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How Membership Meetings Can Help Your Preaching

About 9 months ago we transitioned to a more formalized membership at Emmaus. The elders’ plan was to interview everyone who wanted to be a member, even if you were a member of our core group. Over the next several months the elders were supremely blessed by the richness of the meetings. We heard so many stories of God’s grace coming from various contexts. This opened our eyes to the many ways in which God works daily in people’s lives.

The meetings also opened our eyes to better know the strengths and weaknesses of the collective members. As people talk you hear theology, practice, habits, and worldview. As a preaching pastor this is gold for me. It helps me to see blindspots that we may have as a church and to consider how to address them.

Some practical questions to ask yourself after a membership meeting:

  1. Is the gospel being clearly articulated?
  2. Is the gospel being clearly demonstrated? (service, mission, leadership/submission/training, etc)
  3. Is the gospel being clearly accented? (In terms of tone, do we sound like a bunch of jerks?)
  4. Do they understand the doctrine behind the big words?
  5. Do they know the big words behind the doctrines? (Not just for knowledge sake but because these words are biblical words)
  6.  Do they understand how the Bible fits together?
  7. Is there gospel humility? (brokenness over sin and burden for the lost)
  8. Are there scents of legalism and self-righteousness?
  9. Do they seem to be benefiting from the ministry of the church?
  10. Do they seem to love Christ?
  11. What can I do as a pastor to better serve this member?

What I found was a mixed bag of encouragement and motivation. Some people were doing better than I thought and others needed more help than I thought. The key for me is that I got data, I got intel. I can go on from here with a strategic and well-informed “air war” (preaching to a group) and “ground war” (ministering one on one), as one pastor would call it. This has helped us as elders to evaluate and tweak our ministries and tone in light of who we are and who God has called the church to be. As these meetings continue, I pray that they will help us as leaders to better know, serve, and shepherd the flock of God.

If you are a pastor I cannot encourage you enough to mine the membership meetings for such nuggets; they are truly shepherding gold. And as preachers, we need all the help we can get!

 

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