In his sermon on 'Meaningful Church Membership,' Paul Carrington explores the concept of church membership beyond just having names on a roll. He challenges the prevailing culture dominated by individualism and consumerism, highlighting the importance of meaningful engagement within the church community. Carrington draws attention to how individualism, characterized by prioritizing personal interests, and consumerism, focused on acquiring and benefiting personally, undermine the cohesion and purpose of the church. He emphasizes biblical analogies, such as the church as a body with interdependent members, to illustrate the need for active participation and commitment. The sermon outlines the benefits of church membership, including investment, accountability, and support during trials, as well as its duties, such as fostering holiness and love among members. The church is portrayed as the dearest place on earth, where believers should bind themselves to each other in covenant, reflecting the unity and purpose God intended for His church.

Well this afternoon it's my pleasure to be able to speak to us about meaningful church membership in the series, Joined and Knit Together. And so as you know, we've been, I think in February is when we first started this series, really with the idea of how can we understand the purpose of the church and how can we get a clearer vision for God's working through the church. And even this morning it was such an encouragement to think of this picture of this storm-tossed, this ravaged boat, but with Christ right in the midst of us. And that's really the story of the church all the way down through the ages. And so today, we're going to be talking about meaningful church membership.

And I put that word there, meaningful, because it's so critical. We're not just talking about getting our names and keeping our names on a roll, but what does it actually mean to be a living, active, breathing member of the body of Christ? And so the topics that we've discovered or we've gone through since February, some of them, I'll just go through a few of them just to calibrate us on them. What the church does was one of the first ones. Then we talked about church culture.

We had a couple of series spread out over elders and deacons. And then we talked about church government. We also went into missions and the family, the use of the tongue. We talked about prayer and worship and singing, and then we also spoke about the Sabbath and stewardship. And so we've covered a broad spectrum of church life, but really everything all comes down to this idea of church membership and what is your role and what is my role in the body of Christ.

And of course next week we're going to be dealing with church discipline and so that hopefully or might be the last of this of this series joined in it together. And so today the hope is that through this series, both for members and for non-members, since we've started in February, is that we all hopefully get a real beautiful picture of the church and God's working in the church for his glory. And our contention this afternoon, what we want to be arguing and what we want to examine is really the idea that every true Christian will have a meaningful membership, church membership, in a local body. Really that's the idea that we want to examine today. And so the challenge though with all of that is the current day that we're living in, right?

If you examine the age that we're living in today, there's really kind of two twin sisters I want to just start off by talking about this afternoon. And the first one is this kind of this love affair, especially here in this country with individualism, right? That's one of the twin sisters, individualism. And it really, it reigns this idea of me reigns like in no other time throughout history. It's this age of non-commitment, kind of keep my options open, have my eye on the escape hatch in case anything goes wrong.

You see that with people with their jobs, even with the most intimate relationship, a husband and wife. If things just aren't working out, you know what? Maybe it's time to get a new husband or a new wife. And I can part ways and really, not much of a big difference for me. This is the age that we're living in.

And the definition of individualism, it's really a doctrine that the interests of the individual are or ought to be ethically paramount. When everything is settled, my own interests should be the most important interests, the ones that I should be most careful to maintain and guard against. And there's an individual by the name of Ayn Rand. I don't know if any of you have heard of her. She was probably one of the most influential philosophers and authors in the 20th century.

A lot of politicians, a lot of those in higher education really looked to her as kind of a thought leader. And she had a philosophy called the virtues of selfishness. Totally flies in the face of anything to do with God. But listen to this quote and this is this is a woman who wrote and impacted presidents, impacted business leaders, impact so many different people and this is what she says, I am done with the monster of we. The word of serfdom, of plunder, of misery, falsehood, and shame.

And now I see the face of God, little G. And I raise this God over the earth, this God whom men have sought since men came into being, this God who will grant them joy and peace and pride, this God, this one word, I." And so this is the day that we're living in, this is what we're swimming in. On the other side of individualism, we have this idea of consumerism, right? This feeling that I need to get and acquire. It was interesting when I was just doing some research that the number one pastime in America, the number one pastime in America is shopping.

Not for groceries, but for going out and acquiring things that we don't really have any need for at all. And so when we begin to think of this idea of consumerism, this other twin sister, everything now becomes filtered through this lens of what can I get and what do I get out of this? How does this most benefit me? And this can affect members of a church as well as non-members. We swim in this water so we're not unaffected by it.

We ourselves have to recognize that this is the plight that we have. And even in the church, there's an entire church industry that's been built around this idea of how can we best organize the church in a way that can best address people's felt needs? And How can we do that to entertain or to have different programs and all these different things to make sure that people as consumers feel like they're getting the best bang for their buck? And it's interesting if you look at even the average SBC church, right? The average SBC or Southern Baptist Church has about 223 members on its roll, but only 70 members in regular attendance.

Which means that less than a third of people who say that they are members of that church are actually attending that church. And it's not even unheard of that you have a church of maybe 2, 000 people, but maybe only 400 people are actually on the coming there on a Sunday. So members 2, 000, but maybe only 400 people regularly gathering. And so what the What the effect of all of this is, is that the church has a very diminished role in the lives of the people that call themselves Christians. People have this kind of view of the church as being this vertical thing, you know, me and Jesus, we have a good thing going.

And as long as that's good, the other stuff, it's not as important. But that, again, flies in the face of what we're going to be seeing today in terms of the gospel and what Christ has done. I've been out, you know, when you go out street preaching and talk to people, I'm always amazed you go and talk to someone and you ask them are they a Christian? Sure, yes I'm a Christian. And what church do you go to?

They're like oh you know I can't quite remember. They can't remember the name of their pastor or the name of their church and I'm not using hyperbole. That's happened so many times where people can't actually remember their church quote-unquote they go to, which means they probably went to a church years and years ago, put their face in, but that's how they look to church membership. And that's not how we want to look at it today. Vodi Bakum has this quote about the church and he this was from last year, he says, God has a plan.

It's the local church. It is plan A and there is no plan B. And that's the way that we want to think about this church today and about the church in general. And if you want to get a sense of what God's vision is for the church, I just ask you open up the back of your Bible and you'll see if you look at a map of say the ancient Roman Empire and you'll see little churches dotted all over the place as the church began to spread and began to take root throughout the Roman Empire. That's God's plan that individual local bodies of churches would be scattered all over the earth, outposts of worship that would fill the earth and bring him maximum glory.

And so when we look at the way the world views commitment, these two sisters of individualism and consumerism, I want to just take us to look at how do the Apostles actually look at the church? How do the Apostles view the church? And when you start to get a picture of what they think of the church, this exalted view, just kind of taking a little bit of a survey of what they say. You know, you have words like from Peter, how he talks about the church being a holy nation and a royal priesthood. He talks about the fact that we're living stones that are actually mortared together into a spiritual house joined to the chief cornerstone.

We hear about the author to Hebrews talking about the city of the living God and how this is the heavenly Jerusalem and to the general assembly and church of the firstborn who are registered in heaven. Other writers like the Apostle Paul talked about the church like the pillar and ground of the truth or the Israel of God or the flock. And so these are ways that these men describe the church and it's this exalted view. Now the church has glory but it's a reflected glory because of who the church calls her husband. And so there is a glory.

And in a world that diminishes the glory of the church, We also are susceptible to having a vision that's kind of susceptible to that as well. We don't have a great vision of the church and therefore church membership can also fall prey to that as well. But if you think about the fact that God purchased the church with his own blood, It really begins to change the whole thing. And so we look at the way that the apostles view the church. But how about the Lord Jesus Christ himself?

And this is beautiful when you begin to think about how the Lord himself views the church. You know, there was a time when Jesus was in a house and he was there and his mother and brothers came and they wanted to see him as he was in the middle of preaching and healing and so on and so forth and he answered them as the people said hey your mother and brothers want to speak with you, and he asked the question, who is my mother and who are my brothers? And then he looked around in the circle at those who sat about him and he said, here are my mothers and here are my brothers. This was the view that Christ had of the Church. And then when you look at Ephesians chapter 5, it's so beautiful where the Apostle Paul is speaking of the way that Christ looks at the Church.

And this is what it says, For we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones. For this reason, a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. This is a great mystery, but I speak concerning Christ and the Church." And so this most fundamental building block of all society from the beginning of time up until now, the husband and the wife, all it is is a shadow of Christ and his Church, this most intimate of relationships. And you think about it, the fact that Christ founded the church he promised to build the church he gave himself for The church on the cross he sent his power his spirit to empower her and then we heard this morning how he's interceding continuously for his church and then he gathers her every Sabbath day to worship and then not only on the Sabbath but from house to house people gather and he's constantly feeding her and making sure that she's well cared for and then most beautifully you know as I was looking at this when the Apostle Paul was going to persecute the saints in Damascus, do you remember that?

And the Lord Jesus arrests him on that road. He asked Saul the question, he says, Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me? How closely does he associate with his church to the point where he says, it's inseparable. When you persecute my church, you're persecuting me. There's no separation at all because it's all one body.

And so a high view of Christ is going to be result in a high view of his church, the very thing that he died for. And what we want to do today is really embrace the view that the the Apostles have and that the Lord Jesus has, that we see really all the way throughout the entire scriptures and reject the ways of this world that hold us as preeminent as individuals and as consumers and how can I get my needs best met to have our minds washed and purified to say well what has God said on the matter of the church and also on the matter of church membership? And so we're going to look at four different categories. The first one is, what is meaningful church membership? Again, we're not interested in members just being on the role, but what is meaningful church membership?

And then membership in the New Testament and then what are the benefits to church members as members of the body and then practical duties of church members and so again when we look at what is meaningful church membership I think all of it is best housed and seen underneath the auspice of what is the Church. And when we have a proper view of what is the Church, all of a sudden it's not that complex to understand Church membership itself. Jonathan Lehman, he makes this comment, He says, church membership is a covenant of union between a particular church and a Christian, a covenant that exists of the church's affirmation of the Christian's gospel profession, the church's promise to give oversight to the Christians, and the Christian's promise to gather with the church and submit to its oversight. So that's what the definition is. We'll use that for this morning.

But really it's this idea of interdependence. You know when you when you think of a church you think of a body where you know you have individual members but they're totally dependent on one another. No member can exist or stand alone, and neither should they exist or stand alone. But each one feeds and helps and comes alongside to be a support and a strength to one another. I think the best example of this is where you look in 1 Corinthians chapter 12 where Paul really describes, he uses the best analogy we probably could use, which is that of a body.

And so we need God, it's true. No one is diminishing the fact that we absolutely need God. But the fact that we need God doesn't diminish the fact that we also need one another. And so the Apostle Paul, he says it like this. He says, I'm just going to read from 1 Corinthians chapter 12.

For as the body is one and has many members, but all the members of that one body, being many, are one body, so also is Christ. For by one spirit, we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free, and have all been made to drink into one spirit. For in fact the body is not one member, but many. If the foot should say, because I am not a hand, I am not of the body. It is therefore, is it therefore not of the body?

And if the ear should say, because I am not the eye, I am not of the body, is it therefore not of the body? If the whole body were an eye, where would be the hearing? If the whole were hearing, where would be the smelling? But now God has set the members, each one of them, in the body just as he pleased. And if they were all one member, where would be the body?

But now indeed there are many members, yet one body, and the eye cannot say to the hand, I have no need of you, nor again the head to the feet, I have no need of you. No, much Rather, those members of the body which seem to be weaker are necessary, and those members of the body which we think to be less honourable. On these we bestow greater honour, and our unpresentable parts have greater modesty, but our presentable parts have no need. But God composed the body, having given greater honour to that part which lacks it, that there should be no schism in the body, but that the members should have the same care for one another." and then he goes on to say now you are the body of Christ and members individually and so he's painting this picture he's using the body as this beautiful analogy to say how interdependent we are and in fact if you even being a part of this church think of yourself as unimportant Would anyone really miss me if I wasn't gone or I don't really, you know, have a prominent role or whatever? Paul is saying that every single part and member of the body is significant and is important.

And in fact, the ones that may not be as prominent and seen, he says, upon those we bestow greater honor. It flies in the face of everything that this world would say, that the most prominent are the most important. But in the eyes of God, that may not necessarily be the case. And so I want to just attack that and say, you might be tempted at times to think, you know, the church doesn't really need me. I'm not that important.

And if I didn't show up, who would really miss me or who would really care? But as we begin to understand the beauty of the church and then the beauty of church membership and then the interdependence of each member relying on one another and drawing strength from one another it's amazing how oftentimes you can get strength from someone who doesn't even know that they're giving strength to you simply because of their presence. You can, you probably experienced that just being with somebody else there you get strength from them. Whether they say a lot or a little there's a strength and so when you're not there you are missed and it is important every single member of the body is absolutely critical. And we want to have that in our minds.

And when we are tempted to overlook others, we should look more closely through the eyes of Christ and say, you know what, should I be trying to aspire to be the most popular or should I associate with those who might be overlooked? There's another function for the body to say, you know what, let me go and spend some time with this person or with that person. As a young person you can be a strength to other young people by looking for those that might be overlooked. And so there's this way that we can work together to give glory and honor to God and be a body that actually, again, is totally the opposite to everything that this world has to say. And so one of the things that you see when Paul is talking about the body is that not every member does the same thing, right?

We need to grasp that. If we don't grasp that, you'll never have peace. You'll always and forever be griping and wondering and never at ease. But when we begin to understand, you know what, there's different functions and different parts of the body working together, then we can have peace because the role that you fulfill is something I can't, like I'll be honest, who wants me leading singing? Probably not that many, right?

But the idea is that is there somewhere else I could be a help or a strength and there there's another person that can do something that I would I would never be able to do and by being able to do all these things together the body functions in a way that brings maximum glory to God. And we need to begin to just see things like that. And so church membership though, what is that? It's a commitment, it's a living, tangible commitment that we have one to the other. And it does result in an official church record, where your name is actually put down somewhere.

And what's happening when we commit to church membership? It's us telling others, you're to expect certain things from me. It's also being, it's this question, I want to be held accountable. Could you hold me accountable in this Christian life and in this journey as we as we travel from one side to the other like we saw this morning. It's a statement, it's saying I am now your responsibility, and you are my responsibility.

And it's just totally countercultural to what do I get. If you're looking at church membership from, well, show me the benefits, and maybe I'll sign up, you've missed it entirely. That's what the world says. But when someone's converted and they come to know Christ, it's no longer, well what do I get? Show me and maybe I'll sign on the dotted line.

But it's where can I serve? What can I do? How can I most exalt Christ even sacrificially so that he gets the most glory at the end of it all? And I just want to attend to a quick sidetrack. You know a good question was asked the other day regarding age of children and you know if it we obviously here we practice believers baptism which we think is biblical And so just as even children considering membership, maybe you're young, here's the idea.

And we've talked about this as elders, is if someone is mature enough to make a commitment to the Lord Jesus Christ, to make a credible profession, and to the point where the elders and others say, yes, I think this person is a true believer. Can you conceive of a situation where that person would not be a candidate for church membership. In other words, they've committed themselves to Christ and they've been baptized. Can you think of a scenario where they're not fit or mature enough to now be in relationship with Christ's bride, his church? It's almost a self-evident question when you look at it like that.

So just maybe something to talk about and look at more deeply. But if they can understand that commitment to Christ, hopefully they'll be able to grasp the commitment to one another. And they obviously don't have the means to do all the things that a parent would be able to do, but they could grasp it at the level that they're at. And so that's just looking at what is church membership. And I just want to take a few minutes to look at church membership in the New Testament.

And I'm not going to spend a whole lot of time here, But somebody might insist and say, well, I can see how this makes sense, but why isn't there any mention of church membership in the New Testament? And this is sometimes a reason why people don't join a church is because they don't actually see it in the New Testament. But I think if you look at the New Testament fairly and you begin to look at the way that the churches were set up and functioned, and we just finished talking about 1 Corinthians chapter 12, where the word, this body, and then individual members, mortared together, working together, operating together for the good of one another and for the glory of God. When you begin to see that it becomes self-evident in a way, right? And if you look at 1st Corinthians chapter 5, you know, we might even address this sometime maybe next week when we talk about church discipline, But here you have a situation where a man is involved with an unspeakable sin in the church, and people were boasting.

And so the apostle Paul writes a letter to this church to rebuke them. And he says this, for what have I to do with judging those who are outside, do you not judge those who are inside? There's this understanding that there is something called the inside of the church, and there is something called the outside of the church. There's a clear, clear distinction. And then in 2 Corinthians chapter 2, when there's talk of restoration and bringing this brother back into the fold, obviously he had repented.

He had expressed sorrow for his sins. It says this, this punishment, meaning his excommunication, being put out of the church for his sins, this punishment, which was inflicted by the majority, is sufficient for such a man. In other words, there must have been some sort of vote or something like that. We don't know exactly what it looked like. We don't know the covenant and what that looked like between the members.

But I think what you come to understand is there was definitely a defined membership. The question would be, do you think that the church in Corinth practiced church membership? The fact that they had an inside and an outside. The fact that they had a majority that was somehow able to excommunicate this man. And then you go to 1 Timothy chapter 5, for example, and Paul is talking about widows and about the number being taken into the number.

There was obviously some lists that were being kept, this defined understanding that there are members of the body who are then not only covenanted with Christ but are covenanted one with the other. And then you can also look at the seven churches of Asia Minor and what we know without question is that this, that the Bible knows nothing at all of the solitary, maverick, stand-alone Christian. You won't find it anywhere. You won't even find that really in the Old Testament. You'll find a nation and then you have a holy nation and a royal priesthood in the New Testament.

There's there's no such thing as just a lone ranger Christian flitting from flower to flower from church to church with no defined commitment. That's just not something that we see at all. And then the last thing I would just say is, you know, you look at all of the analogies that are used, we just talked about the analogy of the body, but you look at things like when we hear about people standing with God, we hear about a family, right? We hear about adoption. We hear about citizenship, where your names are registered in heaven, and you hear about all these different types of things.

And so I think it's not too far to say that in the New Testament you have very clearly membership. Maybe it doesn't look exactly like how we do it, And we're not saying we do it absolutely perfectly, but there is some sort of defined structure. And then I want to just talk about the benefits of meaningful church membership. The question could be, well, is it really essential to join a church? Can I get everything I need as a Christian from just being a regular attender, right?

That's a question that people could ask, and I think sometimes maybe if it's not verbalized, that might be the question that some people might have in their minds. Well, I think, you know, the first benefit of meaningful church membership is almost like the first benefit of a husband and a wife coming together right there's this idea of investment this idea of commitment and when you're committed to something The very thing that you're committed to all of a sudden ramps up in terms of value in your eyes. Why? Because you've actually made a commitment. So the very first benefit of church membership is that you yourself are put out to invest from the heart in the welfare of others and in the advancement of God's kingdom in a local body.

There's something wonderful about limiting your options, just like when a man fixes himself on a woman and they get married. There's something wonderful and there's something freeing about fixing and limiting your options to be wholly set upon one other person or one other body. And you're gonna labor for the benefit of that body going forward. And we're going to have problems all the way through, right? I'm a human, I'm going to step on your toe, you're going to step on my toe.

But when there's a commitment, that investment that we've made, all of a sudden Now, in spite of our differences, we're going to work through difficulties. We're not just going to leave at the first sign of trouble, but we're going to be able to work through and help one another. I think another benefit is that others commit to you, right? There's this idea of locking arms. It's more than just loose associations where we know each other.

And when life is hard, and it will be hard, or when it's sorrowful, or when you're in sickness, you're going to find, and I think this church is a beautiful example of that, you're going to find you almost have to keep people at bay from serving you because there's so many people that want to to help and to to come alongside and and to be a support for you because there are times when you're going to be the strengthener of others but there's going to be times when you're going to need the strength of others And when you have brothers and sisters who are locked in arms, committed to fulfilling their obligations to you and you to them, there's something beautiful about that. Then there's the idea of accountability, which is another benefit, right? This idea, it's good to know that others are looking and wanting to hold you accountable and hold you accountable to walk in a certain way. And you have a certain standard of wanting to maintain and keep away from sin. You can think of it almost like A can bring in the Babylonian garment and the wedge of gold and the impact that it had on the rest of the camp.

You know, when we understand that we're not just, again, isolated members, but my sins can affect others, that should have some sort of impact on us. And I'll talk a little bit about that in a second here. But thinking about this too, right, and this idea of accountability. Think of an uncommitted Christian, someone who doesn't think church membership is that important, calling to unconverted people asking them to commit their hearts and lives to Jesus Christ. There's a bit of an oxymoron where you're saying commit trust in the Lord and then at the same time you yourself are willing to commit to the Lord's body in a local expression called the church.

There's an inconsistency there. I think another benefit is also that you help your elders as well, where your elders want to make sure that they're taking good care of the flock, want to know where there's difficulties, and want to shepherd with the word in any way that the church can be supported. But it helps the elders know who is in their charge, who it is that is in their flock, and who they have accountability before God, too. That's one of the most fearful things to think about is that you're gonna give an account for souls before God and it helps your elders when they know who are the people that are committed to that local body. Another area is assurance, right?

It's not a light matter for a solid church, a local church, to find your profession of faith credible and your conduct and your lifestyle credible to the point where they say, you know what? We are going to accept this person into membership. Why? Because they have been baptized, but we also see in their lives that there is fruit. Not perfect, where none of us are, but there's endeavoring to walk in the way and to exalt Christ.

There's something there that adds a level of assurance as well. It's not the assurance that comes from Christ that is in, you know, ministering in your spirit, giving witness and so on, but there's an assurance that does come from it that we don't want to despise that either. And I think one of the most beautiful things is the watching world, right? Nothing, nothing so astonishes a fractured world as a community in which radical, faithful, genuine love is shared among its members. This is something that sometimes we may not even be able to fully understand because you're in it, but when you're looking from the outside in and you're watching people, this is the statement of the agnostics, the atheists, the pagans, in the times of the early church right after the apostles where they would write and they would say, behold how they love one another.

They didn't understand the church, but one thing they could grasp is that there was something called love abiding there and and they looked on from the outside in. And so this is another benefit of church membership, because there's not really many places that you can go for commitment. You can join a club, a shooting club, or you can join a political party, but you're not gonna get the same thing as you get from the church, this true agape love, one for another. It's hard to find, it's in fact impossible to find outside of the church. You simply will not find it.

And so those are some of the benefits. I want to just talk as we wrap up here about some of the practical duties of meaningful church membership. And so you have a duty. This is a bad word in an individualistic, consumeristic society. You have a duty to the Lord.

You have a duty one to another. You have obligations and responsibilities. And really, the church is a community of doers of people wanting to exalt the Lord in that way and and so in an age of non-commitment where people flee at the first sign of trouble we want to we want to look at church membership of an entirely different sort because the the king that we're serving is of an entirely different nature than any other king. And so what are some of the concrete ways? Well we talked last week about stewardship, we've talked about missions and in worship and prayer.

I just want to talk about some other considerations. I did mention love, and I think this is one of the most important duties that we have one to another. You know, when you look in the New Testament, there's about 58, maybe 59 one another commands that you see all the way through. Well, out of those 58, 59, one another commands, 24 of them include the phrase, love one another. That's almost half of all of those commands.

Love one another. Love one another. And so what is love? It's not a feeling, right? It's not this overwhelming passion that you have in your heart and and Vody says it like this, Vody Bakken, he says what is love?

It's an act of the will. Compare this with the world's version of love, right? Love is an act of the will. It's a choice that you're making, accompanied by emotion, it's not void of it, that leads to action on behalf of its object. That's what love is.

It's a, I'll read that again, it's an act of the will accompanied by emotion that leads to action on behalf of its object. And so again it totally obliterates this idea of you know what do I get or this feeling of you know I'm just not feeling all that fulfilled to how can I serve and maybe fulfill others? It flies in the face of all of these different ways of the world. I love this quote from Christopher Ash and he's talking about marriage but I want you to just substitute church membership in there and see if it makes sense. He says, when we approach marriage or church membership, expecting our needs to be met, we have not understood the real nature of love.

And we are sowing the seeds of destruction in our marriages. This idea of don't just get married so I can have my needs met. Well, another one is the gathering that we have, another benefit or practical duty that we have. Hebrews 10 says it like this, and let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more, as you see the day approaching." And I thought this was important, because what you see in this text right here is this connection between assembling ourselves together on the one side and the stirring up to love and to good works. The fact that we do gather like we did this morning and we're here today, It's the perfect environment to not just talk about whatever, but have you today, has it been in your mind or in your heart in any of your conversation to stir up another brother or maybe a sister to another sister, to love and to good works, to challenge somebody, to really engage them in something thoughtful.

It's really worth pondering, but this is the idea of the gathering on the one side is the perfect environment for stirring one another up for love and for good works. And we have a duty to do that every time that we gather. So if you haven't been doing that, it would be a recommendation that you take that as a proactive way to think about, how can I actually be thinking about that maybe next week or whenever we do gather together? And then of course we have other gatherings like Monday morning, Wednesday evening, you know the women have women's mentor once per month. Get engaged, get involved in these things, contribute.

Not, well I don't get all that much out of it, but what can I contribute to it would be the far better statement? Another one is influence for holiness and I'm gonna just cut this short but the word church, ecclesia, it means called out. Well the idea is called out from what right? What are we called out from? We're not our own but but we've been bought by the precious blood of Jesus Christ and we're to be salt and light and so one of the things we want to directly challenge each other about is are we encouraging each other towards holiness.

It's one thing to gather, it's one thing to just have conversation, but are we encouraging each other towards holiness? And we live in the 21st century in America. And there's so many things, you know, when you look in Pilgrim's Progress, There's a place in Pilgrim's Progress where Christian, he's going along his journey, and he comes to a place called the Enchanted Ground. If you've read it, you might remember this. And what happened to him there?

Unlike any other place along the journey, there were no lions there, right? There were no pits, no valleys, no dangers. But what happened to Christian as he reached the enchanted ground? He fell asleep. He fell asleep when he shouldn't have fallen asleep.

And this often happens. We live in an environment right now where there's not a lot of persecution or trouble right now. And there's this idea of false security. And Christians are tempted to fall asleep. And maybe some of us have even fallen asleep.

You know, this is what J.C. Rowell says. He says, the worst chains are the ones which are neither felt nor seen by the prisoner. Are you chained? Are you drifting towards the world?

Well, the beauty of the church is when you see that, you have a duty as a brother or sister in love to maybe put your arm around someone or awaken them and call them to holiness in a way that's becoming, in a way that's encouraging, not self-righteously of course, right? But if you look at all the churches down through the ages, look at the seven churches in Asia, not one of them was persecuted out of existence. That rarely, rarely happens. Even in hard countries, the church is rarely persecuted out of existence. What happens?

The church drifts out of existence. It loses its salt and it goes away. So when you go to Asia Minor today in Turkey or wherever, you're not gonna find those churches around. But it wasn't because of persecution, it was because of worldliness. And we have a duty toward one another to warn each other and to be careful to love one another in this way as well.

We say in our church covenant, we will abstain from gluttony, drunkenness, illicit drugs, materials, entertainments, or practical things which jeopardize our own or another's faith. Well, the last duty that we have is to be a theologian and it's really helpful when we think about how much of a remedy this is against false teachers and wolves coming into the church to be like those of Berea and Ephesus where we actually know what we believe, and we can have a grasp of it. There's this overarching design that we have in the Bible, and we're to know what that is. What is the entire redemptive history? That's not just for the elders or even the deacons or just a few people to know, but we should all become acquainted with that.

We should all become acquainted with, you know, our statement of faith. What do we say that we believe and why? Even being acquainted with the Second London Baptist Confession, that's also important as well. And what that does is it helps build doctrinal unity and helps us avoid needless disputes because a lot of the battles that have been fought all the way down through the ages are captured in things like our Second London Baptist Confession or our statement of faith and so it provides a really good context or parameter for us to understand the doctrine of God. And it's not just to fill our heads with knowledge, but it's to get to know God better at the end of the day.

And so that's really, those are the duties that we have one toward another. And so I hope that we get out of this, that church membership is not just this idea of having an accurate church role. That's not really the goal, but it's a congregation of committed, engaged believers, committed to God on the one side and committed to one another where we're so close in heart, going the same way. And when one is weak and struggling we have other brothers and sisters that can help us and carry us on forward. One thing that's amazing is that when you look at most of the commands of God, they're interlinked.

In other words, you can't please God without serving your brother or sister. That's how God has set this up. You can't even be forgiven for your sins unless you're willing to forgive those who have sinned against you. And so the church militant below will one day be the church glorious above. But while we're here, storm-tossed, what a blessing, what a beautiful thing he has given us in giving us a local church body where we can lock arms and go forward for the advancement of his kingdom the church is really the dearest place on earth when you think about it.

Compare it to anything else. It has its flaws, it has its faults, but it is the dearest place on earth. And I'm thankful, I'm sure many of us are thankful that God has joined us and brought us to fellow brothers and sisters that want to serve God. I'm so thankful for this place as well. And so all, the conclusion is, all that have given themselves and bound themselves to Christ should also bind themselves to a local church body.

Amen. Let's pray. Father, we do thank you for your great work. Lord, this concept of the Church, these local bodies that are scattered all over the globe, and here we are in one here, Lord, in Wake Forest. How thankful we are, Father, that you have set your love upon us and you've saved us, but Lord, you've joined us to fellow brothers and sisters.

Thank you, Lord, for this great and wonderful design of the church and this idea that Lord we can covenant with one another for the advancing of your kingdom on the earth for the benefit of one another and for your glory. Father we are so glad so glad that you've you've called us Lord help us to be a church that walks in your way and is committed to you above all, but also committed to one another in love. Father, fill our hearts with that we pray in Jesus name Amen.