8. Church Covenants

The goal of the covenanting stage is to produce a covenant based on God's expectations of His people as a church. The covenant focuses on the interpersonal relationships that God requires of His people. This paper explains why we use a covenant to define the membership of the church. Each church writes its own covenant. The covenant should focus on relationship, not doctrine. Jesus taught that the defining characteristic of his people would be their love for one another. A quick review of the "one another" verses of the New Testament and of the life of the early church (Acts 2:42-47, 4:32ff) confirm this. Thus, the covenant is a summary of the relational expectations God has for his people's fellowship as the church. The covenant should be "inclusive" that is, any Christian should be able to sign such a covenant. A sample covenant appears at the end.

This is one area where we find people often balk. However a church must find a way to define itself and its membership. If it does not, it will likely never develop into much more than a Christian club where people come and go as they please. There may be several ways to define a church, and we explain why we use covenants here. You may choose a different way, but whatever way you choose it should include the concept of becoming the people of God.

In our house churches, a church formally comes into existence when a group of two or three families commit themselves to one another by ratifying the covenant. In the West we ratify it by signing it, since this is consistent with making contracts (covenants) in other spheres of life. Each member signs a personal copy which he/she keeps. They also sign a common copy which someone in the church keeps. Often the covenant signing ceremony will be accompanied with baptisms, since we might wait to baptize new believers until the church is ready for birth.

The Covenantal Basis For Defining The Church
The church may be defined as a community of believers committed to living out the corporate life of the kingdom before the world and the heavenly realm (Ephesians 2:11-3:10). This paper addresses how membership in a local church community can be defined. Some may argue that the church and its membership does not need to be defined, but rather we ought to let the Spirit define it. But the New Testament makes it clear that there were churches in different cities and that these were not buildings, but congregations of people (Acts 14). They knew who they were and were aware of their membership (Cf. I John 2:19, Ephesians 3:6, 4:25, Romans 12:5). The community was so carefully defined that when a believer went from one community to another it was normal for him/her to carry a commendation from his/her former community to the new community (Cf. Romans 16:1,2).

BAPTISM
What was the vehicle by which a person became a member of a church in the first century? The way one entered into the community in the early church was baptism. Baptism was a public statement that the initiant had turned from his old life (which involved the worship of particular god's) to embrace a new life (Acts 2:37-41). This testimony thus had two components: a vertical one between the person and God, whereby he disavowed his old god and turned to the true God; and a horizontal component which involved inclusion in a new community, the church. When public, it was often accompanied by persecution. Baptism was an excellent vehicle to define who was and who was not in the community. It still is in many cultures.

Today, in Western culture, baptism is seldom understood as having a horizontal component (new relationships within the Christian community). Baptism is rather seen as symbolic of a personal decision with only a vertical component (of the individual following Jesus). In churches where it has lost its horizontal component (commitment to God's people), it no longer defines meaningful membership in the church. There are many people who have been baptized who are not members of any local assembly, nor do they understand why they ought to be. Perhaps some differences in our modern society contribute to this. In the first century the community to which a person belonged (a guild, mystery religion, church, etc.) was the social/welfare network for that person and his family. Today, this role is taken by the government. Thus a person does not depend upon an intimate community in time of need. We have tried in times past to teach the horizontal component of baptism and thus utilize it as the vehicle for defining community, but without success in our Western culture. The Christian culture in America is so influenced by the "individual commitment" understanding of Baptism, that the horizontal component remains hidden for many.

So if Baptism is not a good vehicle for defining membership in an assembly in our culture, what is? We will explore three other vehicles which have been used historically in defining membership in an assembly: a covenant, a constitution, and articles of faith.

COVENANT
We believe a covenant is the most suitable vehicle in our culture for defining membership in the church. A covenant places the emphasis on the church as an organism of living relationships rather than an institutional organization. This is the obvious emphasis of the book of Acts and the epistles; the New Testament church was a body of believers identified by their deep intimate inter-personal relationships (which neither came nor were maintained with ease). The relationships that believers enjoyed was based solely on the relationship that each one shared with Christ through the work of the Holy Spirit. The relational responsibility among believers is exemplified by Jesus' relationship with his disciples (Cf. John 13, 17), and is defined in the many "one another" verses in the New Testament, as well as in passages such as I Cor 12, Galatians 5f, Colossians 3, Ephesians 4-6.

The relationship believers have with God is a formal covenantal relationship. God has always worked with his people through covenants, and his people are often expected to respond to God's covenantal love by entering into covenant with one another (See "Covenanting Together", Appendix 12). In our culture, the marriage covenant serves as an example of a covenant which defines a relationship. A marriage covenant establishes the expectations that a husband and wife have in the marriage relationship.

A church covenant can be an excellent way to define the expectations which believers ought to have with one another in a particular assembly, and should be based on God's commands regulating relationships among believers. Thus, a church covenant identifies the expectations of the members of the community which we call the church. It establishes the fact that to become a part of the church a believer enters into a RELATIONSHIP with the other believers in the assembly. It sets the parameters of the relationship. In our independent thinking culture, it also serves to bind those who would leave the covenant community for spurious reasons, which short-circuit God's plan for sanctification both for the church and the individual. Since the reformation, covenants have often been used to define the membership of churches, especially by anabaptists.

CONSTITUTION AND ARTICLES OF FAITH
The other two ways mentioned to define community membership (Constitution and Articles of Faith) have serious deficiencies our culture. The traditional constitution is borrowed from the corporate world. It defines the church as an organization rather than an organism. As such it defines membership as being part of a corporate institution, with the constitution defining the way in which the institution is run. It may be important for churches to develop constitutions at some point, but not as a vehicle for defining membership. It does not work in forming the church into a loving community. We have likened a house church to a virus which needs to mutate rapidly to adapt to changing conditions. A constitution fixes the operation of a church and keeps it from adapting. For this reason we have found typical, traditional constitutions to be counterproductive not only for defining the membership of the church but also in the operations of a house church. We have found that a family conference approach, using Scripture and led by godly elders, is more helpful in the decision making (for more on this see Appendix XI, Consensus Decision Making).

Using articles of faith as a vehicle for defining membership suffers from the same drawback of not treating the church as a living community. In this case the connection with the church is based on a system of belief rather that a commitment to relationship, As has been more common in denominational churches. Another drawback is that articles of faith, rather than distinguishing believers from unbelievers usually serve to distinguish between different types of believers. For example, views on end times, election, predestination, scripture, spiritual gifts, are almost always included with the understanding that "our kind" of Christians are welcome here. What an affront to the unity of relationship which Christ calls us to have (John 17:21-24)! If a believer is included in God's heavenly church, how can we use such distinctions to exclude him from our local assembly?

For these reasons we believe that the church covenant is a good vehicle for defining membership in a local assembly. Apart from the Bible it is the most important document in the church, since it sets forth the expectation of members of the community; and the community is the body of Christ.

Sample House Church Covenant

WICKENDEN ST. HOUSE CHURCH COVENANT

Responding to and reflecting God's covenant that he has made with His people through Jesus Christ (Hebrews 10:16f, Jeremiah 31:31-34), we covenant with one another to be the church known as "the Wickenden St. House Church". This is a binding commitment that by the grace of God each member will faithfully uphold. As baptized believers in Jesus Christ, we realize that the purpose of God for believers is carried out through his divine plan, the Church, as reflected by local assemblies.  This local assembly exists so that "the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms" (Ephesians 3:10), specifically by worshipping God, edifying the believers, and spreading the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

I. We commit to love one another (1 John 4:7) by:

Building up one another (Ephesians 4:29)

Encouraging one another (Hebrew 3:13)

Serving one another (1 Peter 4:10)

Praying for one another (Ephesians 6:18)

Exhorting one another (Hebrews 10:24)

Rebuking and Correcting one another (II Timothy 4:2),

When necessary, discipling one another (Matthew 18:15-17),

Bearing with one another's burdens (Galatians 6:2),

Forgiving one another (Colossians 3:13),

Doing nothing that would cause a brother to stumble (Romans 14:13)

Maintaining unity with one another (Ephesians 4:3)

Obeying God's word (John 14:23)

Meeting together regularly for fellowship and the breaking of bread (Hebrews 10:25, Acts 2:42), Contributing financially to the church (II Corinthians 8:1-5,9-7) and the relief of the poor (Galatians 2:10), and Submitting to our leaders (Hebrews 13:17)

II. As a corporate body,

A. We commit to love those outside the church (Luke 10:27-37) by evangelizing (Matthew 28:19-20)

B. Also, we commit to love other churches (Acts 11:22-30):

Resolving to be joined in fellowship with other churches in the East Providence Fellowship of House Churches, we as a church commit to uphold the other churches in our immediate fellowship.

III. In our personal lives, we commit to love God (1 John 4:19) by:

Having personal and family Bible study, worship and prayer (Dt.6:4-9)

Being a witness for Christ to friends, family and acquaintances (Acts 1:8)

Waling Righteously (proverbs 4:23-27), being exemplary in our behaviour (1 Peter 2:12), and avoiding the appearance of evil (1 Thessalonians 5:22)

Finally, if God removes us from this assembly, we commit to unite as soon as possible with another church where we can carry out the spirit of this covenant. Amen.