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Church Covenants: Yes or No?


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Here's my opinion, you can take it or leave it. A church covenant, like many things, can be good or bad depending on how it's used. It can be a good thing to have expectations in writing, that way no one has an excuse for not knowing. If they are required to read the church covenant before becoming a member than they know what is expected of them as a member and they can't say, "I wasn't there when you taught on that". What should you put in a church covenant? I guess that all depends on what you expect from your members. I would say, if you are going to have a church covenant, write it yourself. Don't rely on someone else to decide what is Biblically right to expect of the members.

Just my two cents.

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Church Covenants are neither biblical nor unbiblical. They are just one of a number of ways to assist in making sure everyone is at least roughly on the same page. Given that church membership is voluntary not compulsory, given that covenants are commonplace in scripture, and given that it is not uncommon for people to enter a church with ulterior motives a church covenant can be one tool to make subversion of a congregation a bit more difficult. 

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Update:

Well, today the church voted on how binding it should be, an actual covenant, or just a general list of what the church holds to, and they absolutely voted for a covenant that they would each be accountable to. Kind of surprised, really, but that's what they want. Guess we'll see how much they want it when I hold them accountable. lol.

So we all brought up idea of what should be on it, went over dress and modesty, hair length, KJV, as well as mandatory reading of the Bible. (They actually ASKED for 'homework'!) And of course, tattoos and piercings, doctrines, marriage between man and woman. Smoking and drinking. I will add to that some other things, as well as some of the suggestions above.

On 4/21/2016 at 6:13 PM, John81 said:

What were the requirements to join the church exampled in Scripture?

From what I've noticed, without doing an exhaustive study at this time, there were only two requirements.

Being saved (born again), followed by baptism, added to the church.

After being added to the church members received preaching, teaching and instruction (as well as examples) of what they should know, how they should live, etc.

I think one thing we deal with that the church in Acts 2 didn't, was believers coming from other churches, already saved but moving location. So we need to have some set idea as to bringing them on. One is that they must be saved and scripturally baptized, (Acts 2) and then that we are in one accord, also found in Acts 2. Thats the point of the covenant I am looking at.

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We accept members who have made a profession of faith and been baptized in our local church, by letter from their former church and by statement of faith.

If they come from Calvary Chapel, a Catholic Church or any church holding to a universal, invisible position, they must of course have a biblical testimony of salvation and be scripturally baptized before coming to a vote for membership.  I've seen some families keep attending but not join because there daddy baptized them in the Pentecostal church when they were whatever and others who could not possibly believe their former church and pastor were biblically wrong in doctrine.  Most came around eventually and some left to continue happily in their sins, rather than be burdened with conforming to truth.  Our Gracious Father brings people into our lives to be a blessing and He removes them too!

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