Is church membership biblical?

• The New Testament uses the word “church” to refer to both “the church universal” and “the church local”.  Many times someone will say something like “one church, one membership”, meaning that the NT uses the word “church” to refer to all Christians and therefore all Christians are inherently members of the one, true church.  It is definitely true that “church” in the NT sometimes means “all Christians” (Matt 16:18, etc).  However, the dominant usage of the word “church” in the NT refers to “local churches” – distinct, organized, and identifiable bodies of Christians with specific marks and practices.  If this weren’t the case, you wouldn’t find any results for the plural word “churches” when you searched the New Testament.

• Acts 2 and 4 give numeric records of the number of people saved and baptized, showing that the church was apparently tracking growth.

• Acts 6 depicts an election taking place to address a specific problem in a specific church.  It’s obviously implied in the text that this is a clearly identified group of people functioning as an organized body.

• 1 Timothy 5:3-16 depicts the church’s practice on how to handle widows who couldn’t care for themselves.  There are specific criteria laid out for who qualifies and who doesn’t and how to approach them. The church at Ephesus is clearly organized – to the point of keeping formalized lists and rolls – and is working out a plan.

• If church membership isn’t assumed in the NT, who (specifically) are you supposed to submit to and who will pastors (specifically) give an account for?  To me, Hebrews 13:7 highlights the most clear reason why it’s impossible to obey the NT without being a member of a local church.  It says, “Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls, as those who will give an account.”  To steal two sentences from Matt Chandler: “If there is no biblical requirement to formally belong to a local church, then which leaders should an individual Christian obey and submit to?  Second, and most important, who will I as a pastor give an account for?”  Without clear, committed church membership this command (and the dozens of others like it) cannot be obeyed on either end.

• Commands for church discipline assume (and necessitate) clear, formal church membership.  Many passages in the NT refer to church discipline, but none as clearly as 1 Corinthians 5.  In this church there was a man who was refusing to repent of sleeping with his stepmom… seriously. Here’s Paul’s command to the elders of this local church: “Let him who has done this be removed from among you… When you are assembled in the name of the Lord Jesus and my spirit is present, with the power of our Lord Jesus, 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.”  Later his command to the church body is, “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. For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge?”  Think about this for a second: How are you supposed to kick someone “out” if there isn’t an “in”?  If Paul isn’t assuming that members of this church are formally recognized by the church body, the elders, and the unrepentant sinner then this passage literally cannot be carried out.  How are elders supposed to know who’s part of the body (and may be in need of discipline) and who’s an onlooker that’s not under their care and authority?  How are people supposed to come under that care and authority?  The only answer is that this (and dozens of other passages) assumes church membership.

A common objection

Over the last three years this has probably been the most common objection-ish response to church membership:

“I’m already functioning like a member; why do I have to come to a class or sign a paper?”  

To cut to the point, my generation is riddled with authority and commitment issues and this objection is a reflection of those issues.  Consider this: the same person who asks me this question will probably walk out of church, buy a $6 lunch with a credit card at a Mexican restaurant, and have no qualms whatsoever about signing a receipt to make that purchase official.  Their issue is clearly not with signing a piece of paper.  At the very least, it SEEMS LIKE their issue is with making a commitment official that establishes a spiritual authority over their life.

A final word