our own homes.

That really is the first place of ministry that takes place. We want to... What kind of Christian is it who doesn't desire the salvation of his children, but it doesn't end there. It branches out. It flows out of that into the broader church and community.

Right. Here's an accompanying benefit. The analogy is a canoe. If you've ever been in a canoe that's not moving, oh, it's so tipsy. You're gonna get wet if you stay long in a canoe that isn't moving.

But a canoe with forward momentum is so much more stable. When there's no forward momentum in our churches, there's too much navel gazing, we're ripe to fight with each other when that happens. But when we're really focused on helping people understand that there's a savior for sinners, it gives us the forward momentum that's so good for the health of the church in a bunch of different categories. Number three, submit to its leaders as they are faithful to Christ. This can be a somewhat controversial subject to some, but yet the scriptures are clear.

God has actually called men to oversee, to rule, to lead, and as he says, to be submitted into and to be obeyed as they obey Christ. I think that is what the covenant says that as they are faithful to Christ, That's the key. An important caveat, right? It is not blind submission, unequivocal submission. Church leaders are under shepherds.

1 Peter 5 has this precious phrase, when the chief shepherd appears, none of us are chief shepherds in the churches that we're serving. But, you know, God put shepherds in the way of people's schedules and lives and What pastors do is they call for meetings to the church and the people should listen to that. Hebrews 13, 17, I'll read it. Obey those who rule over you and be submissive, for they watch out for your souls as those who must give account. Let them do this with joy and not with grief for that would be unprofitable to you.

People are often very insensitive to actually the authority that God has given pastors and they just want to keep doing their own thing. Oh, you're calling us to prayer? I don't really want to. Well, wait a minute. You actually, there's somebody in your life that has some authority.

It's not unqualified authority for sure, but it's real authority. And it's not authority that's intended to puff up the elder and the pastor as well. I love what Hebrews says there in that verse that you just read, let them do so with joy, not with grief. That would be unprofitable. Our desire is the spiritual profitability of the souls of our people, And that's where our heart is.

And sometimes that's a contrary thing to some people. They don't like what it takes to get there. I was speaking with someone recently and I was speaking to them about this very subject. And boy, wouldn't it be easy if we could lift weights one time and get in shape. Yeah, really.

But it's a continual on a regular basis. And that's where our desire is. We have to come in on a continual, regular basis because our desire is for the good of the people. Yeah. One time I said to our church, hey, God sent us to get in the way of your life.

We hope that's a good influence. Number four, contribute cheerfully and regularly. There you go. You know, this is maybe a strange thing, but if there's a church member in our church that's not giving, our deacons come to us and say, you know, we got a couple of members who aren't giving anything. You know, that's a spiritual issue.

So, you know, we don't, we don't, and from time to time we've gone to people who aren't giving and said, hey, what's going on? What's going on in your soul? And it's always, it's always been so profitable and actually very bonding and, and transforming in that person's life because it's what you give is a spiritual matter. I was teaching on giving one time And I asked this question, would you go to a church that your level of giving affords? Some people can say, yes, I actually am going to the church that my level of giving affords.

Some people would say no, in their heart of hearts would have to say no, I would never go to a church. I only give this paltry little amount, and if everybody gave this paltry little amount, the resources we would have, I would never go to that kind of a church. We wouldn't even be able to have a teacher who had really prepared himself to teach on Sunday. We would have these paper-thin sermons because there was really no time given to it. That's a good question to ask yourself.

Would you go to a church that your level of giving affords? If everybody gave like you gave, would you go to that church? Yeah, bring the tithe into the storehouse and let God open up the windows of heaven. That's what the Bible says. Yeah, prosperity gospel preacher, you saw it here.

Amen. Hey, hang on. I've seen God really bless people who give a lot and don't have a lot. Like their finances get straightened out when they start giving. You know why that is?

Paul mentions this in 1 Corinthians 9. He says, do not muzzle the ox that treads out the grain. And he said, did he write this for the sake of the ox kind of thing? And he said, no, it's for us. He's actually pointing back to the Ten Commandments, thou shalt not steal.

And The argument there is from the lesser to the greater. If you should not steal from an ox, of course you should not steal from a pastor or from someone who's ministering the gospel. So we're related to oxes there, you know, he helps us. Yeah. Maybe today it would be a dog.

You would treat your dog like a king and your pastor like a dog. I don't want to be pushed around in stroller, I'll tell you that. Number five, not forsaking the assembly. There you know, John and Angel James said, they who would grow in grace must love the habitation of God's house. It is those that are planted in the courts of the Lord who shall flourish, and not those who are occasionally there.

Hey, you know, the researchers say that you're a church attender if you go twice a month, okay? That's the measure. And I think, you know, if you go three times a month, I'm kind of concerned. Hey, you know, I have Samaritan, some of our people have Samaritan ministries and you can't verify them unless they're at least at church three times a month. And so you find people that fall, They don't take the meetings of the church that seriously.

They take their vacations really seriously. They take a lot of things more seriously. And so they're not there. I want to see a church of full attenders that are there every possible time they can be there on Sunday, particularly. Yeah.

Is this good for your soul or isn't it? Do you need this or don't you? If you're at a church where it's not really good for your soul, find another church. If you don't need it, go somewhere else where you get what you need. No one will begrudge you that, but if you just treat like where you are as something that is really not necessary, not needed, not helpful, then either you're at the wrong place or you're the wrong person.

Yeah. Hey, I'm looking for fully functional church members who are there for one another all the time. Right. Amen. That's where the unity comes in, as we're there together serving one another, loving one another.

And in fact, when you're not there, you're actually robbing the other members. You know, God says we are all endowed with spiritual gifts. We're actually robbing the other people of the church when we're not there and ministering one to another. Number six, maintain family and private devotions. Okay.

So, you know, church we think is all about the corporate, but it's building blocks that come into the corporate meeting. What kind of a building block are you? Do you need for your church experience to be the sum total of your spiritual life? Well, that's terrible. We should come having met with God daily, having met with God in our families daily.

Why does that make for a wonderful time together when the people who are going to gather on Wednesday night and Sunday aren't looking to those times as the sum total of their spiritual life but have been feeding their spirits all along. And then we're really ready to worship the Lord wholeheartedly. Hey, Richard Baxter goes really extreme on this. He says, if you're not having private devotions, you undo everything the pastor is saying. He says, we will, we undo all.

So I mean, you know, God gave the church and the family as the primary discipleship and communicators of the word of God. And neglecting that is really harmful to the church. It's not, It doesn't just affect your family, it affects the whole church if you're not doing that. You know, there's something that should not be assumed, a little confession from me. I was in my first pastorate in my young 20s, And I was been pastoring this church for almost two years.

And I was confronted with a sermon I was listening to about family devotions. I'd never heard of such a thing. And I was pastoring a church. And After I heard it, I went to my wife. I said, honey, things are going to change.

She said, oh boy, what's next? But it truly, it radically changed our family. It changed everything about what we are as a family. And it really gave us a good solid direction. And do not neglect family.

It makes church life so much sweeter when your spirit has already been fed. Yeah. Amen. Number seven, watch over each other and brotherly love. Remember to pray for each other.

Aid one another in sickness and distress. So this is about body life, how we're interrelated, we're interdependent on each other. Hey, so many people all around us in this community, they go to church and then they leave, and they go to church and then they leave, and they don't enter into the pains and the difficulties and the joys of other people in the church. They go to a place to get something and then they leave. And it's not a picture of a biblical church.

You know, there's different giftings within the body of Christ, but prayer is one of those things that everyone can do. We often hear little children praying. You know, John Angel James, again, I'm not going to read the whole quote, but he does mention here, and he's specifying towards elders, like praying for your elders, but he says, prayer is a means of assigning the minister, which is within the reach of all. They who can do nothing more can pray. And he goes down through there and he lists about the sick, he lists those who are not gifted, and he goes through this whole list of different types of people, those who are timid and maybe can't go out and be upfront, but he says everyone can pray.

And again, when we neglect even the prayer meetings of the church, we're neglecting that aspect that is really the most powerful and the greatest blessing to the body of Christ. Because at the end of the day, we don't control very much. So this, if you can't do anything else, you can pray. He did not mean it this way. I know John Angel James meant it in exactly the right way, but it is not our last recourse.

It actually should be our first one. And in many ways, it's our most mighty lever to pull, because God can do all the things we can't do, and controls all the things we don't control. Amen. And Jesus himself prayed. He was God.

He walked on water, he raised the dead, he calls blinded eyes to see, yet he prayed. How much more should we? Beautiful. Number eight, don't practice things which jeopardize your own faith or another's faith. There's a whole list in the covenant, but you can just imagine what those things are.

Yeah, right. Yeah. Yeah, there's a whole list. That's one of the issues regarding Christian liberty that I think we must be really self-inflecting upon how we conduct ourselves in our everyday lives. There can be things that are of faith that are not sin for us, But our consideration is not what is the limits of my Christian liberty, but it's actually what are the limits of my brotherly love.

We should consider one another more important than ourselves. Paul says if it causes my brother to stumble if I eat meat, I'll never eat meat again. Yeah. All things are lawful, but not all things are profitable. But he's, but he's talking about things, you know, in modern language, pornography, drugs, things like that, things that would really harm your faith.

Number nine, be slow to take offense, think the best. Wow. Oh boy, you could fix about 99.9% of church problems and problems between people if they just thought the best of each other. You know, this is one of the things that I believe every time we've spoken about the church covenant with someone who's wanting to join our church, this is one of the things I will always bring up. Do not be easily offended because the church is full of sinners.

I mean, you can't even live in your own marriage without offending somebody, much less can we be a part of a church with numerous other sinners and not have rubs there. And we have to be so guarded. We need to not be easily offended. And remember, our greatest offense is against God. And He showed an abundance of grace.

And we should too. My wife Debra is famous for saying, don't have your feelings on your sleeves. You know. Yeah, very good. Ten, number ten, submit to biblically defined church discipline.

I believe it was Calvin that said a church without church discipline is not a church. It's one of the defining marks of a true church. It's one of the defining marks of a true church, is if you're willing to deal with sin. Right. You know, the pattern, right, today is just to brush it under the carpet and keep on going.

But churches are refreshed by when there's a genuine opportunity for church discipline. It challenges everybody in the church. It drives everybody to repentance. People get converted when someone else's sins often. We've seen that, you know, someone, you know, is caught in some egregious sin, but there are other people that are dabbling with it, and it causes a little revival.

So church discipline is actually a good thing. That's what happened in the early church in the book of Acts. In chapter 5, it brought fear upon the whole church, upon all those. And that's really part of church discipline. It acts as a restraint against more sin.

And in fact, It is what true Christian love is, is when you love someone enough that you don't want to see them continue in sin because you know the end of it. It's destroying, not only themselves. I tell my children this all the time, your sin will never only affect you. It always affects others. And so we must love the entire body.

That's really loving the body is when we do not brush sin under the rug. So our membership covenants are interlocking with a more comprehensive document, which is our Constitution. And our constitutions actually afford due process rights to members. So when you say submit to biblically defined church discipline, we believe that's appropriate. So it isn't elder discipline.

In our churches, it is not elder discipline. It's actually a congregational discipline, and we can't impose discipline without the consent of the congregation and the members having due process rights, which I think is very appropriate. Yeah. Yeah. OK, so there you have it.

The top 10 duties of church membership. Yeah, that's really good. OK, any parting shots? One parting shot. We have one.

Love the brethren. Love the brethren. My life has been so radically impacted by having my life closely intertwined with local church life. People who don't have their lives closely intertwined with local church life are cheating themselves out of all the blessings that Jason and the Dohm family has experienced. Yeah, amen.

Yeah, all this to say be a fully functional church member. Don't just go to church, say, this is my church. This is the place of my habitation and I want to be a fully functioning member of that church. Charles Spurgeon called it the dearest place on earth. There you go.

Amen. I have found that to be true for sure. Okay. Well, thank you for joining us on the Church and Family Life podcast, and I hope you can join us next time. Church and Family Life is proclaiming the sufficiency of Scripture by helping build strong families and strong churches.

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