The back door…how do people cease being members?
People regularly move away, people change churches, and some people simply quit coming to church for whatever reason. It’s important that we have a way to remove these people from our membership so that our membership rolls reflect the reality of our situation. This helps our continued witness in the city as we are able to continue to be involved in the lives of our members, preventing us from claiming those with whom we no longer relate or, perhaps more importantly, preventing them from claiming us and so, possibly, maligning our witness and providing them false spiritual security. One mechanism we will use for a back door is to require that each member annually sign their membership covenant. This will generally eliminate from membership all those who no longer remain part of the common life of our congregation. The back door discussion also relates to the subject of godly admonition. Those who have been called to repentance formerly by the Presbyters on at least two occasions, at le
