Wednesday, August 31, 2011

Iran: another pastor charged; Also: Taliban torture

Pastor Matthias Haghnejad

IRAN –Pastor Matthias Haghnejad, of the evangelical Church of Iran was arrested Aug. 17 while making a pastoral visit. Earlier this year he was arrested, charged, and acquitted with ten others for “activities against the order.” He previously arrested in 2006.  

Haghnejad was charged with blasphemy against Islam, a capital offense, and was held without attorney access or family contact in a secret location. A family member has pledged his property, and he was released on US$30,000 bail Aug. 27, but he is in deep trouble. 

Pray that Matthias will have grace, strength, clarity, and wisdom as the Iranian regime now seeks to break him. Pray for peace for his wife and daughter. Meanwhile, Pastor Youcef Nadarkhani remains in prison awaiting the re-examination of his case for apostasy. Please continue to hold up both men in prayer for their safety, strength, and courage in the face of suffering. 

AFGHANISTAN Afghan Christians and Jews are seen as infidels by al-Qaeda and the Taliban. They are viewed as agents of the FBI or CIA, are tortured and interrogated inhumanely, and finally slaughtered with a sharp-edged dagger or with the iron wire from the tires of motorcycles or cars. 

Another method of torture is to tie them in an iron chair while three or four candles burning beneath the chair roast their buttocks and flesh. The torture is designed to force them to confess crimes they haven't committed and disclose, under duress, that they were agents of the FBI or CIA. The torture and murders are videoed and posted on Islamic websites. Pray for protection of Afghan Christians and Jews.

Source: http://assistnews.net; http://presenttruthmin.org

Thursday, August 25, 2011

Armor for those we love

Stand up, stand up for Jesus,/ Stand in His strength alone;
The arm of flesh will fail you,/ Ye dare not trust your own;
Put on the gospel armor,/ Each piece put on with prayer;
Where duty calls, or danger,/ Be never wanting there.

One of the best things we can do for a friend or family member undergoing a hard time is to shut up and intercede for them before the Throne, surround them with prayer and let God handle the battle. Remember the stragglers, the weak, and the tired ones who are not in close step with God’s people are easy prey for the enemies of God (Deuteronomy 25:17-18).

Sometimes those we love are blindsided with problems or hammered by a financial hit or overwhelmed with temptation or plagued with poor decisions. Armoring those we love helps them stand in the Lord’s strength.

Ephesians 6:10-18 is a classic passage of standing in battle. Paul stresses four times the importance of standing strong and firm in God’s mighty power – a continuing standing and keep-on-standing way of life. Paul concludes with a command to pray in the Spirit on all occasions and with all kind so prayers and requests (Ephesians 6:18). 

The great Puritan writer William Gurnall, who wrote the classic The Christian in Complete Armour, warns, “Christian, take special care not to trust in the armour of God, but in the God of the armour. All your weapons are only ‘mighty through God’ (2 Cor. 10:4).” Pray that your loved ones will trust in the God of the Armour.

A model for praying on the armor for those we love:

Father, I thank you, for my loved one ______. I ask you to cover ______ in the complete armor of Christ. Make ______ strong in the Lord and in Your mighty power (Ephesians 6:10) so they can stand against the wiles of the devil (Ephesians 6:11). 
  • Clothe ______ in your belt of truth which keeps ______ from deception. Let them walk in Your light of truth. Remove from them all lies, untruthfulness, denial, and deceptions. Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life (John 14:6). Set ______ free in your truth (Ephesians 6:14a).

  • Cover ______’s heart in your breastplate of righteousness. Jesus is our righteousness (1 Cor. 1:29). You, Lord, are complete in everything for ______’s life to provide all that is needed at this time in their deepest being, emotionally, spiritually, and mentally. Keep ______’s heart pure before You (Ephesians 6:14b).

  • In your shoes prepared by gospel truth, guide ______ into paths of peace in their own heart and soul, as well as with others. Let them leave peace wherever they go. Jesus is our peace (Ephesians 2:14), and let them find their complete well-being and wholeness (Ephesians 6:15).

  • With the shield of faith in Christ Jesus, give ______ great faith. Help them understand that you have begun a good work in them and you will complete it for your Name’s sake. You are working all things for their good and Your glory. By Your mighty power, do not let fiery darts of fear or doubt, accusation or discouragement find their mark (Ephesians 6:16).

  • Cover ______ in the helmet of salvation to protect their mind. Take their thoughts captive (2 Corinthians 10:5) and make them obey the truth of Your Word. Let them act in harmony with the mind of Christ (Ephesians 6:17a).

  • By the mighty Sword of the Spirit, minister to all ______’s needs and give ______ direction or rebuke, discernment and encouragement through your inerrant and powerful Word (2 Timothy 3:16; Hebrews 4:12). Call to ______’s mind Your precious promises. Cut through and break all the plans of the enemy, his strongholds, lies he wants them to believe, and every thought set up against the truth of God (2 Corinthians 10:4-5; Ephesians 6:17b).

  • Help ______ to stand against the enemy at all times in prayer and praise. Fill ______ with confidence that out of the riches of Christ, You are filling every need in their family, finances, physical health, strength, and all that touches them.
We praise (or call on) You that the walls around ______ are salvation, and the gates before them are praise (Isaiah 60:18). Pour your peace and praise into their life like a river (Isaiah 66:12). Let ______’s testimony of Your provision be a thankful overflow from a heart filled with praise, because You are the fullness of all that they are and have. In Jesus holy Name we pray, Amen.
Adapted from Sylvia Gunter, Prayer Essentials for Living in His Presence (Birmingham, AL: Father’s Business, 2000), vol. 1, 201-296.

Sunday, August 21, 2011

Nehemiah 13:1-14 - Giving: Important Things to Remember

Opening thought
Some people don’t like a preacher to talk about money from the pulpit.  In the Bible, there are 40 verses on baptism, 275 verses on prayer, 350 verses on faith, 650 verses on love -- and 2,350 verses that relate specifically to finances and material possessions.[1]
Two men were marooned on an Island. One man paced back and forth, worried and scared while the other man sat back and started sunning himself.  The first man said to the second man, "Aren’t you afraid we are about to die?" "No," said the second man, "I make $100,000 a week and I tithe faithfully to my church every week. My pastor will find me."
Contextual Notes:
Nehemiah rebuilding JerusalemImage via Wikipedia
Nehemiah rebuilding the Wall
Nehemiah, one of the greatest leaders in the Bible, had pulled off the building of the city walls of Jerusalem in fifty-two days – unbelievable.  After a 12-year tour of duty as governor of Judea, Nehemiah returned in 433 BC to report to Artaxerxes on his work (Nehemiah 2:6; 13:6). While he was gone, the people gradually abandoned their “binding agreement” to obey carefully God’s Torah (Neh. 10:28-39).
Upon returning for a second term as governor, Nehemiah was shocked to find how much Israel’s obedience had deteriorated.  The high priest Eliashib (by now an elderly man, Ezra 10:6), had given guest quarters in the Temple complex (Neh 13:4-5) to no less than the infamous Tobiah the Ammonite, the enemy who had threatened war on Israel for rebuilding the wall! (Eliashib’s granddaughter had married Tobiah the Ammonite’s son.) He also learns that services at the Temple have been abandoned because God’s tithes had not been paid, and the Levites who served at the Temple have been forced to go back to their farms in order to survive (Neh. 13:10-14). The people are working on Sabbath (Neh. 13:15-22), and marrying foreign wives (Neh. 13:23-31). It was a common ancient practice to store valuables in a temple complex. It is the origin of banking in the ancient world.
Key Truth: Nehemiah wrote Nehemiah 13:1-14 to explain to believers how God works through obedience in giving, to invest resources, tithe regularly, and
Key Application: Today I want to show you what God’s Word says about giving.
Pray and Read:  Nehemiah 13:1-14

Sermon Points:
1.   Invest resources for Kingdom benefit (Neh 13:1-9).
2.   Tithe regularly for Kingdom benefit (Neh 13:10-12).
3.   Entrust resources to Kingdom people (Neh 13:13).
4.   Cover all giving in prayer and viewpoint of eternity (Neh 13:14).

Exposition:   Note well,

1.   INVEST RESOURCES FOR KINGDOM BENEFIT (Neh. 13:1-9).
a.   The people had heard the Law read (Neh. 8:1-8) from Deuteronomy 23:3-6 that because the Ammonites and Moabites had refused them access (Num. 22:22-24) to their resources to cross to enter the Promised Land hundreds of years before, that none of them would be permitted in the assembly (Neh. 13:2; Ezra 8:29).  (Unless of course, like Ruth the Moabitess, you choose to follow the Lord.) Deuteronomy 23:3-6:  3 No Ammonite or Moabite or any of his descendants may enter the assembly of the LORD, even down to the tenth generation. 4 For they did not come to meet you with bread and water on your way when you came out of Egypt, and they hired Balaam son of Beor from Pethor in Aram Naharaim to pronounce a curse on you. 5 However, the LORD your God would not listen to Balaam but turned the curse into a blessing for you, because the LORD your God loves you. 6 Do not seek a treaty of friendship with them as long as you live.
b.   Nehemiah found that resources were being used to benefit someone personally at the Temple, that resources were not being invested to honor the Lord. And benefits were being accrued even to Tobiah, an enemy of the very Temple in which he lived for free! Nehemiah did not hesitate. He did not seek an intermediate solution. He did not compromise. Nehemiah had a Kingdom mindset and was not going to compromise by allowing the personal benefit of an enemy of God’s people to continue. Reform the way the church spends money and reform the church.
c.   Nehemiah’s action is a foretaste of Jesus’ cleansing of the Temple (Matthew 21:12-13): 12Jesus entered the temple area and drove out all who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves. 13"It is written," he said to them, “'My house will be called a house of prayer,'[a] but you are making it a 'den of robbers.'[b]
d.   ILLUSTRATION: Indulgences to pay out of purgatory. When the Catholic Church needed money for building projects re: rebuilding St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome, Pope Leo X came up with a great funding strategy.  In 1517, they began selling indulgences, certificates which cut your time in purgatory, a pre-Hell holding pen of fire and torture in which you can get a second chance at heaven. Want to pay your way out? Want to pay Mama’s way out? Want to pay your wayward child’s way out?  Buy Indulgences!  Various indulgences would pay you out from several years to 10,000 years. The aggressive marketing practices of Johann Tetzel in promoting this cause provoked Martin Luther to write his 95 theses, protesting what he saw as the purchase and sale of salvation. According to tradition, he nailed these theses to a church door in Wittenberg.Martin Luther went back to Scripture and found that we are justified by faith alone, not by paying our way out of an imaginary purgatory.  From this controversy the Protestant Reformation was launched.
e.   APPLICATION: We must spend funds on Kingdom priorities. We will be audited at the Judgment.
f.    The Church’s Squandering of Resources: Today, 85% of every dollar given in a church offering stays at that church. Is that missions? In 2000, 97 dollars of every 100 of the entire income ($269.61B) of all Christian organizations was spent on, and primarily benefited, other Christians at home or abroad: spent on ministering to Christians, $2.90 ($7.8B) on already-evangelized non-Christians, and 3 cents ($0.81B) on unevangelized non-Christians,[2] in 2010 that has dropped to 2 cents.[3]
2.   TITHE REGULARLY FOR THE KINGDOM’S BENEFIT (Neh 13:10-12).
a.   Services at the Temple had been abandoned. The Levites and priests had to feed their families, so when the people stopped tithing, the funding ran out, and they had to find other work farming or otherwise. (Neh 13:10). Nehemiah rebuked the officials (Neh. 13:11), restored the sacred duties and reintroduced the practice of tithing (Neh. 13:12).
b.   ILLUSTRATION: I like the old story about the guy who came to church with his family. As they were driving home afterwards he was complaining about everything. He said, “The music was too loud. The sermon was too long. The announcements were unclear. The building was hot. The people were unfriendly.” He went on and on, complaining about virtually everything. Finally, his very observant son said, “Dad, you’ve got to admit it wasn’t a bad show for just a dollar.” Isn’t that reality? It seems the ones who give the most complain the least and vice-versa. When it comes to giving, some people stop at nothing.
c.   APPLICATION: The Church’s Great Storehouse of Wealth. In 2000, American evangelicals collectively made $2.66 trillion in income.[4] Total Christian [including nominal] income in the United States is $5.2 trillion annually, nearly half of the world’s total Christian income.[5] The average donation church member in 2000 who attend U.S. Protestant churches was about $17 a week.[6] The average amount of money given by a full or confirmed member of a U.S. Christian church in 2004 was $691.93. This comes to an average of $13.31 per week.[7] Only 1/3 to ½ of church attenders give anything at all.[8]
d.   Among church members of 11 primary Protestant denominations (or their historical antecedents) in the United States and Canada, per-member giving as a percentage of income was lower in 2000 than in either 1921 or 1933. In 1921, per-member giving as a percentage of income was 2.9 percent. In 1933, at the depth of the Great Depression, per-member giving grew to 3.3 percent. By 2000, after a half-century of unprecedented prosperity, giving had fallen to 2.6 percent.[9]
e.   Overall, only 3 to 5 percent of Americans who donate money to a church tithe (give a tenth of) their incomes, though many more claim to do so.[10] Thirty-three percent of U.S. born-again Christians say it is impossible for them to get ahead in life because of the financial debt they have incurred.[11]
f.    The Potential for Funding the Harvest: If members of historically Christian churches in the United States had raised their giving to the Old Testament’s minimum standard of giving (10 percent of income) in 2004, an additional $164 billion a year would become available.[12] Eighty percent of the world’s evangelical wealth is in North America—and the total represents much more than enough to fund the fulfillment of the Great Commission.[13]
g.   Tithing as a practice continues to decline.
“The proportion of households that tithe their income to their church—that is, give at least ten percent of their income to that ministry—has dropped by 62% in the past year, from 8% in 2001 to just 3% of adults during 2002. Born again adults, who represent 38% of the nation’s population, also sustained a decline in generosity during the past couple of years. In 2000, 12% of all born again adults tithed. The percentage rose to 14% in 2001, but dropped to only 6% in 2002. Reasons for this decline include concern about financial security, fear about terrorism, failure of parents to pass along this practice to their children, the Catholic church’s pedophilia scandal,
the rise of para-church ministries and the rapid growth of Hispanics, very few of whom give generously to their churches.[14]
h.   20-35% of church attendee giving records are blank ($0 of recorded offerings given). In 1999, ~$3 billion was given to 600 Christian mission agencies, $60B to local churches.  Compare this to $58 billion for soda products, $24 billion in jewelry store sales, $8 billion for movies theaters, $13 billion for chocolate products, $38 billion in vending machine sales, $11 billion for comp/video games, $7 billion greeting cards, $23 billion for toys, $91 billion in lawn/garden industry, $40 billion for pets, $60B on weight-loss.[15]
3.   ENTRUST KINGDOM RESOURCES TO RELIABLE PEOPLE (Neh. 13:13).
a.   Nehemiah appointed four reliable men to be in charge of the storerooms where they were made responsible for distributing the supplies to their brothers.
b.   No one person without accountability should ever have control of the finances in a church. There must be checks and balances. There must be accountability.
c.   It seems sometimes like the church has a hard time spelling the word prophet/profit.
d.   Mark Murnan, a criminal defense investigator, says that many Christians fail to heed Jesus’ admonition to be “wise as serpents” (Matthew 10:16). As a result, scams such as Financial Federated and Baptist Foundation of America have swindled Christians of billions of dollars. Using examples of past religion-based scams, Murnan points to five common elements of fraud: promises of high returns over a short period, recruitment of fellow church members, appeals to Scripture, complicated explanation of the investment, and suspect phrases and tax strategies.
e.   Columnist J. Lee Grady writes of his growing sense of alarm over the financial practices of some within the charismatic circle. Citing examples of faith preachers with extravagant expenses and televised preachers who promise miracles and blessings for donors, Grady says “we've been taken hostage by what I call the charismatic cartel.” He asks his readers to “boycott those who are turning God's house into a den of thieves.”
4.   COVER ALL GIVING IN PRAYER AND VIEWPOINT OF ETERNITY (Neh. 13:14).
a.   Remember: Heb zakar – not only mental activity but behavior appropriate to memory. Nehemiah asks God to remember him not b/c God forgets, but instead to request Him to respond in an appropriate fashion. He is expressing faith that God will reward him. Nehemiah turns in prayer to God, his signature leadership characteristic, not seeking glory for himself, but rather seeking to serve God with all his heart.
b.   ILLUSTRATION: Ann Landers had an interesting letter in her column once. It was from a girl who wrote about her aunt and uncle. She said, "My uncle was the tightest man I’ve ever known. All his life, every time he got paid he took $20 out of his paycheck & put it under his mattress.  Then he got sick & was about to die. As he was dying, he said to his wife, "I want you to promise me one thing." "Promise what?" she asked. "I want you to promise me that when I’m dead you’ll take my money from under the mattress & put it in my casket so that I can take it all with me."  The girl’s letter went on with the story. "He died, & his wife kept her promise. She went in & got all that money the day he died & went to the bank & deposited it, and wrote out a check and put it in his casket."
INVITATION:

[1] Brian Kluth, “Twenty Financial and Generosity Facts Impacting Churches,” http://www.kluth.org/church/20%20Financial%20and%20Generosity%20Fast%20Facts2.pdf
[7] John Ronsvalle and Sylvia Ronsvalle, The State of Church Giving through 2004: Will We Will? 16th ed. (Champaign, Ill.: Empty Tomb, 2006), 17.
[8] The United Methodist Foundation of Los Angeles, Money and Religion, rpt. in “Lifestyle Stewardship: Learning the Freedom of Generous Giving,” Alliance Life (January 2001), 13.
[15] Source: Empty Tomb Research, www.kluth.org

Friday, August 19, 2011

Church discipline: Practically recovering regenerate church membership

Part of a series on the church. 

Matthew 18:15-20. When we mention church discipline, we often get the picture in our minds of kicking somebody out of the church because the church members think they are ‘holier than thou,’ but church discipline is actually a system based on Matt. 18:15-20, ordained by Jesus, to lovingly restore believers to a vital relationship with Jesus Christ and to foster harmony among the body of Christ.

We need to recover the practice of church discipline. Changing our baptism and church membership policies should greatly reduce the need for church-wide discipline. The Biblical basis for church discipline is abundant: Matthew 15:15-18; 1 Corinthians 5:1-12; 2 Corinthians 2:5-11; Galatians 6:1; 2 Thessalonians 3:6; 1 Timothy 1:20; Titus 3:10

Historically, the Catholic Church lost the practice, but some of the Reformers called it a mark of a true church. Anabaptists were strict on discipline, including shunning former members. Early Baptists did not practice shunning, but discipline was common for moral violations and doctrinal error. Between 1845 and 1900, SBC churches disciplined 1.3 million members and expelled around 650,000, but the practice disappeared by 1950. “No one urged its neglect, and nearly all agreed that it should be restored. But they failed to see that they had embraced new commitments incompatible with church discipline.”

Several changes in church and society led to the decline of church discipline in the late 19th and early 20th centuries: (1) a growing American individualism which eroded the authority of the church, (2) the decline of doctrinal teaching on sin and depravity of man replaced by an evolutionary model of the goodness of human nature as not needing discipline, (3) general secularization of values, as churches adapted to culture and adopted principles of business, emphasizing numerical growth, (4) a crippling of church discipline being practiced with harsh, legalistic, punitive, and judgmental ways. 

Instead, churches (1) looked for ways to gain new members and keep them coming and happy, (2) redefined what it meant to be Baptist to focus on individual freedom and undermining the church’s authority “to judge belief and behavior,” (3) changed the churches mission to include curing social ills at the expense of communicating the Gospel, which secularized the churches. By the beginning of the 20th century, discipline in Baptist churches had become uncommon. Today it is very rare.

In order to restore discipline to the church, pastors should teach from Scripture on these ideas from Matthew 18 and other places. Congregations may want to place a brief statement in their by-laws or constitution of their understanding of Biblical church discipline, stating that it is not punitive but restorative for the individual and protective for the church, and stating that what calls for church discipline is not grave sin, but sin that the sinner refuses to admit and repent of. 

Discipline is not for the weak person who falls and is repentant, but for the rebellious one who denies his sin or refuses to repent. Further, it should be emphasized that exclusion from voting/Lord’s Supper should be only a last option, only exercised after repeated attempts to win over the offender, after prayer and love have been extended. It should never be hasty, but only after all other attempts at Matthew 18 are exhausted. It should never be final, but always open and hopeful that repentance will come and the offender welcomed back. In fact, we want the offender to continue to come to church where he may hear the Word of God and repent, but the exclusion extend to communion and voting at least.

Which sins should be a matter of church discipline? The only guideline that Scripture gives is the sin that one refuses to acknowledge as sin. It is wisdom to further limit exclusion to matters affecting the church, either its reputation in the community (sins of public knowledge) or its unity (sins that disrupt fellowship between two or more members) or doctrine (a member’s teaching or advocating unscriptural doctrine). But that matter should only come to exclusion after repeated attempts to resolve the issue in other ways have failed.

Is restoring the doctrine of regenerate church membership worth the trouble? It was the quest for a pure church that brought Baptists into being 400 years ago. Regenerate church membership is the Baptist mark of the church.


Thursday, August 18, 2011

Training at Baptism: Practically recovering regenerate church membership

"So, Mr. Tom, tell us why you think you're old enough."
Another area to help with regenerate church membership is a period of examination before and training after baptism. Examination is probing to understand if a person truly understands salvation and has submitted himself to Christ Jesus

Training is the initial disciple-making that is supposed to take place and is the church’s responsibility to provide. Examination and training were common in North Carolina Baptist churches a century ago, and continue to be important in other parts of the world today. Young children are one area to consider. 

As late as the early 1800s, during the tenure of the famous Richard Furman as pastor of First Baptist Church of Charleston, SC, children were carefully taught the church’s catechism, but “the greatest care was exercised in guarding against premature professions of piety.” Among earlier Baptists, the supposed conversion of someone under age 16-18 was considered unusual at best and more often suspect. Believer’s baptism was seen as synonymous with adult baptism. 

Baptism of children is rare among Baptists worldwide. The United States is the exception. Today, Baptists in Romania, Ukraine, Brazil, France, and nearly everywhere except the American South expect to baptize their young people no earlier than age 14.

In many of our Southern Baptist churches, while we do not practice infant baptism, we do practice toddler baptism. Between 1996 and 1993, baptisms of children under 6 years of age tripled. Recently, the only age group among Southern Baptists showing an increase in baptisms was preschoolers, a statistic not even kept until 1966. Certainly many had a genuine conversion, but many baptized as young children have never experienced a redeemed life. How do we know? 

We know because of the disturbing numbers of re-baptisms. A 1993 survey by the old Home Mission Board found that of adult baptisms (age 18+) in SBC churches, 3 of every 5 had been previously baptized. Some of course were coming from previous traditions, but 36% of all adults baptized in SBC churches in 1993 had been previously baptized in SBC churches. 

This is heinous. More than one third of those previously baptized Southern Baptists asked for re-baptism because they had just experienced conversion. It seems we are guilty of prematurely baptizing people, especially children, without insuring that they understand the gospel and are indeed responding to the leading of the Holy Spirit to submit themselves to Jesus Christ.

So what is a minimum age at which a child can be truly saved? That answer is impossible, but there is cognitive information in the Gospel that is beyond preschoolers’ concrete thinking skills. Art Murphy, Children’s Pastor at FBC, Orlando, says that “we have found that most children who make that decision under the age of 7 tend to need to make another decision later” and points to the high numbers of rebaptisms as evidence. Some people place a lot of emphasis on the age of 12. It is the age at which Jesus assumed spiritual responsibility (Luke 2:49); it seems to be the age at which Paul saw one as spiritually accountable (Rom. 7:9), what used to be called the age of accountability. It is the age of bar mitzvah and confirmation in paedobaptist churches). It is within the age-range that many developmental psychologists say significant cognitive abilities blossom. It was the age of conversion mentioned overwhelmingly in a Southern Baptist survey (more mentioned 12 than 11 and 13 combined; overall 67% were converted between 7 and 16).

How do we deal with a child age 4 or 5 who might come forward, who have asked Jesus into their hearts, and who are requesting baptism and church membership? First of all, we should encourage that child. At FBC, Dallas, young children making professions of faith are a cause for celebration that the Holy Spirit is at work in that child, but there is no hard conclusion drawn conversion has occurred nor that they should be immediately baptized. They take the attitude that the child has taken an important step in their relationship with Jesus, and a time is planned with the parents to further counsel the child.

God can move at any age in a person, but when does the church certify that? The church is in no way hurting him or keeping him from obedience. If his conversion was indeed genuine, then there is nothing the church can do to damage his salvation. If on the other hand, the church baptizes the child and receives him into church membership without a genuine conversion, then the church has hurt the child by providing a false sense of hope to him and his parents. Speaking as a pastor, usually it is the parents who want the pastor to do something who apply the pressure to baptize their child. The child is usually easily led in these circumstances. All the child wants is to be obedient to the Lord at that point. Here’s a rule of thumb: If a child is too young to read the church covenant, then he is probably too young to join the church!

Second, we need to be clear that salvation and baptism are separate issues. Salvation is God’s business, and he can save whomever he wants whenever he wants. Baptism is the responsibility of the church, and should occur only when the church has reason to believe that the one to be baptized has experienced salvation in Jesus Christ. Since baptism doesn’t complete salvation, there is no rush to baptize except to give a person freedom to partake in communion. Give the child’s commitment time to take root and grow and for the church to see evidence of new life in that little person. 

Third, some churches, like FBC Orlando, make baptism contingent on completing a four-week new Christian’s class and younger children are encouraged to grow and enroll in the class when they reach second grade. I don’t favor making baptism contingent on taking a class. In fact, I am growing in the idea that once converted one needs not to wait a long time to be baptized, but I like the idea of encouraging children to wait to be part of a new Christian’s class when they can, in fact, read the material presented to them! 

Some churches deal with that issue by baptizing children but adding other requirements to be a voting church member, such as age 16 or 18. Such a requirement seems to betray the idea that young children understand what they are doing. It doesn’t make sense that a congregation says a child can understand the most important decision of their lives at age 4 but they cannot understand how to vote on whether to pave the parking lot until they are 16.

Everyone who comes forward at an invitation should be warmly welcomed, but the church must take its responsibility seriously as a baptizing body. The church needs to have reason to believe the candidate for baptism is genuinely a believer. It is the church who decides who are to be church members, not the individuals coming forward. Christ Himself gave the church the competence and authority to make this decision, but we have exalted soul competence and neglected church competence. In order to make an intelligent vote on admitting someone to membership, they need some basis on which to vote.

Wednesday, August 17, 2011

Church Covenant: Practically recovering regenerate church membership

What can a church do practically to begin recovering regenerate church membership? There are three main ways: (1) Go back to the old practice of the church covenant, (2) Examination before and training after believer’s baptism, (3) Return to church discipline.

Church Covenant Church covenants have always been part of Baptist life from the beginning. It is a statement of the membership’s aims and its commitment to one another. It should be reaffirmed annually by every member, and read corporately at important times in church life, such as when the ordinances are celebrated. We find Nehemiah leading Judah to covenant together and reaffirm it (Nehemiah 9:38-10:39). 

Reaffirming the covenant gives churches a way to handle inactive members without the offense of the church taking action against them. We don’t want offense taken, but if they cannot participate enough for this, then they choose to exclude themselves.

Traditional Baptist Covenant (click to enlarge)
Some congregations handle it this way: If they do not affirm the church covenant by coming and signing it, then they are visited or contacted and urged to come and sign the church covenant as soon as possible. If they do not come, effort is made to determine why they have not come. This is a time of emphasizing restoration (“We really miss your presence at church”) or perhaps evangelism. The tone is gentle but insistent that being a Christian means following Christ, and that means participation in His Body. 

After a time of patient work, their membership status then comes before the church body to regard this person as a member “not in fellowship.” They make it clear that this does not affect their salvation, nor that they will shun them, but that they will try now to win them back into fellowship. It is a call for special attention to be given to loving and praying for them. It is a way to say that membership means something in the church. It encourages a committed, participating membership.

Our church has a policy that does nearly the same thing. One year of absence from services means that member is moved to an inactive list in which they lose their voting rights on church matters. The deficiency in our policy is that we do not emphasize enough their restoration to fellowship, and our love and prayer for them.

Tuesday, August 16, 2011

Recovering the Treasure of Regenerate Church Membership

(Part of a series this week)
Recovering the Lost Treasure – So how may we recover the doctrine of regenerate church membership?

Recover the Church’s Calling: First, we must remind the congregation of the church’s calling to purity. We must teach the Biblical necessity and importance of regenerate church membership. Since the day of Augustine (4thC AD), the ideal of a pure church had been abandoned in favor of a corpus permixtum, a church with both believers and nonbelievers mixed in. The Biblical justification was the parable of the wheat and tares (Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43), with the field being the church. The problem with that justification is that Jesus said, “The field is the world” (Matt. 13:38). Later the Calvinist doctrine of God’s secret work of predestination in the heart of the elect became another support. Since no one can distinguish with full accuracy those genuinely saved and those who are not, the best solution is to make all the inhabitants of an area (a parish) members of the church. Thus we saw the rise of the state church. Everyone came together and heard the Word of God, and genuine faith would be born in the hearts of those God wanted to save.

Unfortunately, this teaching is not Biblical. The New Testament clearly pictures the church as a body of redeemed believers, God’s people, Christ’s pure Bride, living stones bound together by the Holy Spirit. Despite whatever difficulty we find in distinguishing who is genuinely saved and who is not, this is the ideal we should reach.

Recover the Church’s Competence: Second, we must recover the sense of the competence of the church. While E.Y. Mullins and later more moderate/liberal Southern Baptists of the late 20th Century highlighted the concept of soul competence, earlier Baptists emphasized church competence. The Second London Confession (1689) stated, “To each of these churches thus gathered according to His mind declared in His word, he (Christ) hath given all that power and authority which is in anyway needful, for their carrying on that order in worship and discipline, which he hath instituted for them to observe, with commands and rules for the due and right exerting and executing of that power.”

Church competence is the basis for local church autonomy. Congregations choose their own pastors, accepting and disciplining their own members, and governing themselves in all matters. Unfortunately we have retreated from this high view of church competence, especially in the area of church membership. Who are we, we say, to question the sincerity or genuineness of someone requesting baptism or church membership? Who are we to judge others as needing church discipline? We must begin again to answer, “We are the church of Jesus Christ, given competence and responsibility by Him to act in such matters, under the leadership of the Holy Spirit, manifested in the consensus of a congregation of regenerate believers.”

Then there are several practical steps we as a church may take.They will be explored in the tomorrow's post.
I am indebted to John Hammett at Southeastern Seminary for the large portion of this material.