1
Come Sunday
Sit in the back if you want to. Nothing is asked of visitors — no card, no standing up, no offering plate passed under your nose.
A cooperative church
The Lion of Judah has prevailed
One congregation that holds its work, its tools and its table in common. We gather Sunday to worship, and the rest of the week to carry each other's load.
Behold, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, hath prevailed to open the book.Revelation 5:5 · KJV
The scroll opens because someone worthy took it, not because the church was strong. We hold things in common for the same reason we sing: it is the shape of a people who have already been rescued, not the price of being rescued.
How people join
Four steps, in order, and nobody is hurried through them. Most households take the better part of a year.
2
Sit and study
Bible study at 6:45, the second and fourth Thursday. Open to everyone. This is where you meet the church as it actually is, and where you find out whether you want in.
3
Take a share of work
Pick something real and carry it for a season — the garden, the rota, the shed, the sound desk. Hours go in the labor book under your name.
4
Make covenant
Baptism if you haven't been baptized, then a public promise before the congregation. From that Sunday you have a voice and a vote.
How churches join
A congregation can hold things in common with us without becoming us. Four steps, the same as for people, and slower — most take two years.
1
Write to us
An elder writes on behalf of the congregation, not an individual on behalf of a hope. Two of ours come and sit through an ordinary Sunday.
2
Open the books both ways
You see ours, we see yours. Holdings, debts, salaries, the relief fund. A cooperative that cannot show its ledger is asking for trust it has not earned.
3
Share one thing first
A tool, a season in the garden, a shared relief case, hours in the labour book. The agreement follows the practice; it does not lead it.
4
Covenant between congregations
Written, read aloud in both rooms, and voted on separately by each. Either congregation may end it by the same vote, without penalty.
You stay yourselves
No congregation is absorbed. You keep your name, your elders, your order of service and your discipline. There is no head office and no assessment to pay.
You keep your property
Your building, land and accounts stay yours. Nothing is transferred, mortgaged or pledged, and no shared holding may be borrowed against.
Doctrine
Agreement on the first-order articles, room to differ on the rest. The three tiers on the belief page are how we sort which is which.
Money
No dues. Gifts between congregations are gifts, recorded in both ledgers and audited in January. Nothing owed, nothing repayable.
Not an investment
Joining the cooperative confers no interest in the fund, no unit, no return and no claim on anything the fund owns. They are separate entities and stay that way.
Leaving
By vote, with a season's notice. Shared tools go back where they came from and the labour book is settled to zero. Nobody is held in by paperwork.
What we hold
Short enough to say from memory. The full statement runs to twelve articles, and the creed is said aloud every Sunday.
First
Scripture
The whole of it, read out loud and preached straight through the books rather than picked over for topics.
- 2 Timothy 3:16
- Psalm 119
Center
Christ, risen
He is King now, not one day. That is why the work is joyful and why we are not frightened of what comes next.
- Revelation 5
- 1 Corinthians 15
Together
One purse
What the first church did in Jerusalem was not a rule, but it was not an accident either. We take it seriously and gladly.
- Acts 2:44–47
- 2 Corinthians 8
Outward
The neighbor
The relief fund and the tool shed are open to people who will never join. That is the point of them.
- Luke 10:25–37
- James 2
Membership
Open to any baptized believer who will make the covenant. No dues, no minimum income, no property handed over.
Money
Giving is free and unpublished. Books are audited yearly by two members who hold no office.
Government
Elders teach and shepherd; servants keep the holdings; the congregation votes on the budget and on every member.
The name
Revelation 5:5 and Romans 8:15 in the same breath — the Lion's roar, and the cry of a child who has just found out whose house this is.
Children
Children stay in the room for the whole service. There is no separate class to take them to, and nobody minds the noise.
Who has been here
Each mark on the globe is a country someone has visited from. Counted on this server, with no outside service asked and nothing set on your machine. Addresses are logged separately and kept thirty days.
Visits
24
Countries
0
Marked on the globe
not recorded yet
Sunday · 10:00am
Come and
sit with us
Email us and we will send directions and a parking note. Dress however you dress the rest of the week — half the room comes straight off a shift.
Sunday10:00am
Bible study6:45pm · 2nd & 4th Thursday
Men's round tableMondays, 7:00pm
Emailelders@roarcry.com