In the sermon this past Sunday, we looked at what it means to be a church member. In John 13:34-35, Jesus called his followers to be distinguishable by the way they love one another. The New Testament goes into great detail to define what Jesus fully meant by “love one another,” with at least 42 ways that the members of the church are to love one another. These are explicit Biblical commands of Jesus that create a culture of truth and grace among the members of the church. Devotion to the Biblical distinctions of the church and these “one another” commands is where a person crosses over from being an attender to connecting to the Biblical community in a devoted covenant relationship. A church membership covenant is a mutual agreement in which believers express their devotion to Christ and one another in a way that promotes unity, permits accountability and establishes the Biblical expectations for believers which allows for Christ-centered relationships to flourish and grow in love and unity.
