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Does your church have a constitution and bylaws?

Lamb

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Does your church have a constitution and bylaws? If so, what things are included in them?
 

NewCreation435

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most Baptist churches that I know of have bylaws which include when business meetings and services should be held and how deacons or leaders are nominated or removed from their positions as well as rules like who can use the church facilities such as for weddings or other events
 

tango

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most Baptist churches that I know of have bylaws which include when business meetings and services should be held and how deacons or leaders are nominated or removed from their positions as well as rules like who can use the church facilities such as for weddings or other events

Our church has a basic constitution that describes this sort of thing - the definition and structure of the leadership, how someone becomes a leader, how long they serve, how many consecutive terms they may serve, how long a break they need to take between periods in leadership, how people apply for membership, what circumstances would cause someone to be removed from membership etc.

It also includes a statement of faith, which contains the kind of thing you'd expect to find in a church statement of faith without being inordinately long. I expect a statement of faith to include concepts like God creating the heavens and the earth, Jesus being fully God and fully man, living a sinless life and dying for our sins etc, but when a statement of faith contains political stances or definitive stances on things like eschatology it seems like a way to drive people away for no good reason. If someone doesn't agree that Jesus died for their sins it's hard to see how they could be considered a Christian at all but a specific stance over whether a rapture occurs before, during or after the tribulation doesn't seem like something that needs to be elevated to a church's statement of faith unless they truly believe that differences in that area would disqualify someone from membership.
 
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