Erroneous Evangelism

I have been becoming more and more alarmed with much of the methods and attitudes prevalent in modern day evangelism. I greatly appreciate those who labor at evangelism and have a zeal to share the gospel. It is my prayer that God would increase such a zeal in the heart of believers and raise up more evangelists at home and abroad. As a pastor, one of my duties is evangelism (2 Timothy 4:5) and I long to share the gospel with every opportunity that the Lord provides. However, I cannot excuse or utilize some of the current popular tactics espoused in evangelistic meetings and sermons. The following are some problems in much evangelistic presentations today. My hope is that this may aid in helping people to get the gospel right in their presentation of the salvation message as laid out in the Bible.


Always An Altar Call
I think that it was Charles Finney who came up with the idea of the "altar call" or at least he can be said to be the one who popularized it. Today, some would claim that it has not been a revival service or an evangelistic meeting unless the pastor or evangelist gave an "altar call" at the end. I have been asked why I seldom give "altar calls." In fact, the only times that I have was in the earliest of my preaching days when I had not thought the idea through or when asked by the congregation in which I served. I believe that there are several problems with the altar call and therefore normally avoid it.

If one is not careful, by giving an altar call they make it sound as if someone cannot be saved unless they get out of the pew and come forward to kneel at the altar. They would imply a "work" added for one's salvation. It would not be that you are saved by "grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone" but by "grace through faith AND COMING FORWARD TO THE ALTAR." Also, many people can be emotionally manipulated to come forward without any genuine work of God occurring in their heart. Music can move us. Play "Just As I Am" a dozen times and it may move you to tears and convince you that you are experiencing something and must go forward as the preacher said that you should. Finney was a master at this. He would have the lights turned down and do all that he could to convince someone to "come forward" and give their life to Christ. The problem with this method is that it forgets that salvation is a work of God and not man. The preacher cannot "move" someone to be saved. Only God's Spirit can change someone's heart, desires, and attitude. Those who can be described as children of God are those who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God (John 1:13). Altar calls and a lot of the manipulation that goes along with them are not needed as the power of conversion never lies with man-made tactics but with the Holy Spirit working alongside the Word of God. On the day of Pentecost, Peter did not end with an "altar call." He did not ask anyone in the crowd to come forward. Instead, he concluded his message with the point he was aiming to get at; the Jesus whom they crucified is the Lord (Yahweh based on the reference of Joel 2:28-32 in Acts 2:17-21) and Christ (Messiah) the Old Testament spoke of (Acts 2:36). There were no special hymns sung ten times. The result of this was the Lord at work. The people were cut to the heart (v. 37). In the Greek, the verb for cut or pierce is in what is known as the passive voice. This indicates that the subject of the verb received the action and did not perform the action itself. This means that this piercing of the people's heart was not of their own doing but happened to them. God's Spirit used Peter's message to pierce their heart and call them to repentance. It led them to realize what they had done and cry out, Brothers, what shall we do? Peter doesn't tell them that they need to "come forward and take their place at the altar" but instead Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit (v. 38). He did call them to repentance and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, as we always should when giving the gospel, but not to "come forward."

In evangelism, we should just proclaim the gospel, pray, and let God take care of the rest. There is a reason why Paul declared that he was not ashamed of the gospel. Because it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes (Romans 1:16). Let's be careful not to add a work in what one might communicate with an altar call. Contrary to popular belief, revival and the saving of lost souls can still occur without one. Just look at the revival meetings held by the great evangelists such as George Whitefield, Jonathan Edwards, and John Wesley. They never gave altar calls and God used their presentation of the gospel to draw many lost souls to His Son the Savior. D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones put it well when he said, "I would affirm that much of the modern approach to evangelism, with its techniques and methods, is unnecessary if we REALLY believe in the doctrine of the Holy Spirit and His application of God's message . . . Should we not concentrate more, as the church has done through the centuries, upon praying for, and laying the basis of Christian instruction for, revival as it is described in the Bible?"


Praying "The Prayer"
Another common method in modern evangelism is to have listeners repeat the "sinner's prayer" after the preacher. Then, usually, the preacher will say something to the effect of: "Now if you prayed that prayer, you can be assured that you are saved and have eternal life. You can mark down today as the day that you received salvation." Many of these preachers don't realize what they are communicating. Look closely at such a statement. "If you prayed this prayer THEN you can be assured that you are saved." According to the statement itself, the assurance of salvation rests, not on the shed blood of Jesus Christ and the sinner's faith in Him, but instead on "the prayer" itself. To be fair, most preachers who use the method of "the prayer" do not intend to communicate this. However, it is easily misunderstood if examined closely. I have talked to people and asked them if they are saved to only have the reply that "yes, I came forward to the altar and prayed 'the prayer.' " Do you see what happened in this case and similar ones? They have based their salvation not on Christ and the cross but on their action of physically responding to the "altar call" and praying "the prayer." This prayer means nothing if God does not change someone's heart. It is merely words. Again, we have to be careful with what we are communicating. I fear that we have too many people who think that they are saved due to "coming forward to the altar" and "saying 'the prayer' " that really are not because they have not been born again in the heart by the Spirit of God. These then become the hardest to witness to because they wrote in their Bible the day that they said "the prayer" and the evangelist promised them eternal life because of it (at least that is the way it was presented, even if unintentionally).

Now am I saying that we should not lead someone in how to pray concerning their salvation? No. I think that there is a big difference instructing someone to "call out to the Lord" for Him to save them (biblical terminology unlike asking Jesus to "come into one's heart" which is never found anywhere in the Bible) and asking them to mimic certain words and phrases verbatim after you. For instance, Paul never asked unbelievers to say a certain prayer for their salvation. Instead, he would say something like the following: The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now He commands all people everywhere to repent, because He has fixed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom He has appointed; and of this He has given assurance to all by raising Him from the dead (Acts 17:30-31). It is not "the prayer" that saves but God Himself by His grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. Let's make sure that we are communicating this and not leading one to believe anything else.

Jesus Loves You and Has a Wonderful Plan For Your Life
A common way to begin a witnessing opportunity is to say something to the effect of the following: Jesus loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life. The problem with such a statement is how it might easily be misunderstood. First of all, for a prideful sinner it might not be seen as such a surprise that Jesus loves them. Of course He would love them! Why wouldn't He? What is there about him not to love? It would be wiser to show them from Scripture of how they are an enemy of God due to their rebellion and sin and what God has done through Christ to turn those who repent and believe in His Son from His enemies to His children. To begin with Jesus loves you plays into their carnal desires and does not get to the heart of their sin. None of the apostles in their evangelistic preaching as recorded in the book of Acts ever began a sermon with Jesus loves you. We would do well to follow their example instead of the errors of our current evangelical culture.

Second, what does it mean that Jesus has a wonderful plan for your life? Does that mean that if you trust in Jesus you can have "Your Best Life Now"? That your marriage will be fixed, you will be healed of all of your illnesses and pains, and that you will be fully healthy, wealthy, and wise? What about those called to be martyrs for the cause of Christ? Or those persecuted for His name sake? My fear is that this communicates something that is not true. Speaking to a "me-centered" sinner," telling them that Jesus loves them and has a wonderful plan for their life could lead them to further idolatry. They may say that they went Jesus not because of how wonderful and great He is but because they believe He will give them "a wonderful life." They will actually view Jesus as a means to these gifts instead of the end Himself. They will center on the gifts instead of the Giver. Something they actually already do! How would this help them come to know the Lord and the necessity to repent of their sin and trust in Christ ALONE to save them from God's righteous wrath that they deserve for their sins? Perhaps it would be better to begin an evangelistic conversation with something more to the effect that "God is a holy God and you are a wicked sinner thus you are a sinner in the hands of an angry God and here is the only hope that you have to ever stand before Him in righteousness not fearing His wrath . . ." That would certainly communicate the truth better.

Jesus is Knocking . . . But At the Wrong Door!
This is probably one of my favorite of the erroneous methods of evangelism today. I shake my head every time that I hear it. It bothers me the most because it is a complete misapplication of what the Scripture quoted even refers. The passage I am talking about is Revelation 3:20. Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with Me. In many evangelistic sermons or presentations, the evangelist inevitably mentions this passage and then appeals to the listeners to "open up the door of your heart and let Jesus in." The problem here is that Jesus is NOT knocking on the door of an unbeliever's heart waiting for them to let Him in according to this verse in Revelation. He is certainly knocking but He is knocking on a different door. Look closely at the context of the passage. The door in which the Savior knocks is the door of a church! This is part of the letter to the church of Laodicea as indicated by v. 14. Unless this church is nothing but unbelievers, Jesus is knocking on the door to saints who are lukewarm (vv. 15-16). This "knocking" is His plea to them to be zealous and repent (v. 19). It is not an invitation to accept salvation but a call to repentance before judgment may come. Preachers who use this verse in their evangelistic presentations, whether they realize it or not, do great discredit to the Scripture. It ignores the context and completely misses the author's intended meaning.

Furthermore, the idea of "inviting a waiting Jesus into one's heart" is unbiblical. I have yet to find in Scripture such a phrase of someone "inviting Jesus into their heart." Scripture calls for one to repent and believe in Christ but never to "ask Him into their heart." God opened up Lyda's heart to receive the things spoken by Paul (Acts 16:14). She didn't "ask Jesus into her heart" but the Lord opened her heart. I really think that we underestimate the Bible's description of man's depravity and what it means when it describes us as "slaves to sin." The issue is that we are under sin's power willingly until God changes our will with the new heart that He promises to give (Ezekiel 36:26-27). We cannot "let Him into to our heart" because we do not desire to. God must change that desire before we are able to come to Him (John 6:44). (I have written more on the biblical doctrine of "Total Depravity" here: http://energeticexegete.blogspot.com/2010/09/disappearance-of-depravity.html ) I would prefer to use biblical terminology and biblical methods in evangelism.

My desire is to see evangelism done right and for God to sovereignly bring more sinners into His Kingdom. I realize that God has been doing this, even in spite of some of these errors in evangelism. I also will admit that I have been guilty of each of these erroneous evangelistic tactics at some point and time. But as I have studied God's Word more and grown in my faith, I have begun to see where I was wrong in these tactics and began to instead go with how the Bible describes and models proper evangelism. I intend to put together a gospel track to hand out to folks that I encounter along my way or who may be in my congregation and dealing with questions of whether they are saved soon. Perhaps I will share that in this blog when it is completed. Let's work to do evangelism God's way according to His Word for His glory.


In Christ,
Lee
Soli Deo Gloria!!!

Missions is About God

God be gracious to us and bless us,
And cause His face to shine upon us-
That Your way may be known on the earth,
Your salvation among all nations.
Let the peoples praise You, O God;
Let all the peoples praise You.
Let the nations be glad and sing for joy;
For You will judge the peoples with uprightness
And guide the nations on the earth.
Let the peoples praise You, O God;
Let all the peoples praise You.
The earth has yielded its produce;
God, our God, blesses us.
God blesses us.
That all the ends of the earth may fear Him.
~Psalm 67

Many Christians have the wrong attitude towards evangelism and missions. Though many mean well, their approach becomes very man-centered. Some view new converts as notches in their belt instead of celebrating the work of redemption that God has done in the sinner's life in giving him eyes to see and the desire to embrace the truth of the gospel. In fact, evangelism and missions is not about people but about God. The impetus for missions should be to make God's name great throughout the earth. Mission activity should spawn out of an intense desire to share God's great name with others and the wonderful and marvelous work He has done, part of that work being His sending of His Son in the place of sinners to appease God's great wrath and the providing of eternal life through faith in Him. Psalm 67 does well in communicating such a desire which all Christians should have in approaching mission work.

The psalmist opens up the poem with an appeal to God to be gracious and to bestow His blessing. The wording is almost identical to the Aaronic blessing of Numbers 6:24-26: The LORD bless you, and keep you; / The LORD make His face shine on you, / And be gracious to you; / The LORD lift up His countenance on you, / And give you peace. This was a blessing which God instructed Aaron and his sons to say to pronounce upon the people of Israel. So they shall invoke My name on the sons of Israel, and I then will bless them (Numbers 6:27). In using some of the familiar language of this blessing, the psalmist is requesting God to show His favor upon His people. But note the reason the psalmist desires God to show His favor. It is not so that they can live a life of health, wealth, and prosperity. It is not so that they can be comfortable. He is not making the request on their behalf at all but God's! His desire is that God would get the glory and make His name known to the other nations. The hope is that other people will view God's work and realize that God is good and is the One who brings ultimate satisfaction. He states the reason as That Your way may be known on the earth, / Your salvation among all nations. In fact, this is God's very reason for the things which He does, to glorify Himself and to make His name known. One of the reasons that God chose to reveal His power through the ten plagues upon the nation of Egypt and Pharaoh instead of striking them dead right away was to glorify Himself through proclaiming His great name. For if by now I had put forth My hand and struck you and your people with pestilence, you would then have been cut off from the earth. But, indeed, for this reason I have allowed you to remain, in order to show you My power and in order to proclaim My name through all the earth (Exodus 9:15-16). In missions we play a part of God's desire of glorifying His great name in proclaiming the gospel which He uses to bring people to saving faith in Him (Romans 1:16-17; 10:17; 1 Peter 23). In spreading the gospel, we proclaim God's way and salvation among the nations just as the psalmist invites God to use His blessings and favor upon His people to do so.

The psalmist next moves to call all to praise God. He not only calls peoples, but specifically all the peoples. God is so good and due to our own delight in Him, we should desire that all would have that same fulfillment of delight. Because He is worthy of all of our praise, we should desire that others would give Him the glory He rightfully deserves. The peace that we experience with God through Jesus Christ should prompt us to share Christ so that God may work in others for them to encounter the same peace. Our goal in missions should be to call people to rejoice in everything Christ is and all that He has done as part of God's perfect, divine plan. John Stott put it well when he stated: "The highest of missionary motives is neither obedience to the Great Commission (important as that is), nor love for sinners who are alienated and perishing (strong as that incentive is, especially when we contemplate the wrath of God . . .), but rather zeal-burning and passionate zeal-for the glory of Jesus Christ."

The psalmist calls the nations to be glad and sing for joy. The reason the nations should be ecstatic is due to God's reign. Judgment and guidance are aspects of the role of a ruler. The psalmist may well have in mind the millennial kingdom where the Messiah will rule over Israel and the nations. This is the culmination of the kingdom He has promised.

The poem closes in much the same way it starts. The psalmist shares a specific material blessing of the produce of crops and then once again reiterates that the reason for the blessing is so that the ends of the earth may be in awe of God for who He is and what He has done for His people. God blesses us so that the world may see Him and reverence or fear Him.

May God send us out to proclaim His great name among the nations and bring Him glory. If we are serious about God's glory, we will be serious about missions!

In Christ,
Lee
Soli Deo Gloria!

A Wonderful Website to Aid in Missions

Jesus was going through all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every kind of disease and every kind of sickness. Seeing the people, He felt compassion for them, because they were distressed and dispirited like sheep without a shepherd. Then He said to His disciples, "The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Therefore beseech the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into His harvest."
~Matthew 9:35-38

I spent some time pondering yesterday the importance that missions must play in the life of the Christian. God's heart clearly is to glorify His name throughout all the earth (Exodus 9:16; Psalm 67; Ezekiel 38:23) and having His children bring the gospel to every tribe and tongue and people group is the means He has graciously chosen to do so. This website is a nice aid in helping us be faithful to the "Great Commission" (Matthew 28:19-20) as it provides information on the unreached people groups in the world. I would encourage you to look over this for any opportunity the Lord may be providing you with and to commit to pray for some of these groups that God would send feet of those who bring good news of good things (Romans 10:15) so that through the proclamation of the gospel, Satan's hold upon them may collapse and God may penetrate hard hearts with His transforming power. As Jesus told His disciples: The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Therefore beseech the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into His harvest (Matthew 9:37-38). Who knows, like the disciples who prayed that prayer, God's answer might be to send you to work in that harvest. Right after Jesus exhorted His followers to pray for workers, He sent them out to do the work (Matthew 10:1-42).

Seeking to glorify God and make His name famous throughout the peoples of the earth,
Lee
Soli Deo Gloria!!!

Why Evangelize?

A friend of mine showed me this video from youtube and it cracked me up. If you need a good laugh today, make sure to watch it. I especially love the commentator with the glasses.

While this video provided me with a good laugh, I believe that it made a strong point about the fact that many Christians in the American church are very lax about sharing the gospel of Christ. As a former pastor of mine put it: so many of us Christians are so excited that we have our place at the table that we just sit there content and do not bother to go out and invite others also. This got me thinking about what should motivate us to go out and evangelize more (in addition to the "Evangelism Linebacker" who may be lurking around to "blow you up!").

Here are six things I have thought of that should motivate us to share our faith:

1) CHRIST COMMANDS US TO

Jesus' final words to His disciples were: "Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age" (Matthew 28:19-20). One thing that should motivate us to go out and share the good news is the fact that Christ commanded us to do so. Jesus also states "If you love Me, you will keep My commandments" (John 14:15). If we are serious about our love for the Lord and our desire to live His commandments, we will want to uphold and live out this important commandment to honor Christ and bring God glory.

2) SHARING THE JOY WHICH IS OURS

The joy of having a relationship with Jesus Christ is so great that we should have no problem sharing that joy with others. It should make such a difference in our lives that we would not be able to not share. After all, why would we not want to share about how Christ, while we were still yet sinners and enemies of God due to these sins, took our sins upon Himself, the innocent being viewed as guilty, and suffered God's wrath on the cross, the separation from God which we were due to experience for all eternity? All so that we would be considered righteous instead of the guilty sinners which we are. Not only that but after having defeated sin, rising three days later to defeat death and give us assurance that all those who place their trust in Him will be raised to eternal life with God. This is wonderful news that should be easier to share than who won American Idol last night or the latest gossip in the neighborhood. Peter and John are wonderful examples of those who could not keep their joy to themselves. Upon being commanded by the Sanhedrin to no longer teach or preach in the name of Jesus, they respond, "we cannot stop speaking about what we have seen and heard" (Acts 4:20). They could not keep quiet about Jesus! Being placed in jail a few times did not damper their zeal to share their joy. The same joy that propelled them to talk so much about Jesus should also lead us to evangelize more.

3) OUR LOVE FOR OTHERS

Take a moment and think about your family members and closest friends who do not know the Lord. Do you realize that without repentance and giving their life to Christ that they will go to Hell as punishment for their sins? You will not have the pleasure of seeing them in eternity if they do not accept Christ. Our love for our unsaved family and friends should propel us to pray for God to open up their hearts to receive the gospel and give us opportunities to tell them about Christ. Paul had a great love for his fellow Jews and longed for their salvation. "Brethren, my heart's desire and my prayer to God for them is for their salvation" (Romans 10:1). In fact, it was this desire and concern for the Jews that led him to increase his ministry to the Gentiles, knowing that God had opened salvation to them in order to spur the Jews to jealousy. "But I am speaking to you who are Gentiles. Inasmuch then as I am an apostle of Gentiles, I magnify my ministry, if somehow I might move to jealousy my fellow countrymen and save some of them" (Romans 11:13-14). You never know. God may have chosen to use you to deliver the gospel message to someone in your family for Him to bring to faith.

4) THE MERCY AND GRACE IN EVANGELISM

A big motivation for evangelism should be the simple fact that evangelism is a privilege. We do not deserve to share in any part of God's work. God does not need us to tell others about Him but He chooses to use us. In many ways, God would probably get things accomplished faster if He did not choose to use us. One of the biggest blessings we have as a believer is the ability to serve God in different ways. Out of gratitude to be granted to be the ones whose feet "bring good news of good things" (Romans 10:15), we should go out and gladly do the privilege of our job to evangelize.

5) CHRIST GOES WITH US

One part of the "Great Commission" we usually forget about is Jesus' last statement: "and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age" (Matthew 28:20). We are not evangelizing on our own but Christ goes with us. If you are nervous about sharing your faith in Christ, don't fear but trust God and seek Him for the words in which you are to say. This is what the apostles did. At the start of the persecution of the early church, they gathered together and prayed that God would "grant that Your bond-servants may speak Your word with all confidence" (Acts 4:29). The Lord answered their prayer as vs. 31 points out and the rest of the narrative in Acts demonstrates. God granted them the boldness to go all over "Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the remotest part of the earth" (Acts 1:8). God gave them the confidence that they needed to proclaim the word unto death (Stephen) and through more imprisonments (Peter).

6) THE RESULTS ARE UP TO GOD AND NOT TO US

It is important to understand that we are only responsible for delivering the message of the gospel and not for its reception or rejection. Scripture is clear that God is the One who works in a sinner's heart to "draw" them to Christ (John 6:44). He is the One who shines the "Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ" in people's hearts (2 Corinthians 4:6) and makes those dead in their trespasses alive in Christ (Ephesians 2:4-5). Paul preached the message in Philippi but the Lord was the one who opened Lydia's heart "to respond to the things spoken by Paul" (Acts 16:14). We are to be those messengers to bring the good news (Romans 10:13-15) to all of those we come in contact with, realizing that the Holy Spirit is the One who uses the message to "pierce" people's hearts (Acts 2:37), draw them to Christ (John 6:44), and bring them to repentance (Romans 2:4; 2 Timothy 2:25).
How is this an important motivation? Recognizing this truth lets us know that we do not have to be perfect in our presentation of the message or that we have to persuade one to come to Christ. God can use the simplest presentations of the gospel to impact one's heart and change their life. We don't need to worry about persuading one because God is the One who opens their hearts to hear the message and changes their hearts, bringing about their conversion. Realizing the fact that it is not based on our ability, we can focus more on getting the truth of the message right, knowing that the gospel is "the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes" (Romans 1:16). God uses the gospel which we are to preach to penetrate the hard hearts of unbelievers. While we will not be held accountable for the results of our evangelizing, I do believe that God will hold us accountable for those opportunities He gave us to share His good news that we did not take. We just need to be faithful to God by following His leading for the opportunities He provides and to faithfully communicate the message.

I pray that you will examine your own life to see how well you are doing in sharing your faith in Christ with others. If you realize that you have been lax in this area, take some time to see which of these motivations might be missing in your life. May God motivate all of us to go out and have the privilege to live out His "Great Commission."

In Christ,
Lee
Soli Deo Gloria!