Dear New City Friends and Family,
Don't forget our weekend seminar called “Discover New City." It’s especially designed those who have visited New City recently or are new to the church. The class is a great time to hang out with the pastors in a classroom/fellowship setting and to help you connect more fully in our church community. The class is also for those who may have attended a while but have not been able to join the church previously.
Friday night, April 10, will kick off at 6:30 pm with introductions and a teaching time from Pastor Kevin overviewing New City’s beliefs, vision and values. It will wrap up by 9 pm.
Saturday morning, April 11, will start with a light breakfast and run from 8:30 am to 12:00 pm. Pastor Billy and New City Staff cover growth and ministry opportunities and explain the membership vows and interview process for those wishing to join. Attendance at both Friday and Saturday sessions is required for those wishing to become members.
Sunday, April 12 during the 9 AM hour, if you are interested in membership, you can meet with a couple of elders to share your testimony of faith in Christ (or just to talk with a pastor or elder about further questions you may have).
If childcare is needed, please let us know on the signup form, and we will try to help make those arrangements.
Together for God’s Kingdom,
Billy McKillop, Executive Pastor
bmckillop@newcityfellowship.com
P.S. Here’s some food for thought on why we believe church membership is a blessing and advantage for all believers. Taken from Why Should I Join a Church? by Pastor and author, Mark Dever.
Ten Good Reasons to Become a Member of New City Fellowship
- As Christian people we are commanded to love all people. By joining this local church, we commit to loving a particular group of people, putting flesh on that command.
- We join the church to display the gospel. Church membership is God’s idea just as the gospel is his idea. God not only saves from the domain of darkness, he saves us to something, to the kingdom of the Son he loves that is proclaimed by his local churches around the world.
- We join the church to follow the example of early New Testament churches. They kept membership records; early Christians followed the commands of Scripture through church membership: to love one another, to watch over one another, to bear one another’s burdens, to pray for one another, to contend together for the gospel, to be examples to one another.
- We join the church to demonstrate that our faith is not just “between Jesus and me.” Individually we are body parts, brothers and sisters, living stones, individual sheep. But together, we are a body, we are God’s household, we are a spiritual house, we are God’s flock.
- We join the church to be accountable to God’s appointed leaders and to one another; spiritual accountability assumes church membership.
- We join the church to love other Christians and to edify the church. It’s more about what we contribute than it is about what we receive.
- We join the church to evangelize the world. A local church is by its very nature a missionary organization. Together we show non-Christians and those who believe they are Christians what true conversion looks like.
- We join the local church to be a testimony to the universal church that we are followers of Jesus as we know and are known by one another.
- We join the church to be reminded that we need help from above every single day and that apart from the saving work of Christ, we would be lost like the world outside the church.
- We join the church to glorify God, as Peter said, to “live good lives among the pagans that though they accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the Day he visits us.” (1 Pet. 2:12)
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