Week 1 Day 6 -- How to Join

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Day 6 – How to Join the Church (Acts 2:41, 47)

 ⁴¹ Then those who gladly received his word were baptized; and that day about three thousand souls were added to them.

⁴⁷ (They were) praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved. But many of the people who heard their message believed it, so the number of believers now totaled about 5,000 men, not counting women and children. (Acts 4:4, NLT)

    The question arises, “How do I join the church?”

In summary, you must be saved or “born again.” We explain that as the “A, B, Cs” of Salvation, as found in the book of Romans. Our salvation begins when we first acknowledge or “Admit” that we are lost and in need of salvation (Romans 3:23, 6:23). Our sins separate us from God, and only Jesus Christ can intercede between us as sinful humanity and God who is Holy (Romans 5:8). When we recognize our sinfulness, we must be willing to repent and turn away from our sinful actions (Romans 2:4). This begins with a new mindset.

Secondly, you must Believe in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior (Romans 10:9-10). As we mentioned earlier, belief is not just intellectual agreement but whole-heartedly trusting in the finished work of salvation in Christ. He was the One and Only Son of God who died on the cross to take our punishment for sins. You cannot trust your own good works for your salvation (Romans 3:12).

Thirdly, you must call to God (Romans 10:13), confessing and forsaking your sins (Romans 10:9-10), committing your life to Him and asking Him through His Holy Spirit to change you from the inside out (Romans 12:2), conforming you to be like His Son (Romans 8:29).

If you have accepted eternal life, you also need to be biblically baptized by immersion (the literal definition of baptism) after your salvation. If you were baptized in a church that practiced that baptism was necessary for your salvation, we also encourage you to be baptized again as a symbol of your salvation and not as a means to gain salvation.

Also, as we learned, baptism means immersion, so if you were sprinkled or poured on or even immersed before your salvation experience, we require you to be immersed in believer’s baptism.

Lastly, if you have accepted eternal life and have already been biblically baptized, you may join by having another Baptist church send us a letter. If the church cannot be contacted about your membership, you can join by a “statement” in which you on your honor simply state that you have accepted Christ and have been immersed in water after salvation, and that your baptism was not meant to be a way of earning your salvation.

For a variety of reasons, there are some who would like to be associated with a church but not officially join as full members. For those, some churches have a “Watchcare” Fellowship, which means you are coming regularly and participating faithfully but are not officially wanting to partner with us in our church membership. This means there may be some restrictions in teaching in some areas, such as adult Sunday School, serving on policy committees, and voting in our church business meetings.

Our desire is that all regular attenders become full members and experience the joyful bond that brings us together as a church body. It is not required for you to go through this new member class, but it is encouraged. 

Week 2, Membership means Interdependence

The chart below shows how we at First Baptist combine our 

“Connect Grow Serve Go” theme of our church
 to the POINT of our LifeGroups being

Prayer in all things, OutReach,
InReach, Need-meeting, and Teaching.