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Church Directories

Discussion in 'General Baptist Discussions' started by Salty, Oct 12, 2012.

  1. Salty

    Salty 20,000 Posts Club
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    Do you have a church directory?

    Do you have inactive members listed?

    How about unmarried couples - do you list them together - what if they have kids.

    How about a (married) couple - and they have adult children who live in a distant city?

    Others you would list or not list?
     
  2. mont974x4

    mont974x4 New Member

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    I don't remember ever being in a church that did not have a directory of some kind.

    They usually get updated annually, unless there was a major change (new pastor for example). During the update people who have not been around for 6 months should be dropped. Prior to this elders and people who know those who are MIA should have already contacted them a few times. Those who have moved or resigned are removed with no issue.

    Unmarried couples are listed as singles. Children are listed with their mother.

    There should be an easy to find lost of leaders (elders and deacons) and the secretaries office line and church email address.

    I have not seen any off the wall lists so I am not sure how to answer that.
     
  3. Jerome

    Jerome Well-Known Member
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    Church members are distinguished with an asterisk after their names.
     
  4. Mexdeaf

    Mexdeaf New Member

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    Church directories are sooooo 1980's. :laugh:
     
  5. Oldtimer

    Oldtimer New Member

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    Our church secretary maintains a list of all members, regardless of their status. However this list isn't distributed to the general congregation. The information on inactive members, for whatever reason, is available, when the need arises.

    She also maintains and periodically makes available a list of those active in the church, whether members or not. We have a few people in our church who do not want to move their membership to ours, yet you'd think they were members with regards to their faithfulness to our church. Hands-on ministry people. That's probably a subject for another thread.

    Married couples are listed together. Singles are listed separately. Young children are not listed. Since we are a fairly small church, most know who belongs to whom in that regard.

    There is one exception to the "inactive". These are members who are confined to resthomes and such and cannot physically attend church. However, their contact information is made available to those who want to keep in touch.

    The other "inactive" members aren't forgotton and simply written off either. Periodically, our church will do some type of outreach to them. To those we know aren't attending a church somewhere else. Sometimes done through the Deacon Fellowship, and sometimes through the congregation as a whole. We have had positive results from things as simple as sending a "Thinking of You" card to an MIA.

    Probably more than you ever wanted to know about our church membership lists. :flower:
     
  6. annsni

    annsni Well-Known Member
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    Our church directory is updated yearly. It's just a printed directory - we've done a few picture directories but haven't done one in about 8 years. A few answers:

    * Inactive members aren't listed because you must fill out a bulletin insert in order to be in the directory so if you are not there, you're not in.

    * Unmarried couples are not listed together unless we don't know they are not married (Yes, this has happened and when we found out, they were asked "Well, aren't you going to fix that??" since they had kids together. They were married 4 weeks later - LOL)

    * All children who attend the church who are over 18 are listed separately from their parents. If they are away at college, we will list them if requested. If they are adult and have their own lives apart from their parents and live away, they are not attending to fill out the insert.

    We always have a separate section in the back for our deaf congregation (they requested this) and another section for "friends who have moved away" so that regular attendees who have moved away can have their new info listed for a year.
     
  7. Gregory Perry Sr.

    Gregory Perry Sr. Active Member

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    Unmarried Couples??????

    Since Church Directories are primarily (or should be..in my opinion) (particularly if it is a picture directory like our church has...with a printed listing as well) for ACTIVE members in good (and I mean scripturally GOOD) standing then UNMARRIED COUPLES (with or without kids) should NEVER be listed at all since that IMPLIES the endorsement by the church of unmarried people possibly cohabiting outside the bonds of marriage. If the "couple" is two singles that are "dating" or even "engaged" they should be listed individually. In the event a marriage takes place their status can be corrected at the next directory "update". We must avoid the "appearance of evil"...in God's opinion:thumbsup:.

    Bro.Greg
     
  8. Gregory Perry Sr.

    Gregory Perry Sr. Active Member

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    Maybe...but....

    Mex...yeah...but..there have been many times when I was looking at a prayer request on our churches online prayer chain that I found myself pulling out my copy of our churches printed picture directory to put a "face with a name". They may be 80's...but they can be quite useful for us old dinosaurs:smilewinkgrin:.By the way...I am thankful for the newer technologies because without them,this prayer chain I mentioned would not be possible!

    Bro.Greg:thumbs:
     
  9. SaggyWoman

    SaggyWoman Active Member

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    I have been a member of different churches who have had directories. Whatever. They become outdated as soon as they are completed.

    Now, my church directory is Facebook.
     
  10. Gregory Perry Sr.

    Gregory Perry Sr. Active Member

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    Stickin' With The Printed Page..

    Ok....but we don't Facebook, or Twitter...or any of that social media stuff.......I know,I know...how very 80's of me.

    Others feel have no problems with it....I just choose not to. That said though...you are pretty much right though SW...the printed Directories do get outdated quickly.

    Bro.Greg
     
  11. Dale-c

    Dale-c Active Member

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    We have a printed directory and we have empty pages in the back, which we fill with stickers as new people join.

    Members are noted with an asterisk.
    people who leave are taken out as new editions are made. They are all done small scale and in house so it is easy to make revisions.
    You will always have someone in it who has moved, left the church, died etc but that is not really a problem.
     
  12. Dale-c

    Dale-c Active Member

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    I believe we have had engaged people together a few times.
    If they were scheduled to get married shortly after the directory was printed. I think this did happen once.
     
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