Church Discipline issue involves SO MUCH MORE...
I for one am pleased that so many are now finally talking about the issue of church discipline and what it means, and what it looks like in the church today. I would suggest though, that many are missing the more practical issues here involved. Most blogs and most individuals are merely discussing the practice from the perspective of the "lost people on the role" mentality. It certainly is a sad but true reality that this occurs, and that when it does, it is a pastor's responsibility to pursue those members of his flock who have not attended in 10 years and confront them about their need for repentance and/or removal from the church roster. Enough others have already commented on this angle, but there is really SO MUCH MORE to the "bloated roles" issue.
Take my church role for instance. The church that I pastor has, by all accounts, somewhere between 700-800 members "on the role" with about 200 people (members and non-members alike) in church on Sunday. We have just recently begun what I call "responsible role maintenance" and we are making some interesting discoveries. Thus far, I have a spreadsheet to work from (thanks to a diligent deacon/ administrator in our church!) that shows the membership figures ONLY SINCE 1985. There are many more prior to that, but this is what we have to start working with. On this list, there are just shy of 500 names, but here is what I am discovering in just one, 30-minute look-over of the list:
1. Already, there are at least 7 "members" that we are sure are deceased, and at least 20 or so more that we suspect are deceased. That is, we are going by someone's memory of that person dying (or at least they think so). Once we confirm the deaths of these others, we will probably remove at least 30 deceased members from the role.
2. We discovered the names of 4 pastors who either previously attended and/or pastored our church, all of whom are now, with their families, actively serving other churches where their membership lies. They are still on our "role." This crowd numbered 12.
3. There are at least 5 or 6 individuals who are on the list twice (one is on it 3x) as members. This is because they were "saved" once (in say...1987) and added to the role, and then "saved again" (in say...1993) and baptized again, and hence, added to the role again. Fixing this would eliminate 5 or 6 "members."
4. Still there are others whom we are sure have long since joined another church of a non-baptist persuasion (Methodist, Christian church, etc...) which did not "send for their letter." These individuals have not been in our church for years, but are rather faithful to their "new" church. I would guess there are at least 30 or so like this (30 is a very conservative guess, there are probably many more than this).
If all of these individuals (except the obviously deceased ones) are also being reported by other churches, then we have an issue of double-counting which results in "cooked numbers."
Now, all of this came from a quick, 30-minute reading of the list, without any phone-calls, deacon meetings, or church votes. There are just in the above mentioned list, almost 80 individuals who we continually represent in our ACP count as "members" who are clearly NOT. This issue is not only about I Cor. 5 discipline of members who do not evidence salvation, it is also about common-sense integrity in reporting numbers. This is an issue of both integrity and laziness. One meeting per year between the church clerk, pastor, and a knowledgable member could probably help introduce some good maintenance measures to our role maintenance. Until we do this, we are merely being lazy and dishonest in the way we represent our churches to the world.
There are other issues to deal with, such as "why discipline is a healthy practice to have in place to deal with attending members who are living openly sinful lives," but that will be addressed later. For now, I hope that I have made my point that this issue of "integrity in reporting numbers" is not merely a "Calvinist thing," nor is it merely about "young reformed guys wanting to 'church' unfaithful members." At the end of the day, it is also an issue of basic administrative integrity in the way we maintain and represent our membership to the outside world.
Take my church role for instance. The church that I pastor has, by all accounts, somewhere between 700-800 members "on the role" with about 200 people (members and non-members alike) in church on Sunday. We have just recently begun what I call "responsible role maintenance" and we are making some interesting discoveries. Thus far, I have a spreadsheet to work from (thanks to a diligent deacon/ administrator in our church!) that shows the membership figures ONLY SINCE 1985. There are many more prior to that, but this is what we have to start working with. On this list, there are just shy of 500 names, but here is what I am discovering in just one, 30-minute look-over of the list:
1. Already, there are at least 7 "members" that we are sure are deceased, and at least 20 or so more that we suspect are deceased. That is, we are going by someone's memory of that person dying (or at least they think so). Once we confirm the deaths of these others, we will probably remove at least 30 deceased members from the role.
2. We discovered the names of 4 pastors who either previously attended and/or pastored our church, all of whom are now, with their families, actively serving other churches where their membership lies. They are still on our "role." This crowd numbered 12.
3. There are at least 5 or 6 individuals who are on the list twice (one is on it 3x) as members. This is because they were "saved" once (in say...1987) and added to the role, and then "saved again" (in say...1993) and baptized again, and hence, added to the role again. Fixing this would eliminate 5 or 6 "members."
4. Still there are others whom we are sure have long since joined another church of a non-baptist persuasion (Methodist, Christian church, etc...) which did not "send for their letter." These individuals have not been in our church for years, but are rather faithful to their "new" church. I would guess there are at least 30 or so like this (30 is a very conservative guess, there are probably many more than this).
If all of these individuals (except the obviously deceased ones) are also being reported by other churches, then we have an issue of double-counting which results in "cooked numbers."
Now, all of this came from a quick, 30-minute reading of the list, without any phone-calls, deacon meetings, or church votes. There are just in the above mentioned list, almost 80 individuals who we continually represent in our ACP count as "members" who are clearly NOT. This issue is not only about I Cor. 5 discipline of members who do not evidence salvation, it is also about common-sense integrity in reporting numbers. This is an issue of both integrity and laziness. One meeting per year between the church clerk, pastor, and a knowledgable member could probably help introduce some good maintenance measures to our role maintenance. Until we do this, we are merely being lazy and dishonest in the way we represent our churches to the world.
There are other issues to deal with, such as "why discipline is a healthy practice to have in place to deal with attending members who are living openly sinful lives," but that will be addressed later. For now, I hope that I have made my point that this issue of "integrity in reporting numbers" is not merely a "Calvinist thing," nor is it merely about "young reformed guys wanting to 'church' unfaithful members." At the end of the day, it is also an issue of basic administrative integrity in the way we maintain and represent our membership to the outside world.
posted by pastorleap | 11:06 PM
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