It’s been commonly said that we don’t choose the people who sit next to us in the pew, but God does. Love requires, in response to the gospel, that we invest in the lives of those who are often most difficult and unattractive to us. It’s one of the saddest things to witness someone throw away their entire local church family for selfish reasons. Is our love sincere and absent of hypocrisy? This is an important question when it comes to church membership.

In recent years I have noticed the growing trend of people who leave their local church without any reflection as to whether their departure is a sinful one. To be sure, there are legitimate reasons to leave a local church. That’s what makes this article difficult to write; it’s not an easy task to get to the motivations of why people do what they do.
As a pastor, I have always believed that people should never feel forced to stay in a church where they are struggling. Departures may come for a variety of different reasons. Church leadership has to guard itself from cult-like behavior in seeking to put straight jackets on their members. I cannot imagine a more oppressing church environment than one that makes its members feel forced to stay in membership because the threat of discipline hangs over their head for departure. This creates a bunch of joyless servants in Christ’s kingdom and has a deadening effect on the whole congregation.
It does happen that even though people leave their local church for foolish reasons, they may flourish well elsewhere.
A wise elder once compared a disgruntled churchgoer to a plant that did not grow in his kitchen window. He cared for that plant, watered that plant, faithfully tended to the plant, but it always looked tattered and wilted. One day the next-door neighbor offered to take the plant with the hope that it would do well, and the man, rather reluctantly, offered the plant to the neighbor. After a short time the neighbor celebrated how well the plant was doing—it was vibrant, green, and producing new leaves. I’ve had to submit to this truth of Christian ministry more than a few times, humbling my own pride and recognizing that sometimes, though people leave for foolish reasons, they may flourish well elsewhere. That’s ultimately what we want for the sheep anyway.
Such a reality, however, does not excuse sinful departures from a local church. Pastors know all too well that when people come into their church sinfully running from their former church, it’s just a matter of time before the same problems resurface. The heart of the matter has not been dealt with. Further, it may be that a former church has neglected disciplining a member for unrepentant sin. As that member jumps to another local church—often unreconciled and bitter—and as this member celebrates the new church as the next best thing since sliced bread, the new church will soon realize how damaging the former church’s neglect is upon their own congregation. But that’s for another article.
In my experience, rarely does anyone sit down with their pastor and express their concerns when they want to leave.
With these things in mind, it’s important to think through what unbiblical departure from the local church looks like. Why do people leave the local church today? It would be one thing if a church is failing to preach the Word of God, is compromised on some point of doctrine, worship, or an article of the Christian faith, or there is some significant spiritual abuse by the leadership that is not properly being dealt with. These are legitimate reasons to speak with church leadership and depart the local church to a more faithful church in an honorable, Christ-like manner. But, sadly, doctrinal conviction and spiritual integrity in the truth are not at the top of the list when it comes to church departures in our day.
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Written by R.C. Sproul |
Tuesday, October 31, 2023
Protestantism really teaches a double imputation. Our sin is imputed to Jesus and His righteousness is imputed to us. In this twofold transaction, we see that God does not compromise His integrity in providing salvation for His people. Rather, He punishes sin fully after it has been imputed to Jesus. This is why He is able to be both “just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus,” as Paul writes in Romans 3:26. So, my sin goes to Jesus and His righteousness comes to me. This is a truth worth dividing the church. This is the article on which the church stands or falls, because it is the article on which we all stand or fall.

At the very heart of the controversy in the sixteenth century was the question of the ground by which God declares anyone righteous in His sight. The psalmist asked, “If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities, O Lord, who could stand?” (Ps. 130:3). In other words, if we have to stand before God and face His perfect justice and perfect judgment of our performance, none of us would be able to pass review. We all would fall, because as Paul reiterates, all of us have fallen short of the glory of God (Rom. 3:23). So, the pressing question of justification is how can an unjust person ever be justified in the presence of a righteous and holy God?
The Roman Catholic view is known as analytical justification. This means that God will declare a person just only when, under His perfect analysis, He finds that he is just, that righteousness is inherent in him. The person cannot have that righteousness without faith, without grace, and without the assistance of Christ. Nevertheless, in the final analysis, true righteousness must be present in the soul of a person before God will ever declare him just.
Whereas the Roman view is analytical, the Reformation view is that justification is synthetic. A synthetic statement is one in which something new is added in the predicate that is not contained in the subject. If I said to you, “The bachelor was a poor man,” I have told you something new in the second part of the sentence that was not already contained in the word bachelor. All bachelors are men by definition, but not all bachelors are poor men. There are many wealthy bachelors. Poverty and wealth are concepts that are not inherent in the idea of bachelorhood. So, when we say, “The bachelor was a poor man,” there is a synthesis, as it were.
When we say that the Reformation view of justification is synthetic, we mean that when God declares a person to be just in His sight, it is not because of what He finds in that person under His analysis. Rather, it is on the basis of something that is added to the person. That something that is added, of course, is the righteousness of Christ. This is why Luther said that the righteousness by which we are justified is extra nos, meaning “apart from us” or “outside of us.” He also called it an “alien righteousness,” not a righteousness that properly belongs to us, but a righteousness that is foreign to us, alien to us. It comes from outside the sphere of our own behavior. With both of these terms, Luther was speaking about the righteousness of Christ.
If any word was at the center of the firestorm of the Reformation controversy and remains central to the debate even in our day, it is imputation. Numerous meetings were held between Protestants and Roman Catholics to try to repair the schism that was taking place in the sixteenth century. Theologians from Rome met with the magisterial Reformers, trying to resolve the difficulties and preserve the unity of the church. There was a longing for such unity on both sides.
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My prayer is that as Christians we would grow in that love as we go about our daily lives learning to be satisfied in the situations that God has placed us in, reading and trusting in God’s Word and promises, obeying His commands as a sign of our faith and always thanking Him for the gifts that he gives His children every day.

What characterises the life of a Christian? Your answer will largely depend on your experience. You may say that a Christian is characterised by following certain traditions, by obeying certain norms within Christian-culture. You may jump to actions and think about Bible reading, church attendance, prayer and other kinds of Christian disciplines. But at the very core being a Christian means following Jesus and becoming more like Him, it also means being characterised the love that we have been shown by God.
Love is one of the many things that should characterise the life of a Christian. I often speak about four the key ‘loves’ that should be seen in the life of every Christian and that should, we pray, be growing in our lives as individuals and as local churches. The four loves are; love the Lord, love His Word, love His people and love the lost.
But what does it practically look like to love the Lord and how can we grow in that love? We don’t have the space to unpack everything that loving the Lord means, but here are four key things I’d like to mention:
1. Being satisfied in Him
One of the passages that many Christians run to for encouragement and strength to face their day to day struggles is in Philippians 4:11-13, where Paul famously says “I can do all things through him who gives me strength”. That statement of faith and confidence in God is the reason Paul has contentment, the reason he is satisfied, because he knows Jesus and all the wonderful gifts God had given him. Paul in his time of need and troubles, of which there were many, reminded himself of the gospel and the grace of God that called him, saved him and sent him to share Jesus with others. We can be satisfied in God because He has given us the solution to our biggest need – our sin and separation from Him, God knows everything we need and His good plan for us will be fulfilled. Growing in our knowledge of who God is will mean that our satisfaction in Him grows.
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