Links: 0. Canrc Church Order, Church Order Lexicon, C.O 66
Created: 2025-03-14 10:13

TVR Withdraw, Withdrawal of Membership

The church order nowhere makes allowance for members to “withdraw” their membership. In fact, those who make a profession of their faith in the presence of the church make a public promise to abide by the discipline of the church if they should stray. But those who withdraw break this promise. The main questions about withdrawals are two: how should a consistory regard the withdrawal? Is it a request or a declaration? And, secondly, how should the consistory announce the withdrawal? Should it ask the congregation to admonish this erring member? From the point of view of our Lord’s way of governing his church through elders, a member’s withdrawal note is a request, not a declaration. From the point of view of one’s profession of faith and one’s covenant with God and the rest of his church, a withdrawal is likewise a request, not a declaration (one party to a covenant can’t just walk away from it, but must request release from the vows that were taken). But from the point of view of legalities and liabilities in this present world of sin, the withdrawal is a declaration that must be accepted because it is issued by the “supreme” will of the individual. In fact, consistories that do not simply accept a written withdrawal could perhaps run afoul of the civil authorities, should such a member bring a lawsuit for defamation. As an aside, in the early 2000s I and an elder of our church attended a Christian legal conference where Christian lawyers recommended that evangelical churches should have confessions of faith and should require members to affix their signatures to these doctrines, so that the church could legally discipline them for sin and they could not just leave for whatever church flavour they preferred that year (confessional membership?!). Whatever the case, a request to withdraw should only ever be accepted in writing, with a signature, to ensure that the person requesting it has truly thought about it and committed himself or herself to the request. In rare cases a repeated verbal request, repeated over a period of at least several weeks, in the presence of at least two witnesses, might be accepted in place of a written request (not everyone can read and write). The consistory has authority over the members and should admonish those who submit a request to withdraw, explaining that their request is contrary to God’s will and contrary to their own promise. Some consistories take the view that they should then announce the request to withdraw and engage the congregation in two to four weeks of admonitions towards the member who has made this request. If the requester does not change the request in this time, the withdrawal comes into effect by decision of the consistory. Some consistories may then proceed to read an announcement that includes portions of the form for excommunication, to underline that the request to withdraw is sinful and amounts to a request for excommunication. In other cases, consistories consider the legal liabilities to be overwhelming, and simply announce the withdrawal very soon after receiving the request.

Each case of withdrawal occurs under different circumstances. If, for instance, a non-communicant member has not attended church in six years, has almost no contact with the church, and then requests to withdraw, it hardly makes sense that the church members should finally at that point make a concentrated effort to change the requester’s mind. Certainly strong admonitions would make little sense, for if the church hardly engaged the member for the last six years, there is almost no meaningful relationship within which to bring the admonitions. If expressions of concern are to be brought in such a case, they should be accompanied by expressions of repentance and regret on the part of the office bearers and members, since they had done so little to shepherd this non-communicant member in the past six years. If, however, a member who is communicant and has been quite active in church life for years suddenly cheats on his wife and asks to withdraw, the church should put in overtime hours to warn and plead with the man. His request should not be accepted easily, and his sinful situation should be made public. Whether parts of the form for excommunication will be used in the announcement of his withdrawal would be in the discretion of the consistory. The way a case is dealt with will also differ based on where the withdrawing member is going. If someone moves to a territory where no church exists that is in ecclesiastical fellowship with the CanRCs, but the member enlists the help of his elder and finds a Reformed or Presbyterian church that is firmly committed to the Scriptures and the confessions of faith, that member may technically need to withdraw membership, yet the consistory might explain that he or she is going with the input and perhaps even the blessing of the consistory. The lack of ecclesiastical fellowship in this case is not a matter of principle but a practical matter, due to the finiteness of the CanRCs, which are not able to find every good and faithful church of Jesus Christ in every place and establish ecclesiastical fellowship with it. On the other hand, a withdrawal to move to a local Roman Catholic Church would bring grief to the church and should be announced as a very serious matter, by which the member is putting him or herself outside the kingdom of God.

The cases that fall in between the two above are more complicated. For example, the consistory will struggle to make the right announcement when a member or family moves to a local congregation of the Presbyterian Church of America—a congregation that may or may not be faithful to the Reformed confessions and practices, given the variation within the PCA. No single template can be made for such announcements, and the situations provide the consistory with opportunities to educate the congregation on the calling that all have, that is, to be fully faithful to the Lord and to their vows. The consistory can do this without making announcements that put sincere Reformed believers outside the kingdom of God. In our sinful and complicated world, some situations are too complex for a simple declaration.

References

1. Church Order Handbook, 238.