There is a move afoot to overhaul our understanding of what it means to be a Christian. This trend is only new insofar as it is now being spear-headed by professing believers, as opposed to secularists or religious antagonists. Exhibit A. I recently commented on a post in Patrol magazine (an ezine of art, culture and religion) entitled Christianity Without Qualifications in which the author hails a “new kind of Christianity,” one characterized by an “openness to differing perspectives,” where denominational affiliations are synthesized, if not completely discarded. The article concludes,
Part of the excitement about the new kind of Christianity is that we’re asked to move beyond definitions identifying certain kinds of Christianity to something that is both unifying and terrifyingly diverse.
Of course, being “unified” around something that is “terrifyingly diverse” is the equivalent of building a house on jello — there’s nothing to stand on. Nevertheless, this trend toward “Christianity without qualifications” is gaining momentum amongst many postmoderns. Which is why I found An Interview with Mark Driscoll on Doctrine so interesting. Driscoll is pastor at Mars Hill Church in Seattle, and one of the most influential ministers in America.
As the tree grows and the fruit increases, the roots need to sink deep as well. So, when our [church] attendance was at about six thousand people a few years ago, we did something unprecedented. We canceled out the membership of everyone in our church and I preached the Doctrine series for thirteen weeks. Each sermon was well over an hour and included me answering text-messaged questions from our people.
Those who made it through the entire series were interviewed, and those who evidenced true faith in Christ and signed our membership covenant were installed as new members. We had always had a high bar for membership, but I wanted to raise that bar higher as we pursued our goal of becoming, by God’s grace, a church of fifty thousand. In so doing, we lost about a thousand people, dropped to five thousand total, and missed budget for the first time in our church’s history. We then rebounded over the next few years to ten thousand people a week and as many as thirteen thousand on our peak weekend. We had pruned, which hurt, but then we harvested, which was healing. It’s not all about the numbers, and we were willing to lose a lot of people, but God proved that there is power in the gospel and that a people united around core biblical doctrine can be used by God to bear much fruit by grace.
If I’m not mistaken, the “new kind of Christianity” probably finds Driscoll’s “membership covenant” appalling. Instead of a “high bar for membership,” they would say, we need a “Christianity without qualifications,” more inclusion and less theological specificity. So while one group seeks to unite followers around our “terrifying diversity,” the other seeks to unite people “around core biblical doctrine.” These two approaches are indicative of our changing religious landscape and the tug-o-war taking place inside Christendom.
In my view, there are good arguments for and against a “high bar” for church membership. On the one hand, being a Christian means something and the Church does a disservice to interested parties by downplaying those demands or distinctives. After all, Jesus said the road to eternal life is narrow (Matt. 7:13-14) and cautioned His followers to count the cost (Lk. 14:25-34). “Christianity without qualifications” not only “broadens” the road, it cheapens the cost of discipleship. If anything, church membership should remind us about the parameters of the road we travel and the cost of staying on it.
On the other hand, the Church is called to love others, embrace others, and woo the world to her Savior. Requiring formal church membership is hardly an attractive evangelistic tool. In fact, Jesus did not hammer potential followers with doctrinal statements or a strict list of requirements. Which is one reason the religious establishment chafed against Him. Yes, once a person was on “the inside” things changed. There were communal, ethical, as well as theological expectations. Of course, most of these were seen as part of an ongoing growth spectrum. (After all, a thorough understanding of the Trinity, Justification by Faith, and Sanctification doesn’t happen overnight… if it happens at all!) For this reason, the creeds of Christendom served less to fire the Gospel than to nourish those who eventually embraced its message. So whatever church membership should be, it should not eclipse the magnanimous love of our Savior and impede one’s journey there.
All that said, I personally find more danger in an un-defined church membership than an overly-defined membership. If our aim is a “Christianity without qualifications,” the byproduct is something other than, well, Christianity. In the long run, the lower the bar, the potentially more unhealthy the church; the higher the bar, the better the Body.
So where do you stand? Should Christian churches have a “higher bar” for membership or require “less qualifications” for inclusion?
I’m with you, Mike. Keep the door open but the doctrine firmly in place. Some people like to re-create Jesus. Make Him into their best pal who’ll tolerate anything they do because, Man, He’s like Love, baby. It’s “all grace”. Well, He is Love. And Judgment. And Justice. And Truth. And Life. And the only Way to God. Narrow entrance with arms open. And Grace has never been an enabler for sin. The apostate church comes out of this makeover of Jesus (and God in general) and leads to eternal death.
I’m completely with you. Keep the doors wide open to seekers. Share with them freely and openly. But keep the bar for membership in the church high. There needs to be a difference between church membership and church outreach.
I also don’t have a problem with people attending a church and not joining, although hopefully they will be drawn to join a church at some point.
But if you want to actually join the church and get involved in it, the bar should be set high.
I am fine with a high church membership. I am fine with the people in a church wanting to make sure your life is genuine before they grant you membership. I don’t have a problem with that, it is probably a good thing. But, I do have a problem with what Driscoll did and I can’t believe people aren’t taking him to task for. Nowhere does the bible allow you to simply cancel the membership of the people in your church. That shows complete lack of pastoral oversight. You don’t grow the local church as big as possible than seek to to get rid of the ungodly so you can grow again. You should be providing Pastoral oversight and be dealing with sin issues in your members as they arise. If someone is being unrepentant then you go through the proper channels outlined in the bible. You go to them alone, then bring a few witnesses, and finally take it to the church. If need be the church excommunicates the brother or sister in hopes that they will come to repentance. That is how you lovingly deal with the members of your church. This is how you care for souls instead of just trying to grow as big a possible.
The bible tells you how to deal with these issues. It doesn’t leave you up to just deciding on a whim how to handle them. You can’t just decide to start over and toss everyone out. It doesn’t work that way.
Im not normally a Driscoll basher. I don’t really listen to him much so it doesn’t affect me. But the fact that this is being seen as a good thing is just scary to me.
BTW, this isn’t a knock on this blog. I’ve just first heard of Driscoll doing this and I haven’t seen anyone commenting on how unbiblical it is.
Mark, I appreciate your comments… and your passion! I’m not sure there’s anything in the Bible that would restrict a pastor from doing what Driscoll did. He didn’t kick anyone out of the church. He just re-emphasized and re-upped what it meant to be a member in his church. The gist I got was that some people opted out and/or did not agree with the doctrinal push and left. But I don’t get the sense that he did this just “to get rid of the ungodly so [the church could] grow again.” He did it for a healthier church, not a bigger one.
I don’t know what Driscoll’s policy on non-committed “members” is, but with these more stringent guidelines, I would be interested in how he navigates the member / non-member gap. I can’t imagine they don’t allow visitors or “fringe” regulars just because they haven’t signed a membership covenant.
Hi Mike. Thank you for writing this article. I think this is an issue that is good and healthy for the church to think and discuss. I am going to chew on what you have written here because it is helping me see this issue from some different angles. I have to be very careful with what I say here because I don’t want to be guilty of slandering a brother in Christ (Driscoll). Which, I may have misunderstood the exact issue, and if so, I’ll repent of it.
I think I can see why Driscoll did what he did. If you take a non-confessional elder led church, which I assume his is, and the elders decide that they want the members to be more unified around more detailed doctrine. What do you do? I guess one thing you could do is “cancel” everyones membership and start over. Which, Driscoll said that they did “cancel” all’s memberships and if anyone wanted to become a “new” member you had to be interviewed by the elders and subscribe to the new church covenant. Now the question is. Is this biblical and is it wise. I don’t know yet. Something good for me to ponder.
If a church feels as though it needs to have membership, then yes, it would seem that having a strong doctrinal stand is good. At the very least, people know what they’re supporting financially if it’s laid out for them that clearly.
But honestly, I find the idea of “church membership” to be barely biblical. Being a Christian is very, very simple. Church membership is very, very complicated. At this church you have to believe X. At the next, X is considered unbiblical. And at the next, X is okay, but not really important. So who is right? Is it the church that makes it a requirement, the church that makes it optional or the church that thinks it’s sinful?
I don’t think Driscoll is wrong. I personally just think that church membership itself is what’s wrong. So yeah, I’d probably be one of those “new Christianity” types. ;-D
Thanks for commenting, Alise. I agree that the concept of “church membership” is fairly squishy. The heart of the issue, I think, is the biblical terms of inclusion in the Body of Christ. The Bible simply does not describe everyone as being “in Christ.” So what does it mean to be a follower of Jesus, to embrace sound doctrine, and to be on “the narrow road”? Any Christian church should have some parameters, whether publicly “enforced” or not, regarding these crucial issues. Without these “parameters” the term “Christian church” really doesn’t mean anything. Thanks for visiting!
I guess the whole “sound doctrine” thing is where I get hung up. When Jesus summed up the whole law in “love God, love your neighbors,” that’s just not that complicated. Is what I’m doing loving? Or is it serving some other purpose?
IMO, the narrow road is simply Jesus Christ. But beyond that, I tend to think that there is much more freedom. Like I said, I’ve just been down so many different “narrow roads” in various churches that it doesn’t really mean much to me any more. I mean, look at something like speaking in tongues. For some churches, initial evidence is a requirement for membership. And in others, speaking in tongues would be considered a BAD thing. And in still others, it’s nothing – you can do it or not, we don’t really care. So which path is the “right” one?
Again, as far as an individual church goes, I think having that laid out very plainly is a good thing. It’s why I don’t really have a problem with an individual church having a high bar for membership. But as for membership in the Body of Christ, I think that once we’re through the “Christ door” (to put it very crudely), I think a lot of what we call doctrinal issues become more “what personally appeals to me” issues.
Thanks for posting your link over a Rachel’s blog! Looking forward to reading more here! (Also, sorry if I sound snarky and mean — I’m not really!)