Church Membership and Church Attendance

Most local Rotary clubs will take a person's name off the membership roll if he fails to attend the meetings for an extended period of time. Yet many churches will allow a person to stay on the membership roll for years after he or she has stopped attending! Membership should mean more in the church than it does in a Rotary club....Biblically, if a member shows prolonged negligence in gathering with God's people, how can he say he loves them? And if he doesn't love them, how can he say he loves God (c.f. 1 John 4:20-21)...When we allow prolonged nonattenders to keep their names on the membership rolls, we actually help deceive them into thinking they are saved when their behavior is in fact calling their salvation into question (Mark Dever, The Deliberate Church, 47-48).