Membership covenant?
I'm ashamed I haven't updated this in three weeks! And in that time my other ventures haven't really been doing very well. Obviously I'm looking for a why, and God just keeps putting this in my head: "First seek the kingdom of God ... " So here I am - a new week, a new resolution to keep up with my Bible study ... If you will, pray for me please, and I'll pray for everybody who stumble upon this blog.
The next chapter in the book I'm following, "Who's Driving the Purpose Driven Church?", concentrates on the membership covenant that anybody that wants to join Rick Warren's Saddleback church is required to sign. It's a serious covenant stipulating that members will contribute financially, will do the SHAPE assessment, will serve in some capacity in the church, etc.
The problem with this covenant is that is goes directly against what Jesus said in Matthew 5:33-37, where He tells us not to make covenants and not to swear by anything, but to let our word be our bond. I'll quote from the King James Version: "Again, we have heard that it hath been said by them of old time, Thou shalt not forswear thyself, but shalt perform unto the Lord thine oaths: But I say unto you, Swear not at all; neither by heaven; for it is God's throne: Nor by the earth; for it is his footstool: neither by Jerusalem; for it is the city of the great King. Neither shalt thou swear by thy head, because thou canst make one hair white or black. But let your communication be, Yea, yea; Nay, nay: for whatsoever is more then these cometh of evil."
So when you sign this covenant, the church has the right to throw you out, but there's nothing in there to keep Rick Warren and his church accountable for their part of the covenant. I think that is a real problem.
This is another example of where we let ourselves be led by our trusted church leaders, because we don't know any better, and just do what they say, which is really sad and unfortunate. I'm thinking of the membership agreement I signed when we started going to Northway. I didn't know any better, if I knew what Jesus said in Matthew 5, I would have have reservations about signing the membership covenant. I am struggling a bit with that, since I am breaking that covenant by going against Northway, but I also believe that that covenant can't be binding because it is against Jesus' direction.
In a previous post I mentioned that a group of people at Northway started pushing back against the plans they are making. We learned last week that that group of people were thrown out of the church. That's so sad to me. What's happening there? And it wasn't just any members, several of these people were very involved, one was the head usher for several years, others were involved in kids ministries. And they just get thrown out of church because they have an opposing viewpoint? That doesn't display Jesus' tolerance and love for members of the church. Very sad indeed.
I want to relate one more story. My wife and I started going to another church. We really enjoyed the first service we were at. They had just started a series on the 10 commandments. Unfortunately on the day the pastor talked about the third commandment, he said some things that caused us some discomfort. First he quoted Rick Warren, and then he talked about what Jesus said in Matthew 5 about not swearing by God's name (do not use my Name in vain). But then in just the next sentence he talks about the covenant members have to sign with this church!! Isn't that just so contradicting? And subsequently we found out that this church is also into the Purpose Driven Church thing ... they do the 101, 201, 301 classes with the SHAPE assessment. So onwards with the search for a church that hasn't been touched by this abomination.
Till next time ...
The next chapter in the book I'm following, "Who's Driving the Purpose Driven Church?", concentrates on the membership covenant that anybody that wants to join Rick Warren's Saddleback church is required to sign. It's a serious covenant stipulating that members will contribute financially, will do the SHAPE assessment, will serve in some capacity in the church, etc.
The problem with this covenant is that is goes directly against what Jesus said in Matthew 5:33-37, where He tells us not to make covenants and not to swear by anything, but to let our word be our bond. I'll quote from the King James Version: "Again, we have heard that it hath been said by them of old time, Thou shalt not forswear thyself, but shalt perform unto the Lord thine oaths: But I say unto you, Swear not at all; neither by heaven; for it is God's throne: Nor by the earth; for it is his footstool: neither by Jerusalem; for it is the city of the great King. Neither shalt thou swear by thy head, because thou canst make one hair white or black. But let your communication be, Yea, yea; Nay, nay: for whatsoever is more then these cometh of evil."
So when you sign this covenant, the church has the right to throw you out, but there's nothing in there to keep Rick Warren and his church accountable for their part of the covenant. I think that is a real problem.
This is another example of where we let ourselves be led by our trusted church leaders, because we don't know any better, and just do what they say, which is really sad and unfortunate. I'm thinking of the membership agreement I signed when we started going to Northway. I didn't know any better, if I knew what Jesus said in Matthew 5, I would have have reservations about signing the membership covenant. I am struggling a bit with that, since I am breaking that covenant by going against Northway, but I also believe that that covenant can't be binding because it is against Jesus' direction.
In a previous post I mentioned that a group of people at Northway started pushing back against the plans they are making. We learned last week that that group of people were thrown out of the church. That's so sad to me. What's happening there? And it wasn't just any members, several of these people were very involved, one was the head usher for several years, others were involved in kids ministries. And they just get thrown out of church because they have an opposing viewpoint? That doesn't display Jesus' tolerance and love for members of the church. Very sad indeed.
I want to relate one more story. My wife and I started going to another church. We really enjoyed the first service we were at. They had just started a series on the 10 commandments. Unfortunately on the day the pastor talked about the third commandment, he said some things that caused us some discomfort. First he quoted Rick Warren, and then he talked about what Jesus said in Matthew 5 about not swearing by God's name (do not use my Name in vain). But then in just the next sentence he talks about the covenant members have to sign with this church!! Isn't that just so contradicting? And subsequently we found out that this church is also into the Purpose Driven Church thing ... they do the 101, 201, 301 classes with the SHAPE assessment. So onwards with the search for a church that hasn't been touched by this abomination.
Till next time ...
posted by Evert DuToit at 12:00 AM
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