The MethodsOf Evangelism, Part 2 - Lesson 10
AI Transcript
This transcript is generated by artificial intelligence. It may contain errors, misidentifications, or omissions.
09:13:00
All right. Start to make your way in. Good morning. Buenos días. Okay. Join me in a word of prayer.
09:14:00
Father, you are good and you do good. We look to you this morning. To hear from you. In the written word of God, we would ask that you would give us eyes to see and ears to hear. Please remove any impediments, hindrances, to us hearing the word rightly. Equip us for every good work that you've planned for us to walk in. And minister to our hearts joy and peace and hope and love and faith. As we encounter you in the scriptures. May your Holy Spirit, which indwells us individually and corporately, accomplish all of the purposes that you would have for us on this Sunday.
09:15:00
We pray for those who are away. Some near, some very far, that you would encourage their hearts, that you would minister to them, protect them, and give them joy in you. This day. This Lord's Day. In Jesus' name. Amen. Okay. We are continuing our methodology of evangelism methods of evangelism, how we go about evangelism. And we began last time looking at how the evaluation for a method is really does this glorify the Lord or not? Does it match with our theology? So does it glorify the Lord does our methodology match our theology? Are they do they connect well or are they opposed to one another? We looked at a verse kind of looks at methodology a little bit.
09:16:00
Second Corinthians 4:2. But we have renounced disgraceful underhanded ways. We refuse to practice cunning or to tamper with God's word. But by the open statement of the truth, we would commend ourselves to everyone's conscience in the sight of God. Reading this morning in First Thessalonians chapter 2, Paul says there in First Thessalonians 2:1, for you yourselves know, brothers, that are coming to you is not in vain, but though we had already suffered and been shamefully treated at Philippi as you know, we had boldness in our God to declare to you the gospel of God in the midst of much conflict. For our appeal does not spring from error or impurity or any attempt to deceive. But just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, so we speak not to please man, but to please God who tests our hearts.
09:17:00
For we never came with words of flattery as you know. Nor with a pretext for greed. God is witness. Nor did we seek glory from people whether from you or from others. Though we could have made demands as apostles of Christ. So Paul speaks about his manner, his method as well. As he sought to bring the gospel to others. Last time we talked about conversation catalyst for evangelism, getting the conversation going, turning the conversation towards the gospel and Christian worldview type things. Spiritual conversation. Last week was a great last Sunday was a great day for me. Lots of opportunities to minister the word. Then when I thought it was all over, I got providentially orchestrated a great conversation that I had with one of my neighbors. And that was just led right into the gospel. And it was it was great. It was like practicing what I was preaching, you know. It's like the Lord was like, all right, you know,
09:18:00
you just taught on getting conversations towards the gospel. Now what are you going to do? And so we we had a great conversation that we are able to talk about much of the gospel. It started with the World Cup. And it ended with with the gospel. And and open door for continued conversation. So I was very encouraged by that. I hope you're thinking about praying about opportunities and finding that the Lord is making you aware of those. And then giving you boldness, encourage to take those opportunities and step out. This morning, though, we want to look at some as far as methods, some particular methods in evaluate them. We might call these concerns in evangelism. And we might say from the get-go regarding methods, can God use poor methods in spite of them? What would you say?
09:19:00
Yes. Yeah. God can. So oftentimes we we don't have the best methods. And yet the Lord still works through that. That doesn't mean we should just keep on doing the same thing over and over again. But we should evaluate what we're doing and see is there a better way that we could do ministry or accomplish this particular aspect of ministry. It is not because of poor methods that the Lord works. But often in spite of them, the Lord even overcomes our weaknesses. And so in any of these, as we evaluate them, we understand that the Lord has no doubt saved people who would speak to one or more of these methods as how the Lord drew them to himself. And that's great. And we praise God for that. But we also want to evaluate and see does it match our theology? Does the method match our theology? And does it is it the most effective way
09:20:00
to bring the gospel to others or methods for that. So we want to look at some of those. Will Metzger just give you this quote. He he he often talks about God-centered evangelism versus a me-centered or man-centered evangelism. He says this. The me-centered evangelist turns into a salesperson creating undue psychological pressure. And so we don't want to to do that. We want to have a God-centered evangelism and leave the results to God. Remember, we keep on talking about faithfulness in clarity with the message is the goal. Not necessarily someone being converted when we talk to them the first time or even after many times. That that's the Lord's work to convert them to the Lord. But we want to be faithful in clearly presenting the gospel. So let's consider a few of these methods. And ask and evaluate them
09:21:00
and see how we should think about them. The first is what about the sinner's prayer? The sinner's prayer. What is the sinner's prayer? Someone tell me. This is a controversial, you know, Sunday. The sinner's prayer. God be merciful to me a sinner. Yeah. So there's a lot of ways you can pray to the Lord as a sinner. And that is probably the most well-known and just precious passage when it comes to someone calling out to God for mercy. The publican, the tax collector, and the Pharisee in Luke chapter 18 verses 9 to 14. And he's just pouring out his heart as he's overcome with his sin. And is calling out for mercy to the Lord. So that is a sinner's prayer. Usually, when we're talking about the sinner's prayer, it's usually meant by that a kind of a rote prayer
09:22:00
that someone might walk another person through , you know, pray this prayer after me or some template we might say where there are, you know, repeat after me. And kind of thing. in kind of that final summons And and you might walk someone through that to the gospel and responding. to believe if they seem to be open Then you might ask them, if they would want to pray this prayer. Now, are there any, let me ask you this. Are there any concerns in doing that? In in leading someone in a repeat after me sinner's prayer? And what might those be? If they're if you can think of any. At least how you've seen it practiced. It leaves out the sentence. Okay.
09:23:00
It might leave out repentance. It's not coming from their heart. Yeah. It's rote. They're just repeating it. Mm-hmm. Yeah. You're they're just repeating kind of what you're saying. And so it while some might point to the Luke 18 passage as justification for this we should do this. Because he says God be merciful to me a sinner. But he's actually just doing that. No one is there coaching him through that. He's just expressing what was on his heart. And so yeah. We're kind of supplying those words there. Yep. What else? Have you noticed? Technically, the Bible doesn't make a requirement for a sinner to pray. Yeah. The response is repent and believe. Yeah. So that's something they do within their will, their heart. Mm-hmm. You know, quote unquote mind. Now, I think, you know, the Bible would clearly indicate
09:24:00
there is a would be a prompting to pray based on a converted heart. But it all has to mean I know what you're taking this. Yeah. Yeah. So I say too much. No. Well, no. Please do. You're absolutely right. I mean, think about Romans 10:9. You know, if you believe in your heart, and confess with your mouth. Right. So those aren't two things. He's not saying like you need to do both of these things. It's probably more the idea of out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks. Right. So what's in your heart will come out of your mouth. So if you're believing in your heart, heart being the immaterial part of you, that your inner man. Right. The real you, mission control center. If you're embracing Christ, mind affections will. Then that's going to come out in that you confess him. That you say that out loud. Now, if you couldn't speak and you believed
09:25:00
like that's not we ought not to take it that way. in your heart and you physically couldn't speak, It's just saying the overflow of the heart, the mouth, the heart speaks. So I think that's what you're saying is there's no requirement to pray a specific prayer or anything like that in scripture that we have. We do have people who call out to God in prayer. But that we would say is an expression of their changed heart, that God is moving in their heart. Here's what one person says about this. Observation. They say in the New Testament, we see people who are saved without praying. And the examples are Luke 23:39 to 43 and Acts 10:34 to 48. And it says we also see those who pray and yet are not saved. Matthew 7:21 to 23 and Luke 18:11 to 12. The Matthew 7:1 is, you know, many will say to me on that day, Lord, Lord, didn't we not did we not do these things? So just review that. We see people who are saved without praying.
09:26:00
And we see those who pray and yet are not saved. Throughout the Bible, it is made clear that prayer is not the switch that activates salvation. Faith alone is the means of our justification. Salvation occurs the moment someone turns from his or her sin and places their hope for salvation in Christ. This is accomplished solely by the empowering of the Holy Spirit. And it is based upon the finished work of Christ. A repentant person must understand at the basis for salvation is repentant faith in Christ alone. End quote. So that's important. Nothing wrong with praying. We should pray. But it's that's not the requirement we see in scripture. There aren't any exhortations to lead someone in a prayer. Or examples of anyone doing that. Of some kind of repetition in that way. Like we said, we have examples of people praying. God be merciful to me. Or like it's like propitiate your wrath against me is the idea.
09:27:00
And then even if you consider this a prayer in Luke 23, Lord, remember me when you enter into your kingdom. Right. The thief on the cross. So we're not encouraged to have people to pray a memorized prayer in scripture. I think we can give people guidance in thinking through the summons, repentance in faith, and encourage them to call out to God, to ask for a new heart. Various things that we that we can do and encourage them in. What would be some other concerns that often are associated with this, though? You could give me like a false assurance. Like I mean, that we would go door to door and we would just do it just because you get someone to pray with us at the door and just be like, you know, God. You can never lose your salvation. Yeah. And they weren't fully understanding the gospel. It's just like a, oh, let's just pray this prayer. Yeah. So it can lead to false assurance
09:28:00
often because like Ashley is saying, those who are trained in this methodology often are trained, maybe not always, but often are trained to, if the person prays, this prayer, they're trained to encourage that person that now you're a Christian. And you shouldn't doubt. Your salvation. And almost giving them instant assurance that they are a true Christian. And they may give them good instruction, like, hey, you should find a good local church and things like that. But there's this heavy emphasis on, hey, if you prayed that prayer, then you're a Christian now. And I think that's a big danger. Because the person talking to them doesn't know their heart. What parable that Jesus told might give us pause about doing that. The parable of the seed of the soils. Right.
09:29:00
The seed is sown and how many different soils are there? There's four. Yeah. And only one of those soils represents true saving faith. Someone who's actually a Christian. And the other three are those who are not truly believers. And even one of them responds really positively at first. And yet proves to not be a true believer. And so while we should be encouraged and we shouldn't be pessimistic, when someone makes a what seems to be a positive move towards Christ in the gospel, you know, we don't ever want to have, especially with our kids, a, yeah, we'll see. We'll see if you are a Christian. Like, we want to encourage every movement towards Christ. And just encourage people that Christians are those who don't just repent and believe one time. But we continue to repent and believe. And so that's what we've encouraged our kids
09:30:00
when they've made movements in that direction. Just say, that's wonderful. And that is, you know, trusting in Christ and repenting of our sin is what God calls us to do. In response to the great work that Christ has done. And we continue to repent. We continue to believe. And we want to encourage you in that. So keep on believing. Keep on trusting. And so we want to encourage that. Keep on calling out to the Lord. But at the same time, we don't want to be the ones who give assurance to someone. It's not our job to give assurance. Whose job is that? It's the Holy Spirit's job to work that into a person 's heart through the Word of God through what the Holy Spirit does through the Word of God in their hearts as well. So not only the objective basis of our assurance being the person and work of Christ that we look to, but also the other evidences that God works into our hearts
09:31:00
in bearing fruit as a result of that. So the danger of false assurance is a real one when it comes to the sinner's prayer. God is the only one who can see the heart for Samuel 16, verse 7. Man looks at the outward appearance, but God looks at the heart. And we don't know that true condition. We don't know what kind of soil their heart is. We can see the response as, and what we can do is continue to encourage them in walking with the Lord and trusting in the Lord. Ultimately, we don't know. And we can encourage them and we should that all those who repent and believe in Christ are saved and encourage them to keep on believing and repenting. All those who come to them, he will in no wise cast out. I've told, you know, some of our kids when they've been thinking through and struggling with,
09:32:00
you know, hey, I'm praying to the Lord, I want to be saved. And just to say, hey, show God his signature. God said he will in no wise cast out those who come to him. So come to him. Keep coming to him. Keep calling out to him. And just continue to pursue the Lord. Continue to call out to him. Tell him how much of a sinner you are. Despair of your own good works, so to speak. And look only to Christ. And keep on doing that in a persevering way. Beg God to give you assurance that he has truly saved you. Jesus said that he would not turn away any who come to him in true faith and repentance. And a good place to encourage people is in John chapter 6. John chapter 6, verse 37. John chapter 6, verse 37 says, "All that the Father gives me will come to me,
09:33:00
and whoever comes to me, I will never cast out." So they are there's election. And then there's a responsibility. And the encouragement that whoever comes Father giving to the Son a people. to Christ, he will not cast out. So come to Christ. We can also point them to 1 John and other places. And the marks of a true believer for assurance. I think that's good to do. If someone's showing a positive response to the gospel, they want to believe. Then we encourage them to embrace Christ. And then we encourage them to, hey, the scriptures actually gave us a whole book about assurance that God has done a work in our lives. 1 John 5:13. Write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life. I often say to people, you know, if I ask you for evidence that you're alive,
09:34:00
physically, I don't think anyone would go and find their birth certificate and present that to me. No, they would probably just say, well, I'm talking to you or take my pulse or whatever, you know. I'm standing here talking to you, right? And I think in a similar way, we don't need to go back to, well, I prayed this prayer. Did this certain thing. As the basis for us being a live spiritually, really, we look at our present state and say, am I trusting in Christ alone? Then that is exactly what God says is true of those who are saved. Their posture is one of trust in Christ. And then there's evidences and fruits of saving faith. John the Baptist and Luke 3 said, "Bear fruits in keeping with repentance." And then he actually gave them some examples based on their vocation, profession, as to what that might look like in their lives. You might ask someone like, hey, John the Baptist, for people
09:35:00
who were interested in repenting and believing and some who had, we're asking John , well, what should we do now? What does repentance look like in our lives? In an ongoing way. Now that we want to follow Christ. And he gave them examples based on their profession. You know, tax collectors, hey, just charge what you're supposed to and not more. And so you might ask the person, what would that look like in your life? You know, soldiers, don't be intimidating people and beating them up. in your situation, in your life that the Lord would want you to walk in in an ongoing way? Jesus said a good tree bears good fruit. Matthew 7:17. What might be some fruits of repentance We would also want to encourage them related to the fruits of true repentance and faith, that true believers continue to believe, continue to believe the truth.
09:36:00
Look at Acts chapter 14. Acts chapter 14. And notice the example of Paul and Barnabas with new believers. And how they encouraged new believers. Acts chapter 14, verse 21. It says, "When they had preached the gospel to that city and had made many disciples, they returned to listen to Iconium and to Antioch, strengthening the souls of the disciples encouraging them to continue in the faith." So these are those who have believed. They've expressed faith in Christ. He says that they made many disciples there. So there's believers. And what did they tell them? They said, "Continue in the faith. Continue believing. Don't leave Christ. Continue holding fast to Him as your only hope." And also saying that through many tribulations, we must enter the kingdom of God. So saying, hey, suffering is to be expected. And when they had appointed elders for them in every church, with prayer and fasting, they committed them to the Lord
09:37:00
in whom they had believed. So they established them in the church as well with leadership that, well, also encouraged them to continue in the faith. Colossians 1 makes this same point that believers keep on believing. They keep on holding fast to Christ. Colossians 1, verse 21 says, "And you who once were alienated and hostile in mind doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in the body of flesh by his death in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him, if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard, which has been proclaimed in all creation under heaven and of which I, Paul, became a minister." He says, "If indeed you continue in the faith." So perseverance in trusting in Christ is a mark of a true believer. You keep on believing. Hebrews chapter 4, or sorry,
09:38:00
Hebrews chapter 3. Verse 12, "Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God, but exhort one another every day as long as it is called today that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. And then look at verse 14. For we have come to share in Christ if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end." So here's the mark of a true believer. We continue to hold our confidence till the end. What is our confidence? That Christ is the only sufficient Savior. That not my works, but his works. And so we continue to hold fast. Notice that this is the common theme in Scripture for people to be encouraged, not only to believe once in Christ, but to continue to hold fast to Christ. We might also observe and point people to the continued obedience to the truth.
09:39:00
John 14:15-23. 1 John 2:3-6. We see that true believers walk in obedience. They continue to conform their lives in obedience to the Scriptures and to the word of God. Bearing fruit in that. John 14, verse 15. It says, "If you love me, you will keep my commandments." There's an evidence of fruit of faith. Verse 23, Jesus answered them, "If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him and will come and make our home with him." There's that fruit of faith. And continued love for the truth and the people of God as well. So the Holy Spirit is the one ultimately who works assurance into our hearts through the word of God, through the gospel and our embrace of it.
09:40:00
Romans 8, verse 16 says, "The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God." So the Holy Spirit works to grant assurance. So what should you do instead? If the method of leading someone word for word in a sinner's prayer is not the most helpful method for a number of reasons, what might you do instead? What do you think? What's an alternative? So the question again. What would be an alternative to the sinner's prayer? That might be more effective, more helpful. Good point in the Scripture. Certain passage or something.
09:41:00
then you could say, "Okay, well, ask some questions." It's like for John, if they tell you they're already said the prayer, Or just a different passage regarding salvation. Yeah. Or a change of life. Yeah. Continue to point them to Scripture, show them the fruits of faith, fruits of genuine salvation, saving faith. Yeah. I'd be better for anything. I've used it myself years ago. Just you pray for them. Yeah. Yeah. Pray those things that you just talked about. Exactly. Yeah. Can I pray for you? All right. That's it. You were telling me that before. Ms. Faye, that's your go-to a lot of times is, "Can I just pray for you?" And that's a great way because then you can pray the gospel for them and pray that the Lord would save them. So can I pray for you? I mean, I think 90% of people probably are going to say yes. That they're okay with you praying for them. After you talk with them. You can pray and ask God to save them while you pray for them and make the gospel clear to them. You can pray that they would count the cost
09:42:00
and find Christ to be worth following. You can pray that they would find their sin to be worthless and Christ to be of utmost value. So you can pray a lot of these things that you've talked about that the Lord would save them, that he would give them a new heart, that he would regenerate them. He would bring them from death to life. Many of these things. You can pray that in their presence before them. You can also ask them to pray themselves without coaching them. Can I pray for you? And then you pray and said, "Would you want to pray?" And just express what's on your heart right now to God. And then just let them pray. And don't coach them or anything like that. You don't need to follow that up with giving them assurance, but continuing to encourage them to trust Christ and look to the word of God. Ray Comfort, I saw it like a funny video he made, but he was trying to talk about the sinner's prayer. And he says, "You wouldn't need
09:43:00
to lead a husband word for word in a confession of his unfaithfulness to his wife." And he literally had like he made a video of Ray himself and a guy knocking on the door and the wife opens the door and he says, "Okay, John, and he just like word for word, like and he's like repeating Ray Comfort to talk to his wife about this." And he says, "Yeah, that would be pretty stilted." He's like, "No, if he's truly broken, by his sin, then it's just going to come out." And so you encourage them to express their heart before God. And that's what we see in those examples of people calling out to God. Like the publican, the tax collector. I think you can encourage them as well to find a healthy church to begin attending. Whether that's yours or maybe they're somewhere else. You can ask them if they've ever been to church. What to look for in a church.
09:44:00
Maybe if you're on a plane and you say, "You know, where do you live?" And you get to that point where they're interested. Then you might say, "Hey, would you mind if I looked and found a see if there's a healthy church in your area? Would you mind giving me your email to send that to you?" Or Joel Beakey say, he does that all the time. But he's got like a whole publishing ministry. So he's like, "Hey, would you mind giving me your address?" And I'll send you a few books. And some churches in your area. And it's like, wouldn't that be great? I want to sit next to Joel Beakey on a plane and just maybe he'll send me some books, some Puritan paperbacks or something. I don't know. But yeah, that's what if it's someone you don't know at all, but likely someone who you work with, "Hey, you need to find a good healthy church to begin attending." Tell them how scripture calls us to make our calling and election sure. Second Peter 1 does that. And it gives us once again evidences
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of saving faith. Verse 5, Second Peter 1:5, "For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue and virtue with faith and knowledge with self-control and self-control with steadfastness and steadfastness with godliness." And godliness with brotherly affection and brotherly affection with love. For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective, run fruitful, and the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For whoever lacks these qualities is so shortsighted that he is blind, having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins. Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to make your calling and election sure. For if you practice these qualities, you will never fall. So we can encourage them in that. And that's another way to encourage looking at how the Lord has worked in their lives. Okay. So any other comments or questions
09:46:00
about the sinner's prayer as we think about that as a method and what might be some good alternatives that we talk about? One thing there. I'm sure I grew up aren't emphasized that a lot. And it kind of reminds us of what Jean Asher was saying, but it turns salvation into like a moment experience. As opposed to a process of God. Like working in the heart is that it led to like a lack of discipleship. Oh, yeah. To your words. And that was like a huge issue that we had a lot of members of people who prayed a prayer. But then there was not like I didn't feel like our church was good at all at walking alongside people as they were new. Yeah. Yeah. So that's just a weakness even from the church body who's using that method. They are focused on getting someone to pray, but not focused at all on helping them live the Christian life. Yeah. After that. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. So I think the flip side is we want to focus on discipleship, right? And continuing that relationship,
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continuing to help them to see what it looks like to follow Christ and count the cost and what the Christian life looks like. You know, ongoing way. So absolutely. Yeah. That can it can we can have mixed motives. It can be, you know, like we want to see we want to be encouraged by some numbers and there's like a very tangible way. Like, hey, this many people prayed to receive Christ, but we don't really know ultimately what's going on in those situations, what we will know is people who commit to the local church or baptized and continue to walk with Christ and so it can be a little pragmatic in a way to want to see some numbers, some result, but once again, remember this comes back to our theology. Our theology is success is not people responding positively. It's our faithfulness to communicate clearly.
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Because we understand salvation is the work of God. It is not us doing that. It is God moving the sinner awakening their heart, their dead heart to life. As they hear the gospel, so we judge success by, hey, I had an interaction with this person. And God gave me grace to be clear about the gospel. And explain the gospel clearly. And let's pray for this person that the Lord continues to work and draw them to Himself. And so and then we've rejoiced in that. So yeah, I think that's a good addition as well. Let's look at another one. This is kind of related. But what about altar calls? What about altar calls in church? Okay. There's a lot of different responses to the gospel. We actually see in Acts chapter 17, Acts chapter 17, verse 32 to 34. This is after Paul was in Athens. He says, "Now when they heard of the resurrection
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of the dead, some mocked." There's one response. But others said, "We will hear you again about this." There's another response. So Paul went out from their midst. But some men joined him and believed. Among whom were Dionysius, the Areopagite, and a woman named Damaris and others with them. There's a third response. So some mocked. Ah, we don't want anything to do with that. Some are interested. They want to continue to learn more. And some actually respond in saving faith. So there will be a variety of responses that we see when the gospel goes out, whether that's like corporately, in a church service, conference, something like that, or individually as we have conversations with people. Okay. So let's think about altar calls. Is there anything in the Bible that calls us, commands us to have altar calls? No. Yeah.
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We don't have any do we have any examples of an altar call in scripture that you can think of? I'll take your silence as a no as well. So I don't think we do. I don't think we have any examples of that. So we don't have any express commands to do this or any examples of this practice in scripture. Let me let me show express some concerns here. Or let me ask you first what or give you the answer key. Right. What what are some concerns about the practice of altar calls as some of as you've seen them done? I went to the church one time. They sang through just as I am four times. All my verses. Four times. Hold you hostage. Yeah. Yeah. So a lot of repetition. We're just waiting.
09:51:00
You know, it's kind of sad. I you know, sometimes we laugh at these things, but I've seen this a lot where it starts as been in a church where the appeal is if you want to embrace Christ, then come forward and however that's expressed to explain why they should do that. But then if no one is coming forward, then it gets expanded out to, well, if you're a Christian and you need prayer, then why don't you come forward? And I can't help but think, and maybe I'm just like cynical or skeptical, but that it's like we have to have see some kind of response here. And so if we're not seeing someone respond in saving faith for the first time, then we don't want to stand up here with nobody. So like let's broaden it out and keep on broadening it out
09:52:00
until you know it's just the most general for any Christian that may need prayer or has a question about something. Why don't you come up and we'll talk to you? So okay. What would be some other concerns that there might be with this practice? What mine is that in the church I grew up in, is that people didn't come down to get saved. Then they would move into like we dedications. Yeah. Like you should like maybe your back slid and you need to like re-dedicate your life. So yeah. Even that is a wrong sense of salvation. Like you just people just re-dedicate their life like over and over as like a. Yeah. It just wrong misunderstanding. But they're looking for an emotional response. Sure. It's a heavy emphasis on the emotions instead of the mind. Yeah. And we're not against emotion. We're not, you know, but we understand that the pathway is the mind rightly apprehending the truth
09:53:00
and inflaming the heart based on that truth and moving the will. Right. Because our will is always going to be moved by our desires, which is which is our heart, what we want. Right. And our wants are informed by what we think and what we believe and our convictions. So truth impacts our hearts. Which moves our will. Right. But if we are moving people not according to the truth, but other means, like playing a song that pulls on your heartstrings just over and over and over again for a really long time, and kind of ratcheting up the moment there, then we may be moving someone for a disconnected reason from the mind. And that's not that's not good. So it can it can confuse. I have a lot of these from just different sources. I'm just kind of pulling from some making my own as well. But one challenge is it can confuse the outward act and the inward work of regeneration.
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God saves people, causes them to be born again. If we are calling someone to do an outward act, to show their faith in this way, it can confuse for new believers that it was they're going forward that was they're being saved, not regeneration in their heart. We might also say that it adds commands to the response of the gospel and it can mute the biblical commands to repent and believe. So the gospel summons is repent and believe. When we say, you know, come forward we may be putting in the minds of an unbeliever like this is what you really need to do to be saved and we de-emphasize repentance and belief by adding that. We should call sinners to believe. We should summon them to repent. But walking down to the front of a meeting place
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is not required. And maybe more dangerous. I think another caution about this is the roots of this practice. Which a lot of people don't realize. Practices that they've adopted and where they actually came from. It seems to have begun as a practice especially related to Charles Finney. If you've heard how many of you have heard of Charles Finney? Okay. A lot of you. Charles Finney, he established what was called the Anxious Bench. So if you're worried about something, At the front of the meeting place. come forward and we will pray for you. So up front. Developed though quickly into something else. And really this was an overflow of his beliefs. Why he established this practice. It wasn't something that was happening before. And so his method, the what we call now the altar call, matched his beliefs and his theology. And that's what we're talking about methodology.
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He did not believe in original sin. In other words, he didn't see that Adam's guilt was imputed to us and we had to, you know, this corrupted nature. He was, I mean, semi-Pelagian or borderline fully Pelagian if you don't know what those terms are. Essentially, like we just need to make a decision like Adam did as well. And so if we make the right decision, then we'll be right with God. It's fundamentally misses the understanding of the condition of the human heart. So in other words, man is just as capable to respond like Adam before the fall. He was also confused seriously on justification. He believed in man's innate ability to respond to God apart from sovereign regeneration. I've thought about Finney a lot over the years. I seriously question if he was even a Christian.
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I personally don't think he was because of the theological beliefs that he had. Some people tried to clean up his theology textbook. They wrote because it was so bad so they revised it. But the earlier versions of it that we have show just how terrible much of his theology was on very fundamental beliefs. So the Lord knows ultimately but he was created this practice very manipulative in my opinion. He thought revival could be produced by applying the right means. And the results of his methods should be enough to give great pause to those who had practiced it. In the upper north east of the United States, he was largely ministering in those regions and after his ministry, they began to call these areas the burned over district. The burned over district. In other words, the result of Finney's ministry in those like him created such poor conditions
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for gospel reception because of what we might say inoculating people to the gospel. If you get an inoculation, right, you get a little bit of the virus or I don't know what. I'm not a doctor. That kind of doctor. You know, you get a little bit of it. To help you fight it off. Well, people get a what sounds like the gospel and they think they're saved. So they see no need for the gospel when in fact they're not truly converted. And so it created devastating for decade after decade results of people who thought they were Christians and yet they were not in fact. So we ought to invite sinners to repent and believe but we don't need to call them to the front. We might say something like, hey, if you have questions about what you've heard today, please come and speak to us after the service. We would love to talk to you. We would love to answer your questions. If you have a need spiritual need or you want to know more about what it means
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to follow Christ, please come and talk to us. I think that's totally fine. I think that's a great thing to do. And then you continue to talk to people. But it takes away that kind of emotional pressure in front of everyone. Let me ask you this. You know, when they say every eye closed, you know, raise your hand. Do you ever look? Are you the person who looks? You know, I always wanted to look. You know, who's raising their hand? You know, if you're interested in Christ, then we will be interested. Then we're happy to talk to you. We're happy to stay as long as you need to talk about where you're thinking about or meet with you this week. And the reality is if they're interested in Christ in that moment, we don't need to fear that we're going to like miss the moment. And that they won't be saved if we don't strike while the iron is hot, so to speak. If they're interested in Christ now, they'll be interested in Christ later. I heard one pastor tell the following story
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about Martin Lloyd Jones, the pastor in London. And he said this. Here's the story. He says, in the church where I ministered in South Wales, so that's where he was before London, I used to stand at the main door of the church at the close of the service on Sunday night and shake hands with people on the way out. The incident to which I'm referring concerns a man who used to come to our service every Sunday night. He was a tradesman. But he was also a heavy drinker. He got drunk regularly every Saturday night. But was also regularly seated in the gallery of our church every Sunday night. On one particular night to which I'm referring, I happened to notice while preaching, this man was obviously being affected. I could see that he was weeping copiously. And I was anxious to know what was happening to him. At the end of the service, I went and stood at the door and after a while I saw this man coming. Immediately I was in a mental conflict. Should I and view of what I've seen say a word to him and ask him
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to make that decision that night? Or should I not? of the Spirit of God if I did so? Hurriedly I decided I would not ask him to stay behind. Would I be interfering with the work So I greeted him in the usual manner and went out. His face revealed that he'd been crying and he could scarcely look at me. The following evening I was walking to the prayer meeting in the church and going over a railway bridge. He came across the road and said, I saw the same man coming to meet me. you know, doctor, Lloyd Jones was a medical doctor before he went into ministry. So they called him the doctor. You know, doctor, if you had asked me to stay behind last night, I would have done so to receive Jesus. Well, I said, I'm asking you now. Come with me. Come with me now. Oh, no, he said. But if you had asked me last night, I would have done so. Lloyd Jones said to him, my dear friend, if what had happened to you last night
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does not last for 24 hours, I'm not interested in it. If you're not as ready to come with me now as you were last night, Whatever affected you last night was only temporary and passing. You still do not see your real need for Christ. End quote. you have not got the right, not the true thing. And I think that's very true. We don't need to fear that if, when someone's really stirred up, then we'll lose them forever. We can talk with people. We can encourage them. We can tell them to repent and receive Christ now. There's an urgency to that. that if we don't act and get them to do something, But we can trust that if the Lord is working, he will continue to work. Yes. That particular stor y, prone to ring to my mind something, that I'd like to share. And see what you think. Have you ever considered or have you ever been in a service
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where the pastor said, is there anyone here that would like for us to pray for them? And then if the people raise their hands, then pray for them. Yeah. And so in this particular story, that you just told , I personally think that that should have been asked of that guy. Our. General question. Sure. For the service. Sure. And then he would have known how, of course, this is just after the fact. Yeah, yeah. And then he would have known that the man was struggling. Sure. You know. But I do agree with him. If it was if he was dealing with him night before it had left. Yeah, yeah. And I think Lloyd Jones has even shown his own heart that as a pastor, you're trying to figure out, like, should I press this person right now? Should I what should I do? And he's wrestling through that himself.
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And then he kind of, what we would say, lets the guy go, just kind of generally greets him. He could have said, hey, can I is there anything I can pray for you for? And, you know, I don't think he would be opposed to that. But at the same. I just meant general. Yeah. Service. Yeah. You don't need to have it. I'll alter it. Sure, sure. But is there anyone here that needs our prayers? Yeah. Would you raise your hand? Yeah. Yeah. Or whatever. Yeah. Or come to me after the service. Yeah. And like I said, I think a good practice can be at times to say, if you have a if you have a need that you would especially like us to pray for or a question or a concern that we would love to talk with you after the service. I guess my inclination is just to avoid in a big public setting. I guess maybe it would be different if it was like a prayer meeting, like a prayer service, right? And maybe we study the scriptures for a shorter time. And then hey, are there any needs here
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that we can pray about in your life or someone else's? And then take those. But we're just kind of devoted to that. So, that's kind of my on the spot thought there. I would let me say this in conclusion, because we got to we got to wrap up here. The Lord has given us a public way to demonstrate that we've trusted in Christ, right? What is that called? Baptism. Yeah. So, it actually kind of mutes that and puts something else in its place, in my opinion. I think if we can talk to people, we can encourage people. We don't we don't need to have them come forward. Because they will come forward. And they've come to, you know, real assurance And can testify with even more clarity, And proclaim their faith in Christ when the Lord has converted them. And so, there's a great time for the church that that's happened in their lives.
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having thought through the gospel and their own conversion. to the roles of the membership. Because this person's committing to a local assembly to praise God and actually be able to add a number and not just what often happens frequently in these kinds of services is that people may come forward and they're making a decision for Christ but many of those people don't end up joining the church. They don't end up sticking around. And so, it's like, how do we it's like people who have made some kind of decision for Christ but they actually haven't made a decision for baptism necessarily. Or to commit to the local church. And so, it's very hard to even follow up with folks like that. All right, let me pray. Lord, as we talk about these things, we don't want to sit in judgment. In a harsh way. On others who've practiced some of these methods. And so, many of us, I think maybe all of us in some way or another have been in churches or have maybe used some of these methods. And Lord, we just want to be faithful. We want to continue to conform our lives and our ministry
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and our methods to the truth of the gospel and what would glorify you, what would not get in the way So, help us as we evaluate these things to do it from a biblical perspective, wanting to honor you. of people truly embracing Christ and knowing him. And that you would bring fruit as a result, Lord. Help us to continue to evaluate our methods so that they may be most in line with you. And help us to consistently call sinners summon them to respond. You will do the most important part, Lord, Trusting that you will do the rest. of converting them to Christ and Jesus' name. Amen.