Why should you become a member at Ithaca Presbyterian Church?
If you attend Ithaca Presbyterian Church regularly, you are a baptised Christian who loves Jesus, you agree with how the church teaches the Bible, and you want to submit to the wisdom and authority of the church leadership in your life, you should formally become a member of Christ’s body, the church. Look what Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 12:
Just as a body, though one, has many parts, but all its many parts form one body, so it is with Christ. For we were all baptized by one Spirit so as to form one body—whether Jews or Gentiles, slave or free—and we were all given the one Spirit to drink. Even so the body is not made up of one part but of many. Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it.
1 Corinthians 12:12-14, 27
Ponder at this mystery: the church is Christ’s body! And just like a human body is made up of different parts which are all needed for its proper and healthy functioning, so also we have been arranged by God in the body of his Son for its proper functioning. But who is the head of this body?
Look at what Paul writes about Christ in Ephesians 1 and Colossians 1:
And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.
Ephesians 1:22-23
He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy.
Colossians 1:17-18
So if we are Christ’s body, and Christ is the head of said body, what does that mean? Listen to what Augustine writes about this:
“Let us rejoice then and give thanks that we have become not only Christians, but Christ himself. Do you understand and grasp, brethren, God’s grace toward us? Marvel and rejoice: we have become Christ. For if he is the head, we are the members; he and we together are the whole man… The fullness of Christ then is the head and the members. But what does ‘head and members’ mean? Christ and the Church.”
St. Augustine, In Jo. ev, 21, 8: PL 35, 1568.
Being part of a church is a crucial aspect of being a Christian. Since Christ is the head of the church, and the church is Christ’s body, together with Christ we make up “the whole Christ”. To be separated from the body or to be joined to it only in a superficial way is a serious spiritual issue. That alone should drive us to be a part of a church in a formal sense.
On a more pragmatic front, it’s helpful to become a member for two reasons: it gives you the opportunity to express a commitment to the wider body (and for the body to do the same for you), and it gives you and the elders clarity around who is responsible for the oversight and care of your soul. Commitment and clarity are really helpful for forging a healthy relationship.
When two people get married, it gives everyone clarity around the relationship, and it gives the bride and groom an opportunity to make commitments to one another in front of family and friends and celebrate the start of their relationship. Likewise, formal membership gives you an opportunity to make formal commitments to the wider body, it clearly communicates to your brothers and sisters in Christ “I’m one of you”, and it clearly communicates to the elders, “I’m one of the sheep, please watch over and care for me.”
This is not to say becoming a member means you are “married” to the church for the rest of your life and you cannot leave. It simply means that while you are with us, you are committed to loving and serving your brothers and sisters in Christ here, and you are willing to submit to the wisdom and authority of the church leadership in your life while under their care.